Martin Shkreli, also known as “Pharma Bro”, criticized and insulted Ethereum and Vitalik Buterin.Â
Summary
Pharma Bro attacks Vitalik Buterin belittling the ideal of the blockchain trilemma
Shkreli is the former head of Turing Pharmaceuticals, known for raising the price of the toxoplasmosis drug Daraprim by 5,000% and being convicted of securities fraud in 2017.Â
On 18 May, he was released from prison and began speaking out against Ethereum in particular, after claiming that he learned how to trade on Uniswap while in prison. He also claimed to have received unspecified benefits in prison for giving advice on Bitcoin to prison guards.Â
During his participation in a Twitter space yesterday, he heavily insulted the creators of a cryptocurrency in his name, and then also lashed out at Ethereum and Vitalik Buterin.Â
In particular, he lashed out at the concept of the blockchain trilemma, i.e. the idea that decentralized networks must necessarily make trade-offs between security, scalability and decentralization.
According to Shkreli, Algorand founder Silvio Micali demonstrated that the trilemma is a mathematically weak idea, and that Buterin resented this demonstration.Â
However, he admitted that Vitalik is a brilliant person.Â
Apparently Shkreli is already gaining quite a following, so much so that the Shkreli Inu token launched a few days ago on Ethereum in his honour generated a trading volume on Uniswap of $1 million in the first 24 hours. Shkreli also claimed to have received half of the Shkreli Inu tokens created, but denied having created them himself.
He also called NFT collections “retarded”, and that Web3 is just a good word for marketing that has no real meaning.Â
Finally, he stated that he does not care about anything he has done in the past and that he is still convinced that high drug prices are morally acceptable because most Americans have health insurance that can pay for them.
Martin Shkreli makes his way into the blockchain world by attracting the attention of the community
At a time when discontent and fear reign in the crypto market, Shkreli is likely to become an online reference point in particular for all those who harbour resentment against Ethereum, NFTs, Web3 and other similar initiatives.Â
Curiously, however, he cites Algorand as a reference point, thus revealing that he is not a true Bitcoin maximalist.Â
It has to be said that Shkreli cannot be considered a true cryptocurrency expert, but at best only a well-known person who uses his notoriety to gain acceptance in the crypto sector. Surely Vitalik Buterin himself is much more of an expert than he is.Â
At the moment, he does not yet appear to have an official personal Twitter profile, but it is possible to imagine that if his very strong and hype-generating statements are successful, he will probably open one.Â