6 ms·

At risk of tangenting the conversation, comments like that from the guardian continue to drive me nuts. I understand that an identity-driven narrative suits the

At risk of tangenting the conversation, comments like that from the guardian continue to drive me nuts. I understand that an identity-driven narrative suits their politics. But to say the crypto community is started by "white men" really rolls up a ton of geographical and cultural diversity between even the founders of the top few coins: Bitcoin (unknown), Ethereum (Russian), Litecoin (Asian-American).

tobr 8y ago
I guess you could say that Bitcoin is pseudonominally Japanese.
pochamago 8y ago
The comment in the article is itself tangential. It's just a pointless bit of racist vitriol against the dreaded White Man, and has nothing to do with any of the substantive criticism
dragonwriter 8y ago
> But to say the crypto community is started by "white men" They didn't say that; they said it is predominantly being evangelized by white men. There's a significant difference between the claims.
gojomo 8y ago
While "The Guardian" published this, it did so as a signed commentary piece, by Nouriel Roubini (which further appears to have come via a syndication service, 'Project Syndicate'). Such pieces are not the publication's opinion any more than a "letter to the editor", and papers will publish many contradicting opinions this way. So it's not really accurate to attribute quotes from this article to "The Guardian". Only a very few, typically unsigned (or signed 'the editors') commentaries in a publication are officially the outlet's house opinion – and these often contradict or reference-but-highly-qualify any differing signed opinions (like this Roubini piece) they've separately published.
- rmrfrmrf 8y ago
  That's really beside the point and the people at The Guardian know that anything under their masthead is ultimately going to affect brand perception.
  - gojomo 8y ago
    Maybe they're hoping online readers will eventually become as smart as paper readers, for whom this distinction between "signed guest commentary" and "house opinion" was clear for hundreds of years?
    - laretluval 8y ago
      Blaming the users is usually not the most effective way forward.
      - gojomo 8y ago
        Blaming those making false attributions is the only way to correct those misattributions!
- TearsInTheRain 8y ago
  It's under their brand, they published it. Imho we should expect better from them
  - gojomo 8y ago
    Still doesn't make it accurate to attribute it to 'The Guardian'. And still, even a publication with a strong "house perspective", like The Guardian, doesn't limit itself to publishing only commentaries it fully endorses. I know this is confusing to online readers, and in some cases poor design by the outlets feeds it further, but outlets like this have long tradition of publishing things they don't fully, or even partially, agree with. Roubini's in the news – just testified for the US Congress – so his perspective is worth understanding, separate from any publications' own beliefs. (And The Guardian is likely to have some sympathy for his opinion, but even there – wrong to attribute Roubini's signed words to the publication.)
LifeLiverTransp 8y ago
Incitin another virtual riot guarantees clicks.
KirinDave 8y ago
No one is saying women and non-white men[0] don't exist in the founding sets and senior engineering sets. They do (and in proportions that to my eye look balanced with the rest of tech, which is damning with faint praise I guess). Many of them are talented, interesting, and perhaps even moral people. But it's definitely the case that outside of the narrow founding set, there's a very specific population bias in the rank and file of the blockchain community on reddit or steemit or whatever silly "libertarian" competitive echo chamber people are retreating to these days. It just can't be terribly controversial to say that that there are tons of white men in the community of people around are and never will contribute to blockchain with anything but pennies and zeal, which arguably hurts a growing industry really badly. [0]: "Russian" is definitely a "white" ethnicity these days. It's pretty wild you're trying to suggest that such a historically rich, anglo-centric and christian nation is somehow an outlier there.

tobr 8y ago

I guess you could say that Bitcoin is pseudonominally Japanese.

pochamago 8y ago

The comment in the article is itself tangential. It's just a pointless bit of racist vitriol against the dreaded White Man, and has nothing to do with any of the substantive criticism

dragonwriter 8y ago

> But to say the crypto community is started by "white men" They didn't say that; they said it is predominantly being evangelized by white men. There's a significant difference between the claims.

gojomo 8y ago

While "The Guardian" published this, it did so as a signed commentary piece, by Nouriel Roubini (which further appears to have come via a syndication service, 'Project Syndicate'). Such pieces are not the publication's opinion any more than a "letter to the editor", and papers will publish many contradicting opinions this way. So it's not really accurate to attribute quotes from this article to "The Guardian". Only a very few, typically unsigned (or signed 'the editors') commentaries in a publication are officially the outlet's house opinion – and these often contradict or reference-but-highly-qualify any differing signed opinions (like this Roubini piece) they've separately published.

rmrfrmrf 8y ago
That's really beside the point and the people at The Guardian know that anything under their masthead is ultimately going to affect brand perception.
- gojomo 8y ago
  Maybe they're hoping online readers will eventually become as smart as paper readers, for whom this distinction between "signed guest commentary" and "house opinion" was clear for hundreds of years?
  - laretluval 8y ago
    Blaming the users is usually not the most effective way forward.
    - gojomo 8y ago
      Blaming those making false attributions is the only way to correct those misattributions!
TearsInTheRain 8y ago
It's under their brand, they published it. Imho we should expect better from them
- gojomo 8y ago
  Still doesn't make it accurate to attribute it to 'The Guardian'. And still, even a publication with a strong "house perspective", like The Guardian, doesn't limit itself to publishing only commentaries it fully endorses. I know this is confusing to online readers, and in some cases poor design by the outlets feeds it further, but outlets like this have long tradition of publishing things they don't fully, or even partially, agree with. Roubini's in the news – just testified for the US Congress – so his perspective is worth understanding, separate from any publications' own beliefs. (And The Guardian is likely to have some sympathy for his opinion, but even there – wrong to attribute Roubini's signed words to the publication.)

LifeLiverTransp 8y ago

Incitin another virtual riot guarantees clicks.

KirinDave 8y ago

No one is saying women and non-white men[0] don't exist in the founding sets and senior engineering sets. They do (and in proportions that to my eye look balanced with the rest of tech, which is damning with faint praise I guess). Many of them are talented, interesting, and perhaps even moral people. But it's definitely the case that outside of the narrow founding set, there's a very specific population bias in the rank and file of the blockchain community on reddit or steemit or whatever silly "libertarian" competitive echo chamber people are retreating to these days. It just can't be terribly controversial to say that that there are tons of white men in the community of people around are and never will contribute to blockchain with anything but pennies and zeal, which arguably hurts a growing industry really badly. [0]: "Russian" is definitely a "white" ethnicity these days. It's pretty wild you're trying to suggest that such a historically rich, anglo-centric and christian nation is somehow an outlier there.