Bitcoin Evangelist Has Podcast Go Bad, Threatens To Sue After It's Posted
from the that's-not-how-it-works dept
Folks in the Bitcoin/blockchain world can be fairly opinionated -- that's no surprise. But just because you have an interview go sideways, it doesn't mean you get to threaten a lawsuit over it. That's not how it works. Perianne Boring founded and runs a lobbying organization focused on Bitcoin/blockchain issues called the Chamber of Digital Commerce. I have to admit to not being that familiar with the organization (I'm more familiar with another organization called Coin Center). However, late last week, Boring appeared on a podcast called Bitcoin Uncensored. To say the interview did not go well... would be an understatement.Not surprisingly, the interview doesn't go over well. They close it out by highlighting that she doesn't appear to understand a number of issues related to Bitcoin/blockchains, and they worry about what happens when people think she represents the technology and the regulatory questions. They point out that there are tons of scams in the space, and they worry that when someone represents the space and can't understand what's a scam and what's legit, it can lead to very bad results overall.
Fine. That kind of thing happens. People give bad interviews with people who are deliberately trying to make them look foolish. It doesn't necessarily mean they really are foolish, just that they got caught in such an interview. What happens next is where things go weird. Boring apparently emailed one of the hosts of the show, Chris DeRose, to demand he take down the episode. Like so many people who are angry about content online, she trots out all the ridiculous reasons why:
@PerianneDC @PaulStrauss @ChamberDigital Streisand effect? pic.twitter.com/FBOm7YkVJG
— Chris DeRose (@derosetech) June 17, 2016
Incredibly disappointed by what happened today. Please delete the episode (link referenced below) immediately -- you are not authorized to publish this content. A cease and desist letter is forthcoming, and charges of harassment and slander will follow if you do not comply.Yeah, so that's not how any of this works. She clearly agreed to go on the program, so there's no "authorization" needed to publish the interview. Publishing her own interview is also neither harassment nor slander. She does get credit for being correct that "slander" is the word for defamatory speech (whereas it's libel if it's written), but having listened to the entire interview, I don't hear anything that comes even remotely close to slander. They do mock her, and are perhaps a little harsh, but it's not slander. And, of course, threatening them only makes this worse. I never would have heard about any of this if she hadn't sent such a bogus threat email, and now it's getting more attention because of it. There's a term for that somewhere...
I actually think it's good that there are people working to educate politicians on Bitcoin and blockchain technologies. I'm not nearly as skeptical as the guys who run the podcast are of the technology, though I agree that there are lots of questions about where it will go and if it will ultimately be as useful as some expect. I also recognize that sometimes interviews can go weird and not come out the way people expect. But to react by demanding it be taken down and waving around bogus legal threats doesn't seem particularly productive, and only seems likely to call into greater question Boring's other claims.
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Filed Under: bitcoin, defamation, perianne boring, podcast, slander, threats
Companies: chamber of digital commerce
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Some sort of effect...
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Re: Some sort of effect...
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A Couple Thoughts...
2) Blockchain is the fundamental issue, and it's not terribly difficult to understand. So Ms. Boring (in the space for several years) should have a better grip.
3) Private blockchains, on Ms. Boring's radar and being looked at by the "real" money players, are antithetical to the concept of a true distributed ledger. If it's private, it's not truly a distributed network, and thus subject to tampering. "The whole point is lost ..." (to paraphrase Dr. Strangelove)
4) Redditors (where intelligent discussion of Bitcoin does take place) peg Ms. Boring as someone who can do more harm than good to cryptocurrencies, as she is trying to be a liason between the Bitcoin world and the govt. (aka lobbyist). One needs more than word-salad buzzwords. Regulators are confused enough already.
5) Ms. Boring followed up her threats by playing the gender card. Intelligent, articulate women in the Bitcoin space, of which there are plenty, were not happy about that.
6) The phrase "Streisand Effect" figured prominently in online discussions of this. Indeed. This was a small-subset issue (previously).
Ms. Boring, meet Ms. Streisand.
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Re: A Couple Thoughts...
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Re: Re: A Couple Thoughts...
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Re: Re: A Couple Thoughts...
The value of a blockchain is not in data transfer or authentication. It is a trust system independent of central authority.
Blockchain only have real value to those who are willing to massively trade efficiency to get rid of central authority. To make a closed "private blockchain", you need trust in a central authority to define who can and cannot access that blockchain. Therefor a "private blockchain" is a self-defeating concept.
Or at least that is my current view. I would be happy to learn something new.
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Re: A Couple Thoughts...
And where might that be? lol
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poor last name.
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No the first time she's spoken poorly for Bitcoin
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My experience
While that was not comparable to this one in the sense that the host was not only supportive of me, he did his level best to make me sound good. The problem was me -- I was ill, and my brain was not really firing on all cylinders. Also, I'd had a bit too much caffeine.
The end result was that I sounded like a hyperactive idiot.
It was so bad that I never told anyone about it, not even my friends. But you know what never occurred to me to do?
Ask that it be taken down.
Ms. Boring, a word of advice: bad interviews happen. When they do, the best thing you can possibly do is just let it go. If you're worried about PR, then do another interview with someone who is "on your side" and publicize the hell out of that.
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Re: My experience
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Ms. Boring's bio offers the explanation
She's a news broadcaster and lobbyist, not a technology person. She may be unaware that technologists tend to care more about technical correctness than messaging.
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Re: Ms. Boring's bio offers the explanation
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Re: Ms. Boring's bio offers the explanation
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Making up random crapola
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Boring
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Some legal advice
If people could sue over a bad interview, then hosts like Howard Stern, Don Imus, and other "shock jocks" would have been sued out of business years ago.
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Invest in Bitcoin
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Bitcoin mining
Bitcoin cloud mining had been always treated as scam or something like casino. But those smart people who succeeded in it, just relax nowand have fun
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