Dogecoin DOGE/USD co-creator Jackson Palmer said that billionaire investor Mark Cuban and some high-profile venture capitalists have “drunk the Kool-Aid” with respect to cryptocurrencies and NFTs.
What Happened: In a recent interview with Business Insider, Palmer said that unlike celebrities that get paid to promote certain crypto projects, Cuban seems to actually buy into the idea of crypto.
“Mark Cuban isn’t getting paid as a celebrity to promote this stuff. He actually has kind of been indoctrinated into believing that these things are the future,” said Palmer.
The Dogecoin co-founder went on to say that by funding the crypto space, Cuban and VCs like Andreessen Horowitz’s Marc Andreessen and Chris Dixon are actually running a type of grift.
“That is more of a grift to me in that they actively see it as an ongoing way to extract profit — it’s not like they’ve been paid once off to promote something — it’s that they want to be the ones that are in control or have ownership or a large stake in this kind of extractive, grifty system of cryptocurrency,” he said.
Also Read: Bitcoin, Ethereum, Dogecoin Surge Higher Into The Weekend: What’s Happening?
Cuban reportedly shrugged off Palmers statements when Business Insider asked for his take on them.
“Sounds like the same thing that has been said about every new technology I’ve been involved in,” Cuban said to Business Insider in a statement. In another statement to Decrypt, the Shark Tank investor said, “some people get caught up in the speculation side [of crypto]. I don’t.”
Speaking at the 2022 Code conference earlier this week, Cuban, who declared himself an Ethereum ETH/USD maxi, said he believes that crypto is “kind of boring” now because it lacks newer applications to take it forward.
Price Action: At press time, DOGE was trading at $0.064 and ETH was trading at $1,719, up 3% and 5% respectively in the 24-hours.
Photo: Courtesy of Gage Skidmore on flickr
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Dogecoin Co-Creator Jackson Palmer said he feels major investors are running a crypto “grift.”
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Palmer originally created Dogecoin as a part of a counter-cultural movement against Wall Street.
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Mark Cuban told Insider that Palmer’s gripe isn’t anything he hasn’t heard before.
Dogecoin Co-Creator Jackson Palmer had some harsh words for crypto enthusiasts like Mark Cuban.
In an interview with Insider, Palmer said Cuban seems to have “drunk the Kool-Aid” when it comes to crypto and NFTs.
“Mark Cuban isn’t getting paid as a celebrity to promote this stuff,” Palmer said. “He actually has kind of been indoctrinated into believing that these things are the future.”
The Adobe engineer accused Cuban and other major investors in and promoters of crypto — including billionaire Marc Andreessen and investor Chris Dixon — of running a “grift.”
“They actively see it as an ongoing way to extract profit. It’s not like they’ve been paid once off to promote something — it’s that they want to be the ones that are in control or have ownership or a large stake in this kind of extractive, grifty system of cryptocurrency,” Palmer claimed.
Cuban dismissed Palmer’s charges in a statement to Insider. “Sounds like the same thing that has been said about every new technology I’ve been involved in,” he said.
Andreessen and Dixon did not respond to a request for comment from Insider ahead of publication.
Still, in August, Dixon, who leads the crypto fund at Andreessen Horowitz, said he sees digital currencies as a way to shift the power away from big tech. The fund, which was co-founded by Andreessen, has invested in more than 50 crypto startups. Meanwhile, Andreessen has called crypto skeptics like Palmer an “incredible gift” to his firm in the past.
Earlier this year, Cuban said 80% of his current investments that are not on the ABC program “Shark Tank” are related to crypto. In contrast, despite helping create Dogecoin — which peaked in 2021 and currently has a $7.84 billion market value — Palmer has said he hasn’t made a cent off the digital currency, he told the crypto blog Decrypt in 2018. He told Insider he’s always seen crypto as more of a “hobby.”
Palmer also commented on the role celebrities like Matt Damon and Kim Kardashian have taken in advertising crypto to the masses. Though he said he sees the role of actors and artists in the crypto scheme as more transactional and less of a “grift.”
“They promote what they get paid to promote,” Palmer said. “I think that the actors don’t have a moral compass when it comes to that, but it’s their job. That’s what they do. It’s not surprising to me.”
