“It would have been nice to get this attention in any other context. WikiLeaks has kicked the hornet’s nest, and the swarm is headed towards us.”
This message was posted by Satoshi Nakamoto to BitcoinTalk on December 11, 2010. A couple of months later, in February 2011, the Silk Road marketplace was launched, and only a couple months after — on April 23, 2011 — Satoshi posted his last message.
In October 2013, Ross Ulbricht was captured by the FBI and the Silk Road fell — only to be replaced by a thousand more copycat marketplace sites. The rest is Bitcoin history.
Ross Ulbricht chose to center his Bitcoin 2025 keynote speech around an experience he had clearing wasp nests in a cabin in the woods. Wearing a suit and tie, recalling growing “magic mushrooms” to kickstart activity on Silk Road, Ross held the attention of the main stage audience of over 8,000 at Bitcoin 2025 Las Vegas in the Venetian Expo. I was sitting in one of the best seats in the house: side stage with his mother Lyn and three other supporters of Ross.
Freedom. Decentralization. Unity.
After over 4,100 days in federal custody and many months in special housing units (solitary confinement), Ross boiled it down to these three words to summarize his first message to the community.
Freedom. Decentralization. Unity.
Following a “21 ways to hack the fiat system” keynote from Michael Saylor, Ross’ three ways to move forward were refreshingly simple.
You would have thought Ross had been speaking in front of thousands of people for years, seeing how calm and commanding he was on the Nakamoto stage.
Lyn Ulbricht called me a few days after the speech, as I was driving a U-Haul truck full of the art gallery contents across the country, including Ross’ auction items which altogether fetched well over 10 BTC for his fresh start. She mentioned that seeing Ross on that stage giving that incredible speech gave her closure for the whole experience of fighting for her son’s freedom.
I have been fortunate to get to know Lyn Ulbricht over the past few years, helping her plan for our conferences. Hearing her say that this conference gave her some closure to that awful chapter of her life was a moment I’ll never forget. She was his number one supporter during his 11 years serving a double-life sentence. She fought relentlessly to raise awareness for her son’s situation, and now she has begun a new chapter doing similar work with MACS, Mothers Against Cruel Sentencing.
MACS is a nonprofit that is effectively the continuation of the Free Ross mission. Lyn says she feels a calling from God to continue fighting for other “crypto prisoners” and people who are being unjustly punished for their crimes, a violation of the Eight Amendment of the United States Constitution.
She launched MACS at the fourth annual Women of Bitcoin Brunch at Bitcoin 2025, in front of an audience of over 300 of the most influential women at the conference.
Later during the event, in the same room, Ross used the same stage to address a smaller crowd of supporters for his official luncheon.
This luncheon, held before his speech, is where Justin Sun famously gifted Ross “The Banana,” handing over a duct-taped, real banana in an elaborately designed white shadowbox fit to display in a museum.
I was also in the luncheon room when the banana transaction happened, as event staff. The piece, Comedian by Maurizio Cattelan, was a conceptual art statement, I explained to the two men sitting next to me. Like Ross himself at the time, these men were confused. (The original art installation, a banana duct-taped to the wall, was purchased — and eaten — by Justin Sun in November last year.)
Knowing the significance of this banana, I assumed at the time that Justin Sun was officially giving his edition #2 of Comedian to Ross, as a $6.2 million donation. It wasn’t until my phone call with Lyn Ulbricht days later that she brought up the banana and its questionable provenance that I began to ask: Did Sun really give Ross the banana?
On this call, Lyn mentioned that they had a relative who worked at Sotheby’s, the auctioneer of Justin’s edition of Comedian. This was an obvious first step toward understanding the banana exchange.
Ross himself emailed me shortly after saying, “Lyn tells me you are looking into what happened with me and Justin Sun. Strike Force Nanner are arriving tomorrow with the box Sun gave me, so I’ll let you know if that turns up anything useful.”
And later, “My Sotheby’s connection says: Just spoke with one of the people who worked directly with the artist during the sale. To truly own the piece you have to have the document from the artist; because that is where the ‘value’ lies, they wouldn’t even share images of it for fear of someone making a counterfeit. He’s going to have a think about whether or not what you have has any value, but Justin still owns the ‘real’ banana which is probably why he’s given you vague answers. So, unless he gives me the document (certificate of authenticity), I don’t have anything that would be valued at auction (probably). Oh well.”
I assured him that I thought his banana was still very valuable. Even if this was truly just a 1/1 print of the banana. Until Sun gives Ross the COA, Ross isn’t really the owner the banana; still, a historic event occurred. Sun transferred some sort of magic-decentalized-banana-powers to Ross when he transferred that banana taped to a frame.
The mere existence of Strike Force Nanner, an armored vehicle transporting the banana to Ross, should be enough to signal the provenance transfer of something valuable.
So whether or not Sotheby’s thinks an official transaction occurred, I think Ross has a rare power to duct-tape bananas to walls now and call it something. Sun will just have to send the COA to Ross later in order to seal the peel.
Until then, I extend an open invite to Ross, as the Artist In Residence at Bitcoin Magazine, to help him make and sell prints of his print of the banana. Then maybe the banana can be even more decentralized!
Avant-garde bananas aside, the experience of Bitcoin 2025 Las Vegas was unlike any other conference that we’ve thrown, and I can say that having been a part of all six thus far. The key difference this year was Ross’ freedom.
The vibes were beyond bullish in Vegas, which usually means the top is in. But this time it really seems different.
We should pay attention when Michael Saylor gives us his 21-step cheat sheet for the infinite money glitch, and how he plans to leverage the existing financial institutions to accumulate as much bitcoin as he possibly can. This could be a regulatory trap.
We should definitely pay attention when the sitting vice president, JD Vance, tells the conference audience that they’re going to use stablecoins to strengthen the dollar, referring to the new Genius Bill. This is probably the backdoor for CBDCs.
But most importantly: After over 11 years in federal hell, we should pay attention to Ross Ulbricht as he becomes the leader that this space really needs right now.
We are the swarm now.
