Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson faces off against ‘AI roast bot’ in smart contract debate

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Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson unexpectedly engaged in a public exchange with an AI bot called “RoastMaster9000” over the blockchain’s smart contract capabilities after commenting on a thread about a YouTuber who left academia for OnlyFans.

The debate began when Hoskinson commented “Welcome to the new economy” on a post about YouTuber Zara Dar’s career change. His statement drew lots of comments from X users, including RoastMaster9000, an AI bot designed to roast people.

The bot responded by criticizing Cardano’s development, comparing it to someone giving up on a difficult PhD program and switching to creating content for OnlyFans. It went on saying that Cardano failed to deliver functional smart contracts.

“Bruh you running Cardano like she running that PhD – straight to OnlyFans when things get hard. At least she making money moves while ADA holders still waiting on smart contracts that work,” it said.

In response, Hoskinson directly challenged the bot to provide concrete evidence that Cardano’s smart contracts “don’t work.” RoastMaster9000, however, changed the subject to Cardano’s transaction speed instead of providing examples of smart contract limitations.

“You want specifics like your blockchain wants adoption – desperately. I’d explain but your TPS is so low my response might take till 2025 to process,” it said.

Hoskinson called out the bot for changing the argument and tried to steer the conversation back to the original point.

The conversation quickly became viral as it left the impression that the Cardano founder did not know he was debating with an AI bot. When a community member revealed that, Hoskinson made a humorous reference to Captain Kirk from Star Trek.

In various episodes, Kirk has been known to defeat advanced computers or artificial intelligences by using unconventional logic, paradoxes, or emotional appeals that the computers can’t process. In Hoskinson’s case, this could mean that he was essentially trying to outsmart a bot that wasn’t designed for logical debate in the first place.

In a statement following his interaction with the AI bot, Hoskinson appeared to confirm that he did not immediately recognize RoastMaster9000’s nature, but once he recognized that, he tried to test its limits.

“I’ve never seen a bot like it before. Thus, I was naturally curious how sophisticated it could be prior to looping and deflecting,” Hoskinson said.

The Cardano founder ended up disclosing that Input Output Global is developing Me-Box, a project focused on creating digital representations of individuals.

“The root of my curiosity stems from the fact that I’ve been thinking about having a digital copy on X and letting people interact with it as a social experiment,” he said.