Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey testifies remotely via videoconference in this screengrab made from video during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing titled, “Breaking the News: Censorship, Suppression, and the 2020 Election,? on Facebook and Twitter’s content moderation practices, on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., November 17, 2020.
Reuters
Jack Dorsey, who’s selling his first ever tweet as a non-fungible token, said Tuesday he’ll donate the profits to charity.
The Twitter CEO shared a link Friday afternoon to a platform called “Valuables,” where his March 21, 2006 tweet “just setting up my twttr” was up for bidding. As of Tuesday morning, the highest offer is from Sina Estavi, CEO of Bridge Oracle, for $2.5 million, according to the website.
The auction will end March 21, Dorsey said. He’ll then immediately convert the proceeds to bitcoin and donate that to Give Directly’s Africa Response fund.
The tweet’s NFT auction comes amid a surge in popularity of crypto collectibles. Ownership of these assets is recorded on a blockchain — a digital ledger similar to the networks that underpin bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. But person can’t exchange one NFT for another as they would with dollars or other assets. Each NFT is unique and acts as a collector’s item that can’t be duplicated, making them rare by design.
Dorsey has also been a vocal proponent of bitcoin. Last month, he announced that he’s partnering with music mogul Jay-Z to set up an endowment fund to fund the digital coin’s development, initially in Africa and India. His digital payments company Square also purchased approximately 3,318 bitcoins in late February, expanding on its October 2020 buy of 4,709.
