“WAGMI” — we're all gonna make it — was crypto's 2021 rallying cry. But those with wealth and power knew it was a lie, and that “all” just meant them. My latest traces the last five years from hype to technoligarchy — and why they're not all gonna make it either.
“WAGMI” — we're all gonna make it — was crypto's 2021 rallying cry. But those with wealth and power knew it was a lie, and that “all” just meant them. My latest traces the last five years from hype to technoligarchy — and why they're not all gonna make it either.
Prediction markets sell themselves as truth engines. Put money on outcomes, strip away noise, and let prices reveal reality. The Venezuela strike exposes the cost of that logic. When someone can profit from a covert military operation before the public knows it happened, markets stop forecasting the future and start rewarding proximity to power. This isn’t information discovery. It’s monetized access.
The political problem is simple and corrosive: greed gets institutionalized. When insiders are encouraged to leak or act early because there’s money on the table, restraint becomes irrational. Journalism delays publication to protect lives. Markets pay you to move first and ask questions never.
The ethical problem runs deeper. Prediction platforms don’t just reflect reality; they reshape incentives inside governments, corporations, and security institutions. They quietly ask every insider: do your job, or place your bet?
And the security problem may be the most dangerous of all. Classified plans, military actions, and diplomatic moves become market signals. Prices move faster than accountability. Risk is no longer mitigated; it’s priced.
Efficient markets are not moral systems. When everything becomes tradable, even secrecy turns into a commodity. And when insiders win, the public doesn’t gain clarity. It absorbs the risk.
TL;DR
🧠 Prediction markets reward access to secrets
⚡ Greed displaces ethics and restraint
🎓 Security decisions become financial signals
🔍 Truth priced by markets is not the same as a public good
#MarketEthics #Politics #Crypto #Power #security #privacy #cloud #infosec #cybersecurity
Prediction markets sell themselves as truth engines. Put money on outcomes, strip away noise, and let prices reveal reality. The Venezuela strike exposes the cost of that logic. When someone can profit from a covert military operation before the public knows it happened, markets stop forecasting the future and start rewarding proximity to power. This isn’t information discovery. It’s monetized access.
The political problem is simple and corrosive: greed gets institutionalized. When insiders are encouraged to leak or act early because there’s money on the table, restraint becomes irrational. Journalism delays publication to protect lives. Markets pay you to move first and ask questions never.
The ethical problem runs deeper. Prediction platforms don’t just reflect reality; they reshape incentives inside governments, corporations, and security institutions. They quietly ask every insider: do your job, or place your bet?
And the security problem may be the most dangerous of all. Classified plans, military actions, and diplomatic moves become market signals. Prices move faster than accountability. Risk is no longer mitigated; it’s priced.
Efficient markets are not moral systems. When everything becomes tradable, even secrecy turns into a commodity. And when insiders win, the public doesn’t gain clarity. It absorbs the risk.
TL;DR
🧠 Prediction markets reward access to secrets
⚡ Greed displaces ethics and restraint
🎓 Security decisions become financial signals
🔍 Truth priced by markets is not the same as a public good
#MarketEthics #Politics #Crypto #Power #security #privacy #cloud #infosec #cybersecurity
Ω🪬Ω
#TheCryptocalypseChronicles: A Rather Alarming Epstein / Russia / Israel Crypto Timeline
The recently released #EpsteinFiles make it crystal clear that #Epstein's involvement in #crypto was much deeper and long lasting than had been previously understood.
Not only do we now know that Epstein funded bitcoin's development team at #MIT starting from 2015, we also now know that #Epstein introduced #Tether co-founder, #SteveBannon business partner, #EOS scammer, and man with an extremely sordid history of sex crimes against children #BrockPierce to former #Harvard president #LarrySummers. Summers would go on to join the board of #DigitalCurrencyGroup ( #DCG), the most important crypto VC fund in the U.S.
Beyond that there's
1. Epstein's proposal to a #Russian #FSB operative that they should create a #BRICS stablecoin
2. A bunch of sinister sounding emails between Epstein and"influential men" in #Qatar about "the e-currency"
3. Bannon + Epstein's plot to undermine Europe with crypto money
4. The integration of #BrockPierce and the #Netanyahu family
5. Accusations from the former head of #Mossad's financial unit about Netanyahu's involvement in crypto
6. The relationship between Chinese criminal #MilesGuo AKA #MilesKwok, Steve Bannon, and Epstein
...and so much more. Retoots appreciated.
* Substack: https://cryptadamus.substack.com/p/the-epsteincrypto-timeline-is-alarming
* DocumentCloud (for Substack haters): https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26363321-a-rather-alarming-epstein-russia-israel-crypto-timeline/
#JeffreyEpstein #uspol #uspolitics #eupol #ukpol #MAGA #Tether #stablecoin #stablecoins #USDT #JustinSun
Yearly update on my verifiable brute force strength gist.
- Bitcoin mining is still just shy of exhausting 95 bits annually.
- Distributed.net's RC5-72 project is still just shy of exhausting 65 bits annually.
We're still 10+ billion years out for completely exhausting every possible key in a 128-bit key space with the current Bitcoin mining power.
https://gist.github.com/atoponce/a7715930ae6eb7d6b487f2f76b57a68d
Yearly update on my verifiable brute force strength gist.
- Bitcoin mining is still just shy of exhausting 95 bits annually.
- Distributed.net's RC5-72 project is still just shy of exhausting 65 bits annually.
