Online Black Market Leader On Life Sentences Sells $6.3M NFT From Prison
Image via Ross Ulbricht
After founding the controversial black market website Silk Road, Ross Ulbricht was given two life sentences. But his story doesn’t end there: Ulbricht has just sold his first non-fungible token for US$6.3 million, all without leaving the prison.
Ulbricht’s Genesis Collection, sold on marketplace SuperRare, comprises writings and graphite pencil artworks he created during his childhood and before his prison sentence.
“Decades of incarceration stretch out in front of me,” Ulbricht writes on the collection’s official website. “As I face that future—my eventual old age and death in this cage—I find myself looking for meaning and purpose.”
“Why am I here?” he muses. “What good can I do with the time I have left and from where I am? I hope that helping my fellow prisoners through my art is one way.”
Bitcoin was the only currency available for exchange for goods on the Silk Road, which included illegal drugs. The currency allowed for anonymity, crucial when you’re purchasing something like a fake driver’s license.
Thus, many of Ulbricht’s followers regard him as an “original catalyst” for blockchain adoption. The 2011 site, after all, came way before today’s crypto and NFT boom.
More than a thousand cryptocurrency investors, coming together to form the FreeRossDAO, raised more than US$12 million to win the auction, per Blockworks. The NFT sold at 1446 ETH, which is about half of the organization’s treasury, according to a victorious tweet.
WE DID IT. Over 1,320 people raised over 2,800 ETH in a week (over $12m at todays price) to win the auction for Ross’s NFT (sold at 1446 ETH - about half of our treasury). Crypto is amazing.
— FreeRossDAO (@FreeRossDAO) December 9, 2021
Here's what happens now 👇👇👇
“Buying this NFT has not freed Ross,” the decentralized autonomous organization writes. “We still have a long way to go to seek justice and rectify his disproportionate sentence of double life imprisonment as a first-time, non-violent offender.”
Proceeds from the auction of the Genesis Collection NFTs will go towards relieving the suffering of the incarcerated and their families, as well as towards the endeavor to free Ulbricht himself from his life sentences in prison.
I am floored. The auction exceeded all expectations.
— Ross Ulbricht (@RealRossU) December 10, 2021
I feel like I have a new purpose now. Lots of joyful work lies ahead.
[via Futurism, cover image via Ross Ulbricht]
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