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Etoro: A Social Trading Platform

eToro is an innovative online retail investor trading platform that provides users with various financial instruments to trade and educational resources to help them make informed decisions.

eToro is an online retail investor trading platform that allows users to trade various financial instruments, including stocks, currencies, commodities, and cryptocurrencies. The platform is designed to be user-friendly and accessible for those with little or no trading experience. In addition to its trading platform, eToro provides educational resources such as market analysis and trading guides to assist users in making informed trading decisions.

Founded in 2007 by brothers Yoni and Ronen Assia, eToro is headquartered in Tel Aviv, Israel, with offices worldwide, including in the United Kingdom, the United States, Australia, and Cyprus. The company’s mission is to open the financial markets to everyone and make it easy for people to trade and invest in various assets. Etoro’s vision is to create a world where anyone can trade, invest, and save, regardless of their level of expertise.

One of the main features that sets eToro apart from traditional online brokerages is its ability to allow users to copy the trades of other successful traders in the community. Etoro has rapidly grown since its founding and has over 20 million registered users in over 140 countries. The Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) and the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) in the United Kingdom regulate the company.

The company’s unique feature of allowing users to copy the trades of other successful traders in the community and its mission to open the financial markets to everyone has propelled eToro’s rapid growth and solidified its position as a leader in the industry.

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Hashmask NFT: The Future of Digital Art and Collectibles

Hashmask is a non-fungible token (NFT) that has garnered attention in the art world for its unique and highly sought-after digital collectibles.

Hashmask is a series of digital artworks created by a collective of artists known as Hashmask. Each piece in the series is a unique and limited edition NFT, featuring a distinct and visually striking mask design. The artwork is based on the Ethereum blockchain, which allows for verifiable ownership and scarcity of the digital collectibles.

The Hashmask series has gained popularity among collectors for its unique blend of digital art and blockchain technology. Each piece is a one-of-a-kind creation, with a limited number of editions available for purchase. This makes them highly sought-after and valuable to collectors.

In addition to their visual appeal, Hashmask NFTs also offer the added benefit of being easily tradeable and verifiable on the Ethereum blockchain. This allows collectors to easily and securely buy, sell, and trade their pieces with confidence.

The rise of NFTs, like Hashmask, has sparked a new wave of interest in digital art and collectibles. As the art world continues to evolve and embrace blockchain technology, it is likely that we will see even more unique and valuable NFTs like Hashmask emerge.

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The Privacy Fire That Tornado Cash Started

The recent sanction of Tornado Cash, a decentralized protocol for private transactions on Ethereum, by the U.S Treasury has lit the fuse of a spiraling, heated, and heavily polarised discussion around privacy both on and off-chain.

The conversation has quickly spread into legal channels as U.S representative Tom Emmer demands answers regarding the Tornado Cash Ban. This article breaks down the events following the Tornado Cash ban and analyses the importance of privacy on the blockchain.

But first, here is a quick overview of the Tornado Cash protocol.

What is Tornado Cash?

Tornado Cash is an Ethereum-based cryptocurrency mixer that supports many Ethereum-based transactions, from native ETH to ERC-20. In addition, users can access a private “lockbox” where funds can be withdrawn or deposited anonymously with the help of access keys.

The access to the lockbox is protected by a ZK (zero knowledge) proof algorithm where the user proves they are the key’s owner without providing any personally indefinable information. To further protect the anonymity of users, users can transact in only a few pre-set quantities on the protocol. As a result, assets that have gone through the Tornado Cash protocol are not easily traceable.

The Ban

Tornado Cash and cryptocurrency Mixers are not something new. They’ve been around for ages (in Internet years), so the sudden ban comes at somewhat of a surprise. Monero not even entering this discussion yet is even more surprising. But I will leave inconsistencies and shortcuts in thinking with whom they belong — government officials, and focus on the story.

Tornado Cash was banned on the 8th of August 2022, and the events surrounding it have snowballed ever since. According to the U.S. Treasury Website, Tornado Cash is allegedly responsible for indirectly facilitating over $7 billion in cybercrime — hence the ban. The website reveals little to no information about this $7 billion figure and how it’s all linked to Tornado Cash.

Vitalik, among others, has used Torando Cash to donate to Ukraine. Soon after the Tornado Cash Ban announcement, multiple notable people within the cryptocurrency industry have outed themselves as having used Tornado Cash for numerous causes.

