The infamous domain Bitcoin.com is once again in the midst of a crypto drama. John Carvalho, best known in the Bitcoin community as the ever-cynical and brutally honest Bitcoin Error Log, has challenged BCH leader Roger Ver to a fight for “the biggest prize in crypto”. While the stipulations regarding the duel are still unclear and the prized possession that Mr. Carvalho puts on the line is yet to be determined, those of us who watch the events unfold can only reaffirm that there’s never a boring day in crypto.

This wouldn’t be the first time the two gentlemen face off, but there’s a chance that we might witness a battle that goes beyond the realm of intellectual debate on Bitcoin scalability. As he revealed in his official interview for Crypto Insider, Mr. Carvalho is even willing to accept a jiu-jitsu challenge at a disadvantaged position (Mr. Ver is known for his brown belt in this branch of martial arts).

We can only hope that the cause doesn’t generate a bloody event which takes us back to the days of gladiators – maybe that a game of chess would suffice?

?ALRIGHT PEOPLE! I have challenged @rogerkver to a duel for the biggest prize in crypto, https://t.co/h2gLo9ePtU, and he is interested! What do you want for the format? What should I put at stake?! ? https://t.co/rVUDd92Gqi — John Carvalho (@BitcoinErrorLog) January 16, 2019

The Legend of Bitcoin.com

Bitcoin.com has received a lot of criticism for pushing Bitcoin Cash (the first major hard fork of the original Bitcoin blockchain, which aims to scale through big blocks) and confusing newcomers with the “BCH is Bitcoin narrative”. This ambiguation of the brand was backed by many industry heavyweights such as Gavin Andresen and Jihan Wu, but their tactics and actions were condemned by a large majority of the original community members (the so-called “Bitcoin Core” group) for being a social attack against the Bitcoin project.

The Infamous John Carvalho Interview With Roger Ver

Now John Carvalho, who has previously pushed Roger Ver’s nerves to the limit in a now-infamous interview, has decided to start a quest to bring Bitcoin.com back to the righteous side. The challenge was launched through Peter McCormack’s “What Bitcoin Did?” podcast, as both men were interviewed in the same show, but on different days. Mr. Carvalho, who happened to be the first guest, suggested to Mr. McCormack that he push forward this challenge for the Bitcoin.com domain.

When Mr. Ver‘s turn came to join the show, he said that he “was interested” in the proposal, but the challenge would have to take place under terms with which he would agree. At press time, the podcast episode wasn’t published yet, but more details about the reply will follow in the coming days. So far, we only have a confirmation from show host Peter McCormack, who tweeted the following:

https://twitter.com/PeterMcCormack/status/1085597928482369537

An attempt which seemed unlikely to succeed seems to have captured the imagination of the crypto-sphere and grown into an incredible phenomenon. If you’re interested in finding out more from John Carvalho’s side, watch the exclusive interview that Crypto Insider’s Vlad Costea has recorded. Furthermore, stay tuned for more details about this strange occurrence which has the potential to turn Bitcoin.com into a Bitcoin.org redirect.

Full Transcript of the Video Interview

Vlad Costea: Hello and welcome to another crypto insider interview and this time we have a very special guest with a very special proposition and this is John Carvalho, you might know him as the @BitcoinErrorlog and he actually made a challenge to Roger Vere and we’re going to find out more about it right now, so hello John

John Carvalho: Hey, how you doing ?

Vlad Costea: Oh well not as well as you are doing right now.

John Carvalho: If you say so… Yeah, I had this idea in my head for actually a long time where I was like… the best way to diffuse Roger is to get Bitcoin.com from him. I know what he really wants is our Bitcoin, even though I think that’s a waste of time and I got the idea in my head: that one day I would just challenge him to a fight and I would try to make this the stake. But I don’t really know what stakes I can put up that are as valuable as Bitcoin.com.

But I would love to see him lose Bitcoin.com so I did my interview recently with a Peter McCormick on “What Bitcoin Did” podcast and we were talking about it. Afterwards after he released it and he said he was going to be interviewing Roger Ver again, he was like “I don’t know what to ask him, you know we’ve already covered everything and I kind of just want to see what he has to say about the new Bitcoin Cash forks”.