We're still 10+ billion years out for completely exhausting every possible key in a 128-bit key space with the current Bitcoin mining power.
https://gist.github.com/atoponce/a7715930ae6eb7d6b487f2f76b57a68d
Happy Birthday Bitcoin! At the risk of awakening long-dormant beasts, it looks like Bitcoin has failed for day-to-day transactions. So I've a simple question to ask - can you meaningfully spend any cryptocurrency in your city centre?
A few months ago, my wife and I went on a 30 day Interrail holiday across Europe. 10 countries, over a dozen cities, making over a hundred payments.
I looked in the window of every cafe, restaurant, corner shop, pub, bar, museum, and tourist-trap that we went into. All of them accepted a wide range of credit cards. Some politely informed us that they were either cash-only or no-cash. A few gleefully accepted foreign currencies at ruinous exchange rates.
None advertised accepting crypto.
Due to the language barrier and the risk of looking like a bellend, I didn't actually ask anyone if I could pay with crypto. But every bill we were handed told me which (fiat) currencies I could pay in. The tip-jars let me tap my card or drop my (metal) coins. There were signs warning that I couldn't use American Express.
But, again, no mention of crypto.
I literally only saw one sign that cryptocurrencies existed. Tucked away in Zagreb train station, next to the left-luggage lockers, was this:
I've never used a crypto ATM before. I've no idea if it's safe or whether it'd give me a good deal. I also didn't know whether a guy with a crowbar would follow me out of the station. But, hey, YOLO!
There was no queue of people waiting to use it, so I thought I'd investigate.
Delightfully, it wasn't just Bitcoin that it offered:
Including two subtly different stable coins. Which is nice, I guess.
I clicked through a screen confirming that I wasn't a Politically Exposed Person and got hit by this screen:
I've never had a cash ATM warn me about those kind of scams. Progress!
And yet, after wandering Zagreb for a few days, I didn't find anywhere to spend whatever crypto I could've purchased from there. I went to laundrettes, museums, galleries, bougie little eateries, and had dark kitchen deliveries. None advertised their acceptance of crypto.
Perhaps I'm not cool enough to go to the hip underground club where all the cocktails are only purchasable with an obscure shitcoin. Maybe there's an exclusive casino where all the beautiful people spend their evenings playing baccarat chemin de fer for tokens?
Or perhaps I'm just unobservant.
In the last few years I've wandered through the twisty passages of the Marrakech Medina and pounded the mean streets of Halifax, Nova Scotia. I've drunk in the bars of Kuala Lumpur and slurped food-court noodles in Hong Kong. From Sydney to London, I'm not exaggerating when I say that no one has ever offered to let me settle my bill with a cryptocurrency.
I've paid by mobile, in-app, using loyalty card points, instant bank transfer, and fairground tickets. No crypto.
In London, my home city, there are maybe 50 places which say they accept Bitcoin. London's population is about 10 million. It is one of the most visited cities in the world. There is, effectively, nowhere to buy a coffee using the blockchain.
Perhaps crypto is more like gold? I don't know any shop which would let me pay with an ingot or doubloon. Yet plenty of people have gold as part of their investment portfolio. Although gold is a physically and chemically useful metal whereas the utility of crypto is yet to be demonstrated.
It's the same with shares. I can't go to a pub and buy a round with GME:NYQ. I need to convert it into something more liquid before I can enjoy something more liquid.
So crypto can be an opaque speculative investment. Maybe it is the next tulips, maybe it is the next Ford Model T. But it is obviously so far from infiltrating normal payments that it can be safely ignored.
I've been writing about Bitcoin since 2011. I even studied for the Certified Blockchain Professional qualification and wrote about it for my MSc a couple of years ago.
I'm just so tired of all the unjustified hype. I despair about the amount of energy that's been wasted - both electrical and mental.
It has been seventeen long years since Dr Craig Wright published the Bitcoin paper. How much longer are people going to keep pretending that this is a transformative payment technology ready to be embraced by the masses?
Think I'm wrong. Don't bother arguing in the comments. Instead, you can put your money where your mouth is by sending Bitcoin to me at bc1q60rt4rrnky7syxdw6234zqnmy84ah2gphra5ev 😂
If you wondered what crypto currencies are used for, Iran (facing sanctions itself) has announced that its Ministry of Defence Export Center will take payments for weapons in cryptocurrencies.
Given many states under sanctions are also shifting some expenditure to crypto, I think its safe to say, that this will not help the proliferation of weapons around the world.
How you think about this will depend on your view of the justification around particular sanctions....
@ChrisMayLA6 “ #Bitcoin (and other #crypto currencies) is like rat poison squared.” - Warren Buffett ✅
Since its inception the use of cryptocurrencies has been seen by users as a way of avoiding taxes on gains made through trading.
Now the major cryptocurrency exchanges will be required to report transactions (and transactors) to the HMRC as part of the first wave of 48 countries implementing the OECD's Cryptoasset Reporting Framework (CARF).
This will mean UK 'investors' in crypto will need to declare gains, or move trading into much shadier dealing environments.
If you wondered what crypto currencies are used for, Iran (facing sanctions itself) has announced that its Ministry of Defence Export Center will take payments for weapons in cryptocurrencies.
Given many states under sanctions are also shifting some expenditure to crypto, I think its safe to say, that this will not help the proliferation of weapons around the world.
How you think about this will depend on your view of the justification around particular sanctions....