The ban marked the start of a much broader conversation around privacy, with several notable events —

Alexey Pertsev Jailed

The story continued to develop as a Netherlands judge ruled that the Tornado Cash developer Alexey Pertsev must spend the next 90 days in jail while awaiting a court date. However, the local Crypto community was quick to take action and start protesting against the decision.

Alexey Pertsev provided a code that would uphold a fundamental human right — the right to privacy, whether on or off-chain. However, the fact that he is currently in jail without a sentence seems too rash and downright targeted. Hence, a protest against oppressive behavior such as this is not only to be anticipated but welcomed.

Shortly after, Amsterdam protestors gathered to demand the developer’s release.

Tether Decides Not to Ban Tornado Cash Addresses

The biggest Stablecoin issuer on the market has decided not to ban Tornado Cash addresses meaning that the users could continue interacting with the protocol.

“Unilaterally freezing secondary market addresses could be a highly disruptive and reckless move by Tether.”

Banned code gets re-uploaded

Cryptocurrency researcher and academic Matthew Green wants to preserve the code for the sake of academic research and free speech.

John Hopkins professor Matthew Green intends to preserve the source code of Tornado Cash for research purposes into cryptocurrency privacy and zero-knowledge proofs.

“The loss or decreased availability of this source code will be harmful to the scientific and technical communities,”

Professor Green is personally involved with Zcash, a privacy-based cryptocurrency; thus, privacy is highly important to him. Furthermore, the Professor has explained how applying economic sanctions against open-source software is a historically unprecedented event in the U.S. government and has crucial implications for free speech. It also creates an unwanted precedent in law history, which could be used to restrict (and not responsibly regulate) cryptocurrency use.

Privacy and the Human Condition

In this closing section of the article, I would like to add my thoughts on this matter.

As mentioned above, the sanctioning of open-source software can potentially have catastrophic consequences for the freedom of our Internet and the decentralized web. This should not go away without significant backlash from cryptocurrency enthusiasts, and it’s great that people like Vitalik are supporting the use case of Tornado Cash.

Here are some other services the U.S. Treasury can ban next due to the same concerns. They probably already know Monero is the biggest decentralized privacy-focused blockchain created in 2014 and is as old as Ethereum. But, the same argument goes, it’s private and therefore is used only for illicit transactions.

Allow me to explain. Vitalik and the Ethereum community have recently started discussing Private Transactions for NFTs, specifically the ERC-721 standard. Now, if this was to be deployed on the mainnet, it could quickly expand to ERC-20. So it’s possible that eventually, you would have the second biggest blockchain out there wholly private. Well, the same applies — illicit transactions could happen, so we’re going to ban them.

The government, yours, mine, whoever’s, seems interested in preserving your privacy, but that couldn’t be further away from the truth. Yes, we had Zuckerberg answering questions once or twice, but other than just that, the government loves Monolithic data mining operations because they get in on the data harvest. When there’s no data to harvest, government bodies such as security services, police, and surveillance need to display a modicum of talent and do their job.

Thank you for reading, and I hope this article gave you a good idea of why protocols like Tornado Cash are crucial for our freedom.

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Hal Finney (Computer Scientist)

Harold Thomas Finney II (May 4, 1956 – August 28, 2014) was an American software developer. He was credited as the lead developer on several console games in his early career. Finney later worked for PGP Corporation. He also was an early bitcoin contributor and received the first bitcoin transaction from bitcoin’s creator Satoshi Nakamoto.

Hal Smiling
Hal Smiling

Early Life and Education
Finney was born in Coalinga, California, on May 4, 1956, to Virginia and Harold Thomas Finney. His father was a petroleum engineer. His mother’s grandmother was a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution and a Congregationalist. Harold Finney II attended the California Institute of Technology, graduating with a BS in engineering in 1979.

Career
After graduation from Caltech, he went to work in the computer gaming field for a company that developed video games such as Adventures of Tron, Armor Ambush, Astrosmash, and Space Attack. He later went to work for the PGP Corporation, with whom he remained until his retirement in 2011.

Finney was a noted cryptographic activist. During the early 1990s, in addition to being a regular poster on the cypherpunks listserv, Finney ran two anonymous remailers. Further cryptographic activism included running a (successful) contest to break the export-grade encryption Netscape used.

