The satirical Non-Fungible Olive Gardens sold more than $130k in volume

https://opensea.io/collection/non-fungible-olive-gardens?tab=activity

by iskander • 5 years ago

60 68 5 years ago

vmception2• 5 years ago

Keep the NFT threads coming guys! Someone exploiting themselves at an adtech conglomerate needs to know there are options

quadrifoliate9• 5 years ago

"Own a piece of a local Olive Garden by paying us money!" is usually treated as financial fraud, not satire – unless there's a reasonable actual contract that allows me to at least theoretically own something if unlimited breadsticks and "Italian" food are suddenly a hit in my area.

Can anyone explain to me how what the projected value proposition of this is?

aufhebung• 5 years ago

It's satirical. The whole point is that there is no value proposition. The project is not in any way associated with Olive Garden.

quadrifoliate9• 5 years ago

Again, satire ceases to be such when there is mention of an actual corporate entity that exchanges real money for real unlimited breadsticks. Or at least, you have to be very careful.

I don't understand how this is not tantamount to someone selling pieces of the local Olive Garden franchise for $100. That person could equivalently claim satire, because there's no way that could happen in real life.

AlexandrB• 5 years ago

The joke is that this is exactly like any other NFT. All you own is the NFT, not the art or Olive Garden the NFT points to.

quadrifoliate9• 5 years ago

I don't know if Olive Garden corporate will get the joke. I suppose OpenSea better hope that they do.

pnathan2• 5 years ago

I understood as a joke. Like.... it might be satire might one day convert it something real, but it's unclear to me how a sober analysis by a conventional semi-educated investor (me), would suggest that this actually leads to anything material, at all.

A particularly unwise investor might buy into this, but, then, they might also buy high and sell low. A certain level of sophistication, even for the lay investor, is presumed.

pessimizer4• 5 years ago

"Own a piece of a local Olive Garden by paying us money!"

Who exactly are you quoting here? The site promised that you would own a token associated with a picture of an Olive Garden set within a frame of Olive Garden food. They have promised, however, that when enough money has been generated to buy the company and buy out all of its franchisees that those tokens would be converted to full ownership of the pictured location.

I have no reason to believe they'll default on any of this.

quadrifoliate9• 5 years ago

Who exactly are you quoting here?

The site. It says "Own an Olive Garden on the blockchain! We are a community of Olive Garden fans invested in both trustless future economies and delicious, reasonably-priced Italian fare." Searching for "image" or "picture" yields no hits on the page.

They have promised, however, that when enough money has been generated to buy the company and buy out all of its franchisees that those tokens would be converted to full ownership of the pictured location.

This just seems more and more like a case of fraud based on its intersection with the real world to me. I'm actually okay if something decides to drop $xx,xxx on an image of an ape, but once you start asking people to invest in convoluted financial schemes to buy out Olive Garden franchises, it's time for regulatory agencies to start taking a look.

labster• 5 years ago

Tulips are sure expensive this year.

thathndude4• 5 years ago

I can hold a tulip bulb and plant it.

It might be insanely overpriced, but at least it’s not completely valueless.

These little bits of code on the other hand . . .

MBCook• 5 years ago

Oh but you don’t understand. I’ve been assured that cryptocurrency can be turned back into electricity. After all, it was generated from electricity.

So clearly it must have some value.

pnathan2• 5 years ago

Yeah, but next year, they will be even more expensive, so I'm sure to be able to sell them and turn a profit.

exdsq2• 5 years ago

The tulip bubble lasted weeks

RantyDave• 5 years ago

I was all set to decry this as bullshit, but apparently not. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulip_mania#/media/File:Tulip_...

giantg2• 5 years ago

I should probably start using my time to come up with bogus scams like this instead of working a job I hate (and making less).

thathndude4• 5 years ago

I feel this so hard.

Can’t wait to hear the tortured justifications of crypto-enthusiasts for this one.

beambot• 5 years ago

Hijinks & satire akin to Cards Against Humanity in the non-crypto world?

AceJohnny2• 5 years ago

Any bubble offers the opportunity to make a profit if you get lucky and time it right? (I'm not a crypto-enthusiast, at all)

nexuist• 5 years ago

Any bubble that lasts long enough is a legitimate investment strategy

iskander6• 5 years ago

This NFT was created partly as a satirical critique of the valuelessness of NFTs. I think people in the NFT scene find it funny to drive up the value of that critique and make it a financially valuable asset. There's no justification of actual real world utility, just a continuation of the joke by a small online community.

jimbob45• 5 years ago

You’re meaningfully contributing to societal prosperity with your job. These people are not. That’s gotta count for something.

londons_explore• 5 years ago

As always... There is no way to know it isn't the same person buying and selling all these NFT's to make it look like there is interest in them.

Then as soon as just one person thinks it might be nice to try buying the NFT, all the other people buying and selling go away...

PragmaticPulp• 5 years ago

To clarify, $130K didn't go straight to the creators. This is trade volume, including people selling these things to each other.

If someone sells it to themselves (wash trade to fake interest) it would also show up in this number.

thathndude4• 5 years ago

And that’s a lot of the trick. Folks sell it amongst themselves to create the illusion of demand. Some sucker comes along and buys it, and the trap is sprung.

I wish I was a more unethical person. I feel like I could do really well in this space.

iskander6• 5 years ago

People looking from the outside of NFTs seem to believe this kind of wash trading is a dominant source of volume. In my experience, it's pretty rare and there's a lot of organic demand around each new "hot" NFT. A better way to think of these is each successful NFT series is a mini-bubble, people inside the scene develop an instinct for features might make an NFT desirable but no one can accurately guess the top. So they play hot potato with each other, where buying earlier increases chances of a successful exit.

katzgrau• 5 years ago

I wish I was a more unethical person. I feel like I could do really well in this space

Chasing money for ... ? The answer to that question doesn't usually lead anywhere good.

Stay ethical, if you are you're killing it.

halpert• 5 years ago

It’s easy to look at something and think “I can do that”, but the reality is such a scam would be a lot of hard work. To start with, no one would know your NFT existed.

If you’re really confident, then you should try it. You can always return the money if you’re successful.

vmception2• 5 years ago

expensive way to give the team all of your ether from royalty splits over time, this assumption really ignores this disincentive or the trading section of the practically every nft discord, it requires assuming all the ENS addresses involved are also colluding and the same constructive entity wash trading

iskander6• 5 years ago

The creators can also set a royalty percentage for themselves which would give them a share of each transaction. Unclear if that's what they did in this case.

criddell• 5 years ago

If you are in a state with a sales tax, would you have to pay that?

throwaway2331• 5 years ago

All of the Olive Gardens were minted inside an "inner circle" over a few days, before the first news article was published (a few hours after there were none left).

Then the value was pumped up by demand to be part of the meme.

Tale as old as time -- and an easy side hustle.

DebtDeflation• 5 years ago

How much of this "volume" is simply people buying the NFTs from themselves to launder money?

The satirical Non-Fungible Olive Gardens sold more than $130k in volume

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