Last Week Tonight host John Oliver recently made a cryptocurrencies and blockchain focused video and had a few things to say about the EOS project from block.one. But there are a few key things John and his research team forgot to tell you about EOS. Before I mention what those things are let me just give you my brief perspective on John Oliver.
I love John Oliver. He is a brilliant satirist and as a part-time satirist myself I have always enjoyed his work. In fact John's buddy Stephen Colbert is mentioned in my satire website Total Nonsense News' Editor's Note. When I wrote it I had to choose between John and Stephen. I chose Stephen because despite delivering several outstanding episodes and satire sketches every once in a while John tends to miss out on reporting key facts.
This is important to mention because I have always felt that John's work on Last Week Tonight is an attempt at offering a critique of serious issues using satire. While Colbert's approach is to simply mock the living daylights out of his subjects with little focus on facts. I like both approaches but as someone who has been writing satire myself I have always felt that if you are going to take the John Oliver approach you have an added responsibility of not fucking up with your research precisely because you are trying to tackle serious issues in a satirical format.
So in this 25 minute long episode titled "Cryptocurrencies" John Oliver tries to offer a fair and honest critique of the crypto space. I have to say that when talking about the overall scams in the crypto space and considering the fact that this is a satire show, John did pretty well. His observations about cryptocurrency scams and the many weird crypto projects are spot on. And the bit about Bitconnect.. well how could you not talk about Bitconnect? If I was writing that episode I would have certainly added two more minutes of Bitconnect to the show. That was hillarious and bang on the money.
The full episode is linked here if you would like to see it.
And then John moved to EOS, block.one, and Brock Pierce. He pointed out that block.one has raised over 1.5 billion dollars. He also quotes The Wall Street Journal piece in which WSJ describe block.one as a software company that plans to sell no software and its digital tokens as having "no purpose". John then goes on to point out that EOS hasn't even launched yet and you just have to take their (block.one's) word for it.
All of these points are true except there is more to it then perhaps John's team and John himself are capable of grasping. Sorry, John, I wasn't aware that you had a background in asymmetric cryptography and distributed consensus algorithms - you know, the fancy computer terms.
At this point LWT starts playing some Brock Pierce clips and attempt to portray Pierce as the face of EOS. This is when things derailed in what was up to that point, in my view, a very fun episode.
The problem here is that while words like "bitcoin", "blockchain", and "cryptocurrencies" have got a lot of attention in the mainstream media, especially over the last 12 months or so, the philosophical, political, and even ideological concepts of decentralization, distributed governance mechanisms, and the many aspects of token tech have not gotten as much mainstream attention as we in the crypto community would like.
This is precisely why someone like John Oliver or the WSJ are not able to accurately point out exactly what companies like block.one are trying to do.
John Oliver forgot to tell you that:
The rules and regulations around the entire crypto space are so incredibly vague that in my view companies like block.one just have to make statements like - the tokens "do not have any rights, uses, purpose, attributes, functionalities or features." Just because governments and regulators are slow to learn new technology, entrepreneurs and innovators cannot be expected to sit on their bums and wait for those jolly old folks to understand what's good!
So if the United States is going to take 3 years to form innovation friendly regulations around an entire industry then the next Steve Wozniaks and Bill Gates have no choice but to move outside unfriendly regulatory environments and issue statements that may appear to some people as vague. If you asked me, regulators around the world are more vague on crypto then block.one's "no purpose" tokens.
EOS has already launched its testnet and developers are already using the testnet to build their projects on top of the EOS platform. EOSindex.io lists the current projects and the various stages they are in. So to imply that because the EOS mainnet hasn't launched yet, the entire EOS platform itself is vaporware is simply not true, John. You don't have to take block.one's word for it. You can already find several third parties mentioned on EOSindex that are utilizing the EOS platform. The fact that there are serious projects and teams eager to get the early mover advantage on the EOS platform by working on the testnet is actually evidence that contradicts John Oliver's remarks.
Brock Pierce sounds like a fun but weird dude. I have heard people describe me as weird - because I use Physics as a framework for solving life's problems or because I think video games and books are fucking awesome - so I totally understand why someone who looks (the cowboy hats are alright IMO) and sounds a little different then what conventional wisdom would suggest is taken to be a weirdo. Personally, I like what Brock is doing in the crypto space but I am not a fan and Brock Pierce is certainly not the first name that comes to my mind when someone says EOS.
We are on the Steem blockchain. Ask yourself what is the first name that came to people's mind when you heard Steem or Steemit when it first launched? What is the first name that comes to your mind when you hear EOS? If you are a company exploring whether or not you should choose EOS over Ethereum for your project at the moment, what is the first name that comes to your mind? If you are a respectable media outlet and you want to learn and talk about EOS, what name would show up in your "serious research" who can give you an accurate picture of EOS?
