In an emotionally charged livestream, Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson responded to escalating accusations of educational misconduct and broader claims that the project is a scam. The 36-minute stream, directly countered critics while providing an in depth defense of Cardano’s scientific foundation, its progress over the past decade, and his personal contributions to the blockchain industry.
The controversy began around Hoskinson’s co-authorship of a recent interdisciplinary academic paper involving a sea salvage expedition off Papua Recent Guinea. Critics have accused Hoskinson of improperly buying authorship on the paper—allegations he described as “unhinged” and rooted in personal vendettas quite than fact.
“I used to be involved in a sea salvage operation and contributed as much as I could. I’m not an authority in geology, especially astrogeology, nor ever professed to be one. But I did have quite a lot of fun reviewing the manuscript, had quite a lot of fun contributing to the actual salvage side,” Hoskinson said. “I’ll remind people, if we weren’t capable of salvage, there can be nothing to investigate—which is why that is an interdisciplinary paper.”
Hoskinson emphasized that his role within the project was primarily logistical and technical on the salvage side, including funding the expedition, helping design recovery sleds, and participating in sample processing aboard the research vessel.
The paper, he clarified, doesn’t present groundbreaking scientific conclusions but quite establishes a foundation for further research. “It was more of a sea salvage expedition than true deep hardcore science,” Hoskinson noted, stating the most important academic contributions got here from the Harvard-affiliated scientists leading the evaluation.
A Decade Of Cardano Development Defended
Pivoting to Cardano, Hoskinson delivered one in all his most direct defenses of the project’s legitimacy, progress, and technological achievements thus far. He dismissed persistent online narratives branding Cardano a scam, pointing to a track record few blockchain projects can match.
“Cardano was began in Japan in 2015 off of about $70 million in funding. Cardano in 2025 is a $26 billion ecosystem,” Hoskinson stated. “It has delivered 240 papers to market, hundreds of thousands of lines of code to market, [and] massive protocol innovations.”
He cited milestones including the primary provably secure proof-of-stake protocol, the prolonged UTXO model, the Plutus smart contract language, and upcoming advancements like Midnight, a privacy-focused partner chain.
Cardano, Hoskinson claimed, stays one of the secure and reliable blockchains within the industry: “Cardano’s been running for nearly eight years now—seven years, 24 hours a day, seven days every week. Cardano has never had a significant hack. Cardano’s never gone down. Cardano runs, and it’s decentralized as measured by the EDI.”
In contrast, Hoskinson referenced industry collapses resembling Celsius, Luna, FTX, and BitConnect, asking rhetorically why Cardano is usually labeled a scam despite its longevity and absence of catastrophic failures.
Where is the scam? That entire arc of time I just gave you […] hundreds of failed projects […] We’re still in the highest 10. We’re still here. We’re still pushing forward. I don’t understand your grievance. I actually don’t.”
Hoskinson warned of what he called “Charles Derangement Syndrome” (CDS), describing a growing online culture that seeks to destroy reputations with misinformation and private attacks. He claimed that critics have formed dedicated Discord servers, parody accounts, and full content channels dedicated to discrediting him and Cardano.
“Now we have now a everlasting CDS marketplace throughout the Cardano ecosystem, and folks will earn money, they’ll enjoy their time with it, and so they’ll invent all these narratives […] until they develop into so ingrained they simply robotically consider they’re true.”
He compared the phenomenon to politically charged derangement syndromes surrounding figures like Elon Musk and Donald Trump, arguing that the crypto industry now faces similar polarization.
Hoskinson also raised concerns about persistent misinformation sticking to Cardano’s fame, resembling the long-debunked claim that the project only processes one transaction per block: “The lie gets sticky […] You see the issue? There becomes this cognitive cost to undo it and unwind it. And while you create these cargo cults of misinformation, they develop into cancerous and so they grow and so they distort and eventually, they derange people to some extent where they create parallel realities.”
A Call To The Cardano Community
In closing, Hoskinson urged the Cardano community to contemplate the results of empowering individuals or entities driven by hate quite than constructive goals because the ecosystem moves into Voltaire, its on-chain governance era.
“All of us drink the identical water. And in the event you’re pouring lead in that water, you’re drinking just as much as I’m. And understand there are consequences for that,” he warned, pointing to upcoming budget decisions and delegate representative (DRep) elections inside Cardano’s governance system.
Despite the attacks, Hoskinson reaffirmed his commitment to the ecosystem and its roadmap:“Cardano is essentially the most decentralized cryptocurrency on the planet. We’ve the perfect on-chain governance system. Leios goes to make us one in all the fastest. Bitcoin DeFi goes to open up a $2 trillion opportunity. Midnight goes so as to add the subsequent generation to the cryptocurrency space. We’re not out. We’re fighting. We’re still within the conversation. We’re within the reserve. We’re still doing groundbreaking research. I’m happy with that.”
At press time, ADA traded at $0.7171.
Featured image from YouTube, chart from TradingView.com
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