It's not that "the media" has gotten worse at their jobs. Rather, there simply a lot less funding for reporters. The hit in funding has become much worse in local reporting -- especially local newspapers. However, if this is viewed as a training ground for the few large national/international news organizations, it's easy to see how this has a profound impact for even the large and well funded publications.

There's simply much less reporting happening than their used to be, and it's a real problem.

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/07/13/u-s-newsroo...

https://www.statista.com/statistics/626459/number-employees-....

Serious investigative reporters with the smarts and experience to dive deep were always the exception, maybe a handful in the world at any given time.

So IMO, “they’ve always been this bad” is the answer, but it’s not entirely fair. Kind of like saying the cooks at McDonald’s have always been this bad; in fact it has never been their job to do world-class work.

Yes, true investigative reporting is rare (and expensive), but good work is still being done.

For the media at large, given the volume of stuff you can read, much of it is plain "story-telling" or "narratives", and I do think the media is more likely to go with things that fit the narrative of the day than look at things with a critical eye.

With Theranos, the media absolutely wanted to highlight a "female Steve Jobs", and Holmes used that to her advantage. Similarly, with SBF, given all the smarmy characters in crypto, he fit the narrative of "the good guy", "the next JP Morgan" coming to save the financial system for good.

With Enron, they were very very good at obfuscating their scam. But it was the WSJ affiliate that was the first mover on Enron being fishy. A major short seller saw that article and shorted the stock, then turned a tip into another reporter. That reporter then pretty much started its downfall. It was, possibly, the best example of the media being the guardians against a scam since the internet started.

Not to mention the fact that a lot of investigative leads likely either don’t pan out, are not newsworthy, or ruffle feathers better left unruffled (news media relies on connections and access for leads on stories, and their customers are advertisers, ie large corporations).

There is not much of a market for investigative journalism. IMO tort law or class-action suits could fill that niche too if the incentives were more aligned (gotta be a lawyer to make anything off a class action) and the playing field were more even - arbitration clause says what?

So lacking an incentive for either of those the next best thing is short selling, which also sucks because it’s time-based, risky, requires capital, and isn’t relevant when something doesn’t have a direct link to a tradable security

It's stunning to me that that interview didn't crash FTX by itself, and it indicates that the industry (fintech, VCs, crypto) is engaged in a huge pump and dump. It's legitimately criminal.

[0]: https://archive.ph/fGLat#selection-3973.7-3973.12 (27:13)

No, sorry, that is their job description. But since we're using radar as analogy, let me introduce to your new friend, IFF (Identify, Friend or Foe).

And the public doesn't help with their hero worship of tech douchebags.

> The laughter has faded. Over the last few days, the collapse of a so-called stablecoin called TerraUSD has sent the crypto market into meltdown, accelerating a dramatic sell-off that tanked the price of Bitcoin and Ether, the two most valuable cryptocurrencies. At Baha Mar, Mr. Bankman-Fried was throwing a giant party for the industry; this past week, he was attempting to restore calm, tweeting long threads about the state of the market.

Then discussing how his awkward, unkempt appearance is actually calculated and intentional. And look at the final paragraph:

> Outside, the convention center was emptying, as hundreds of crypto enthusiasts headed for the airport. It was the calm before the coming meltdown. To leave the resort, guests had to walk through the Baha Mar casino, the largest in the Caribbean, a brightly lit hall of flashing slot machines.

The whole thing is framed around this guy hanging out with celebrities and lobbying government officials while his market crashes. Reading it for the first time 6 months after it was written, I think it holds up as an accurate profile with a bit of foreshadowing of what was to come.

I don't think they did.

To check my memory, I clicked on to the "Cryptocurrency" keyword to see the crypto-related stories going back. It's mostly reporting news (which is mainly bad) and skepticism.

Is the next crypto narrative is going to be "why didn't the media save us?" I guess it makes about as much sense as all the previous crypto narratives.

" The $69 million spent by Bankman-Fried and his deputies on the 2022 midterms likely would’ve done little to plug FTX’s reported financial hole, but it couldn’t have hurt. Bankman-Fried told Forbes last month that “in the end, I care about policy more than politics,” adding that “my giving has been bipartisan, and my goal is to help support great policy makers.”

    Bankman-Fried has supported Republicans during this cycle, primarily through his $2 million contribution to the blockchain and cryptocurrency-focused GMI super PAC. But the bulk of his giving, including $27 million to the Protect Our Future super PAC and $6 million to the House Majority super PAC, has gone to support Democrats. Bankman-Fried told Forbes last month that “much of this was for primaries, rather than D vs R general elections” ($33 million of his contributions were made during the first four months of 2022.) "

https://www.forbes.com/sites/michelatindera/2021/10/21/the-w...

This is the basis of NYT Pitchbot.