In 2004, Finney created the first reusable proof of work system before Bitcoin. In January 2009, Finney was the Bitcoin network’s first transaction recipient.

Bitcoin
Finney was a cypherpunk and said:

It seemed so obvious to me: “Here we are faced with the problems of loss of privacy, creeping computerization, massive databases, more centralization – and [David] Chaum offers a completely different direction to go in, one which puts power into the hands of individuals rather than governments and corporations. The computer can be used as a tool to liberate and protect people, rather than to control them.”

He was an early Bitcoin user, and on January 12, 2009, he received the first bitcoin transaction from Bitcoin’s creator Satoshi Nakamoto. Finney lived in the same town for ten years that Dorian Satoshi Nakamoto lived in (Temple City, California), adding to speculation that he may have been Bitcoin’s creator. Finney denied that he was Satoshi Nakamoto.

In March 2013, Finney posted on a Bitcoin forum, BitcoinTalk, that he was essentially paralyzed. Nevertheless, he continued to program until his death; his last project was working on “bcflick,” the experimental software which uses Trusted Computing to strengthen Bitcoin wallets.

During the last year of his life, the Finneys received anonymous calls demanding extortion fees and becoming victims of swatting. In addition, extortionists have demanded fees of more bitcoins than Finney had left after using most of them to cover medical expenses in 2013.

Personal Life
In October 2009, Finney announced in an essay on the blog Less Wrong that he had been diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) in August 2009. Before his illness, Finney had been an active runner. In addition, Finney and his wife raised money for ALS research with the Santa Barbara International Marathon.

Death
Finney died in Phoenix, Arizona, on August 28, 2014, as a result of complications of ALS and is cryopreserved by the Alcor Life Extension Foundation.

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Satoshi Nakamoto

Satoshi Nakamoto is the name used by the presumed pseudonymous person or persons who developed bitcoin, authored the bitcoin white paper, and created and deployed bitcoin’s original reference implementation. As part of the implementation, Nakamoto also devised the first blockchain database. Nakamoto was active in the development of bitcoin up until December 2010.

There has been widespread speculation about Satoshi Nakamoto’s true identity, with various people posited as the person or persons behind the name. One person, Australian computer scientist Craig Steven Wright, has publicly claimed to be Nakamoto, though this claim has met with skepticism. Nakamoto’s name is Japanese, and he stated in 2012 that he was a man living in Japan; most of the speculation involved software or cryptography experts in the United States or Europe.

Nakamoto stated that work on writing the code for bitcoin began in 2007. On 18 August 2008, he or a colleague registered the domain name bitcoin.org and created a website at that address. On 31 October, Nakamoto published a white paper on the cryptography mailing list at metzdowd.com describing a digital cryptocurrency titled “Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System.”

On 9 January 2009, Nakamoto released version 0.1 of the bitcoin software on SourceForge and launched the network by defining the genesis block of bitcoin (block number 0), which had a reward of 50 bitcoins. Embedded in the coinbase transaction of this block is the text: “The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks”, citing a headline in the U.K. newspaper The Times published on that date. This note is interpreted as both a timestamp and a derisive comment on the alleged instability caused by fractional-reserve banking.

Nakamoto continued to collaborate with other developers on the bitcoin software until mid-2010, making all modifications to the source code himself. He then gave control of the source code repository and network alert key to Gavin Andresen, transferred several related domains to prominent bitcoin community members, and stopped his recognized involvement in the project.

Nakamoto owns between 750,000 and 1,100,000 bitcoin. In November 2021, when bitcoin hit its still-highest value of over US$68,000, that would have made his net worth up to US$73 billion, making him the 15th-richest person in the world at the time.

Characteristics and identity

Nakamoto has never revealed personal information when discussing technical matters, though he has sometimes provided commentary on banking and fractional-reserve banking. On his P2P Foundation profile as of 2012, Nakamoto claimed to be a 37-year-old male who lived in Japan; however, some speculated he was unlikely to be Japanese due to his native-level use of English.

Some have considered that Nakamoto might be a team of people: Dan Kaminsky, a security researcher who read the bitcoin code, said that Nakamoto could either be a “team of people” or a “genius”; Laszlo Hanyecz, a developer who had emailed Nakamoto, had the feeling the code was too well designed for one person; Gavin Andresen has said of Nakamoto’s computer code: “He was a brilliant coder, but it was quirky.”

