Finding a way for artists to be paid for their work is great, right? Not exactly. An added layer of security of blockchains is that it takes a lot of computational power to create a record in the chain. An army of computers compete to brute force solve a difficult puzzle. The winning computer gets a small award and the right to create the record. This makes it hard for just anyone to create a record, which reduces fraud. But, it uses a lot of power and contributes to the carbon footprint.
So, is this a step in the right direction? It is too early to say. But it is definitely something that should be on all of our radars, and Winkelmann himself said he "really [feels] like this is going to be the next chapter of art history."
h/t: CNN