A growing force in political fund-raising, he has a super PAC that recently gave more than $10 million to a Democratic congressional candidate who supports some of his philanthropic priorities.

In public, Mr. Bankman-Fried can sometimes seem uncomfortable, tapping his foot or twirling a fidget spinner. But the awkwardness is part of a calculated self-presentation. Over countless tweets, interviews and TV appearances, he’s positioned himself as a mad-scientist-cum-diplomat — a straight-talking brainiac willing to embrace regulation of his nascent industry and criticize its worst excesses.

Now Mr. Bankman-Fried is trying to leverage his fame to set policy in Washington, at a moment when the risks of crypto trading are growing increasingly stark; he makes regular trips to the Capitol from his base in the Bahamas, meeting with regulators and testifying in Congress. If he’s successful, he could become one of the most influential figures in the new era of technological experimentation that supporters call web3, writing the rule book for a slew of risky investment products that are increasingly reshaping the internet, finance and even the arts.

But his detractors say his advocacy is driven by self-interest. His political contributions have prompted complaints that he’s distorting the competitive landscape to advance his own agenda. And the charm offensive in Washington has alarmed consumer advocates who argue that FTX is exacerbating the volatility in crypto markets and putting investors at risk.

FTX serves as a portal to the crypto world. With the click of a button, a curious investor can turn dollars into Bitcoin, Dogecoin or Ether. It’s as simple as buying paper towels from Target — except that the value of a digital asset can be wiped away overnight amid the types of market gyrations that have sent cryptocurrency prices crashing over the past month. In the United States, crypto exchanges occupy a regulatory gray area: It remains unsettled whether the tokens are securities, commodities or something else entirely. Mr. Bankman-Fried has been pitching a regulatory structure with expanded authority for the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, which is smaller and less aggressive than the Securities and Exchange Commission and has traditionally been more sympathetic to the crypto industry.

FTX is headquartered in the Bahamas partly because 80 percent of its $1.1 billion in global revenue stems from a trading instrument that remains illegal in the United States. On the FTX platform, investors can borrow money to make enormous bets on the future prices of cryptocurrencies, leading to potentially astronomical gains — or catastrophic losses.

So not only is the article extremely up-front about the fact that SBF donated to the Democratic primaries (and as far as I can tell, none at all to the general election), it's far from "glowing" (it's a banal, if colorful, profile) and, contrary to the parent commenter's claims, nowhere does it claim that he is a "do-gooder", rather using the phrase in the context of how EA advocates think of themselves.

The sheer irony of people railing against misinformation in media while willfully misinforming people on social media.

This is actually quite a profound statement.

Is there actually anything in human history that can come close to rivalling this ?

We have everyone from teens promoting shitcoins on TikTok, to household celebrities like Matt Damon, to white collar criminals, to arguably VCs, all the way to nation states like Iran and North Korea.

Is this a soft implication that the same scene should "continue" to exist as it currently is?

One example blog post: https://csgobetting.com/iesnare-how-youre-being-made-paranoi...

What unique properties does Bitcoin have that makes it useful that other cryptocurrencies don't, beside first mover advantage?

Source: a decade of VC funded Enterprise saas company selling experience

http://mungerisms.blogspot.com/2009/09/philanthropy-round-ta...

But, what I am calling for is not a lawless reprisal but something a little closer to appropriate punishment than either is likely to get. Punishment that many people in countries with much more history culture and civilization than ours, like China, would agree is gentle and mild for these kind of crimes. In China someone like SBF would likely just be executed, and yes, this seems on the harsh side of reasonable and deserved - but only just.

Because he donated money to Democrats it makes people still want to invest in cryptos, is that the message?

Market participants that do this aren't market makers anymore.

And no, BTC is not the reserve currency; Ethereum is. Nearly all of these "crypto tokens" are just ERC-20 contracts that run as contracts on the Ethereum network. They're not even cryptocurrencies, just contracts with sets of rules that mimic the properties of a currency.

[1] https://www.investopedia.com/terms/m/mr-market.asp

The Winkelvoss’s net worth [1] is less than half of FTX’s shortfall alone [2]. These folks didn’t get rich by giving their money away.

[1] https://www.celebritynetworth.com/richest-businessmen/tyler-...

[2] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-11-10/sam-bankm...

Interrst rate hikes kill zombie companies. Scams put dumb people under the lash of their betters.

It doesn't really seem like much of a distinction, since Bankman Fried viewed FTX as his personal piggy bank. Regardless, the DNC will be fine. They're still popular with voters, regardless of what donors are doing. Donor money doesn't actually win elections, voters do.

Edit: Great timing - DailyBeast literally just published a story exposing how the leader of one of those idiotic COVID misinformation groups spent her millions in ill-gotten gains: https://www.thedailybeast.com/covid-misinformation-group-ame...