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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   30433 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 21, 2022

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Author, journalist Andrew Ross Sorkin plans to interview SBF on Nov. 30th

https://twitter.com/andrewrsorkin/status/1595517635441090565

SBF confirms

https://twitter.com/SBF_FTX/status/1595512579417378837

Even though SBF limited his replies to only people he follows, he is still getting trashed in his comments. Others are livid as well.

Does SBF deserve a platform despite being presumably a major fugitive? Is this ethical on the part of Sorkin?

Why is SBF still free or at least not in trouble?

Regarding the second item, I am guessing the feds are still in the evidence gathering stage. The feds cannot just issue an arrest unless they have enough evidence to build a case that with a near 100% certainty will lead to a conviction or a plea. Kenneth Lay of Enron for example was indicted in June 2004, nearly 3 years after Enron's bankruptcy.

All establishment sources and authorized establishment underdogs seem committed to frame this primarily as a failure of crypto and not of Bankman-Fried and his cronies; the sentiment on Twitter and HN and in other places is also being amplified in this direction (with bafflingly basic takes like «non-custodial wallets are hard what if I forget my password, this is dangerous for clients», so I guess normies have been primed for the next step in their disempowerment).

Bankman-Fried, being a psychopath of some sort, is committed not to admit blame in any nuanced analysis, he'll apologize pro forma for «fucking up», but when going into details he will blame external forces like CZ, insufficient regulation, crypto bros, whatever, indeed, as per OP's link, he intends to spin such schlock about victory stolen from him in the last minute at Sorkin. So platforming him, and promoting his narrative, is in the establishment's interest, even if in the end he only compromises his own defense.

P.S. Me, not long ago, speculating:

Like they ask you in the Russian prison: there are two chairs. Say, you're a normal rationalist, it's mid-2022, and you want to use an exchange to park some of your crypto in a token. So, there are two major exchanges. ... Using only knowledge provided here, whom would you rather entrust with your money? And what would an Antisemite do?

An Antisemite in June:

"you're hiding uncollateralized loans underneath your floorboards, aren't you?"

Self-custody is better than exchanges but still easy to mess up, such as losing the piece of paper that has your codes, someone accidentally throwing them out, someone copying them and stealing your crypto, etc. You have to anticipate many things that can go wrong. BIP 38 is supposed to mitigate some of these risks, to some extent.

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