[rchaud]

I never saw Beanie Babies in my economics textbooks, yet they were a physical product with limited supply, that people exchanged for sometimes large sums of money on the basis of its rarity and collectible value.

NFTs aren't even that. They're basically a mass-produced print with some unknown artist's signature. And unlike autographed mementos, NFTs require a ridiculous amount of electricity to generate each additional signature.

[SideburnsOfDoom]

> yet they were a physical product with limited supply, that people exchanged for sometimes large sums of money on the basis of its rarity and collectible value.

Were. As in, now they aren't. Because there's not any real value there.

Perhaps this kind of bubble / craze should be in economics textbooks - one that covers social and historic factors of failure. Probably Beanie Babies will be dealt with in the preamble on the section of Cryptocurrency, as a foreshadowing. And after the chapter on the Albanian ponzis and Civil War in 1997.

[CarelessExpert]

The reason I expect it'll land in economics textbooks is that the snake oil of the blockchain has provided a very pure marketplace for these bubbles to form, including a complete and visible transaction record. That provides a level of rich data in the context of a natural experiment that researchers normally can only dream about.