And I said “look if you want to make it interesting tell him that I want to fight him and I will fight him for Bitcoin.com. That’ll make your interview interesting”. So he did it and Roger and I haven’t heard of the interview yet. I don’t think he’s released it yet, but apparently Roger is interested.

Roger does have a habit of kind of getting out of bets so we’ll see if anything actually happens, but just before this interview right now we put it out to crypto Twitter to see what people have to say. For what they think we should do for a format that’s fair because he’s like a brown belt in jujitsu and I am NOT any kind of qualified fighter, in any way. But I’ll train with the bears of Romania if I have to take Bitcoin.com.

Vlad Costea: Let me tell you that we have very powerful bears. Yeah it’s not like you have nobody to train with or no kind of strong bear on your side but this is early chivalrous cause, you made it sound as it’s some kind of duel.

John Carvalho: Yeah.

Vlad Costea: You are the only one who actually was able to stand up to him and tell him all these facts about Bitcoin cash when it was a time when a lot of people didn’t have maybe the guts to have that kind of debate with him and challenge his views about what bitcoin should be and now he wants to get Bitcoin.com from him so what if you actually get it and let’s say that’s a miracle you actually get Bitcoin.com what’s going to happen with it ?

John Carvalho: I don’t know, I’ve barely began to think about that. I think the first thing I would do is probably just redirect it to Bitcoin.org or something like this, but I would use it for the benefit of Bitcoin. I’m not interested in exploiting it in any special way, even though it’s an extremely valuable domain. My main interest would definitely be in seeing it be the tool that everybody wishes it would be. You know, something that was for onboarding people and educating people about Bitcoin — the real Bitcoin.

Vlad Costea: Okay that’s really ambitious and to be honest I never thought about it when you distinguish the layers or the different parts of the community you think that Bitcoin.com belongs by default to Roger Ver and the r/BTC belongs to the Bitcoin cash side of the debates and it gets complicated and confusing and I guess my view on it was that this wouldn’t happen up to the point when Bitcoin cash should fail or Bitcoin would fail I know one of the options to reach that point where it’s no longer successful on the market and that’s when the domains and the places can merge but up until that point it’s really courageous of you to think about this and actually make him accept the challenge or the domain I guess it’ll also be useful for somebody to take the subreddit for r/BTC and I guess there are also channels which sound misleading for the audiences or maybe for the noobs who get into the space later.

John Carvalho: Yeah, this whole thing is I just don’t want people to be misled anymore. The situation even with r/BTC is ridiculous right? Because BTC is the ticker for Bitcoin proper and he’s doing BCH. But he’s holding tightly onto BTC and making it, and it’s all about Bitcoin Cash so it would be nice to figure out a way to just get everything where it belongs.

I don’t know if this fight will do it or if this fight will even happen for sure, but it would be pretty cool. I was talking to some people about what I could possibly put up for stake because I can’t think of anything worth as much as Bitcoin.com. Currently, nothing I own is as valuable, but I’m open to ideas. I’m open to whatever creativity people have about this: I was even talking to my new company (I’m working with BitRefill) and they said “look man, we’ll implement Bitcoin Cash… we’ll figure out whatever it takes to be able to help make this happen”.

I was thinking maybe I could ask Damos to put up our Bitcoin as stake on my side because I know Roger really wants that. But I really know Damos and I don’t really own it. So yeah, I want to see I’m interested to see the people on Twitter have for ideas, maybe we just end up arm wrestling or playing tic-tac-toe. Who knows, but I’m certainly gonna try to have as much fun as possible, if not the actual domain.

Vlad Costea: There was exactly this old expression which says eye for eye and tooth for tooth: so if he gives you a domain you should give him a domain so if he puts Bitcoin.com on the line you can put Xotika.com on the line.

