10 Years In Prison: How Ross Ulbricht’s Silk Road Accelerated Bitcoin Adoption

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The founding father of the darknet market Silk Street which dealt solely with Bitcoin, Ross Ulbricht, lately introduced that he had spent 10 years in jail. Regardless of his fraudulent actions, Ulbricht is a well-liked determine within the crypto group as he’s believed to have contributed to the accelerated adoption of the flagship cryptocurrency, Bitcoin.

Silk Street And Bitcoin Adoption

Silk Street was an internet black platform that was used to facilitate unlawful actions, together with drug commerce and cash laundering. Curiously, Bitcoin was the one forex used to facilitate these transactions, as Ulbricht is claimed to have been an enormous proponent of the flagship cryptocurrency.

In accordance with Ulbricht’s mom, her son created the Silk Street with the intention of offering a “actually free market.” She mentioned he used Bitcoin because the platform’s forex as a result of he believed within the “financial freedom” that the forex supplied.

His actions undoubtedly helped to extend Bitcoin’s utility and recognition (though not essentially in a great way). In reality, some contemplate Silk Street as Bitcoin’s “first important use case” because it exemplified what may very well be achieved (the great and the dangerous) with the decentralized forex.

Silk Street is claimed to have processed as a lot as $45 million yearly in gross sales (all in Bitcoin). There isn’t any doubt that the platform supplied early liquidity to the ecosystem as such determine means that there was an enormous demand for the forex simply because of transactions on the Silk Street platform.

Ulbricht Silk Street was even rumored to have been one of many largest holders of BTC in some unspecified time in the future. Regulation enforcement is mentioned to have confiscated a complete of 174,000 BTC from Ulbricht and the Silk Street syndicate.

Using Bitcoin on the platform additionally supplied perception into how Bitcoin (and different cryptocurrencies) may disrupt the monetary system and develop into the go-to choice for day by day transactions, particularly because the world continues to undertake decentralized techniques.

Ross Ulbricht Exhibits Regret

In the meantime, the Silk Street founder has continued to precise regret for his actions on his X (previously Twitter) platform. Nonetheless, it’s believed {that a} relative manages the web page, contemplating that Ulbricht continues to be in jail.

In his newest publish, saying 10 years in jail, he admitted that his “poor decisions” led him to the place he’s now, and all that he may do was pray for mercy.

Many have additionally jumped to his protection and proceed to clamor that injustice was finished in how his case was dealt with. Some imagine he didn’t deserve the punishment as a result of it didn’t match the crime. Ulbricht’s sentence is life imprisonment with out the potential of parole.