1st Edition

Non-Fungible Tokens Multidisciplinary Perspectives

Edited By Usman W. Chohan Copyright 2024
    214 Pages 7 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) have blossomed into an area of immense cultural, investment, and academic interest, and this groundswell of fascination with non-fungible digital tokenization has been accompanied by a variety of attitudes towards their function, purpose, and potential. Some advocates perceive NFTs to be revolutionary in character, reshaping notions of the construction and preservation of unique assets in the digital realm. At the same time, a notable number of skeptics and detractors view the NFT movement as a passing and overhyped fad at best, and a disingenuous ploy in the digital economy at its worst. Given the diversity of views that have emerged in a comparatively brief span, this book draws upon rich academic perspectives on NFTs from a variety of disciplines, including: computer science, cultural studies, mathematics, sociology, linguistics, mass communication, economics, and finance.

    The book teases out nuances in how NFTs can and should operate, while also pointing to the potential that these non-fungible assets wield in the digital sphere, along with countervailing arguments against their conceptual and functional salience, and perhaps some dangers that they pose. The book considers the longevity and viability of NFTs as sociocultural, technological, and economic phenomenon, while offering estimates of future paths that NFTs might take in each domain and weighs the opposing narratives and strikes balanced assessments of the legal, cultural, technological, economic, and political role of NFTs in modern society.

    With its panoramic display of analysis on NFTs, the book will be of particular interest to scholars and researchers across a wide number of subjects.

    1. Introduction: Non-fungible tokens: Blockchain, scarcity, and value Part I: The Essentials of NFTs 2. NFTs and their Core Technologies 3. A Thematic History of NFTs 4. Discoveries from the NFT market Part II: The Value of NFTs 5. NFT Communities as Societies of Producers 6. Are NFTs sustainable? An ESG perspective 7.  A Look Beyond Static NFTs 8. Do Smart Contracts Dream of Bored Apes?: On The Uniqueness of the NFT Subculture Part III: The Disvalue of NFTs 9. The Leisures of Blockchains: Exploratory Analysis 10. The Fetishizing Language Behind the NFT Craze: A Semiotic-cum-semantic Critique 11. Racial capitalism, Platform Capitalism, and NFTs 12. NFTs and the Spectacle of Accumulation 13. Conclusion: Some Precepts of the Digital Economy

    Biography

    Usman W. Chohan, Ph.D., is an international economist and academic who serves as Advisor on Economic Affairs and National Development at the Centre for Aerospace & Security Studies (CASS), one of Pakistan’s premier research-based think tanks, where he was also a founding director.