Non-fungible tokens, known as NFTs, will not be recognized as works of art in Wikipedia for the time being.
If NFTs are intimately linked to cryptocurrencies, the online encyclopedia Wikipedia has decided not to classify them as works of art in their own right.
According to the specialized site artnet, a vote would have been put in place and almost unanimously, the editors of Wikipidia refused to classify the Non Fungible Tokens as works.
According to the publishers, it would not be reasonable to “decide what counts as art or not”.
Bad news for the market
Consternation reigns since this announcement, within the community of cryptocurrencies, and holders of NFT.
Wikipedia being a global reference, the price of these could be negatively impacted.
The co-founder of popular NFT platform Nifty Gateway complained about it on Twitter. “There is a debate on Wikipedia that has the potential to officially classify NFTs as ‘not art’ on the whole of Wikipedia. Wikipedia is a worldwide source of truth. Not categorizing NFTs as “works of art” would be a disaster!”
Art Emergency!!
There is a debate happening rn on @Wikipedia that has the potential to * officially categorize NFTs as ‘not art’ on all of Wikipedia. *
Wikipedia is a global source of truth. Having NFTs categorized as ‘not art’ would be a disaster!
:
—Duncan Cock Foster (@DCCockFoster) January 12, 2022
The leader of NFT Nifty Gateway explained that this decision could not remain frozen since “digital artists had fought for non-fungible tokens to be recognized as art”.
Although 5 of the 6 editors of the online encyclopedia are against it at the moment, the encyclopedia has not closed the discussion. Publishers must set a new date to extend discussions on the subject.