Besides practical use, gold also has aesthetic use: jewelry, as an external status symbol of wealth. That is not possible for crypto currencies in the same way. Of course as online presence and social structures mature, this might change. Maybe not in my generation’s lifetime, but who knows.
Im hate crypto as much as the next person, but is jewelry as a status symbol that different from an NFT as a status symbol or having a bitcoin wallet worth $1mil as a status symbol?
People in CS:GO pay (tens) of thousands of dollars for skins which are just digital status symbols.
Maybe the property of gold is that it is a status symbol which has a long history and cannot be duped.
In general, yes. Jewelry can be melted down and repurposed. It’s also visible in the physical world, which means more to many people today (maybe not to future generations). In that way, I think NFTs are more comparable to, say collectible mechanical watches, baseball cards, stamps, art. It might be worth dollar for dollar to some people, but the market for gold is much larger.
