Tech / Technology

NFT partygoers blame Bored Ape Yacht Club event for loss of vision

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People who attended the Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs ‘ApeFest’ event are complaining of eye pain and vision loss.
Bored Ape Yacht Club

With the collapse of cryptocurrency in the mainstream last year, some might be surprised to find out that NFTs are still a thing. Yet, people are still buying receipts minted to the blockchain that point to a piece of digital art, and one of the most popular NFTs continues to be the Bored Ape Yacht Club.

Now, the entire NFT market — including Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs — is worth a lot less than it used to be. But they do still grant holders of the NFTs access to exclusive parties and club events.

Bored Apes are once again back in the spotlight, and not because NFT prices are spiking again. It’s because one of those aforementioned Bored Ape parties has resulted in multiple attendees complaining of eye pain and vision loss.

“Anyone else’s eyes burning from last night? Woke up at 3 am with extreme pain and ended up in the ER,” posted @Feld4014 on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, on Sunday after attending the three-day ApeFest event in Hong Kong.

The post received quite a few responses from other ApeFest attendees.

“I promise, it was really bad, so I had to go to the hospital,” replied one ApeFest goer. “After they cleaned my eyes and gave me medicine, I’m feeling a little better now.”

“I got it as well. Went to bed at 1:30, woke up at 5 eyes burning,” said another X user who shared that they also went to the hospital due to the issue.

According to tech founder Adrian Zduńczyk, who attended the party and went to the hospital after experiencing vision loss, doctors diagnosed him with “photokeratitis over both eyes.”

“Doctor told me it was due to the UV from stage lights. I go to festivals often but have never experienced this,” shared @CryptoJune777, another attendee of the event.

Bored Ape Yacht Club’s parent company, Yuga Labs, put out a statement regarding the reports.

Apes, we are aware of the eye-related issues that affected some of the attendees of ApeFest and have been proactively reaching out to individuals since yesterday to try and find the potential root causes. Based on our estimates, we believe that much less than 1% of those attending and working the event had these symptoms. 

While nearly everyone has indicated their symptoms have improved, we encourage anybody who feels them to seek medical attention just in case.

Thankfully, it does seem that those who have shared their experience are on the mend.

In the NFT and cryptocurrency communities, fans of Bitcoin often like to show their support by portraying themselves with lasers shooting out of their eyes. 

But after ApeFest, we might have to reconsider those depictions. As cryptocurrency researcher Moly White put it, maybe the lasers were going in the opposite direction the whole time.

Tech / Technology

FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried found guilty of scamming billions from crypto customers

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Sam Bankman-Fried, founder of crypto exchange FTX, has been found guilty of wire fraud after scamming customers out of $10 billion.
Sam Bankman-Fried, co-founder of FTX Cryptocurrency Derivatives Exchange, leaves court in New York, US, on Wednesday, July 26, 2023.

Sam Bankman-Fried, founder and former CEO of crypto exchange FTX, has been found guilty of wire fraud after scamming customers out of approximately $10 billion.

The verdict came down in a Manhattan federal court after a relatively brief deliberation on Thursday, with the jurors finding Bankman-Fried guilty of all seven charges brought against him. In addition to the two counts of wire fraud, this included two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to commit securities fraud, conspiracy to commit commodities fraud, and conspiracy to commit money laundering. 

The former crypto billionaire had pleaded not guilty to all charges, and even launched a Substack to defend himself in the court of public opinion in January.

Bankman-Fried now faces a maximum sentence of 110 years in prison, with sentencing scheduled for Mar. 28 next year. A second trial for five additional charges against the disgraced former billionaire is also currently scheduled for March.

“Sam Bankman-Fried perpetrated one of the biggest financial frauds in American history — a multibillion-dollar scheme designed to make him the King of Crypto — but while the cryptocurrency industry might be new and the players like Sam Bankman-Fried might be new, this kind of corruption is as old as time,” U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said in a statement. “This case has always been about lying, cheating, and stealing, and we have no patience for it.”

SEE ALSO:

FTX determines around $9 billion in customer funds are missing

Prior to its dramatic collapse, FTX had been the fourth largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world. However, unbeknownst to the public, the company was secretly lending billions of dollars worth of customers’ assets to Bankman-Fried’s trading firm Alameda Research. This money was used to bet on other cryptocurrencies without FTX customers’ authorisation — a scheme that eventually fell apart. Approximately one million FTX customers are now facing losses. 

FTX filed for bankruptcy last November, before Bankman-Fried was arrested and extradited to the U.S. in December. 

It’s highly likely that Bankman-Fried will appeal this week’s verdict, his lawyer stating that he “maintains his innocence and will continue to vigorously fight the charges against him.” He’ll have a difficult fight ahead of him if he does intend to keep arguing his innocence, though.