Web3 is Going Just Great

The reasoning may have just become clear, as Cronje published a blog post titled "The rise and fall of crypto culture" in which he wrote, "Crypto culture has strangled crypto ethos... I now more than ever see the need, or even necessity for regulation, not as a mechanism to prevent, but as a mechanism to protect. Its like a child trying to stick their finger into a electric outlet, you stop them, before they can learn why they shouldn't. One day they will understand, but not today." He remained optimistic about the prospects of crypto if regulation is introduced: "We will see the rise of a new blockchain economy, not one driven by greed, but instead driven by trust, not trustlessness."

Not everyone was impressed by his apparent change in tune. Twitter user 0xCana wrote, "andre cronje with the gigagrift walking away with over 1 billion dollars generated from crypto and then exits the space, rails against 'get rich quick mentalities' and advocates for strict regulations and then founds an investment banking company. incredible."

Estimated damages to the project were higher than the amount the hacker was able to take for themselves — around $182 million. The $BEAN token, once pegged to $1, dropped to nearly 0. The project creator wrote in the Discord, "We are fucked. This project has not had any venture backing, so it is highly unlikely there is any sort of bail out coming." However, they were later slightly more optimistic, writing, "it may also be the start of something good... there may be a path forward. We don't want to comment on next steps until that path is at least visible to us" while reiterating that a bail-out was "highly unlikely". They also told members of their community that they had contacted the FBI about the theft.

Following the publication of the BuzzFeed article on April 16, the Gem Discord erupted in anger — apparently discovering for the first time that Gem had known Thompson's real identity for quite a lot longer than they had let on. Some members accused the team of lying and trying to cover up who Thompson was, demanding the team explain themselves. The Gem Discord bot was subsequently configured to block links to BuzzFeed.com, so people couldn't post the exposé article.

Crypto culture has embraced pseudonymity to such an enormous degree that not only is it common for everyday traders to cloak their identities behind wallet addresses or pseudonyms, but for founders and prominent members of major projects to do so as well. This is not the first time this has enabled deception, such as in the case where a chief developer of a defi project later being unmasked as a man with a history of financial crimes and other shadiness.

Reception to the project was swift and overwhelmingly negative. Even the biggest Archie fans who already populated the existing Archie Comics Discord (which saw the addition of crypto channels on the day of the announcement) seemed largely unhappy with the news, and a plan to migrate to their own server free from the NFT and crypto chat was quickly hatched.