John Carvalho: Well it’s exactly that CV but I mean obviously it’s not worth the same. I’m not gonna pretend and say that it’s anywhere near as valuable, I just don’t think he’ll be interested in that. But you know, if I have to start piling multiple things on to get the stake to be right if he’s really willing to put it up at stake… like I said, I’ll do whatever I can that makes it a fair deal. Whatever I can offer, I will. And whatever we can do to make the fight fair I will do that as well.

Vlad Costea: So what kind of challenges do you think would make you in a position where you’re the one with the advantage ? What kind of challenge did you actually prefer to win Bitcoin.com ?

John Carvalho: I don’t know, I mean an intellectual one, I guess. But this is more about a fight, I think you know obviously the one that he’s gonna prefer is an actual fair fight. Jujitsu match because he’s brown belt, I have no experience any kind in martial arts, but if that’s what it takes I’ll do that too, man! I’ll find a jujitsu trainer, I’ll train for six months, a year, whatever it takes for me to feel like I might actually have a chance.

Vlad Costea: This is crazy on your side if you want to fight him physically. I think that’s a bad idea. I think you might be bigger than he is, you’re like six foot two or something… I met you in person, that’s how I know how tall you are: you’re about six foot two. And I’ve seen Roger Ver next to Vitalik, and I know that Vitalik is pretty tall. So I guess if it was a boxing match you would have the advantage in terms of reach.

John Carvalho: Maybe we should do a boxing match then no but either way if it’s any kind of real physical challenge real physical fight I’m gonna have to train I mean I’m you know I work on a computer I’m not like some kind of gym dude but I’m willing I’m willing to do it I’m willing to train hard if that’s what it takes

Vlad Costea: I can just imagine how this is going to go on websites like Vice.com and they’re going to present a bit crazy bitcoiners fighting for Bitcoin.com.

John Carvalho: People like coming to the fighting in Satoshi suits and stuff. Actually, now that you mentioned it, it’s a good educational publicity for the problem of how Bitcoin.com isn’t the real Bitcoin website as well. Even if nothing comes with this, even if we don’t fight, at least people will keep talking about it and all day. They will understand why I even want this domain.

Vlad Costea: That’s actually smart and the fact that he responded to this challenge and he’s willing at least in this early phase to put something on the line or pretend that he is interested in challenging you that’s interesting. It would be boring if this was a game of chess or maybe some game on Satoshi dice the back out of free whoever wins

John Carvalho: Yeah, I mean maybe that’s what he’ll end up agreeing to. I feel like he won’t agree to anything really in the end… But you know, I think I was surprised that he even accepted this initial challenge because I thought he would pussy out.

Vlad Costea: Those are big words and I guess…

John Carvalho: Well, I gotta start my shit talking game. You know, I’ve already started listening to some hype men, gonna point at Don King.

Vlad Costea: You’re from which state from the United States?

John Carvalho: Massachusetts, near Boston.

Vlad Costea: Do you have any great boxers who came out of Massachusetts?

John Carvalho: I have no idea but Southie in Boston is where all the Irish bare-knuckle boxing takes place. So maybe I can find some friends there, we can do boxing training. For the actual fight, people are already saying on Twitter that they want to see a MMA match. So maybe we’ll do that and we’ll just choose our own styles.

Vlad Costea: I think for you it’s better to the boxing because you have the higher reach you have long reach, long arms.

John Carvalho: Yeah well, thank you for your advice.

Vlad Costea: Just think about the mainstream media covering this they’re going to be like : « this bitcoiners are fighting for domain like —literally » or the days of the medieval chivalry challenges are back.

John Carvalho: Yeah, what’s the name of like in Game of Thrones when they had the guy fight for the other guy like an avatar? But something like this… I’m trying to act this Bitcoin’s avatar, I guess.

Vlad Costea: I don’t watch Game of Thrones but …

John Carvalho: Well, it’s a medieval thing: there’s some kind of term for when you know you choose a proxy fighter for you and to do a duel for you. And you know Bitcoin can’t fight for itself right, so I’ll do it.

Vlad Costea: I know what that’s called in Romanian but not in English.

