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A16Z is the “worst and largest” scammer of all, says CEO of Swan Bitcoin (2022)
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- paxys 4y ago"All of these crypto startups promoted by A16Z are scams. But mine is totally legit, I promise."
- unboxingelf 4y agoSwan provides a marketplace for buying and selling Bitcoin and Bitcoin only. So yeah, I’d agree with the quote.
- rufusroflpunch 4y agoSwan Bitcoin is a service for buying Bitcoin, an asset that they do not control or have any influence over. Not remotely the same thing as pumping and dumping token after token.
- rexkwondo 4y agoI get what point you're driving at, but the expressed sentiment could be fully true.
- eh9 4y agoThese next couple of decades are going give us the absolute best financial crime documentaries. I’m here for all these documentaries based on tweets.
- wolverine876 4y agoRemember when Silicon Valley was about innovation; meritocracy (a person in their garage with a better idea could overcome a corporate behemoth); and a belief we could solve any problem using reason, knowledge, intellect, and creativity (HN is about 'intellectual curiosity'), and that we could build a better world by empowering everyone. A place were someone with an idea could go and live their dreams. Now it's the the world's leading agent of corruption, mis- and disinformation, lust for power over others (including anti-worker management, anti-democracy and support for authoritarians), megalomania, and post-truth 'thinking'. Investments are in bitcoin, VCs' and founders' massive egos, and even real estate. The former was where a generation of innovation came from. Where do the leaders and people of SV get the idea that somehow that will continue. It's like they think they sh-t gold.
- paulpauper 4y agoFrom $32 to $ https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/braintrust/ https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/braintrust/ Worldcoin worthless From $55 to $1.6. about as bad as FTX https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/helium/ https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/helium/ Andreessen was right about Facebook, his other investments have been stinkers
- amalgamated_inc 4y agoThey hinted at this ("our brother the VC") on the All-In podcast several times now. Not just this author's opinion.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- rexkwondo 4y agoChris Dixon rightfully gets a few mentions, but Chris Lyons is another a16z GP that has been involved with funding these very questionable web3 & NFT projects.
- butmuh 4y ago[dead]
- cabinguy 4y agoHN buried this story. Should be #1 on homepage. That’s bullshit and puts HN in the scammy category as well, IMO.
- etc-hosts 4y agoI find the twitter accounts of the a16z personalities to be very depressing.
- s5300 4y ago[flagged]
- jabthedang 4y ago[dead]
- codetrotter 4y ago(November 2022)
- arberx 4y agoThis dude calls Vitalik a scammer. While he might make some good points about A16Z, that viewpoint alone ruins his credibility for me.
- aardvark179 4y agoHis attempts in 2013 to get funding for Bitcoin mining using quantum computers (and claims they could get similar benefits by simulating those computers on classical machines) could at best be described as naive and ill informed, less charitably described as idiotic, and reasonably described as a scam.
- baby 4y agoYou should read his blog
- manxman 4y agoThe problem is that all the proponents of blockchain have conflated technical arguments for decentralisation with lofty political ideas for radical social reengineering and have been working to pump the blockchain assets to give themselves the capital to fight their social agendas. It’s all buried in plain sight. But the credible ideas are running out and the flagrant lack of accountability this time around is kind of no different to Socialism 1.0 or Communism 1.0. I look forward to being cancelled for having such a viewpoint.
- jongjong 4y agoThe movement was corrupted years ago. The goal of founders has been self-enrichment since.
- tromp 4y agoMostly agreed, but not every blockchain allows its creators to enrich themselves.
- cmrdporcupine 4y ago
- thegjp210 4y agoNot to support A16 - but this reads as classic PR/SEO for the extensively quoted “CEO”. Below the quality of what I expect on HN
- manxman 4y agoPerhaps, but their backing of Helium alone is makes the headline have basis. I mean if you’re reading this on a helium hotspot somewhere then I will gladly stand corrected but if not…
- sacnoradhq 4y agoHelium is nothing more than an Airbnb for "cell phone tower" real-estate. It has a viable business model because commercial vendors need pervasive low-data connections in populated areas without using the expensive cell phone network (and SIM management). The "mining" or whathaveyou is a coolhunting gimmick that accomplished the goal of getting people excited about it. I don't understand why they didn't have a closed platform and hand people their devices. Instead, there's a "waiting list" and a shortage of equipment. Coverage where I'm at is nearly 100%. Attach the word "mining" to it, and the dotcom money flows like mana from heaven.
