For the first time in history, the manuscript of a best-selling book is being offered for sale as an NFT

NFT was the most researched word of 2021 according to Collins. In this new year 2022, we shall write a new page of this young saga. The Boischaut house is orchestrating the metamorphosis into NFT - and the release - of a best-selling french book written by two cryptocurrency experts.

By Marc-Olivier BERNARD, published on 22 December 2021, updated on 09 january 2022

After a first « Transition NFT » digital art sale conducted on October 23, 2021, the auction company Boischaut is organizing in Paris on January 15, 2022 the first auction of an author file with NFT certificate : the best-seller "Bitcoin and Cryptomonnaies" (Bitcoin & Cryptocurrencies), by Daniel Ichbiah and Jean-Martial Lefranc, published by First Editions, in the collection Pour les Nuls (For Dummies, Trademark of John Wiley & Sons).

The lot offered for sale will consist of:

• the Word files of the first and second editions with a right of use defined by contract, corresponding to a strictly personal and non-commercial use (see next section)

• the NFT certificate associated with these files, created on the Polygon Blockchain by the company Āto (→ check on Polygon Blockchain)

• a paper copy of the files, signed by the authors

• the right, for the initial purchaser of the NFT to be quoted in the 3rd edition of the book, as the owner of this historical NFT

Despite the joint sale on the one hand of the files with their NFT certificate and on the other hand of the signed print, the purchaser may resell these two parts of the lot separately at a later date, if he or she deems it more appropriate.

Above  : Chap ter  5 of second edition : « Bitcoin & Cryptocurrencies for Dummies  », by Daniel Ichbiah and Jean-Martial Lefranc.

Practical information about the sale

• The sale will take place on Interenchères Online, from January 8 to 15, 2021, with a closing time of 8:00 p.m., Paris time

• Estimate of the lot: as this is the first sale in this segment that we are creating, it is delicate to propose an estimate, but for the sake of form we are putting an estimate at 2000/3000€. We have made an original choice for the starting price: see the last paragraph of this article

• To bid, it is necessary to create an account on the Interencheres website

• The buyer who wishes to do so can be accompanied by our partner Āto create a MetaMask wallet, allowing the holding of the NFT

• The sale fees are 26% HT (buyers' fees, wallet creation and transfer) + 3% HT (Interenchères Online), i.e. 34,8% TTC

• The paper print of the files, signed by the authors, can be delivered in person in our offices (Paris, Rambouillet) or sent (at the charge of the purchaser)

For any further question, please contact Marc-Olivier BERNARD by phone (+33 6 20 10 00 56) or by email (mob@boischaut.fr).

A contract that secures the parties and creates value in the NFT ecosystem

The acquisition will be secured by a contract drafted by the company Āto, mirroring the one accompanying the first « Transition NFT » digital art sale. This contract with general conditions of use of the NFT and license of use of the associated Word files makes it possible to mitigate the legal vacuum surrounding the sale of digital files by defining contractual rules on the parties concerned, the authors of the files, the purchaser and the trusted third party (SVV Boischaut, escrow agent Bailiff), the most important being:

• Defining the conditions of possible uses by the owner of the NFT certificate (Art. 2.4), which is a strictly private, personal and non-commercial use, including the possibility of printing the files, but for its own use only, excluding the right to distribute it to third parties, even free.

• The conservation of digital works by an escrow (Art. 2.4). The Word files are delivered to the buyer by SVV Boischaut and can be delivered again later, as well as to any subsequent buyer. The NFT certificate contains a summary view of the files and an imprint of the files (SHA 384 hash).

• The possibility to have a new NFT certificate re-issued in case of loss or theft (Art. 4.5). In one of these cases, duly justified, a new certificate will be created and the old one will be registered on a database of stolen or lost NFT certificates, the new one becoming the legitimate certificate on the auction market;

• The definition of a "right of resale" in case of subsequent resale of the NFT certificate (Art. 8.2), set at 10%. As is customary for NFTs, a percentage of the resale price of the NFT certificate must be paid back to the authors;

• Guarantees of copyright ownership, ensuring that the owner of the NFT certificate enjoys the peaceful use of his work (Art. 4). The authors ensure that the files do not infringe the rights of third parties. There are no consequences on the value of the files sold, as well as the print run.

All these elements contribute to the creation of certificates of high legal quality, in accordance with French law, which is not generally the case of NFT certificates sold on platforms. This contract is also present in the NFT certificate.

From manuscripts to authors' files: a new segment of the Letters and Manuscripts market

Auctions of letters and autograph manuscripts of a literary, scientific, artistic or historical nature are regularly organized in France: this field, which has been around for a long time, is one of the specialties of Valérie MAUDIEU, auctioneer in Boischaut. Exceptional manuscripts achieve records sales, such as the manuscript of the novel Ursule Mirouët, by Honoré de Balzac, auctioned for €900,000 on December 20, 2017.

Since the end of the 19th century, many authors have begun writing with a typewriter, allowing a form of direct printing, immediately having the aesthetics of the finished page. As a result, "typescripts", sometimes annotated, have been added to auctions of letters and manuscripts, such as the auction of the entire collection of typescripts of the mystery writer Gérard de Villiers.

For about 3 decades, most authors have exchanged their typewriters with a computer and a word processor, with enthusiasm for the new possibilities offered by this kind of "electronic typewriter". The computer file - usually with the Word format - has replaced the typescript.

The challenge of preserving authors' files

The existence of a collectors' market for a class of objects contributes significantly to the good conservation of these objects over time. Otherwise, these objects, which have no market value, are more at risk of being destroyed, despite their patrimonial or aesthetic interest, as is sometimes the case with the archives of personalities, whose rightful owners do not have the reflex to entrust them to institutional archivists.

In the case of authors' files, which are sometimes kept without much care by their owners or intermediaries such as publishers, some of them are already lost forever. However, an author's file has a real interest, because it constitutes the result of an author's work in the same way as a handwritten notebook, with possible annotations, a personalization of the document, etc. This form is thus just as interesting, because it has personal traces of the author, even if in another form than handwriting.

Selling digital files now possible thanks to NFTs

An author's file is a computer file, therefore easily and perfectly duplicable, which is to say without the same unique character as a manuscript. This lack of uniqueness which applies to all assets represented by digital data (photography, digital work, etc.) makes them more difficult to sell.

However, since the emergence of Blockchain technology, which has allowed the creation of cryptocurrencies (represented by interchangeable or fungible tokens, such as coins) a rapidly developing field of application has been the one of non-interchangeable or non-fungible tokens. (Non Fongible Token, NFT), commonly called "NFT Certificate". These allow a Blockchain to be used as a ledger - the registrations are NFT certificates, directly associated with digital data (a Word file, an image file, a tweet, etc.).

This technology therefore makes it possible to give a non-unique object (digital data) a uniqueness, by associating this data with a certificate that has this uniqueness. As a bonus, NFTs certificates have, due to the technological principles of the Blockchain, a strictly non-modifiable (unalterable) and permanent character over time.

This technology has enabled the growth of a market for digital assets, unique in this way, mainly in the field of art, “collectibles” but also “intellectual creations”: in July 2021, the source code at the origin of the Web was thus auctioned, in August 2021 an article from the New York Times by Kevin Roose to name a few examples.

May the best win!

To stay in the fun and festive spirit of a generation that loves challenges, we have decided, in agreement with the authors, to start the auction at € 100, without setting a reserve price, in order to allow for a large number of prospective buyers.