John Carvalho: Yeah, what’s in Romanian.

Vlad Costea: “Turnir”, it’s like a tournament where you appoint somebody it was used by noblemen in Middle Ages to appoint some kind of slaves they had to fight do what is in the end if if it got really tense or early even they would do it themselves get on their horses and grab their swords and try to impress the damsel.

John Carvalho: Hmmm.

Vlad Costea: This used to be about a girl, but in our case it’s about Bitcoin.com.

John Carvalho: Yeah, much more important.

Vlad Costea: I don’t know what to say good luck with this and I’m actually curious to follow this it’s insane because I spoke to you before we settled to do this interview and you told me that you don’t want to be you do not want to be asked about your discussion and debate but rather fear from…

John Carvalho: Yeah, just because it’s so old, I’ve done it so many times and I think everybody’s bored with it. But then you know on a whim I put there so I didn’t expect him to actually respond. And we just put the tweet out right before we started this interview so everybody’s probably talking about it now and we’ll see what the fallout really is.

Vlad Costea: Oh this is so going on YouTube immediately and I’m gonna ask somebody to cover it and write a quick article. But congratulations for managing and actually making him accept. I mean, a guy can dream you can challenge Roger Ver to anything but he on Twitter… he doesn’t respond usually. Like he either doesn’t care or he only picks a few specific people that he cares about.

John Carvalho: Yeah I usually only interact with people that are saying good things about Bitcoin Cash or whatever other coin he’s trying to show at the time. So I’ve never gotten him to reply to me on Twitter, but I had an inside guy when Peter was interviewing him. And Peter relayed the message so the message got through, yeah.

Vlad Costea: Okay I can only hope that this doesn’t end in a bloody way.

John Carvalho: I figure even if I lose, he loses right because he’s like the bad guy and I’m the big winner.

John Carvalho: Yeah, yeah… Even if I lose at least I tried and he’s’ still Roger Ver.

Vlad Costea: So you’ll be the real Bitcoin Jesus because you’ll be the one getting beat up for a good cause.

John Carvalho: Yeah, I’ll take that title from him too.

Vlad Costea: There’s a bigger stake than the actual Bitcoin.com domain: it’s about who is the Bitcoin Jesus.

John Carvalho: Yeah, I guess so.

Vlad Costea: So you will upgrade from Johnny BCash to Bitcoin Jesus.

John Carvalho: I really don’t want to be called Bitcoin Jesus but it’ll be good for people stop coming.

Vlad Costea: Yeah we’ll see, we’ll see. And unlike the times of the Roman Empire we actually have technology to record it and show it to the bitcoiners of the future.

John Carvalho: Yeah, we’ll get into the end.

Vlad Costea: This will go up there with all the crazy moments about finding Satoshi.

John Carvalho: Hopefully we make some history

Vlad Costea: Right this is history if you think about it. Bitcoin.com that’s I guess it’s more important that Bitcoin.org because people when they associate a certain business or assets and anything with a website.

John Carvalho: Yeah, I mean for as scammy as I think it is right now, he has certainly done a good job making sure it gets proper ranking and having tons of content and looking professional. So it’s a really good deceiving mechanism and I’d like to see that end.

Vlad Costea: So is there anything that you would like to add before we wrap this up ?

John Carvalho: Nope, I think we’ve said enough, the challenge is out there. I hope he doesn’t turn this into some kind of annoying non-challenge that never happens. I hope we can figure out a good format that makes it must both have a fair chance and I hope that me or the community can come up with a good steak for my end to make sure he actually puts Bitcoin.com on the line.

Vlad Costea: Okay, thank you John and I’m happy that I had the exclusive rights to record this.

John Carvalho: No problem man, thank you.

Vlad Costea: I’m going to make this big.

John Carvalho: Oh, you go for it.

Vlad Costea: Oh no you go for it, it’s easy for me to just publish content it’s hard for you to actually fight for Bitcoin.com

John Carvalho: I’ll do my best.

Vlad Costea: So I’m going to wrap this up, thank you very much and I look forward to see how this works out.