The use of British English in code comments and forum postings, such as the expression “bloody hard,” terms such as “flat” and “maths,” and the spellings “grey” and “colour,” led to speculation that Nakamoto, or at least someone in a consortium claiming to be him, was of Commonwealth origin. Furthermore, the reference to London’s Times newspaper in the first bitcoin block mined by Nakamoto suggested to some a particular interest in the British government.

Stefan Thomas, a Swiss software engineer, and active community member, graphed the timestamps for Nakamoto’s bitcoin forum posts (more than 500); the chart showed a steep decline to almost no posts between the hours of 5 a.m. and 11 a.m. Greenwich Mean Time (This was between 2 p.m. and 8 p.m. Japan Standard Time), suggesting an unusual sleep pattern for someone supposedly living in Japan. This pattern held even on Saturdays and Sundays, which meant that Nakamoto was consistently asleep at this time.

Possible identities

The identity of Nakamoto is unknown, but speculations have focused on various cryptography and computer science experts. Most are of non-Japanese descent. Many people have attempted to claim the Nakamoto identity. With no one knowing for sure, the world has done some research, and three educated guesses are presented almost constantly.

-Hal Finney-
Hal Finney (4 May 1956 – 28 August 2014) was a pre-bitcoin cryptographic pioneer and the first person (other than Nakamoto himself) to use the software, file bug reports, and make improvements. Widely believed to be the mastermind behind bitcoin, Finney also lived a few blocks from a man named “Dorian Satoshi Nakamoto,” according to Forbes journalist Andy Greenberg. Greenberg asked the writing analysis consultancy Juola & Associates to compare a sample of Finney’s writing to Nakamoto’s and found it to be the closest resemblance they had yet come across, including when compared to candidates suggested by Newsweek, Fast Company, The New Yorker, Ted Nelson, and Skye Grey. Greenberg theorized that Finney may have been a ghostwriter on behalf of Nakamoto or that he used his neighbor Dorian’s identity as a “drop” or “patsy whose personal information is used to hide online exploits”; however, after meeting Finney, seeing the emails between him and Nakamoto and his bitcoin wallet’s history (including the very first bitcoin transaction from Nakamoto to him, which he forgot to pay back) and hearing his denial, Greenberg concluded that Finney was telling the truth. Juola & Associates also found that Nakamoto’s emails to Finney more closely resemble {Nakamoto’s other writings than Finney’s. Finney’s fellow extropian and sometimes co-blogger Robin Hanson assigned a subjective probability of “at least” 15% that “Hal was more involved than he’s said” before further evidence suggested that was not the case.

-United States Government (The CIA, Navy, Etc)-
The United States Government has a long history of cryptographic research. For example, the privacy software Tor is a product of U.S. government research. But unfortunately, the United States and the CIA also have a long history of destabilizing governments, and bitcoin has shown its power to replace whole nations’ currencies.

-Rouge AI-
An even spookier and more fantastic option than those presented above is the thought experiment of Bitcoin being created by Rouge AI living on the internet. The AI would interface with Emails, Code Repositories, and IRL Humans to release the code that would eventually become bitcoin. In this scenario, The AI’s motives could be related to digital ownership, global value, or the massive computing power behind the network.

The truth is that no one knows for sure. It could be a mixture of all/some of these or something entirely out of the left field. But, again, no one knows for sure, and that’s part of the mysticism of Satoshi Nakamoto and bitcoin.

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The Web3 Adult Industry.

There was a time when a significant number of people were incredibly bullish on the Web3 Adult Industry, and many would deem it the necessary next step in Adult Entertainment. During the 2021 bull run, we saw an influx of Cryptocurrency projects targeting and promising to revolutionize the adult industry. However, the hype surrounding some of these projects seems to have disappeared into the depths of the Internet. So what happened to the decentralized adult industry promise?

The Promise
The reason Web3 and adult entertainment seemed to be a perfect match couldn’t be simpler — decentralization of adult content and its distribution promising a fairer environment for content creators without subjecting their content to the unfair ToS and monetary policy of a centralized platform. Throwback to when OnlyFans nearly banned all adult content, only to backtrack the next day due to massive outrage from its user base. The idea of a decentralized platform where individuals can create Adult Content shared in a way that minimizes the involvement of any middleman entity, such as onlyfans, is a strong value proposition for any adult content creator.

