Elon Musk briefly changed his Twitter profile photo to a $24.4 million NFT on Wednesday before being instructed by the co-head of Sotheby’s digital craftsmanship section to remove the image.
Musk, 50, seems to have grabbed a screen snap of a series of images titled ‘Exhausted Ape Yacht Club,’ which sold at a closeout price in September.
The NFT features 107 images of animated chimps and was acquired by an unknown bidder.
NFTs are bitcoin-like electronic tokens that function as proof of ownership and exist on a blockchain.
Michael Bouhanna, Sotheby’s co-head of automated craftsmanship, saw Musk’s use of the image.
‘@elonmusk, as much as I respect your effort, I’d want you to remove your pfp that I produced for our Sotheby’s deal,’ tweeted Bouhanna.
Musk did not respond directly, instead of tweeting 30 minutes later: ‘I don’t know…’ ‘Seems to be relatively malleable.’
A few hours later, the chimp shot vanished, replaced by a photograph of a child playing with a rocket.
Some speculated that Musk was mocking the NFT industry, only one day after The Wall Street Journal reported that the market for advanced craftsmanship had ‘fallen,’ with agreements down 92 percent from its peak in September.
Key Points to Remember:
Elon Musk updated his Twitter profile image to a screenshot of a collection called ‘Exhausted Ape Yacht Club’ on Wednesday.
The image is a composite of a piece of the 107 NFT children’s shows that sold together at Sotheby’s in September for $24.4 million at closeout.
The buyer of the NFT is unknown: Musk isn’t known to own any NFTs, but his action sparked speculation that he had invested in the advanced fine art.
Sotheby’s co-head of advanced craftsmanship saw Musk’s use of the image and tweeted a request for him to remove it at 6:30 a.m. ET on Wednesday.
Musk responded 30 minutes later, saying, ‘I don’t know… looks to be rather fungible.’
Musk had altered his profile photo again by Wednesday evening, this time portraying a child playing with a rocket.
Musk’s experiment with NFTs on Wednesday comes only days after NonFungible reported on Tuesday that the market had crashed, with trades down 92 percent.