Just when you thought the world of NFTs couldn’t get crazier, extravagant TRON CEO Justin Sun today threw $1,000,000 at a tweet.
just setting up my twttr
— jack (@jack) March 21, 2006
Not just any tweet: It’s the first tweet ever published, written by Twitter founder Jack Dorsey himself in 2006, and now Dorsey’s auctioning it off as an NFT.
NFTs are digital collectibles coded on the Ethereum blockchain. Thanks to advanced cryptography, an NFT proves its own digital scarcity through virtually unalterable coding. That means NFTs are much like any other collectible—trading cards, old cars, stamps—except they’re totally digital.
As of midnight UTC, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey auctioned the tweet, which reads “just setting up my twttr,” on NFT auction house Valuables.
— jack (@jack) March 6, 2021
Nine hours later, Sun replied to Dorsey’s tweet saying that he bid half a million dollars for it.
Hi @jack, I made a half million USD offer to buy your first NTF tweet: https://t.co/A8PYPTns76 @cent https://t.co/ijKWotsjfQ
— Justin Sun
(@justinsuntron) March 6, 2021
It seems Sun really, really wants to win Dorsey’s tweet. The listing now says that the highest offer is $1,000,000 by @JustinSunTron, though exactly whom he’s bidding against remains unclear.
A tenacious bidder
When Justin Sun wants something, he’s been known to wait half a year and splash out $4.37 million to get it. In that particular case, it was a dinner with billionaire investor and Berkshire Hathaway CEO/chairman Warren Buffet.
Originally scheduled for July 2020, Sun had to postpone after he came down with kidney stones—although a Verge article claims it was just an excuse. The pair rescheduled and in February they sat down to it.
The number one agenda for Sun, a blockchain billionaire, was to turn hardened nocoiner and old-world business tycoon Buffet on to Bitcoin. He also took the opportunity to apologize to Buffet for being “a big-mouthed over-marketer.”
Sun loves to flash.
Justin Sun loves the spotlight. In August last year, he released a DeFi meme coin in his own name. Stylized as $SUN, it is the native governance token of SUN Finance, a DeFi platform built on the TRON blockchain.
When Barstool Sports CEO Dave Portnoy launched a $1 million crypto fund to help America’s small businesses at the end of last year, Justin Sun donated $50k in Bitcoin, promptly taking to Twitter to announce his generosity.
I have matched my $50k #Bitcoin donation with @APompliano to the Barstool Fund. Happy to help small businesses and communities to grow! Join us! @stoolpresidente https://t.co/giWpP7c3DC pic.twitter.com/yWSkfSJb1m
— Justin Sun
It looks like Sun really wants that tweet. But don’t worry: you can still view it for free on Twitter.