- senko 4y agoHelium was AirBnB for LoRa before they turned it into a crypto (land coverage) gold rush. If A16Z encouraged that pivot or invested after it, the parent comment stands.
- theCrowing 4y ago[flagged]
- mikeyouse 4y agoI'd be wary about spending any proceeds from any A16Z crypto funds if I were an LP.. Given all the renewed focus and enforcement, I suspect there will be clawbacks from the obviously fraudulent pump-and-dump schemes they supported. I'm pretty amazed at the gall of Dixon as well, he is/was just aggressively rude to anyone who questioned the utility of any of those companies or coins.
- jacquesm 4y agoBut those LPs in turn will have an excellent case against the fund managers. The 'L' stands for limited, once they have committed their capital to the fund they can't do anything about what the fund does with it, they might register their protest but they'll have to pony up regardless and if they get paid out they might not have sufficient perspective on which $ came out of which investment (this varies from fund to fund, some are very transparent, others less so and funds that re-invest or evergreen funds can be even more complicated). LPs also don't necessarily live in the same jurisdiction as the fund managers or the legal home of the fund.
- throwawayjan3 4y agoI've enjoyed reading a YC founder named Liron Shapira's Twitter threads on a16z Crypto's blatant scams. E.g. - On Helium: Received $365M in investment, convinced regular people to spend $250M buying hotspot nodes in hopes of earning passive income. The result? Helium's total revenue is $6.5k/month. Link: https://twitter.com/liron/status/1551738599254773765?lang=en https://twitter.com/liron/status/1551738599254773765?lang=en - On Axie Infinity: blatant Ponzi scheme disguised as "play-to-earn"https://twitter.com/liron/status/1554941450697179136?lang=en https://twitter.com/liron/status/1554941450697179136?lang=en - On a16z's scams in general: https://twitter.com/liron/status/1565214131942146051?lang=en https://twitter.com/liron/status/1565214131942146051?lang=en
- braingenious 4y agoHere’s my favorite one: Marc Andreesen gives a rambling non-answer to a simple and straightforward question about a web3 use case. It’s genuinely funny. https://twitter.com/liron/status/1537186589486460928 https://twitter.com/liron/status/1537186589486460928
- lazzlazzlazz 4y agoLiron is a known grifter who has been trying to find the right thing to complain about, to get online famous, for years. His insane past has been discussed before[1]. He's not somebody you want to take seriously or cite as a source. [1]: https://twitter.com/joshsojoshsoj/status/1554139329643122688 https://twitter.com/joshsojoshsoj/status/1554139329643122688
- jakelazaroff 4y agoThis is pretty unconvincing. What's the grift? Raising valid points about web3 and crypto?
- WickyNilliams 4y agoWho cares? This isn't engaging with the arguments, but attempting to smear the person presenting them. Whether it is done for engagement or not is besides the point
- pbiggar 4y agoCertainly, their relentless fervor for crypto has destroyed the reputation of a16z, though it made them a lot money, and it remains to be seen if there will really be any repercussions for them. In a country with a functioning regulatory system, the partners would be looking at jail time for their involvement in these scams, but I suspect they'll come out of this just fine.
- rubyist5eva 4y ago[flagged]
- Nextgrid 4y agoCrypto currencies are the only part of blockchain/crypto/web3 that's actually not a scam. They do work if you treat them as a means of transmitting money, although they do make many trade-offs to be trustless, private and censorship resistant which means that in practice they are an inferior alternative to fiat currencies & traditional finance if you have the option to use those, so the only legitimate use that remains is either grey area/unlawful transactions or legal transactions in locations where traditional payment rails do not exist or are outdated. The problem is all the "utility" tokens and other bullshit in the crypto/web3 space. None of that is required to operate a legitimate business in the real world, should there be an actual, sustainable business behind it. But the truth is that there's no business and the whole crypto/blockchain/web3 concept is used as a smokescreen to conceal that fact and be able to make off with the gains of the underlying Ponzi or pump & dump.
- rubyist5eva 4y ago> although they do make many trade-offs to be trustless, private and censorship resistant which means that in practice they are an inferior alternative to fiat currencies & traditional finance if you have the option to use those, so the only legitimate use that remains is either grey area/unlawful transactions or legal transactions in locations where traditional payment rails do not exist or are outdated Is this supposed to be an argument for cryptocurrencies, because this sounds like one that shows why they are a scam.
