Someone Went Ahead & Created Pied Piper Coin (PPI) & It's not HBO

If you're a fan of the show Silicon Valley like I am then you've probably seen the 5th season which ended in hilarious fashion with the launch of Pied Piper's ICO in order to raise funds and create a free and decentralised network as opposed to being throttled by a VC by taking series B investment. While the show pokes fun at cryptocurrency and rightly, we all know the ICO space is a self-parody at the moment it probably never had the intention of taking it as far as creating a real coin.

The introduction of Pied Piper Coin (PPI)

An anonymous crypto enthusiasts have now taken it upon themselves to create a Pied Piper Coin using an ERC-20 token and since PPC was already taken by Peer Coin these crypto enthusiasts have gone with PPI instead.

News broke of the coin on Twitter when Alphabitfund analyst Brad Mills shared a link on Twitter that raised concerns around the actual creation of a Pied Piper cryptocurrency. As pointed out by Mills, the coin is not affiliated to the show’s producers HBO, but was created in May through an airdrop.

This Pied Piper Coin situation shows the popularity of the TV show - with enough people interested in an actual token inspired by Silicon Valley. There's no doubt that there will be more of a spotlight on this airdropped token in the coming weeks.

Link to Tweet By Brad Mills

Accounts affiliated with the PPI coin project

I did some digging on the subject and managed to find the following accounts being used to shill the Pied Piper (PPI) coin project

• Medium
• Twitter
• Discord
• BitcoinTalk
• Telegram Group
• Telegram Announcements

Activity of the ERC-20 token

A simple search on Etherscan has reviled there are 10 million coins available with 2 532 individual accounts/wallets holding currency and 6188 transfers have been made

• Total Supply: 10,000,000 PPI
• Holders: 2532 addresses
• Transfers: 6188

• Account where PPI coin was created
• Current transactions of the PPI token

Why was Pied Piper Coin Created?

While little is known about the coin or any use for the funds raised from it, it looks to me as if its a parody coin looking to make a quick buck off some of the fans of the HBO series.

Some of the medium articles are posted with the following disclaimer.

We are not affiliated with HBO or Silicon Valley. Please keep in mind Cryptocurrency is very risky and subject to rapid volatility. Loss of all funds should be considered when investing into cryptocurrency. Nothing in this post is intended to be financial advice.

But who honestly reads these things and a suspecting investor who loved the show and thinks his contributing to some sort of crowdfunding experiment for the next season could be sadly disappointed.

For more on PPI check out the following posts

• PiedPiperCoin Airdrop #D-Day
• Pied Piper Coin: much needed breath of fresh air over the megalo crypto world

Is PPI a Scam?

Well, some think so and while it may be a clever parody account. Personally, I do find it funny but I wouldn't be investing money in something like this. I found a post on Silicon Valleys subreddit about it documenting the start of what could be a major Twitter war.

https://www.reddit.com/r/SiliconValleyHBO/comments/8j5ahh/so_someone_actually_started_a_pied_piper_coin_the/

While followers of the show can appreciate it what about people who have no context and think this is a legitimate project trying to decentralise the internet as is depicted on the official show's website and end up investing hoping for real returns. I feel coins do have a fiduciary responsibility and just saying we're not affiliated with HBO simply isn't good enough to get away with what could be defrauding people of money.

It's all fun and games until someone loses their life savings.

Have your say

Do you think this is just a fun fan coin/meme coin project or someone trying to profit off of the success of the show by creating this parody coin? Are coins becoming like domain urls and companies should secure it even if they do not plan to use it? Does this affect the brand of the show in a negative light?

Drop me a comment and let me know what you think!

Let's connect

For more cryptocurrency news & reviews feel free to follow me @chekohler

Sources:

• Cointelegraph