If you never thought you would hear Laffy Taffy and NFTs in the same sentence, that all ends today. Y’all, we live in a society that’s living in the future that’s living in the metaverse that’s living inside Mark Zuckerberg’s cold lifeless eyes. The point is, people are making clipart called NFTs (non-fungible tokens) that somehow cost a lot of money and I don’t really understand what they are even though I’m Gen Z and I’m supposed to. What does this all have to do with Laffy Taffy, you ask?
Well, Laffy Taffy wrappers have been adorned with “dad jokes” since the 1980s as a way to “provide free entertainment value” along with the candy. And eventually, they started to incorporate jokes that kids would send in. Now, according to a press release, they have apparently decided to retire 15 of their iconic original wrapper jokes and make NFTs out of the puns (for a total of 90 non-unique NFTs) as well as a few “shiny” versions of each joke (for a total of 30 unique NFTs, meaning only one will exist of each design in the entire world wide web). And they’re giving away a bunch of free NFTs next Wednesday, July 20, at 12 p.m. EST at this website. You can claim one on a first come first served basis and then it’s just…yours, I guess?
This whole stunt is supposed to “celebrate the history of Laffy Taffy” by making the retirement of these 15 “laffs” into a fun experience. According to Laffy Taffy’s marketing director, the collection of NFTs will give fans “a unique opportunity to preserve one of our signature attributes – the jokes on our wrappers.” To that I would say, “Cool! But also, what is an NFT again?”
Non-fungible tokens I’m told are not the same as the tokens you get at Charles Entertainment Cheese (Yes the E. in Chuck E. Cheese stands for entertainment, which I’ve always found to be a hilarious lapse in creativity). Instead, they are basically just internet art that you own the code for once you buy it. It’s supposedly much like buying physical art, except copy/paste exists online, so… I’m still confused.
Whatever it all means, I’m sad to see these classic laffs go, as I have often thought they were the best part of a Laffy Taffy. But hey, apparently this is to make room for new laffs, so I’m excited to see if they continue with the puns or start doing QR code links to stand-up sets or something.
Ugh. Tired of hearing about brands doing NFTs. Shameful nonsense every time.