Blog 5-22-2018

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Who Are the Crypto Celebrities?

22 May 2018

The cryptocurrency and blockchain industry, like any traditional industry, has its own set of celebrities. These are the movers and shakers of the crypto industry.

Who Are the Crypto Celebrities?

The Winklevoss Twins

Photo from CNBC

Remember the insufferable Harvard twins from The Social Network movie who said Zuckerberg “stole their idea” and settled for $65 million? Well, they have become major crypto celebrities and “ Bitcoin Billionaires.”

Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss (aka “The Winklevii”) bought Bitcoin back in 2013 at $120 making their current holdings worth over a billion dollars. I know…this is infuriating to think about. Why the hell didn’t I buy Bitcoin in 2013 and why can’t these geniuses invent a time machine so I can do that?

On top of investing in Bitcoin, the Olympian rowers(yes, they do everything) also started one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges, Gemini. These guys can’t catch a break! They have recently become notorious in the crypto industry for their bold prediction that Bitcoin will be worth 40 times its current value in the relatively near future.

Why do they also have to be good looking? The brothers believe that Bitcoin is disrupting the precious metal industry and will eventually be a favorable replacement for gold.

You can say they are pretty, “bullish” on the whole crypto thing.

( If you want more on the Winklevii you can see them on mainstream news outlets almost every day.)

Roger Ver

Photo from AMB Crypto

Like the Winklevoss twins, Roger Ver invested in Bitcoin and other Blockchain-related startups at a very early stage giving him the nickname, “Bitcoin Jesus.” As you can imagine, he is an extremely modest man.

Roger is famous for being (almost weirdly) obsessed with Bitcoin Cash, a hard fork of Bitcoin. He is hyper-critical of Bitcoin itself, calling it “slow, expensive, and unreliable.” He claims Bitcoin Cash is built better than Bitcoin for transactions and is ultimately a more efficient currency. He infamously got in a defensive, viral argument about how to pronounce Bitcoin Cash with a trolling YouTuber.

If you ever see Roger, please call him “BCASH Jesus.” I think he might like that better.

Brock Pierce

Photo from Fortune

Ready to have your mind blown? Brock Pierce played fictional hockey coach, Gordon Bombay in the original Mighty Ducks movie.

Who knew that the kid with the best triple deke on the planet was a future tech mogul genius. Unlike most childhood actors who turn to drugs…Brock Pierce turned to Bitcoin. I think we have established this was good move.

In 2013, Pierce joined Bard and Bradford Stephens in foundation of Blockchain Capital (BCC), a venture interest firm for crypto related projects. He is also the Director of the Bitcoin Foundation and is a consistent keynote speaker at tech enthused invents. In February of 2018 he was estimated to have net worth of 1.1 Billion, making him one of the top 20 richest people in the crypto industry.

Vitalik Buterin

Photo from Fortune 40 Under 40

Vitalik Buterin, whose name sounds like he should be exactly who he is… IS a Russian-Canadian programer who co-founded of Ethereum. The name Vitalik is good for an extra 50 IQ points, so no surprise he has become one of the most important humans on the planet for tech innovation.

Alpha Token is based on Ethereum

Vitalik recognized that Bitcoin needed scripted language for application development. According to Vitalik, Ethereum is a decentralized platform that runs smart contracts: applications that run exactly as programmed without any possibility of downtime, censorship, fraud or third-party interference (language from Ethereum website). Since its inception in 2013, Ethereum has become the world’s second largest cryptocurrency in total market cap of just under $70 billion.

John McAfee

Photo from Crypto Coin News

John McAfee is one of those guys who you always hear about, but never really know how. I still feel that way after just researching him! You may recognize his name from the famous anti-virus software, “McCafee,” which was eventually renamed to Intel Security in 2011. He has made a splash in multiple industries, including political activism with a Libertarian nomination for the Presidency in 2016. He ended up losing to “Mr. Aleppo,” Gary Johnson.

McAfee has become famous in the crypto space for his active, Altcoin shilling Twitter account and outlandish Bitcoin prediction. Back in 2017, he famously stated that he would cut off his own (male appendage) and eat it on national television if Bitcoin did not reach $500,000 by the end of 2020. After the massive price spike toward the end of 2017, he changed his prediction to $1,000,000.

For everyone’s sake, I hope Bitcoin moons.

Warren Buffett

Photo from CNBC Money

Warren Buffet is the infamous 87 year old billionaire CEO of Berkshire Hathaway. His investment prowess is second to none. However, Mr. Buffett has become a thorn in the crypto industry since he claimed “Bitcoin will definitely come to a bad ending.” He followed that statement up by admitting he knows little to nothing about the industry. Just recently, he doubled down on his initial critique of Bitcoin and called it “rat poison” on May 7th. Because he is so highly respected, the market tends to act negatively when he makes these statements often resulting in a slight sell-off. Mr. Buffet, you are a legend. But pleeeassse stop scaring investors with your damning anti-crypto statements.

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