Elon Musk, Tesla Boss, SpaceX CEO, serial meme poster, and part-time Dogecoin hustler just took a dig at Bitcoin enthusiasts. Or more specifically, the cryptocurrency enthusiasts who believe in only Bitcoin superiority. Elon Musk who can’t seem to be making his mind up on Bitcoin, the world’s largest cryptocurrency, decided to add fuel to the fire. In May, months after saying that electric vehicle company Tesla announced it would accept Bitcoin as a payment for its cars, Musk backtracked, saying that he decided Bitcoin mining wasn’t ‘clean’ and he didn’t want his decision to come at an environmental cost. A month later, in June, Musk went gone back on that comment, with a slight tweak. Musk announced that the electric carmaker will resume allowing bitcoin transactions when miners who verify transactions use more renewable energy.
“When there’s confirmation of reasonable clean energy usage by miners with the positive future trend, Tesla will resume allowing Bitcoin transactions,” he had said.
On Friday, Musk posted a snide tweet about Bitcoin maxis – very much not aligned with his earlier sentiments about Bitcoin. Using the classic “how many (insert person or thing) does it take to fix a lightbulb” joke, he tweeted, “How many Bitcoin maxis does it take to screw in a lightbulb?”
Then he backed it up with his own reply.
“That’s not funny!” – Bitcoin maxis— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 25, 2021
Bitcoin maximalists or ‘maxis’ in crypto slang are enthusiasts who believe that Bitcoin, which is the world’s largest cryptocurrency, is the only digital asset that will be needed in the future. Maxis believe that all other digital currencies are inferior to Bitcoin. The maximalist ideology holds the view that other cryptocurrencies are not in line with the ideals that were established by the pseudonymous Satoshi Nakamoto, who created Bitcoin in 2009, as evident from a paper called ‘The Bitcoin P2P network’ from the Bitcoin Foundation. Bitcoin maximalists also believe that these other cryptocurrencies—called altcoins—are unnecessary and inferior.
Despite Musk’s dig, the price of currency surged price past $35,000-mark on Friday. The world’s largest cryptocurrency rose nearly 9 per cent on a day, to $35,233 at 0810 hours IST on June 25 on coinmarketcap.com Index. Bitcoin price dropped below $30,000 for the first time this week since January.
Tesla in February disclosed that it had purchased $1.5 billion in Bitcoin and planned to accept it as payment. That announcement added legitimacy to the cryptocurrency as an increasingly acceptable form of payment and investment, especially coming from a large member of the S&P 500 with a high-profile CEO who commands a big following among retail investors and the general public. Tesla’s website earlier also had a support page dedicated to Bitcoin, noted that Bitcoin was the only cryptocurrency that Tesla accepts in the continental U.S.
Bitcoin, however, isn’t the only cryptocurrency Musk deals in – Dogecoin has been his favourite for a while now.
Elon Musk, Tesla CEO, SpaceX boss and Dogecoin advocate, in a recent interview while at a public signing mentioned, that this cryptocurrency may be the future. In the interview, he says that “There is a good chance that crypto is the future currency of the world. Then the question is which won is it going to be? It could be multiple,” he said.
He then explains the origins of how Dogecoin was invented as a joke, essentially to make fun of cryptocurrency, and that’s the irony, explains Musk. “That the currency that began as a joke, becomes the real currency.”
In the video, he does add that, “Don’t invest your life savings into cryptocurrency. That’s unwise.”
Crypto enthusiasts, however, have stopped enjoying Musk’s tweets since he announced that Tesla will no longer be accepting Bitcoin as a payment method. This is not the first time Musk has done this, or even the second, or third time. Every time Musk mentions the cryptocurrency, a surge (often following an eventual downfall) occurs in the prices of the cryptocurrency. Internet sleuths have more than just co-related the phenomenon, they’ve even christened it: “The Musk Effect.” Over the weeks, the response to Musk’s tweets has become increasingly negative – with people blaming him solely for the rise or dip in prices, saying it cost them a loss and he’s ‘manipulating’ markets. Some took this a step further – by making a cryptocurrency solely dedicated to stopping Musk: $StopElon.
Read all the Latest News, Breaking News and Coronavirus News here
