Jack Dorsey, the co-founder of Twitter, now known as X, has reportedly inadvertently funded a developer with ties to a Brazilian fascist through his $10 million donation to the decentralized social-media protocol Nostr.
What Happened: The recipient of Dorsey’s funding, Giovanni Torres Parra, is a developer who has also created webpages dedicated to spreading the work of far-right conspiracy theorist Olavo de Carvalho, reported Business Insider. Parra’s support for the Brazilian fascist was evident through his webpages, even before the developer was publicly identified.
Parra, who also goes by the pseudonym Fiatjaf, is the founder of Nostr, a decentralized social-media protocol that has a small user base of cryptocurrency and privacy enthusiasts, including Edward Snowden. Dorsey’s funding of Nostr comes at a time when Silicon Valley is experiencing a shift towards right-wing politics, with some tech elites criticizing what they see as excessive censorship and diversity initiatives.
Despite the controversy, Dorsey remains a vocal advocate for Nostr, describing it as a “truly open protocol” with a rapidly evolving development environment. The funding, which included 14 Bitcoins worth approximately $245,000, was provided to a foundation supporting Nostr and directly to Parra.
Parra’s political views, shaped by the laissez-faire Austrian school of economics and his parents’ negative experiences with government regulation in Brazil, led him to create a decentralized protocol as an alternative to Twitter’s increasing censorship. Despite acknowledging the potential for Nostr to attract hate speech due to its decentralized nature, Parra believes that such users are necessary.
Why It Matters: This development adds to the recent controversies surrounding Dorsey. In a previous interview, he revealed his reasons for leaving Bluesky, the decentralized social media platform he co-founded as an alternative to Twitter, now known as X. Dorsey stated that Bluesky was “literally repeating all the mistakes [Twitter] made as a company.”
Despite his efforts with Bluesky and Nostr, Dorsey continues to face criticism as the “face of censorship” at Twitter 1.0. He attributed the core, critical sin that led to Twitter’s censorship issues to the platform’s advertising-based business model. This model, he believes, was the root cause of the censorship problems on Twitter.
Earlier in May, Dorsey’s company, Block Inc. SQ, was addressing a potential Department of Justice investigation into Bitcoin BTC/USD transactions. Dorsey clarified that the company had proactively investigated potential threats in 2022, leading to a thorough review of transactions possibly linked to sanctioned countries.
Photo by Frederic Legrand – COMEO on Shutterstock
This story was generated using Benzinga Neuro and edited by Shivdeep Dhaliwal
© 2024 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.
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