In June, Damon was mocked online as the value of cryptocurrencies plummeted. People took to social media to slam the actor for his Superbowl ad with Crypto.com that told viewers “Fortune favors the brave” just months before cryptocurrencies lost more than $2 trillion in value.
The co-creator of the meme currency has long had a cynical view of crypto as more and more traditional finance types have embraced what was once an alternative to the mainstream financial system.
“Back in 2013 — or even when crypto was first coming out in 2008 — there was a portion of it that was actually a response to Wall Street and the overarching capitalist system,” Palmer said.
“What really turned me off was that I quickly realized that the people that were building these systems —building Bitcoin and building all of these cryptocurrencies — didn’t necessarily want to replace a corrupt capitalist system. They more so wanted to be the ones in control of an alternative capitalist system. The gripe for most people in crypto isn’t that Wall Street bankers were exploitative or had unfair power, it’s that they want to be the unfair power in the system and they want to be the ones that are able to extract large profits from people instead of Wall Street bankers,” he added.
Read the full interview with Palmer here.
Read the original article on Business Insider
Musk’s appearance on the US’ popular comedy television show had driven up the price of Dogecoin – a cryptocurrency that was created as a joke in 2013 – as much as 800 per cent in the past month. Cryptocurrency investors expected their ‘Father Musk’ to talk up Dogecoin, as he has done on numerous occasions on Twitter throughout 2021.
His comments that ‘dogecoin is the people’s currency’ and other similar feigned remarks about the ‘meme’ crypto, portrayed with the symbol of dog breed Shiba Inu, has helped the cryptocurrency become the fourth largest. Prior to the Sunday’s collapse, the cryptocurrency’s market capitalisation was greater than that of India’s second-largest IT company Infosys.
Musk’s comments betrayed what many in the world of finance believed the dogecoin rally was symbolising – that the movement was merely an insincere joke on the failure of the current monetary system.
ETMarkets.comDogecoin has plummeted over 50 per cent since Musk’s comments as disenchanted investors rushed to the exit to protect whatever windfall they had made over the past three months.
The episode sheds a critical light on the role that social media plays in magnifying herd behaviour in financial markets. Dogecoin, ultimately, has no uniqueness. It has unlimited supply, which makes it an unattractive store of value compared with Bitcoin, the first-ever cryptocurrency.
Dogecoin’s founder Billy Markus himself could not comprehend the meteoric rise of the joke he had created to get back against a tweet someone had made about the ‘next big thing’ in cryptocurrencies. He sold his coins to purchase a second-hand Honda in 2015.
Doegcoin’s rally was simply a function of what happens when a crowd of people believes in something even if that something may appear bizarre to those not standing in the crowd.
“Today’s social media tools have far greater reach, scale and anonymity than previous technologies. This raises a potential issue: the possibility that wrongdoers will attempt to use these powerful forums to hype certain stocks or manipulate markets,” Gary Gansler, the new commissioner of the Securities Exchange Commission, told the US Congress recently.
Gansler’s comments come on the back of the ‘meme’ stock phenomenon on Wall Street that saw a bunch of traders, who were part of a Reddit community, take on a multi-billion dollar hedge fund by short-squeezing them out of positions in stocks like GameStop.
Dogecoin is a child of a similar movement.
In the world of investing, being part of the popular or following successful investors is common. Just ask the blind worshippers of Warren Buffett and Rakesh Jhunjhunwala. Herding is as old to stock markets as water is to Earth. It is generally accepted that herding or buying stock for popularity’s sake is not sound investing judgement and yet it is as common as crowding in a Mumbai local.
Musk’s persona of being a futurist and his credible track record of being part of some of the most successful innovations of the recent past made many of his fans and followers believe that he saw something in Dogecoin that others did not. A classic case of following the money, just this time those were only words.
Or was he literally ‘drinking the Kool-Aid’, an expression that refers to a person who believes in a possibly doomed or dangerous idea because of perceived potential high rewards?
To be fair to Musk, he never once asked investors to buy Dogecoin. His own company, Tesla, invested $1.5 billion only in Bitcoins, not Dogecoin. Yet, it will be foolish to suggest that Musk was unaware of the effect his words could have on his followers.
The ‘Technoking of Tesla’ chose his biggest night under the spotlight to puncture the hopes of Dogecoin owners. Ironically, millions of Dogecoin owners were spotted with Doge’s expression plastered all over their faces.