David Gerard (author)

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David Gerard
David-gerard-libra-shrugged-arkady-rose (cropped).jpg
Gerard in 2020
Born1966or1967(age 56–57) [1]
Perth, Western Australia [2]
OccupationIT systems administrator [3]
Known for
  • Cryptocurrency criticism
  • Wikipedia volunteering
Notable work
  • Attack of the 50-foot Blockchain (2017)
  • Libra Shrugged (2020)
SpouseRose Gerard
Website davidgerard.co.uk

David Gerard (born 1966/67) is an Australian IT systems administrator, [3] [4] finance author and Wikipedia volunteer, best known as a cryptocurrency sceptic and commentator on cryptocurrencies, non-fungible tokens (NFTs), and related blockchain technologies. [5] He is the author of the cryptocurrency books Attack of the 50-foot Blockchain (2017), [6] and Libra Shrugged (2020). [7]

Contents

Criticism of cryptocurrency

Gerard has expressed sceptical views on cryptocurrencies, NFTs, and blockchain technologies. [8]

Advocacy

In 2018, Gerard was consulted by the Treasury Select Committee in the Parliament of the United Kingdom during its inquiry into crypto-assets, [9] and his evidence was cited in the committee's final report. [10] His works have been cited in various academic papers and journals on cryptocurrencies and related blockchain technologies. [11]

In 2022, Gerard was interviewed on both 60 Minutes Australia about the dangers of cryptocurrencies and the bursting of the cryptocurrency bubble [12] [13] and on CNN Business about the dangers of the bubble in non-fungible tokens in the United States. [14] Gerard is interviewed in the 2021 Canadian documentary film Dead Man's Switch: A Crypto Mystery , about the collapse of Canadian cryptocurrency firm, QuadrigaCX, in 2018 and 2019. [15]

Gerard's stance against cryptocurrencies has attracted the ire of parts of the cryptocurrency community, including being labelled as "the most intellectually dishonest man in the crypto universe". [16] [17] Gerard has won public support from prominent financial commentators, such as in 2021 when US investor Mike Burry changed his Twitter image to a quote from Attack of the 50-foot Blockchain: "NFTs exist so that the crypto grifters can have a new kind of magic bean to sell for actual money, and pretend they're not selling magic beans." [18] [19]

Books

In 2017, Gerard released his first book, Attack of the 50-foot Blockchain, [20] which criticises cryptocurrency for, among other reasons, its energy cost and the high number of exchange hacks. [21] Gerard details technological issues with the infrastructure of blockchain applications, including smart contracts, which he describes as neither smart nor legal contracts. Parts of the book are dedicated to debunking claims made by cryptocurrency advocates; for example, he provides evidence that bitcoin has not dispensed with the malfeasance present in traditional banks and markets or helped people rise out of poverty. [22]

Sue Halpern described the book in The New York Review of Books as "a sober riposte to all the upbeat forecasts about cryptocurrency". [21] Martin Walker of the London School of Economics Business Review called the book "the first real, 'no holds barred', attack on the whole bitcoin/cryptocurrency/blockchain movement". [22] Regarding the cryptocurrency bubble, the BBC said, "Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain is a very convincing takedown of the whole phenomenon." [23] In the American Book Review , Aaron Jaffe recommended it alongside David Golumbia's Politics of Bitcoin: Software as Right-Wing Extremism. [24]

In 2020, [7] Gerard released his second book, Libra Shrugged. [25] The book explores Facebook's aborted attempt to create Libra, a cryptocurrency, and discussed reactions to it from central banks. [26]

Wikipedia editing

Gerard has been active as a Wikipedia volunteer since the encyclopedia's early days, [27] and is one of the administrators on the project. [28] At various times he has volunteered and acted as a spokesman for Wikipedia [29] for various news media outlets, including appearing on Newsnight , [30] speaking with BBC News, [1] and others. [31] [32] [33]

Personal life

Gerard lives in Greater London with his wife and child. [34] [4]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bitcoin</span> Decentralized digital currency

Bitcoin is the first decentralized cryptocurrency. Nodes in the peer-to-peer bitcoin network verify transactions through cryptography and record them in a public distributed ledger, called a blockchain, without central oversight. Consensus between nodes is achieved using a computationally intensive process based on proof of work, called mining, that requires increasing quantities of electricity and guarantees the security of the bitcoin blockchain.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cryptocurrency</span> Digital currency not reliant on a central authority

A cryptocurrency, crypto-currency, or crypto is a digital currency designed to work as a medium of exchange through a computer network that is not reliant on any central authority, such as a government or bank, to uphold or maintain it.