For me and for most people I know, the answer to all of those questions is Dan Larimer.
You would think John Oliver's team would know that anyone who deserves to be the face of EOS are the people who are building EOS and that's Dan Larimer, Brendan Blumer, and their block.one development team. So why would John Oliver and LWT focus on Brock instead of Dan when talking about EOS? I don't think there is a conspiracy theory here though I would like to hear what people reading this have to say about that.
To my mind the answer is rather simple but worth mentioning. If you are doing a satire piece on something you would choose a colorful personality willing to say supposedly weird things in public and willing to be misunderstood over a freaking genius whose technical language and measured words are surely not the perfect fit for a satire piece. No disrespect to Brock but personally, I prefer listening to Dan Larimer, Vitalik Buterin, and Nick Szabo over Brock Pierce any day. And anyone interested in actually learning how the crypto space truly works should be listening to computer scientists like Szabo and innovators like Vitalik, Dan etc.
By choosing not to focus on Dan, John Oliver chose to omit several key facts and rendered what was a good episode useless through sloppy research and even sloppier presentation of the EOS project.
If you are new to the crypto space or the Steem blockchain and don't know enough about Dan Larimer, here are a few facts that John Oliver would have had to include in his episode had he chosen to talk about Dan.
Dan Larimer was one of the two key people behind BitShares, which was a disruptive concept for its time as the first real attempt at a truly decentralized asset exchange (think decentralized NYSE).
Dan Larimer was one of the two key people behind Steemit and the technical brain behind the Steem blockchain. We have all heard about the potential of blockchain technology but how many people have built highly scalable blockchains? I will give you a hint: it's not my former employers IBM or Microsoft - the two tech giants who are involved in the blockchain space, so to speak. Okay that wasn't much of a hint so I will come right to the point. Steem is by far the most successful blockchain ever.
Just how successful is Steem? Well if you combined the number of transactions in a 24 hour period on the two most famous blockchains - the bitcoin blockchain and the ethereum blockchain and multiplied that sum by 2 you would get (slightly more) then the number of transactions on the Steem blockchain in the same period. And there are a ton of other statistics you can explore on your own on Blocktivity.
Screenshot from Blocktivity
Talking about Dan would have taken away from the underlying theme of the LWT cryptocurrency episode. The underlying theme of the episode wasn't a careful examination of cryptocurrencies. Rather, it was an attempt at discrediting cryptocurrencies at any cost because that would appeal to their audience at the moment. I say at the moment because looking at the way EOS is progressing on the technical front I have a feeling this episode would end up making John Oliver and his research team or his writers look incredibly out of sync with the current trends in technology.
Also, John, why would you even begin to compare Google Glass, a niche product, with the crypto space - a collection of technologies that cross over to many industries?
Perhaps, you need a better informed satirist on your team, John. I am free this upcoming weekend. #JustSayin
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And here is the problem with Steemit. A very thoughtful article and it's only earned $2.50 in just over 2 hours. Voted and resteemed and added you to my steemvoter account.
Thank you. I appreciate it very much. Following you.
Agreed
$2.50 buys a decent meal in a lot of places including my home-thailand. just saying
It also buys a couple of games of darts in the states, or 1 STEEM, or a bag of chips, or a ....
And now it is up to $60 with 4 days left!
Excellent write up. Thanks for pointing it out, @billbutler. Voted and followed.
Thank you. Glad you liked it. Following you :)
All American mainstream news is presented with such bias, its just that those of us that have followed EOS and Dan's other projects know this is not the same as BitConnect. Oliver's job wasn't to dig deeper, it was to create humor regardless of accuracy.
Although Brock Pierce is not helping himself or EOS given his prior accusations, with his sleeveless shirts, cowboy hats and showing his less than conventional wedding into what should be a professional presentation. We get it...you are from LA and you think you're cool / hip etc...but if you've been accused of crimes against kids, wear a f-ing shirt with sleeves and take the hat off when you are representing a company that is going to change the world...if EOS blows up and these guys become even more famous, all this is going to get used against him/them. They need a better PR firm.
I predicted to my wife awhile back ago that at some point, he will have to leave the project because his value will be outgrown by his liability...go ahead, keep painting a target on your back.
(I've been long EOS since August)
Brock is gone according to EOS official response to the Oliver piece:
https://medium.com/eosio/dear-john-oliver-6aa5ac5fff26
Personally, I am relieved Brock is gone, his past is morally dubious and just like Facebook got rid of Sean Parker for his morally dubious behaviour, Brock had to go from BlockOne. He is not a good look for EOS. Dan Lahimer has an impeccable reputation and he doesn't need it tainted by someone with pedophilia allegations being closely associated with him and his dream project.
I had not yet seen this. Thanks for the heads up...it is/was only a matter of time. If the accusations weren’t true it’s a shame for him. But in this day and age, it’s guilty until proven innocent.
