Monetization

‘CryptoGPT’ Twitter accounts spring up as hashtag trends on Twitter

Dozens of Twitter accounts have emerged on the social media platform claiming to be related to “CryptoGPT.”

A Twitter hashtag relating to a purported artificial intelligence crypto token called “CryptoGPT” has been trending on Twitter.

Alongside it, a number of very similar-looking Twitter accounts have also sprung up — some of which have been touting likely fake giveaways.

As of the time of writing, “Download CryptoGPT” was trending, with 6,185 tweets associated with it. GPT-4 (Generative Pre-trained Transformer 4), an unreleased neural network created by OpenAI, was also trending with 4,683 tweets.

*Trending topics on Twitter. Source: Twitter*

Meanwhile, dozens of Twitter accounts sporting the name “CryptoGPT” can also be found on Twitter, with some offering likely fake giveaways or airdrops

Many of these accounts describe the purport ed project as allowing users to use blockchain to monetize their data with AI. The system is based on Ethereum and scales with a zero-knowledge rollup layer-2 network.

The project purportedly aims to attract decentralized application developers to build on its blockchain. CrypoGPT will offer its GPT tokens as payment for anonymous user data generated from the usage of these DApps.

Contrary to what its name may suggest, however, the project doesn’t appear to be directly related to the ChatGPT AI chatbot that has taken the internet by storm in recent months.

*A snippet of Twitter accounts with names relating to “CryptoGPT” Source: Twitter*

The crypto token also appears to have backing from certain crypto exchanges, at least from a listing perspective.

On March 8, Bitfinex announced it would list CryptoGPT’s native GPT token two days later, describing it as a project that aims to offer users an opportunity to earn crypto for sharing their anonymized data. Other exchanges that will reportedly list the GPT token include PancakeSwap, ByBit, Gate, MEXC and Bitget, among others.

Earlier this year, blockchain analytics firm PeckShield warned its followers about dozens of alleged “pump & dump” tokens purporting to be related to ChatGPT and Bing AI.

#PeckShieldAlert PeckShield has detected dozens of newly created #BingChatGPT tokens, of which 3 appear to be #honeypots & 2 have high sell tax. 2 of them have already dropped over -99%.
Deployer 0xb583 has already created dozens of tokens with a pump & dump scheme #AI #ChatGPT pic.twitter.com/merQikuslk

— PeckShieldAlert (@PeckShieldAlert) February 20, 2023

A pump-and-dump scheme typically involves the creators orchestrating a campaign of misleading statements and hype to persuade investors into purchasing tokens, then secretly selling their stake in the scheme when prices go up.

Twitter monetization and free speech drove Binance’s $500M injection: CZ

Binance will also assist Twitter’s integration into Web3 by implementing crypto payments and deploying a dedicated team of on-chain specialists to stop spam bot accounts.

Binance CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao has explained the reasoning behind its $500 million co-investment into Elon Musk’s Twitter, citing monetization potential, crypto community free speech and the opportunity to eventually “help bring Twitter into Web3.”

CZ’s comments came from an Oct. 31 CNBC Squawk Box segment, where he explained what drove his co-investment with Elon Musk to acquire the social media platform noting:

“I believe Twitter has not been monetized well, it has not grown well, there’s many tactical problems like bots that spam my comments, there’s scammer accounts on there, it’s not been run well.”

“But I think the platform has huge value in itself, and especially now with Elon at the helm, we’re very confident,” he added.

Binance has not wavered in its support for Musk’s acquisition of Twitter since it first announced its support in May 2022. Other co-investors include Sequoia Capital Fund, Fidelity Management and Research Company.

The Binance CEO said Twitter’s difficult price valuation didn’t impact its investment decision as they considered the long-term prospects to be strong while giving crypto a “seat at the table” when it comes to free speech:

“We’re long-term investors, we believe in strong entrepreneurs, we believe in strong platforms, we believe in free speech […] we look at this from a 10, 20, 50, 100-year basis, so a little price fluctuation on a monthly basis doesn’t bother us.”

However, decisions as to what Twitter accounts are re-activated won’t lie in the hands of Musk, who said that a new “content moderation council” will bear the duty to determine what banned user accounts are restored.

However, the billionaire entrepreneur confirmed in a tweet that the council will exercise its discretion with “widely diverse viewpoints.”

CZ says it invested as it also hopes to play a part in Twitter’s eventual transition to Web3, such as adding cryptocurrency-based payments onto the social media platform:

“We want to help solve those immediate problems like charging for memberships [….] that can be done very easily by using cryptocurrencies as a means of payment.”

According to a Reuters report on Oct. 28, the crypto exchange plans to create a dedicated team to work on potential crypto and blockchain-based solutions for Twitter.

The new team will explore how to build on-chain solutions to address issues such as spam bot accounts.

Binance’s $500 million investment into Twitter makes them the fourth-largest shareholder in the social media platform among 19 investors.

Twitter is also no longer a publicly-traded company, having been delisted from the New York Stock Exchange on Oct. 28, following Musk’s decision to take the company private.