But look a bit closer, it appears intentionally bad.
1. This beautiful and thought provoking piece of 21st century art was shared widely in anti-EU Facebook groups, Twitter replies to journalists and elsewhere online, in 2016.
Is it an untrackable, untraceable, Cambridge Analytica-style, fake?

But look a bit closer, it appears intentionally bad.
Literate enough to spell “Sovereignty” correctly.

Cambridge Analytica boasted on hidden camera that they created “untraceable, untrackable” social media themes, memes and propaganda that spread.
“We put the information into the bloodstream of the internet and watch it grow.
Give it a little push.
This stuff infiltrates the online community and expands.
With no branding.
So it’s unattributable, untrackable"

It’s impossible to find out unless you work at Facebook or Google.
But there are some strange clues.
TinEye reverse image search shows that it was first saved by their web crawler in 2016.
A few days before the EU referendum in the UK.
With the username “niteoflight”.
Note the strange spelling and grammar; ‘re_election'

(A table of Johnny's most shared accounts on Twitter)

Unusually for a pro-Brexit British man named Johnny, he often used “Beeter”.
An obscure Japanese Twitter app, to Tweet.


But probably just a random weird guy, from the UK?
Who can’t really speak English.
Who likes Russian government TV more than any other news outlet.
Who uses a defunct, obscure Japanese language Twitter app, to post to Twitter.
But searching back further, the earliest example of this meme that we could find was not on Google, Twitter or Facebook.
The first evidence of it anywhere online, is from a guy called “Martin Corner”. Who posted the meme on Russian Facebook (VK), on the 3rd of June 2016.

The people who liked the 40 YEARS EU RULE post on VK purport to be English neo-Nazis and fascists, if their posts on VK are to be believed.

He loves Hitler and IKEA candles.
But hates the EU.
Who’d have thought.

Seeded it online via various “independent” groups and activists, who spread it so that it multiplied across social media without being tracked back to the creators.
More from Brexit
31 liars & hypocrites who facilitated brexit
Some are mad, some are bad
All are millionaires, some are billionaires
They’ll profit from UK companies failing, keep their money abroad to avoid UK tax and travel freely with their EU passports
#RejoinEU

https://t.co/mZRr9u1RPb
A brexit advent calendar to count down to loss of our EU rights
— European Unity #FBPE \U0001f1ea\U0001f1fa\U0001f4b6\u2b50\ufe0f (@EuropeanUnity1) December 31, 2020
Box 31: Boris Johnson told us:
\u201cI\u2019m in favour of the single market\u201d
\u201cThe cost of getting out will be virtually nil\u201d
\u201cWe have an oven ready deal\u201d
\u201cThere is no threat to the Erasmus scheme\u201d
\u201cF**k business\u201d pic.twitter.com/w8KxDJYV4x
https://t.co/BY6hKloR9d
A brexit advent calendar to count down to loss of our EU rights
— European Unity #FBPE \U0001f1ea\U0001f1fa\U0001f4b6\u2b50\ufe0f (@EuropeanUnity1) December 30, 2020
Box 30: Nigel Farage told us:
\u201cIn a 52-48 referendum this would be unfinished business by a long way\u201d
\u201cI never promised brexit would be a huge success\u201d
\u201cIf brexit is a disaster, I will go and live abroad\u201d pic.twitter.com/UfO9gzoUPD
https://t.co/NdC0ltLeSM
A brexit advent calendar to count down to loss of our EU rights
— European Unity #FBPE \U0001f1ea\U0001f1fa\U0001f4b6\u2b50\ufe0f (@EuropeanUnity1) December 29, 2020
Box 29: Andrea Leadsom told us:
\u201cI don\u2019t think the UK should leave the EU. It would be a disaster for our economy & lead to a decade of uncertainty\u201d
\u201cMy expectation is that there will not be an economic impact\u201d pic.twitter.com/SMSQ6ruG2h
https://t.co/BLnRLotso7
A brexit advent calendar to count down to loss of our EU rights
— European Unity #FBPE \U0001f1ea\U0001f1fa\U0001f4b6\u2b50\ufe0f (@EuropeanUnity1) December 28, 2020
Box 28: Andrew Bridgen told us:
\u201cAs an English person I have the right to go to Ireland, I believe I can ask for a passport can\u2019t I?\u201d
\u201cWe won\u2019t be crashing out, we\u2019ll be cashing in\u201d pic.twitter.com/jFINFu8xNe
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If everyone was holding bitcoin on the old x86 in their parents basement, we would be finding a price bottom. The problem is the risk is all pooled at a few brokerages and a network of rotten exchanges with counter party risk that makes AIG circa 2008 look like a good credit.
— Greg Wester (@gwestr) November 25, 2018
The benign product is sovereign programmable money, which is historically a niche interest of folks with a relatively clustered set of beliefs about the state, the literary merit of Snow Crash, and the utility of gold to the modern economy.
This product has narrow appeal and, accordingly, is worth about as much as everything else on a 486 sitting in someone's basement is worth.
The other product is investment scams, which have approximately the best product market fit of anything produced by humans. In no age, in no country, in no city, at no level of sophistication do people consistently say "Actually I would prefer not to get money for nothing."
This product needs the exchanges like they need oxygen, because the value of it is directly tied to having payment rails to move real currency into the ecosystem and some jurisdictional and regulatory legerdemain to stay one step ahead of the banhammer.