- jpgvm 4y agoIt doesn't show they are a scam. It shows they are useless to most people because fiat does what most people need, just better. Crypto has actual use cases, just those use cases usually revolve around not being able to trust your counter-party, access to easy laundering systems or access at all when access to fiat is denied. This leaves you with the very healthy of set of potential users being those oppressed by nation states, criminals and adult industries and maybe some variations on these that I can't think of right now. So not a scam, just mostly useless and when it's not useless probably attracts unwanted attention vs fiat physical cash.
- ETHisso2017 4y agoThis article reads like someone put Klippsten's November thread into ChatGPT
- ldjkfkdsjnv 4y agoAt a private event with a16z investors, among other VCs, I was told: 1. Crypto is primarily preferred due to early liquidity and being able to dump the bags on someone else. Old school startup models lock up too much capital. 2. Under the table deals mean that privately (kept a secret) some well known VCs have exited coins long before the ICO
- JumpCrisscross 4y agoI’m increasingly convinced, and thank god, I’m finding similar minds on the Hill and in D.C. broadly, that anyone in leadership in crypto or web3 is perpetuating a scam or an idiot. The former should be prosecuted. The latter, fined under a deferred prosecution agreement.
- scifibestfi 4y agoTold that by whom?
- dvt 4y ago> Old school startup models lock up too much capital. I've gotten in debates here on HN before about this, but a VC's job is literally to multiply capital. Crypto has been extremely good for business (and, more key, for the numbers). I honestly don't see how anyone takes issue with a16z dumping on crypto bros any more than a16z over-funding a startup which, in turn, completely obliterates their competition. Not to mention SPACs that have been doing basically the exact same thing, as well. I have as much sympathy for degenerate crypto gamblers as I did for Citadel Capital.
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago> don't see how anyone takes issue with a16z dumping on crypto bros any more than a16z over-funding a startup which, in turn, completely obliterates their competition One of these is securities fraud.
- dvt 4y agoUntil Ripple v. SEC is settled, this is hypothetical.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- mikedouglas 4y agoIt's overwrought takes like this that fail to see the real issues at play. Many of those projects were all good faith efforts and I haven't seen a shred of evidence that a16z was mass dumping tokens (most articles confuse a16z's first crypto fund, which did well, with the funds that were deployed in 2020/2021). With all that said, a16z (and other top VC firms) are at or near the top in the list responsible for inflating the crypto bubble. 1. They weren't aligned with their LPs. The economics fundamentally changed for them as their funds 10x'd in size and they started bringing in $100M+ in management fees. They should have been asking themselves if they could responsibly invest anywhere near this amount in a crypto market with very few real users, but they decided to cash the checks instead. 2. They used social media to promote these tokens to retail and lobbied to reduce barriers for more retail investment. They were more than happy to sign off on plans for their portfolio companies to sell what were basically securities in seed companies to retail investors at orders of magnitude inflated prices. Then, they used their own Twitter accounts and podcast appearances to play up a potemkin digital revolution and raise their next fund, all while retail investors took a bath. 3. Due diligence was universally awful. They might have avoided most of the worst frauds, but plenty of investments were in unsustainable mechanisms where the collapse could have easily have been predicted.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- yunohn 4y ago> I haven't seen a shred of evidence that a16z was mass dumping tokens Why do you assume their entire investment was just tokens? No other possible way to cash out?
- dinkumthinkum 4y agoThey were all good faith efforts? That is an extraordinary claim. How many crypto-scams do we need to see a pattern? I think scam is almost too banal a word; they are complete hucksters taking advantage of naive people (as well as greedy people similar to them). What Axie Infinity brought about in places like the Philippines is just repulsive.
- EGreg 4y ago
- defnotahuman 4y agoIt's just so obvious at this point. I remember Justin Kan's interview[0] about Web3 and gaming, specifically the idea that we'd have NFTs as transferable game assets and instantly thinking "how does this guy not know how dead-in-the-water this idea is?" You'd need collaboration from studios on a level that would test antitrust law in order to make such an idea even remotely realistic. Of course he knows better, but hype machine go brrrrr. 0: https://techcrunch.com/2022/08/08/twitch-founder-justin-kan-on-crypto-web3-video-games-business-model-profit-play-to-earn/ https://techcrunch.com/2022/08/08/twitch-founder-justin-kan-...