Theorizing the 2017 blockchain ICO bubble as a network scam

【Author】 Swartz, Lana

【Source】NEW MEDIA & SOCIETY

【影响因子】5.310

【Abstract】In the popular imagination and in academic literature, scams are usually seen as dyadic, involving a con artist and a mark. This article retheorizes scams as networked, collective activity. Scams, like all commerce, are shaped by and in turn shape communication channels. The "network scam" is therefore offered as a lens for understanding scams in the digital economy more broadly. As a case study, this article documents the 2017 Initial Coin Offering (ICO) Bubble. ICOs were supposed to be a new, radically disruptive way of crowdfunding to finance the development of a new, radically disruptive blockchain technological ecosystem. All told, ICOs raised an estimated $5 billion in 2017 alone. But by all analyses-both from observers and participants, both during the bubble and after-the vast majority of ICO turned out to be scams. This article uses these scams to theorize the "network scam" as a collaborative effort to bring about a shared future, but one that is fundamentally characterized by arbitrage on uneven belief among participants in that future ever coming to pass.

【Keywords】Bitcoin; blockchain; crowdfunding; cryptocurrency; digital economy; Ethereum; Initial Coin Offerings; scams

【发表时间】2022 JUL

【收录时间】2022-08-15

【文献类型】实证数据

【主题类别】

区块链治理-市场治理-欺诈犯罪