IOTA and the Sewer: Crypto-currencies Exchanges
b) a glaring hypocrisy on the part of the exchanges. Unregulated, manipulated markets – if you, for example, truly believe that Tether has $4,039,892,173 USD in the bank as their cash reserves, than I wish you all the best with your Ðogecoin investment; I truly can’t sell you the Eiffel tower, your own investment is much more entertaining – are rife with fraud. In the murky waters those with power can do whatever they want. In March of 2018, the Business Insider published an investigation, titled “Crypto exchanges are charging up to $1 million per ICO to list tokens” (link). While listing your company on a “real” stock markets comes with a price, you know that price and are obligated to disclose it, The Sewer is not regulated so no one really knows what is needed for a coin/token to be listed and what the process of listing the token truly entails. IOTA in between rock and a hard place IOTA, being a regulated not-for-profit in Germany, that is as we write undergoing an audit process and is due to report its finances after September 4, 2019 (one year after being registered; we do not know how much time they have to report, a month, three more, but it is due soon) can not pay, what is legally a bribe, in order to be listed. We have no information about any potential discussion IOTA Foundation is having with any of the exchanges but things are pretty obvious. In prior times, the fact IOTA’s Tangle is not a blockchain and is therefore difficult to list was used as an excuse for it was apparently “very hard” for those exchanges to implement whatever they needed to implement in order to properly list IOTA. And herein we see the real problem of being associated with The Sewer: IOTA, being aware of the issues their different tech creates for the exchanges went out of their way and created a whole new IOTA Hub, a way of integrating the Hub into a cryptocurrency exchange(s). And yet, nothing has happened; the IOTA is still being shunned by the most of the exchanges. The tech was clearly not a reason for not listing IOTA; it was a balderdash excuse for the bribe to be extorted from the IOTA Foundation. So, where to go from here, if you’re the IF? Nowhere it seems, as long as you want to navigate the Sewer’s polluted waters honestly and transparently. In order to create the Hub, IOTA had to invest time and money. This also wastes enormous working and emotional energy, to work hard but to be blackmailed, if this is the case, or simply ignored and blacklisted in the best case scenario. (no one is a thief in the Sewer, they all work honestly for the benefit of the poor and for the revolution) It’s a vicious cycle — if IOTA is not listed, i.e. if it is not visible, it can’t gain trust it deserves. On the contrary, unlike Ðogecoin, IOTA is de-facto not endorsed by the leaders “in the blockchain revolution” and as such, again unlike the Ðogecoin or the BTC fork LTC or so many other projects, it is not a part of the “revolution.” This creates a negative feedback loop and a Sewer’s encouraged mud slinging against it. At the moment, IOTA is drowning in The Sewer and is slowly being suffocated. Moreover, given the value of the token that does not reflect IOTA’s enormous potential, its asset is being devaluated and the solvency of the whole project might be jeopardized by The Sewer’s nefarious treatment of it. Yes, the IOTA Foundation has been aware of it for a long time and has already received a grant of the EU Commission for “IOTA and the European smart city consortium +CityxChange” in the amount of 20,000,000.00 EUR, to mention only one grant. Needles to say, the IOTA Foundation is already creating its own revenue streams so The Sewer’s negative impact might not be that severe on the long run. Having said that, the extreme wickedness with which the “revolutionaries” are treating IOTA are seriously damaging its reputation and are turning the whole niche into, well, a sewer of dishonesty. Being also subjected to libelous, vicious lies, no one can’t say IOTA has not been harmed and that its investors are not bleeding the money. This fact creates another negative loop. Barking from the echo chambers sends a clear message: “Our forks of the fork are making us profit while your own is losing yours,” and that’s it. No one gives a damn about real progress, tech or about a monumental efforts the IOTA Foundation and all it members are putting into a truly revolutionary idea/project and The Sewer keeps smugly reeking of the crooks’ triumph. It is unlikely the Reddit censorship or Twitter trolling, even the exchanges obvious boycotting of IOTA (a shame that would for sure outlive them), put a dent into the IOTA’s progress. But at this point in time The Sewer drains the energy out of the IOTA Foundation and out of its community. This is a serious issue. We think a “pressure” on the exchanges would be another waste of energy; they has shown us that they don’t give a damn, so why bother? IOTA is a protocol for the future Machine 2 Machine economy, the Industry 4.0 and it is deeply involved with development of smart cities and smart energy all over the world. If it’s successful, it will be a part of a whole new world, a whole new thriving, exciting economy. Does it really need The Sewer? Would it not be better to seriously ponder the idea of decoupling from it and find a way to, as for a profit subsidiary or whatever (it is very easy to find a proper regulatory path) finds its way into the grown-up world where it belongs? The questions are rhetorical. # # # # UPDATE: On August 6, 2019 we’ve sent two identical e-mails to Jesse Powell, CEO of Kraken and to Bill Sahara, CEO of Bittrex. Mr. Powell’s automated response asks for $100.00 in order to reply. We’re not going to pay him for a comment that is for the public good but if someone wants to do it, here’s the way: https://earn.com/jespow/
Disclaimer (1): We do not mean to single out Kraken and Bittrex; Coinbase is listing LTC, a BTC’s lazy fork whose purpose we’ve never been able to grasp; Gemini does the same and it has also listed that Bitcoin Cash thing, a Roger Ver’s BTC bastard version; Poloniex lists “GRIN” another bloody joke, a “mimblewimble blockchain,” and yet, no one of those exchanges lists IOTA. The same stays with the Ðogecoin; we used it as an obvious joke anyone can get in an instant. This shows a grotesque situation The Sewer had put the IOTA in.
Disclaimer (2): We own only a minuscule amount of IOTA. Back in 2017 we wanted to produce a IOTA – The Paradigm Shift documentary with the profits IOTA has generously provided us with (we were lucky and sold it almost at the peak, at $4.87) but no one of the IOTA’s “big four” (Dom, David, Serguei, Sergey) replied to our emails, snail-mails or messages. Truth to be told, Dr. Popov, to whom our editor in chief sent a snail-mail with some uber-fast provider from Berlin, received the said mail three months after the editor had already left São Paulo. Dr. Popov replied very kindly but than it was too late, the editor was already in New Zealand and thereafter in Kenya and so forth. Than he, our editor, has also used the IOTA profits for a twice around-the-world trip and funded the time he used to write a book.
