A deep dive on Andreessen Horowitz's latest "State of Crypto" report. In short: they want people to keep buying crypto, and are not above publishing blatant falsehoods to convince them to do so.
The report itself is 60 pages long, so this is a long one.
Review: In "Read Write Own", the Andreessen Horowitz general partner and web3 superfan Chris Dixon lays out an unconvincing argument that blockchains are what it will take to fix the web.
New report out from the Bank of International Settlements: "cryptoassets have so far not reduced but rather amplified the financial risks in less developed economies."
To bulk block accounts, go to Moderation -> Accounts. Set 'Location' to Remote. Search for a Display Name of "Mastodon". Then you can bulk suspend from there.
Wow. The Tor Project is doing the whole "#web3#crypto funding" drive in 2023. 2023. As if that was a normal thing that did not totally taint your reputation.
A service called Spy Pet is scraping Discord servers, archiving and tracking users' messages and activity, and then selling access to that data.
Spy Pet scrapes more than 10,000 Discord servers, and besides selling access to anyone with cryptocurrency, it offers the data for training AI models or to assist law enforcement agencies, according to its website.
Spy Pet claims to be tracking more than 14,000 servers, 600 million users, and includes a database of more than 3 billion messages.
Sam Bankman-Fried and his brother Gabe wanted to buy the island nation of Nauru and turn it into a doomsday bunker and lab for genetic enhancement, regardless of the impact on its 12,000 residents.
Nauru has a long history of exploitation by powerful outside forces, and the Bankman-Frieds’ desire to be their latest exploiters tells us a lot about tech billionaires.
Last week the SEC sued Binance and Coinbase, launching a legal process that could determine the future of crypto in the United States.
On #TechWontSaveUs, I spoke to @molly0xfff to dig into why this is the “final boss fight” of the crypto industry and why it’s unlikely they could ever comply with US securities law. It’s a fascinating and very informative episode!
“Crypto researcher Molly White skewered [Chris Dixon’s Read Write Own] with the delight of Pete Wells after downing an Almond Joy cocktail at Guy Fieri’s Flavortown.”
An independent examiner will be appointed in the #FTX bankruptcy case after all, thanks to a Third Circuit decision overturning the bankruptcy judge's decision not to appoint one.
This is the very same issue I urged more attention to in my op-ed for the New York Times back in November. Really glad to see it being recognized by the courts!
"f you regularly follow debates about public policy, especially those involving wealthy tech bros, it’s obvious that there’s a strong correlation among the three Cs: climate denial, Covid vaccine denial and cryptocurrency cultism."
This week: the aftermath of the #Bitcoin ETF approval, #Coinbase tells a judge that crypto's kind of like beanie babies, and an e-pastor says the Lord told him to run a crypto scam.
Worldcoin wants to scan the irises of every person on the planet to build a global ID network to bring crypto to the masses and ensure we’re not AI — or that’s what it claims.
Behind the grand vision, there’s a history of exploiting people in the Global South for biometric data and tech that doesn’t actually work very well. Maybe it’s just a means to pump a crypto token, but there’s good reason for regulators to shut it down now.