I liked the John Oliver piece, and I took all his jabs at EOS in good fun. Though it's funny, while I was watching it, I didn't stop to think about how people who don't know about crypto would see it... They'll come away from it thinking that EOS and BitConnect are in the same category.
That's funny, but I suppose the people who take that too seriously weren't likely to invest anyway. For those who care to research, it's just free publicity.
Thanks for posting.
Yeah. Though I have noticed that it (the episode) did make people who are on the fence about investing in crypto a little more cautious (which is a good thing overall I think). A friend of mine who was sort of planning to invest in eth and EOS in April now says he will wait a few months to invest in EOS after watching John Oliver lol. To each their own I guess.
I think the best thing for someone in that position is, just put in a little bit, so they can take it slow.
Agreed.
I saw the segment and thought his rant on EOS was funny but probably not in the way his writers thought. I look forward to watching it again when EOS launches. People should do their own research when it comes to crypto and in this case what he is doing is keeping away the uninformed speculators. Which is probably a good thing. Nice writeup.
Thank you.
Agreed with your comments! EOS is probably one of the best things to happen to the crypto space since Ethereum. The launch of EOS will be a catalyst to take the blockchain and Crypto space to the next level come this summer.
Agreed. EOS is one of the most promising projects to watch out for this year.
You're right. EOS is great and will grow this year, but making fun on Brock Pierce is easy because he's quite a character. He is doing good work with EOS but we need to be able to laugh at ourselves. It's completely okay.
Totally agree. I don't think Brock himself would mind that video. He seems like a fun guy to me. And I should have mentioned that line in the post "we need to be able to laugh at ourselves". I just wanted to highlight that it's easy to make fun of someone who is willing to be misunderstood which is what John Oliver did but taking EOS' name in the same breath as Bitconnect was poor form I think lol. My satire site is full of me making fun of myself :D
That's why I love Steemit. We can cali out even the most popular personality to straighten the record for people and get rewarded for it.
Followed, Upped and resteemed. Superb article, although I don't agree that Oliver & company had any intentions of being fair and balanced. I thought it was an anti-libertarian hit piece, picking on some low hanging fruit. I look forward to playing the clip back though, when EOS blows up and Oliver has more egg on his smug, corrupt face.
Thank you. I also look forward to revisiting this episode in March 2020 :D
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Ultimately everyone has to make their own mind up about blockchain and crypto currency. It seems those who truly do not understand it are the loudest and most critical.
I think EOS is a fascinating project. And I love hearing about Dan talk about what the future holds for this tech. Exciting times.
The more detractors there are, the more opportunities I have to stack more coins. So talk all you want John. Eventually you will be all “last week”
Great article. I was thinking similar things about John Oliver's bit. It's so misleading to talk about EOS without mentioning Dan Larimer and his incredible track record for building successful blockchains.
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Thanks.
Wow! You got upvote from Dan Larimer 😱... EOS to the moon!
EOS could be the next Google! -John Oliver-
Last Week Tonights take on cryptocurrencies was in general rather fair and balanced, except the EOS part. I mean if you want to make fun of hyped ICOs from last summer Tezos and what happened after their ICO would be (IMHO) a much better target.
One thing I was missing was Ethereum: to me it seemed a little odd that it wasn't mentioned, since it is currently the number 2 cryptocurrency and trying to achieve something similar to EOS. And speaking of which, it was never really mentioned what EOS actually is and what block.one tries to achieve with it, instead EOS was portrait as a collection of buzzwords.
Also omitting Dan Larimer and his previous projects gives the impression that Last Week Tonight is sacrificing depth and journalistic integrity for cheap laughs (the same can be said for their recent bit about the Italian election or an older one about Laibach in North Korea).
Sure, John Oliver is a satirist and not a journalist, but if you give facts why stopping halfway and only painting a distorted picture, when you are trying to give the impression that you are painting the full picture.
This "distorted picture" was completely intentional. That show is politically biased.
I am aware of that, and that's why I was a bit surprised, that the fist parts of their take on cryptocurrencies were rather fair, balanced and well researched. For the part about EOS this stopped.
That's a good summary of the LWT episode. And as someone who has dabbled in satire for close to a decade, I agree with your last paragraph 100%.
You've earned yourself a new follower! Great response!
Thank you :)
Just jokes! Thanks to them for a very good publicity.
Haha.. I guess you are right.. all publicity is good publicity. EOS on HBO :D
and don't forget--as a serious challenger to ETH, EOS will be the target of a lot fud via eth trolls
My Best coin <3
I can't bring myself to watch late night "comedy" anymore. Just saying rude things about Trump for an hour is not actually satire.
nice post sir
Dan Larimer is why I invested in EOS, I have complete faith in him