As part of Bitcoin Stories, Sunny Ray, co-founder and president of Unocoin, interviewed Anthony Di Iorio and the two spoke about personal responsibility, money and creating a positive impact on the world. The story of Anthony Di Iorio is rich, and in this article, we bring you some golden nuggets from the conversation.
Anthony Di Iorio may have worn several hats in his life — entrepreneur, orator, ideological leader, mentor and manager of meetings in the realm of decentralised technologies. But what he is best known for is co-founding Ethereum, the most actively used blockchain in the world and the second-largest cryptocurrency, right after Bitcoin. As part of Bitcoin Stories, Sunny Ray, co-founder and president at Unocoin, interviewed Anthony Di Iorio and the two spoke about personal responsibility, money and creating a positive impact on the world. The story of Anthony Di Iorio is rich, and in this article, we bring you some golden nuggets from the conversation.
“Although I studied marketing, I soon realised that I wasn’t a fan of marketing. I always felt that marketing is trying to push something even if you don’t believe in it and trying to get you to buy something. And I thought I had to believe in something to be able to sell it,” said Di Iorio, explaining the beginning of the end of his marketing career.
He then went on to participate in his family business for sometime before he got interested in the concept of money and started watching YouTube videos on the history of money. Egged on by his learnings and curious about the recent housing and financial crisis in the US, he delved into the study of economics and stumbled upon videos of Peter Schiff.
On Disrupting Old Models of Economics and the first Bitcoin Event in Canada:
“This is where I started learning about the Contrarian model of economics as opposed to the Keynesian economic model. I started digging into ideas of liberty, personal freedom, which coincided with my feeling of not wanting to be told what to do and to be in control of my life, which was something I was passionate about. I dabbled in gold and silver a bit, and lost 20% of my investment that year. I then came across a podcast called Free Talk Live — a radio podcast that has been around for a few years. They are proponents of personal responsibility and urge people to understand money. They were a show involved with a movement called the Free State Project — to find the freest state in the US and shift people that are freedom-oriented to that state to get involved in changing systems. This caused a migration within the US and there was some international migration too. It was on the first show that they mentioned Bitcoin. I had no idea then back in 2012 and I looked it up. I was enthralled by Bitcoin and immediately saw potential. You know everyone goes through that phase, finds something and dismisses it, well I never went through that. I bought my first Bitcoin then, it was 9 dollars some cents at the time. Next few weeks I stayed up learning more about it. I started looking up communities and similar minds. I couldn’t find any, and so I set up one myself and hosted the first event.”
On Being Principled and Seeking to Empower:
“For me, being principled is super important. I always try to do things by being in control and not having partnerships and not taking investors’ money. I don’t like the idea of having to provide returns to investors which can impact the delivery of what I’m really trying to accomplish.”
“I want to empower people, I want to build the tools to empower people to get the things which I want that is more freedom. I believe in personal responsibility. I think it’s really important to have to work on things so that you can get to where you want, based on your learnings.”
“The idea that has been pushing me in the last few years is that the incentive structures that the world lives on I think are misaligned. I think most incentives are to give you power and money, and that’s misaligned with other people and the planet. I like to think that I am a problem-solver, I can put together a number of things based on formulas I developed in the past and based on principles and tools that I developed. The idea of creating winning situations for everyone is really important to me. It’s not about creating divisiveness, it’s about creating unity. It’s about utilising your strengths to create a better world. So what really drives me is to see how I can change the incentive structures of the world.”
“I think there is a cyclical possibility that the more impact that you create as an individual that is improving people’s lives, considering as many people as you can in things that you’re creating, that you will do better in creating the wealth that you want — not the other way around.”
“Most documentaries you will watch on scandals that have happened are based on greed, where the desire is to improve or maximise shareholder return. Month after month you’ve got to keep producing better returns and that goes contrary to I think what is needed in order to drive brands and people. The traditional models are simply not working, the entrepreneurs and the problem-solvers need to think of new ways to bring the population on your side, that will think of the majority, not the minority.”
Anthony Di Iorio after Ethereum
Di Iorio became the chief digital officer of the Toronto Stock Exchange for a while before he left to found Decentral — developer of the Jaxx Digital Wallet for Bitcoin and Ethereum. Today one of the Forbes Top-20 richest people in Cryptocurrency, Di Iorio aims to use his power to “shift incentive structures and contribute to the cause of using technology for the greater good of the world,” notwithstanding the harmful effects it has had in several parts of the world. Listen to the rest of the conversation on Bitcoin Stories: Anthony Di Iorio, CEO & Founder Decentral & Jaxx, Co-founder Ethereum (Episode 029)
