Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin slams Elon Musk: “X has become a Death Star because of hate”

Vitalik claims that Musk is “actively randomizing” X’s algorithms.

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin criticized Elon Musk’s leadership of

In a series of posts on Tuesday, Buterin said recent waves of online hostility, particularly attacks targeting Europe, seemed “unhinged” and closer to “a coordinated attempt at delegitimization” than a meaningful debate. He pointed to what he described as an “apocalyptic attitude” and generalizations about the region, adding that such comments did not reflect his own experiences after spending “an average of two months a year over the past ten years” there.

Coordinated hate machine?

Buterine directly urged Musk to reconsider his role in shaping the platform’s discourse, saying:

“I think you have to remember that it is actually harmful to make

He warned that the ability to mobilize large-scale hostility under the banner of open expression risks creating political and cultural backlash that could weaken the commitment to freedom of expression generally. Buterin also suggested that Musk is influencing the platform’s visibility algorithms in ways that increase polarization, saying he “seemed to be actively tweaking algorithms to boost some things and de-boost other things based on fairly arbitrary criteria.”

As long as such control exists, Buterin says, it would be preferable “to promote kindness rather than fad bait.” His comments come as debates intensify over how major social platforms, which are increasingly focused on ownership, balance moderation, influence public debate and define the boundaries of acceptable speech. The comments also come at a time of a major change in direction at Farcaster, a decentralized social network that Buterin once endorsed and which announced it is transitioning from a social-first design to a wallet-centric model.

Buterin’s privacy push

Last month, Buterin donated 128 ETH each to the Session and SimpleX messaging projects, while expanding his support for privacy-focused communications tools. The Ethereum co-founder explained that the two platforms are working to strengthen decentralization by offering end-to-end encrypted messages without registration of phone numbers and improving protection against Sybil and denial-of-service attacks.

He said the industry’s next priorities include unauthorized account creation and better metadata privacy. Buterin added that both projects publicly list their donation addresses and, while still imperfect, represent active efforts to promote privacy-protective communications.

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