People know Vinay Gupta for his work on Ethereum and Mattereum, and he’s also a remarkable cypherpunk. He was an early adopter of E-Gold (a precursor of digital coins) and actively participated in its community in the 1990s until its shutdown. His practical view of cryptocurrencies and his resistance to state interference have established him as an influential voice in the crypto market.
In this article, we give recognition to
Born to an Indian mother and a Scottish father in January 1972, Gupta spent his childhood in the United Kingdom. He didn’t complete his computer science degree at the University of Edinburgh, but he still managed to build a successful career in the technology industry.
Gupta started his journey in commercial software development in 1992. His work
Around 1997, his commitment to cypherpunk ideals led him to join CryptoRights, an organization that developed cryptographic software to combat human rights abuses in China. Since then, Gupta has continued his fight for the protection of human rights and digital liberty.
A Failure of Cypherpunks
In the early 2010s, Gupta became attracted to Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT). In 2015, he was a coordinator and an important participant in the launch of Ethereum. He also took advantage of his speech in the
“This is the first large failure of cypherpunk(s), that we didn’t manage to sort out, which was we didn’t manage to do sufficiently heavyweight funding of public works, we didn't keep the money flowing in after the initial push was made, which results in projects going into maintenance mode (…) for the cypherpunk movement to succeed what we needed was voluntarist taxation, we needed people to put a tithe of their income, maybe 10% as an allocated preordained amount that would be spent building a future in which people have liberty”.
Such a system hasn’t been applied yet, but Gupta went forward with his own projects. He was a strategic architect for the Ethereum-related firm Consensys and has been involved in the development of other projects besides Ethereum. He invented, for instance, the Hexayurt shelter system.
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This low-cost disaster shelter design has a place today in refugee camps and desert festivals like
Gupta is now recognized as a leader and innovator in the crypto world. He has received invitations to speak at conferences worldwide and has written a lot on the subject. He holds a strong belief in the DTL potential, which he sees as a solution to global challenges like poverty, inequality, and climate change.
Mattereum and Sustainability
Gupta founded
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The semantic richness of Ricardian contracts is a key feature. In case of a dispute, it allows for a resolution through an arbitration process. Moreover, the world’s manufactured goods tokenization could lead to an efficient global market. In this market, assets can be bought, sold, rented, allocated, and divided through Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs).
Mattereum is also tackling a consumer issue. Consumers often buy goods to be quickly thrown away, without even knowing their origin or ecological impact. To address this, Mattereum introduced
Tokens and Contracts for the Future
The cypherpunk ideals promote the adoption of robust cryptography and technologies that enhance privacy, security, and online freedom for everyone. These are seen as a route to effect social and political change. In the same line of thought, Mattereum and Obyte are clear exponents of this worldview.
Besides, Obyte offers
They’re not as automatic as smart contracts, though. So, in case of a dispute, either party can disclose the document and conditions to a legal third party. On the other hand, Obyte has
Users can offer that type of smart contract from the wallet to anyone worldwide, without coding, and knowing that they’ll be protected against fraud by the arbiters. Unlike what happens with traditional legal contracts, they won’t need to spend high fees and long periods in a legal court. Instead, they can pay a small fee to the
This way, Obyte is streamlining the process of dispute resolution and asset management, fostering a more accessible, sustainable, and secure digital economy.
Read more from Cypherpunks Write Code series:
Tim May & Crypto-anarchism Wei Dai & B-money Nick Szabo & Smart Contracts Adam Back & Hashcash Eric Hughes & Remailer St Jude & Community Memory - Julian Assange & Wikileaks
Hal Finney & RPOW John Gilmore & EFF Satoshi Nakamoto & Bitcoin Gregory Maxwell & Bitcoin Core
Featured Vector Image by Garry Killian /
Photograph of Vinay Gupta by