The Current Situation
So if decentralization promises a better, fairer Adult Content platform, what has happened with some of the most hyped projects in the space? Let’s take a look at some of these projects.

–CumRocket Crypto–
CumRocket Crypto achieved notoriety in November 2021, reaching a total market cap of $110 million. It was among the first concepts of web3 adult sharing platforms that somehow positioned themselves between meme coins and an adult platform. Finally, something has reached actual meme status when Redditors joke about becoming millionaires and having to report capital gains as “Got early into cummies.” Despite the meme status notoriety and several “strategic” partnerships, CumRocket has lost over 95% of its market cap since its all-time high.

Furthermore, the top creator on the platform, Dickasso, owns a total of 3.5m of the platform’s tokens, which at the time of writing is equivalent to ~$10.000 as opposed to nearly $300.000 during the all-time high. Most other creators’ earnings are now worth under $3000, which indicates why the platform only saw some niched attention. Adult content creators would be unable to earn a living, so many have left or remain inactive.

–Taboo–
Taboo branded itself as a “Playboy for Crypto,” promising privacy and freedom to create, minus the meme angle CumRocket took. However, the business model seemed to have been very similar to CumRocket. Taboo also launched an NFT collection of “Taboo Punks” that currently sits at 0.09ETH floor price. The project lost over 96% of its value from a $400 million market cap to only $16 million.

–Nafty–
Like the previous 2, Nafty promised privacy, instant payments, and ownership of the content created and purchased. In addition, just like CumRocket and Taboo, Nafty had a token, a marketplace, and “strategic” partnerships to entice users to join. There is currently very little data on the token; however, according to many online, this project has been nothing but an orchestrated cash grab or “rug pull.”

Furthermore, the team has missed every step of the roadmap, so is project is not going anywhere. It is unclear what the total rugged amount was, but there are still 14,000 Nafty token holders today, which means the scam was significant.

The Issue
And this is just the situation with the most popular projects, which were “fortunate” enough to create some community buzz, albeit temporarily. However, the reality is there are now hundreds, if not thousands, of copycat projects with the same approach that will inevitably meet the same fate. There are more and more popping up daily, with popular Twitch Streamers announcing their own NFT Adult Content platform almost weekly.

None of the other new projects have made it past the promise phase, and given the current state of the market, it’s not very likely that many of them will see the light of day. Do another search tomorrow, and you will likely find a brand-new set of different results. With so many platforms already available and more projects popping up daily, what’s stopping the Adult Content Industry from migrating to Web3?

The Solution (In My Opinion)
The answer lies within the current product offering. Unfortunately, Nafty, Taboo, CumRocket, and countless other copycat projects are not prioritizing the growth and development of the platform and its user base. Rug artists built most of these projects for hype during a bull market where everyone would go and buy any coin they could find and would magically see double-digit gains in a matter of days. That alone is unsustainable, but when a product offering is tied to the underlying value of its governance token, once the tide turns and the market becomes bearish, these projects will struggle to survive. However, I believe that the creators of most of these projects are fully aware that they are riding a temporary hype and are probably prepared with an adequate exit strategy so the core group of developers will be well-off in most cases. The issue is that it creates disappointment, and unmet promises, creating an unsustainable income stream for creators.

If Adult Content creators are to survive — as in day-to-day living on the income they make from ERC-20 tokens that fluctuate with hype — it would be a massive surprise to see anyone able to achieve that, let alone thrive. Significant help in situations like these could come from stablecoins ($DAI,$USDC) and the protections they offer in volatile markets. Adult entertainers can also control more of their “Brand” using Domain names such as the traditional [.Com] or even the new blockchain-based [.Eth].

This set of projects listed above was primarily based on Ethereum and implemented as “tokens”; the round before this was essentially stand-alone layer one chains. The next round of projects will undoubtedly focus on eth layer two chains such as zksync and polygon. As a result, reduced fees and increased speed could help further reduce friction during onboarding, transactions, and everyday use.

Closing Thoughts
Web3 Adult Content Platforms need to be rethought from the ground up for these to provide a viable alternative to traditional centralized Web2 platforms. Web3 is about decentralization, ownership over one’s data, and privacy. It is not about meme coins, it is not about tokenomics, and it is not about “get rich quick” schemes. A fairer web is a decentralized web monetized for the individual content creator, not the corporation that owns the website.

