The ban on social network X in Brazil has dealt a heavy blow to the Brazilian crypto community, as many in the blockchain industry — from researchers to influencers, fundraisers, conference organizers, and incubators — use the site as an important medium for communication and promotion.
On August 30, nearly 22 million users in Brazil were cut off from X, when Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes found that X enabled and promoted misinformation related to former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.
The ban has cost Elon Musk's social media company one of its biggest markets.
Victor Cioffi, growth manager and core member of crypto incubator SolanaSuperteam Brasil, told TinTucBitcoin that X is the most popular social media platform among Brazilian youth, as it is mainly used to share random thoughts informally.
However, the crypto industry uses it as a professional tool to promote their companies and ideas, and more importantly, it is a portal for them to connect with the global crypto community:
“X is meant to reach a global audience, so if you don't use X in your marketing strategy, it's like losing an arm.”
Cioffi explains that the X ban in Brazil forces you to choose between being an outlaw to communicate and promote your product to the outside world, or complying with the regulations and struggling to connect on other social media platforms.
Brazilian Crypto Industry Loses Audience and Revenue
A 2024 study by cryptocurrency price tracker CoinGecko found that X is the top social media platform for cryptocurrency users to gather valuable information and is their favorite social media site.
For influencers and crypto companies, X provides a large audience to launch campaigns and creates an easy entry point for new potential customers.
João Ferreira, co-founder and CEO of Brazilian DeFi app (DeFi) Picnic, told TinTucBitcoin that his company lost “half of its reach” because X was their main communication platform.
“As a founder, in terms of fundraising and communicating with venture capitalists and other influential individuals, this definitely has a big impact,” Ferreira said.
Casta Crypto, a cryptocurrency educator and content creator in Brazil, told TinTucBitcoin that X is his main channel for communicating with new projects and initiatives and a means for him to engage with his audience through regular interactions.
After the ban, he said his audience dropped by about two-thirds, as another third of his viewers came from YouTube.
A prominent crypto influencer in Brazil, who wished to remain anonymous to avoid possible repercussions, told TinTucBitcoin that she “couldn’t sleep for days” because she felt that her audience’s “treasures” might be at stake. X is her most prominent social media platform in terms of engagement.
Furthermore, as an influencer, she said she started to feel lonely “because this is the way to connect with people.”
She said the X ban pushed her paranoia levels to a high, joking that she started to think that the recent suspension of Brazilian crypto influencers' Instagram accounts might be related to the X ban.
The anonymous influencer told TinTucBitcoin that “everyone is trying to find alternatives.”
She observed user growth across several platforms, including YouTube community posts, Substack posts, Instagram, Farcaster, Threads, Nostr, and Bluesky, which have added more than 1 million new users since the X ban went into effect.
Casta Crypto admits that he has tried alternatives, but “so far, it has been impossible to replicate [X's] dynamics elsewhere.”
He lamented that the Brazilian community “not only lost a large audience, but also lost valuable synergies and network effects.”
Cryptocurrency Conferences and the DAOs Affected
Cryptocurrency conferences are the backbone of the cryptocurrency industry.
Daniela Zschaber, product manager at blockchain development company Blockful and organizer of the ETH Floripa crypto conference, told TinTucBitcoin that the loss of X is significantly affecting her business.
ETH Floripa is set to take place in February 2025; however, she worries that, with less than six months to go before the event, “any access to X will be crucial at this stage.”
“We lost important data like event engagement, potential sponsors and interested partners […] without X, we lost the network effect in the Web3 space.”
Zschaber said that their events, while sometimes smaller and geared toward Brazilian attendees, usually reach maximum attendance.
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However, without X, the smaller events they are organizing like the upcoming conference in Curitiba are only reaching about half the desired numbers because they have lost a vital tool for coordination.
Decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) are global and decentralized organizations that need digital tools to coordinate effectively.
Zschaber said her company, Blockful, which works directly with DAOs, lost its main communication channel. She said the company lost access to important information from stakeholders, partners, and other DAOs.
While DAOs typically use Discord for coordination, Zschaber said that major updates are often shared on X in real-time.
It's not that they're completely cut off from information; “it's the convenience of accessing information,” which makes the process slower and more cumbersome.
The lack of access to critical information in real-time can also affect everyday Brazilian crypto holders.
The anonymous influencer said that many cryptocurrency protocols use X to notify users of security vulnerabilities and attacks. Brazilian victims of hacks like the one of DeFi staking protocol Ether.fi would not receive timely warnings, increasing the risk of being scammed, she told TinTucBitcoin.
As the situation worsens and the ban drags on, many have debated moving abroad to avoid these issues without wanting to leave the country. Ferreira said he is “actively considering leaving Brazil,” as the X ban “was the last straw for me.”
Brazilians debate X ban
The debate over the X ban is ongoing in Brazil. Some frame the story as a fight between billionaires and the sovereignty of the Brazilian state, while others see it as a matter of free speech.
Joao Victor Archegas, founder of the digital constitutionalism and content moderation research group ModeraLab and coordinator at the Institute of Technology and Society, explained to TinTucBitcoin that freedom of expression has many limitations under the 1988 Brazilian Constitution.
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Archegas said that free speech “may be lawfully restricted to protect other equally important fundamental rights.”
The central debate in Brazil, he said, is whether the ban after X's refusal to comply with Brazilian law is proportional.
While some saw the ban as disproportionate and a blatant attack on free speech, Archegas said it “cannot lose sight of the fact that X has deliberately avoided compliance by outright defying the Brazilian Supreme Court on multiple occasions.”
Archegas acknowledged that the Supreme Court’s decisions can and should be criticized, but they “do not indicate any signs of intentional, widespread political censorship in the country.” Like other countries, Brazil is learning to deal with some of the negative consequences of platforms like X, Archegas said.
While there are legitimate concerns about judges overreaching their powers – particularly when it comes to fining those caught using VPNs to access X – all companies operating in Brazil should use the legal channels available to them to seek redress. Challenging the power of the courts is not feasible.
As the debate continues, many fear that X will never return to its original state due to self-censorship. Crypto Casta believes that “self-censorship is a growing trend across the Western world since the emergence of cancel culture and its use as unwritten rules to regulate acceptable speech and worldview.”
For Crypto Casta, the problem is that once activist voices challenge the unwritten rules and the fear of being “cancelled” is no longer an obstacle, the state will step in to enforce these rules.
Ferreira is pessimistic, believing that X may never return to its original state and believing that most people will not care.
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