Ooh, the thread took a much more interesting turn. Thanks Lou, samooth, rick...and even Noobtard, for dialing it back a bit.
I believe my own thinking on this is becoming a bit more balanced - obviously there are going to be a lot of scams/questionable investments out there, but I have more reason to believe now that there will be at least *some* with genuine value.
When I think about NFTs that are straight up art/collectibles, I would be worried about the supply side. As a comparison, I'll use sports cards, and I'm thinking about the 90s.
I was quite involved in the industry at the time, not really as an investor, but as someone who sold at card shows, and organized many card shows in the area and made some money off that end. What we saw was a lot of companies, some new, start making a lot more product. And we also saw people start collecting in a very serious way. In the 80s and earlier, not many people were serious collectors, so what was purchased wasn't looked after, and the numbers produced were far lower. Fast forward to the boom in the 90s, and people saw cards from the 60s, 70s, 80s worth a bunch of money, and they started snapping up all this new stuff figuring to make their big bucks. The problem is there was a huge glut in supply, and people cracking packs and putting everything in sleeves, or not even opening the boxes. Just about the only thing that really gained in value were the truly limited products. Now, that didn't kill the market, and I believe sports cards are having a pretty big resurgence these days (some of it tied to NFTs, I believe). But there is a lot of product that is, and will always be, pretty worthless. Thankfully, none of that product would have been purchased for really big $, so I doubt anyone got burned too badly.
While there are a lot of ways the comparison breaks down, I wonder if there are some similarities in that there is, or will be, a real glut in supply, and in this case, that potential seems much greater with pretty much anyone being able to create product. It's going to be difficult for the average person to separate the gimmicks from what has real value. And in some cases, what has real value today, might not in six months, or a year, or five years. Sports cards have a history to them - people know the major manufacturers who make quality product, who the depicted players are, and the value of the cards is largely tied to their scarcity and the quality of the depicted players (and similar things can be said about more "traditional" art and collectibles). The potential for outright scams seems far lower. NFTs are a real wild west right now for most people, and will remain that way for some time, I think. That's not to say they're inherently bad, and while it's unsettled like this I imagine there's a ton of money to be made for those who know what they are doing and/or are lucky. But a lot of risk for those who don't and/or aren't so lucky.
Of course my comments above are primarily targeted at the art/collectible NFTs that don't offer any additional value. There are a lot of other uses that have been discussed in this thread that offer a lot more utility, and I'd think very different "rules" will apply to how their value will hold up. And obviously I still have a very limited understanding of this, and don't even know what I don't know, so I might be completely full of ****.
A very interesting topic.