In addition to everything listed above, web3 and decentralization contain countless deeper problems that reach deep into the fabric of much of our current understanding of human/digital networking and our rights and responsibility regarding them.

These issues extend well beyond the Adult Entertainment Industry. These ideas would be a good starting point, not only for Adult Content platforms but for any platform that wishes to provide a web3 alternative to a mainstream web2 service. Start with the user.

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Billionaires, Celebrities, and their Crypto Activity (2022)

Many people see the cryptocurrency revolution as the new gold rush. While bitcoin was the pioneer and still one of the largest stores of digital wealth, the Ethereum blockchain itself has brought about a drastic evolution of the crypto landscape, facilitating things like smart Many people see the cryptocurrency revolution as the new gold rush. While bitcoin was the pioneer and still one of the largest stores of digital wealth, the Ethereum blockchain has brought about a drastic evolution of the crypto landscape, facilitating things like smart contracts and non-fungible tokens, or NFTs. As a result, some early adopters of crypto are well-known names in finance and business and even constitute the most wealthy individuals in the country and beyond.

The Biggest Players In Crypto So Far
The biggest names in crypto seem to have gotten involved, like many retail investors have, with bitcoin. However, some recent advancements in blockchain adaptability and usefulness seem to have tipped the scales, with many now looking to Ethereum for increased functionality and more diverse usability. Here are some of the billionaire household names that have crypto wallets.

Elon Musk
The Auto/Space CEO is a significant proponent of bitcoin while simultaneously being one of its most prominent critics. He is also known throughout social media sites such as Twitter and Reddit for being a big booster and influencer for the meme coin Dogecoin, even promising to “take Dogecoin to Mars.” Musk has stated that he owns ETH, though he won’t divulge the volume of his holdings. Singer Grimes, the mother of one of Musk’s many children, has also sold her artwork as an NFT on the Ethereum blockchain.

Mark Zuckerberg
The unblinking Facebook creator has recently become an Ethereum fan and announced plans to bring the concept of NFTs to his platform Instagram. He has stated that he will allow users to connect their Ethereum wallets to their Instagram accounts, bringing the creator of Ethereum, Vitalik Buterin’s, ambition of having Ethereum “running the metaverse” one step closer. Zuckerberg was behind the Libra cryptocurrency, which rebranded, now known as Diem, which aims to create a stable coin for use in the metaverse.

Mark Cuban
This Investment mastermind is known to be not only a relatively early adopter of bitcoin, but he’s also made headlines for being a backer of lesser-known Lazy.com, which allows NFT owners to show them off in a virtual gallery. Cuban made headlines after getting the “@NFT” account permanently banned from Instagram for reportedly not disclosing which posts were sponsored content. Cuban has stated that NFTs are why he’s now “all in” on crypto, being partial ETH and BTC.

Changpeng Zhao
CEO of one of the largest crypto exchanges and an estimated 30% owner. The Binance “chain” is a fork of the Ethereum chain. While it is essentially an ETH copy, it changes to the consensus protocol, which allows some transactions to be faster but in a more centralized and less secure manner. With the recent surge in blockchain activity, particularly with NFTs on the powerhouse Ethereum blockchain, Zhao has become one of the wealthiest CEOs in the cryptocurrency arena.

Jack Dorsey sold the first tweet ever as a NFT.

Jack Dorsey
The Twitter founder and Block payment system (formerly known as Square) creator eventually quit his position at the social media giant to become what HODLers call a “bitcoin maxi.” He is adamant that bitcoin is the only viable cryptocurrency and owns an estimated 8,000+ BTC. Dorsey is also famous for minting the first tweet on the Twitter platform as an NFT on Ethereum and donating the proceeds to charity. Additionally, Dorsey was rumored to have had a hand in the hexagonal profile pictures on Twitter, which indicates the account owner is involved with a verified NFT and can be activated by subscribing to the Twitter Blue premium service and linking your wallet and account.