Coinbase Global, Inc., branded Coinbase, is an American publicly traded company that operates a cryptocurrency exchange platform. Coinbase is a distributed company; all employees operate via remote work. It is the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the United States in terms of trading volume. The company was founded in 2012 by Brian Armstrong and Fred Ehrsam. In May 2020, Coinbase announced it would shut its San Francisco, California, headquarters and change operations to remote-first, part of a wave of several major tech companies closing headquarters in San Francisco in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of bitcoin</span>

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vitalik Buterin</span> Canadian programmer (born 1994)

Vitaly Dmitrievich Buterin, better known as Vitalik Buterin, is a Canadian computer programmer and co-founder of Ethereum. Buterin became involved with cryptocurrency early in its inception, co-founding Bitcoin Magazine in 2011. In 2014, Buterin deployed the Ethereum blockchain with Gavin Wood, Charles Hoskinson, Anthony Di Iorio, and Joseph Lubin.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ethereum</span> Open-source blockchain computing platform

Ethereum is a decentralized blockchain with smart contract functionality. Ether is the native cryptocurrency of the platform. Among cryptocurrencies, ether is second only to bitcoin in market capitalization. It is open-source software.

A decentralized autonomous organization (DAO), sometimes called a decentralized autonomous corporation (DAC), is an organization managed in whole or in part by decentralized computer program, with voting and finances handled through a blockchain. In general terms, DAOs are member-owned communities without centralized leadership. The precise legal status of this type of business organization is unclear.

A blockchain is a distributed ledger with growing lists of records (blocks) that are securely linked together via cryptographic hashes. Each block contains a cryptographic hash of the previous block, a timestamp, and transaction data. Since each block contains information about the previous block, they effectively form a chain, with each additional block linking to the ones before it. Consequently, blockchain transactions are irreversible in that, once they are recorded, the data in any given block cannot be altered retroactively without altering all subsequent blocks.

Monero is a cryptocurrency which uses a blockchain with privacy-enhancing technologies to obfuscate transactions to achieve anonymity and fungibility. Observers cannot decipher addresses trading Monero, transaction amounts, address balances, or transaction histories.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Digital Currency Group</span> American venture capital company

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cardano (blockchain platform)</span> Public blockchain platform

Cardano is a public blockchain platform. It is open-source and decentralized, with consensus achieved using proof of stake. It can facilitate peer-to-peer transactions with its internal cryptocurrency, ADA.

A cryptocurrency wallet is a device, physical medium, program or an online service which stores the public and/or private keys for cryptocurrency transactions. In addition to this basic function of storing the keys, a cryptocurrency wallet more often offers the functionality of encrypting and/or signing information. Signing can for example result in executing a smart contract, a cryptocurrency transaction, identification, or legally signing a 'document'.

A cryptocurrency bubble is a phenomenon where the market increasingly considers the going price of cryptocurrency assets to be inflated against their hypothetical value. The history of cryptocurrency has been marked by several speculative bubbles.

Cryptocurrency and crime describe notable examples of cybercrime related to theft of cryptocurrencies and some methods or security vulnerabilities commonly exploited. Cryptojacking is a form of cybercrime specific to cryptocurrencies that have been used on websites to hijack a victim's resources and use them for hashing and mining cryptocurrency.

Video games can include elements that use blockchain technologies, including cryptocurrencies and non-fungible tokens (NFTs), often as a form of monetization. These elements typically allow players to trade in-game items for cryptocurrency, or represent in-game items with NFTs. A subset of these games are also known as play-to-earn games because they include systems that allow players to earn cryptocurrency through gameplay. Blockchain games have existed since 2017, gaining wider attention from the video game industry in 2021. Several AAA publishers have expressed intent to include this technology in the future. Players, developers, and game companies have criticized the use of blockchain technology in video games for being exploitative, environmentally unsustainable, and unnecessary.

OKX is a global cryptocurrency spot and derivatives exchange and the second biggest crypto exchange by trading volume, serving over 50 million people globally. It was founded by Star Xu in 2017, who is also the CEO as of 2023. The President is Hong Fang and the CMO is Haider Rafique. OKX is owned by OK Group, which also owns the crypto exchange Okcoin.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Non-fungible token</span> Unique and non-interchangeable data

A non-fungible token (NFT) is a unique digital identifier that is recorded on a blockchain and is used to certify ownership and authenticity. It cannot be copied, substituted, or subdivided. The ownership of an NFT is recorded in the blockchain and can be transferred by the owner, allowing NFTs to be sold and traded. NFTs can be created by anybody and require few or no coding skills to create. NFTs typically contain references to digital files such as artworks, photos, videos, and audio. Because NFTs are uniquely identifiable, they differ from cryptocurrencies, which are fungible.

