For or against ICO, the controversy continues to challenge us

Mit's Media Lab director, Joi Ito, spoke out against ICOs.

For him, given the speed with which these fundraisers have developed, we do not have enough perspective to consider the impact they can have on our society.

For him the motivations of the ICO should not be purely economic, but one should always ask before launching this kind of fundraising: "will I improve the society where I will unfairly do money."

Thus, he sees in these ICOs a form of theft of an under educated public.

He explained:

"I do not want to be involved in an ICO business because we are in a period of history that attracts all the wrong people. Even if you had to run a perfect ICO, I think it would always attract the wrong people."

On the other hand, Joi Ito also highlighted the positive role that crypto currencies such as Bitcoin? could have, claiming that they could perhaps avoid the social evils linked to the economies defined by the currencies issued by governments or institutions. financial. And he also added that over time Bitcoin?-related progress could certainly help to build the future, if we were more interested in the intention of crypto currencies rather than their speculative values.

"Does money make him happier?" He asked. "Can we think of ways to break this pattern that wants us to be more greedy?"

After these reflections, Ito recalled the history of the Internet, the formation of its various protocols and how they have been able to flourish.

He compared companies like Coinbase to AOL and R3 to Minitel, showing how successful blockchain? companies have to provide a series of services that could one day be served by open networks.

Finally, he supported the Bitcoin? community, which was often attacked for its conservative design approach and claimed:

"We have not won the battle yet. [But] I think the interesting thing is that Bitcoin? Core has a lot more firepower than any of the other networks."