Ethereum faces an ideological crossroads with popular celebrity tokens

Wintermute co-founder Evgeny Gaevoy has expressed sharp criticism of Ethereum’s leadership and its approach to building the blockchain. He believes that if Ethereum fails in the future, it will be due to his leadership, not technical limitations.

So it looks like the ongoing celebrity coin debate has escalated again.

Gaevoy points to the contradiction of Ethereum’s goals as the reason. According to him, the Ethereum “elite”, including Vitalik Buterin, are building a technology inherently suited to capitalism, but appear to have a socialist ideology.

There is huge cash in the game

Gaevoy argues that these approaches are fundamentally different. He believes that Ethereum cannot build a capitalist system while pursuing socialist outcomes, and calls on leaders to choose sides.

The Wintermute leader expressed a strong inclination towards the profitable aspects of the digital economy. His reasons stem from his careful observation of blockchain technology. He sees this technology in this field “is impressively very conducive to the creation of purely capitalist systems based on incentives”

“Either you are building capitalism or planned socialism” Gaevoy stated. “I choose capitalism in all its (often ugly!) glory. And if you’re not here for the glory, then one simple argument is this – unlike socialism, capitalism actually works.

Gaevoy’s position comes in the context of the ongoing debate about celebrity memecoins. This trend has drawn criticism from many cryptocurrency figures and members, including. Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin.

In a recent tweet, Buterin expressed dissatisfaction with celebrity memecoins, arguing that they provide no social value. He believes that financial ventures should have causes that benefit society, such as health care, open source software and the arts.

They just want money!

In response to Buterin’s comments, Iggy Azalea, a singer who recently joined the celebrity memecoin trend, posted a sarcastic post on Twitter. The post featured a photo of Iggy as a breastfeeding mother with Buterin’s face on it.

Azalea’s post was met with criticism from Hayden Adams, founder of Uniswap. While Adams was more neutral on celebrity meme coins, he criticized Azalea’s response to Buterin and suggested that profits from such ventures could be used for social causes.

The Wintermute co-founder said he sides with Azalea in this debate. But Gaevoy’s arguments also sparked opposition. Some cryptocurrency members believe that Buterin’s stance on celebrity coins does not mean Ethereum is taking a socialist path.

In response, Gaevoy said it was the basic principle that mattered. He preferred capitalism with modifications to remove its flaws and was less interested in policies that seemed to use capitalism as a secondary tool.

On-chain data shows that Azalea’s Mother Iggy (MOTHER) token rose above $0.1272 on June 6, bucking the downtrend of other celebrity meme coins.

Mother of Iggy (MOTHER) has surged 134.70% over the past 7 days, outperforming the global cryptocurrency market and outperforming similar meme cryptocurrencies that are down 5.30%.

Over the past few days, the market has seen a surge in celebrities and KOLs from various industries rushing to issue their own tokens. Due to the popularity and ease of token creation, influencers can easily create tokens and then aggressively promote them on their social media accounts, which are often very popular.

The fear of missing out (FOMO) and fan support could cause the prices of these tokens to skyrocket, attracting an influx of fresh money for influencers. However, the consequence is often that less informed users lose their investments and see no profits.

If we take a more positive perspective, Buterin may simply be expressing his personal preferences and vision for cryptocurrency that is unaffected by the continued financialization efforts of celebrities.

Certain phases are necessary in any economic development to lay the foundations for higher-level goals. While the financial gains are more tangible, some of Buterin’s remarks also highlight the benefits to humanity, although in less obvious ways. So in the long run, the Ethereum and Wintermute co-founders may find common ground.