Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong recently announced on the company’s blog that it will launch a fact-checking portal called “Fact Check”.
In an article entitled “Coinbase Announces Fact Check: Decentralizing Truth in the Age of Misinformation” (“Announcing Coinbase Fact Check: Decentralizing Truth in the Age of Misinformation”) on May 27, Armstrong stated The company’s vision to combat false statements against Coinbase and the entire crypto industry:
“We will use Fact Check to combat misinformation and misdescriptions related to Coinbase or cryptocurrencies shared globally.”
The subtitle of this article is: “Every technology company should directly face the audience and become a media company.” He also said in this article that this is not difficult to achieve: “Whether it is traditional media, social media or corporate media , We all just type on the Internet.”
The title of Armstrong’s blog post indicates that at some point in the future, fact checking will involve some form of decentralization, but the current “fact checking” is only for articles that respond to what Coinbase considers to be “misinformation”.
In other words, Coinbase intends to publish some articles on Fact Check to express its views on Coinbase and cryptocurrency related issues.
Some people may think they have done this. In fact, Fact Check currently contains four fairly standard blog posts: Coinbase’s response to a negative Coinbase article in The New York Times, the company’s response to “misinformation” related to Coinbase executives’ selling stocks, and an article about Bitcoin. A review article on the environmental impact of cryptocurrencies and another review article on the use of cryptocurrencies in illegal activities.
Armstrong claims that Fact Check will be seen as a “source of facts.”
“In order to be a source of facts, companies will increasingly need to be willing to share facts that also have a negative impact on them. Nothing can build trust like sharing mistakes.
Armstrong is notoriously reluctant to deal with the media and claimed in 2020 that more and more company leaders choose to contact customers directly instead of dealing with mainstream journalists:
“Post to our own blog/Twitter/YouTube, let us speak our own thoughts and talk to our customers, instead of quoting our remarks by an objective (sometimes completely acrimonious) article. “
Armstrong subsequently stated in the post that Coinbase will become more proactive in content creation and may accept blockchain-based fact checks in the future:
“In the future, it may also switch to more encrypted native platforms, such as Bitclout or encrypted oracles. In the long run, the real source of truth will be found on the chain with encrypted signatures.”
Some companies and news organizations have begun to try to use blockchain for fact checking and verification.
In April 2020, the Italian news agency Ansa launched a blockchain-based news tracking system that enables users to verify the source of any news appearing on any of the company’s media platforms.
In October 2020, the U.S. telecom giant Verizon launched a blockchain-based open source news editorial product that uses “encryption principles” to bind and protect the company’s news. However, the company pointed out at the time that “currently in Only text changes are tracked on the blockchain.”
Author/ Translator: Jamie Kim
Bio: Jamie Kim is a technology journalist. Raised in Hong Kong and always vocal at heart. She aims to share her expertise with the readers at blockreview.net. Kim is a Bitcoin maximalist who believes with unwavering conviction that Bitcoin is the only cryptocurrency – in fact, currency – worth caring about.