In March, Beeple sold a digital collection of his art as an NFT for a record $69 million. Now, the buyer wants everyone to have a free copy.

The buyer, Vignesh Sundaresan, who’s also known as MetaKovan, told Bloomberg he’d be happy if everyone downloaded a copy of the multi-million dollar non-fungible token, “Everydays: The First 5,000 Days.” That’s because Sundaresan, a crypto investor who cofounded bitcoin ATM company BitAccess, told Bloomberg “information wants to be free,” and keeping things on the internet inside walled gardens like paywalls doesn’t work well.

To him, everyone should be able to enjoy an NFT, a digital piece of art tied to the blockchain, without having to pay for it. For those who pay for the production, they get the credit for it, Bloomberg wrote.

“Instead of giving the importance to that copy of the file, it kind of gives importance to something else big. The idea that some person supported an artist at some time and this was the memorabilia,” he told Bloomberg.

NFTs have ballooned to a massive market this year, reaching more than $10 billion in trading volume in the third quarter alone, a more than 700% jump from the prior three months.

Even as the mania around them continues, NFT enthusiasts and critics are sparring over the digital asset’s actual worth. Enthusiasts say NFTs are the key to unlocking the future internet, known as the metaverse; critics say they’re nothing more than a file that can be right clicked and downloaded. One critic even downloaded all of them to make a point…read more.

University of Oxford Professor Jim Naismith asserts that despite England dropping its mask mandate in July and Scotland keeping its rules in force, official data shows this “has made no meaningful difference” to infection rates.

Naismith goes on to argue that new face mask mandates imposed in England today are “unlikely to have much of an impact” in fighting off the spread of the Omicron variant.

Despite flatlining case numbers and declining deaths, partly achieved because England chose to lift lockdown restrictions in the summer unlike many European countries, mask mandates are once again back in force.

Face coverings are compulsory in shops, on public transport and numerous other venues arbitrarily chosen by the government.

Highlighting the absurdity of the rules, face masks are mandatory in takeaways but not restaurants, meaning you have to wear one if picking up a takeaway but not if you stay inside the restaurant for a sit down meal…read more.

The new German government has cited crypto in its coalition agreement, advocating for an equal playing field between traditional finance and “innovative business models.”

Three German political parties agreed to a coalition deal this week that will see left-leaning Social Democrats (SDP), the Green Party and the right-friendly Free Democrats take the reins from December this year.

According to a rough translation of the 177-page agreement published on Wednesday, the coalition calls for a new “dynamic in relation to the opportunities and risks from new financial innovations,” such as crypto assets and blockchain businesses:

“We are making European financial market supervisory law fit for digitization and for complex group structures in order to ensure holistic and risk-adequate supervision of new business models.”…read more.