Kraken Battles with the semantics XRP Army Over Ripple

Kraken ended up in disorder from the XRP army after disputing the vernacular around Ripple and XRP. Is Kraken's character powered by Jesse Powell's former bad blood with Ripple?

Kraken is one of the largest cryptocurrent exchanges in the United States, having eased $ 3.7 billion over the past 30 days. The company has entered a crisis after causing the "XRP Army & # 39; beyond the conventions on the names of Ripple and XRP on Twitter:

Dear XRP Army, Ripple is (and was the first) a payment protocol whose native currency is XRP. You could suggest the company of the same name to change its name (again) to avoid ambiguity. The convention is , such as: Ripple XRP, Ethereum ether, bitcoin bitcoin, etc. 💙

– Kraken Exchange (@krakenfx) 29 December 2018

Although at first glance it may seem that this is a normal Crypto fire war on Twitter, the debate raises some challenging questions.

Relationship between XRP and Ripple

The crux of the problem concerns the origins of XRP Ledger and how it became synonymous with Ripple as a company. If the courts found that XRP was a cryptocurrency issued by Ripple, or worse, that XRP was a security in Ripple, so the company would have a legal and accounting nightmare in his hands.

Ripple states that the XRP cryptocurrency is decentralized and completely distinct from the company, according to their website:

"XRP Ledger can not be owned by any single entity, it exists independently of a person or company, including Ripple."

Ryan Zagone, Ripple's Director of Regulatory Relations, builds on this sentiment during his testimony to the UK Parliment:

"XRP is not controlled by us.It has not been published by our company, it is an open source platform, we are only using this open source technology.We have integrated it into our product: there is a close correlation between us and the currency just because the market has begun to understand it, the reality is that it is open source and we as a company can go away and this technology will continue to exist ".

Yet, the company's statements are full of controversy. Critics, such as Kraken, have pointed out that Ripple's large XRP reserves and the ambiguity behind the creation of cryptocurrency suggest evidence to the contrary.

The alternation between these two factions left the laity confused about the difference between Ripple and XRP. Some people think that buying XRP equals the purchase of Ripple shares, while others never want "Ripple to be mentioned in the same sentence as XRP", as he has declared of Kraken.

Volleyball shot on Twitter

To further provoke XRP fans, Kraken was irreverent in his response to the intransigent Ripple. In response to a tweet discussing the clarity of the use of "Ripple" in Kraken's lists:

not to be confused with Nipple (XRP)

– Kraken Exchange (@krakenfx) 29 December 2018

And in another tweet, the exchange agrees that even XRP is the wrong terminology given its first analogy:

In reality, you're right. Thank you for pointing this out. The correct example would have been Ripple ripples (or Ethereum ETH, Bitcoin XBT).

– Kraken Exchange (@krakenfx) 29 December 2018

Bad Blood on Ripple's Executive Team

A few stories about Ripple shed light on the situation. Jesse Powell, the founder of Kraken, was a director and a member of the Ripple board of directors. In 2014, Powell fought with Ripple co-founders Chris Larsen and Jed McCaleb for their self-assignment of XRP:

"I am no longer confident in the management or in the company's ability to recover from the embarrassing attribution of the founders of 20% of the XRP, which I hoped until recently would be returned".

The dispute intensified after Powell's concerns were realized, with Jed McCaleb leaving with a multi-billion XRP points to start Stellar Lumens. When Powell transmitted his concerns to the public, the company ceased and desisted for defamation. According to the document:

"Your recent public statements about Ripple and his CEO, Chris Larsen, are false and defamatory and are clearly intended to harm society …. you're using your internal knowledge to sabotage Ripple Labs and tear out huge payments for yourself. and McCaleb …. The most glaring, you're doing all this while trying to cheat Ripple Labs and your former partners as greedy and indifferent to Ripple's best interests
Community."

Four years later, it seems that Jesse Powell's hostility towards Ripple can still manifest itself in the Kraken character. If history tends to repeat itself, maybe Crypto Twitter will get another theatrical cause.