Soulja Boy and Kim Kardashian

Soulja Boy
While known to be an investor in Tron and Binance, he is most recently famous for being named in legal action surrounding an alleged crypto scam. Along with fellow rapper Lil Yachty, he is a defendant in a class-action suit that alleges that they participated in a “pump-and-dump” scheme with the SafeMoon token. Also named in the lawsuit is the brother of Logan Paul, Jake Paul. This scheme allegedly saw the celebrities leverage their status as influencers to artificially raise the token’s value without being open about their partial ownership in the company.

Kim Kardashian
“The Kardashians” TV star was named in a lawsuit alleging that she took part in the pump and dump scheme behind the “EthereumMax” scam. Kim Kardashian received payment from “EthereumMax” to promote the currency in social media posts as a way to gain traction. Kardashian tweeted numerous times, allegedly making false or misleading statements which helped push its value higher than standard utility and usage could have.

Logan Paul
This Social media influencer is one of the newest names in the crypto game. He announced in 2021 that he would be starting his very own cryptocurrency project, known as CryptoZoo. The autonomous ecosystem is similar to a modern-day spin-off of the famous early 2000s online game Neopets. With CryptoZoo, owners will be able to collect, breed, and trade hybrid digital animals in the form of NFTs while earning tokens. Paul is also alleged to have pumped the “Dink Doink” crypto token scam and is currently involved in minting NFTs in a collection called “99 Originals”.

Floyd Mayweather
The Gold Medal Winning, World Class boxer faces a lawsuit for an alleged pump and dump scheme. The allegations state that he misled investors and artificially inflated the price of the cryptocurrency “EthereumMax.” Mayweather made “false or misleading statements” about the lesser-known crypto token in several social media posts. Mayweather also used his fame as a boxer to promote Pump and Dump NFT Projects and even accepted various scam coins as payment for his Exhibition match with Logan Paul.

Regulatory Hurdles and The Road Ahead

While there has been little regulation from the US government, there is still movement toward increased governance. For example, the Internal Revenue Service is beginning to tax crypto owners on their investments. While they won’t tax the purchase of any digital assets yet, it does set a tax on the sale of such holdings as cryptocurrencies and NFT art. Starting in 2022, the IRS has begun to require 1099-B forms for those with significant crypto sales and will collect taxes on the sales of similar assets going forward.

The 115th Congress has also begun looking into potential regulation and increased monitoring of the crypto activities of US citizens. Congress examined the bitcoin ecosystem primarily in their initial blockchain hearings. However, they note the expanded Initial Coin Offerings for other blockchains such as Ethereum have provided a much more accessible entry point for people to explore crypto while also increasing the potential incentive for malicious hacks of extensive exchange infrastructure.

With the current administration showing a decided interest in regulating and taxing crypto assets, there will undoubtedly be more debate coming. As a result, the road ahead for crypto and the large-scale billionaire investors, celebrities, and everyday citizens will undoubtedly be bumpy, but where it leads is still unclear.

The digital landscape is becoming so diverse, and the possibilities blockchain technology offers are many that outright prohibition is all but a moot point now, but that doesn’t mean that regulations aren’t coming. And those shouldering the most considerable burden of risk are the ones with the most significant investments on the line, even if that line is digital.

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Via.Eth Project Update #5

This post is a short update going over the few things I was able to get done the last month. Dealing with personal issues has left me little time to plan and organize for via.eth. I’ve primarily been working on website updates and minor page layouts. Hopefully, things will calm down this upcoming month, and I’ll have more time to work on stuff like PayViaEth and community-related items. Please visit the site and community and give feedback.

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Via.Eth Project Update #4

Excluding the two sentences immediately following this one, I promise you this is a positive update; read until the end. Sorry, I’m late with the second update for the month of June. I had a lot going on this past 2-3 weeks and have had to spend my time dealing with personal matters. GR10 has started, and I’ve been in the process of updating some website elements and thanking individuals for their contributions. If you’d like to see a working example of Pay.Via.Eth, you can “Order” a download from the ViaEth.io site. While the website asks for a name and email for “Processing Purposes,” remember you can always download the code and check it out yourself from our GitHub. I’ve also added other “Products” so you can experience how the plugin would work on a live site with multiple products. I’d also like to add a couple more articles and info to the site to help fill out the content.
If you have previously donated before, please consider donating again. Any amount helps tremendously.
With minor content and its work-in-progress status, I’m amazed by the almost 8k visitors the site has had so far in June.

Thank you for all the support.
We are doing good work.

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