BitClout

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BitClout is an open source cryptocurrency project and social media platform where users can buy and sell "creator coins" based on people's reputations;^[1][2] these creator coins are non-fungible tokens ^[3] On the platform, users can also post short-form writings and photos (similarly to Twitter) and award money to posts they particularly like by clicking a diamond icon (similarly to Twitch Bits).^[4] The platform's primary leader is known as "diamondhands".^[4] The platform launched in March 2021 with 15,000 "reserved" accounts for celebrities on Twitter to prevent impersonation.^[1][4]

On 12 June 2021, the supply of BitClout was capped at ~10.8 million coins,^[4][5][6] in what diamondhands called "the Deflation Bomb".^[5]

As of July 2021, BitClout's open-source Rosetta API implementation is live.^{[7][better source needed]}

History[]

A BitClout post by the user @dogey describing the platform.

In early March 2021, about fifty investors received links to a password-protected website with the BitClout white paper.^[4] They were encouraged to explore the site and send the same link to "two or three other 'trusted contacts'".^[4] Within weeks^[when?], users were spending millions of dollars per day^[quantify] on the platform.^[4] The platform's founders were "completely unprepared", having planned to have a "soft-launch", but decided to keep the platform up anyways.^[4]

On 24 March 2021, BitClout launched out of private beta.^[1] Early investors include Sequoia Capital, Andreessen Horowitz, the venture capital firm Social Capital, Coinbase Ventures, Winklevoss Capital Management, Alexis Ohanian, TQ Ventures, Arrington Capital, Polychain, Pantera, Digital Currency Group (CoinDesk’s parent company), Huobi, and Variant.^[1]

On 26 April 2021, diamondhands announced that the "BitClout Exchange Listing API" had gone live; as of that date, BitClout developers were working on integrating it with Coinbase's Rosetta standard to enable the cryptocurrency to be listed on Coinbase.^{[8][better source needed]} As of July 2021, BitClout's open-source Rosetta API implementation is live.^{[7][better source needed]}

On 12 June 2021, the supply of BitClout was capped at ~10.8 million coins^[4][6] (consisting of the then-current supply of ~11M coins as well as the ~275k coins to be mined in the next 30 years^{[5][better source needed]}), in what diamondhands called the "Deflation Bomb" and "the most deflationary event in BitClout history".^[5][6] From this point, coin value is determined by supply and demand.^[4]

On 18 July 2021, BitClout added the ability for users to mint and purchase NFTs within the platform.^[9]

Overview[]

BitClout is a social media platform; there users can also post short-form writings and photos (similarly to Twitter),^[4] with a 280-character limit for messages, and upload images and videos of size up to 2MB.^[10] They can also award money to posts they particularly like by clicking a diamond icon (similarly to Twitch Bits).^[4] However, users need to use purchased coins in order to interact or repost with messages.^[10]

Top: graph of the BitClout creator coin price curve. Bottom: a tabulated version of the same.

The prices of each account will go up and down with the popularity of the celebrity behind it. For example, if someone says something negative on Twitter, the value of corresponding account may go down.^[11] The platform's founder diamondHands states that this was done "to prevent handle squatting and user impersonation".^[1] This price is computed automatically according to the formula ${\displaystyle price\_in\_bitclout=.003*creator\_coins\_in\_circulation^{2}}$.^{[12][better source needed]}

BitClout scraped 15000 profiles of celebrities from Twitter to create "reserved" accounts in their name, allowing the platform to raise money off of their likeness without their knowledge or consent.^{[1][13][14][15]} To claim a reserved account, the account holder will need to tweet about it (which serves as a marketing strategy).^[13] As of April 2021, about 80^{[quantify][needs update]} profiles have been claimed.^[16] Notable people who have joined BitClout include:

• Pamela Anderson^[17]
• Sigil Wen^[4]
• Matt James^[4]
• JVCKJ^[13][who?]
• Kygo^[13]
• Aryan Sharma^[18]
• Tiffany Ariana Trump^[16]

Controversies[]

The development team has made concerted efforts to remain anonymous. The CEO is anonymous and answers by the name "Diamondhands" on the platform.^[11] However, it is widely believed^{[by whom?]} that diamondhands is the former Google software engineer Nader al-Naji.^{[4][speculation?]} In fact, New York Magazine reported that Nader al-Naji had pitched BitClout's own investors under his real name and began posting job listings for a "new operation" in the fall of 2020.^[13]

During its initial launch, BitClout could not be independently mined and the source code was not published, leading to claims of decentralization being disputed. BitClout coins could only be bought with Bitcoin, but could not be sold on the platform.^{[19][20][unreliable source?]} Users could only sell on sites like Discord servers or Twitter threads.^[20] However, on 18 May 2021, diamondhands announced that 100% of the BitClout code went public,^[21] and the code for BitClout.com became available on GitHub.^[22]

Some people with reserved accounts have actively tried to distance themselves from the BitClout platform. For example, in March 2021, law firm Anderson Kill P.C. sent Nader al-Naji, the presumed leader of the BitClout platform, a cease-and-desist letter, demanding the removal of Brandon Curtis's account and alleging that BitClout violated sections 1798 and 3344 of the California Civil Code by using Curtis's name and likeness without his consent.^[13][23][16] Curtis also tweeted, "Adopting Bitcoin's aesthetic to raise VC funding to carry out unethical and blatantly illegal schemes like BitClout: not cool".^[23] (However, Curtis's coin, despite not being listed on the official website, can still be bought by users searching for the original username.^[16]) Additionally, in April 2021, Lee Hsien Loong asked for his name and photograph to be removed from the site, stating that he has "nothing to do with the platform" and that "it is misleading and done without [his] permission".^[24]

A single bitcoin wallet related to BitClout^[which?] has received more than $165M^[quantify] worth of deposits.^[1]

References[]