Diem was a permissioned blockchain-based stablecoin payment system proposed by the American social media company Facebook. The plan also included a private currency implemented as a cryptocurrency.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tezos</span> Decentralized open-source blockchain

Tezos is an open-source blockchain that can execute peer-to-peer transactions and serve as a platform for deploying smart contracts. The native cryptocurrency for the Tezos blockchain is the tez. The Tezos network achieves consensus using proof-of-stake. Tezos uses an on-chain governance model that enables the protocol to be amended when upgrade proposals receive a favorable vote from the community. Its testnet was launched in June 2018, and its mainnet went live in September 2018.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Solana (blockchain platform)</span> Public blockchain platform

Solana is a blockchain platform which uses a proof-of-stake mechanism to provide smart contract functionality. Its native cryptocurrency is SOL.

References

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  2. ↑ Salmon, James (13 April 2022). "Cryptocurrency has its fans — and its detractors". The West Australian . Archived from the original on 10 June 2023. Retrieved 10 June 2023. Gerard, a London-based journalist from Perth ..
  3. 1 2 Van Boom, Daniel (13 April 2021). "Beyond Bitcoin: Inside the insane world of altcoin cryptocurrencies". CNET . Archived from the original on 9 March 2023. Retrieved 8 June 2023.
  4. 1 2 Brown, Abram. "Inside The Reddit Forum That Wants To See Bitcoin Die". Forbes. Archived from the original on 25 March 2023. Retrieved 30 May 2023.
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  7. 1 2 Silverman, Jacob; Shure, Natalie; Pareene, Alex (20 April 2021). "Cryptocurrencies Are the Next Frontier for the Surveillance State". The New Republic. ISSN   0028-6583. Archived from the original on 30 May 2023. Retrieved 30 May 2023.
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  11. ↑ "Academic papers: Attack of the 50-Foot Blockchain". davidgerard.co.uk. 2023. Archived from the original on 8 June 2023. Retrieved 8 June 2023.
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  16. ↑ Munster, Ben (8 April 2019). ""Bitcoin is an apocalyptic death cult" — Curry with David Gerard". Decrypt. Archived from the original on 9 June 2023. Retrieved 8 June 2023.
  17. ↑ Munster, Ben (22 January 2020). "Do "no-coiners" gate-keep Crypto Wikipedia?". Decrypt. Archived from the original on 9 June 2023. Retrieved 10 June 2023.
  18. ↑ Graziosi, Graig (16 March 2021). "'Big Short' investor Michael Burry shares quote slamming NFTs as 'magic beans' sold by 'crypto grifters'". The Independent . Archived from the original on 9 June 2023. Retrieved 10 June 2023.
  19. ↑ Mohamed, Theron (16 March 2021). "'Big Short' investor Michael Burry slams NFTs with a quote warning 'crypto grifters' are selling them as 'magic beans'". Business Insider . Archived from the original on 9 June 2023. Retrieved 10 June 2023.
  20. ↑ "Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain: The Book". Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain. 22 April 2017. Archived from the original on 8 June 2023. Retrieved 30 May 2023.
  21. 1 2 Halpern, Sue. "Bitcoin Mania". ISSN   0028-7504. Archived from the original on 7 March 2023. Retrieved 30 May 2023.
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  29. ↑ "Wikipedia child image censored". BBC News . 8 December 2008. Archived from the original on 9 December 2008. Retrieved 30 May 2023.
  30. ↑ Wark, Kirsty (26 August 2009). "Is the philosophy of Wikipedia now dead?". BBC Newsnight . Archived from the original on 9 June 2023. Retrieved 8 June 2023. Kirsty Wark is joined by David Gerard, a Wikipedia Editor, and by Kevin Anderson from the Guardian
  31. ↑ Smith, Catherine (18 December 2007). "Wikipedia blocks users in Lehi neighborhood". Deseret News. Archived from the original on 30 May 2023. Retrieved 30 May 2023.
  32. ↑ "Wikipedia bans posts from Qatar". The Age. 4 January 2007. Archived from the original on 30 May 2023. Retrieved 30 May 2023.
  33. ↑ Sonnenfeld, Daniel (9 February 2021). "IDF asks Wikipedia to edit 'Hezbollah' entry to reflect terror designation". The Jerusalem Post . Archived from the original on 10 June 2023. Retrieved 9 June 2023.
  34. ↑ "About the author". Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain. 8 July 2017. Archived from the original on 30 May 2023. Retrieved 30 May 2023.
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