Bitcoin Plaza: December 2014

Wednesday, December 31, 2014

Cornell Professor Challenges ChangeTip

Emin Gün Sirer, the Cornell professor who recently said that ChangeTip needed to die a quick death has returned to the offensive on the issue of privacy. ChangeTip CEO Nick Sullivan recently criticize

Anthony Di Iorio: 'The Time has come for me to focus on my Businesses'

Anthony Di Iorio, the founder of the Bitcoin Alliance of Canada (BAC), has resigned from its position as Executive Director and member of the Board to focus on his businesses. He will continue to help

The Nxt Client Just Gave Me a Braingasm

I see a lot of cryptocurrency-related press releases. I research many different crypto companies and coins. I comb through a lot of their websites and wikis. It’s part of the job. And about a month ag

Singapore Hosting Inside Bitcoin 2015 Conference

The large cryptocurrency even, Inside Bitcoin, will be held next year in Singapore on January 29-30, 2015.

Tuesday, December 30, 2014

Has China Abandoned Bitcoin?

There has been much conjecture on the role China has played in the rise and fall of Bitcoin’s price. Most in this space recognize that China has been leading the Bitcoin marketplace in terms of tradin

Bitcoin Wedding Industry Taking Off, iDIAMONDS Taking Bitcoins

The digital currency wedding industry is taking off with iDIAMONDS offering diamond rings for Bitcoin. Following the first blockchain wedding at Coins in the Kingdom in late 2014, the wedding industry

Investing in the Bitcoin Space: Moe Levin Interviews Pantera Capital

At the nexus of North America and Latin America, Miami Beach’s historic Fillmore Theatre will stage The North American Bitcoin Conference (TNABC) on January 16–18, 2015.

New BTMs in North America, UK and Australia

The proliferation of BTMs around the world continued last week, even with the Christmas holiday giving billions of us an excuse not to do much work at all.

Bitreserve Raises US$9.5 Million in Second Largest Crowdfunding Round in the Digital Currency Sector

Bitreserve has become the second largest crowdfunded digital currency company by hitting US$9.5 million in a public Series-B investment round.

TradeBlock Welcomes New Lead UI Engineer

Jeff Ward has been welcomed as the new lead UI engineer at TradeBlock, where he will be in charge of optimizing human-computer interactions on the TradeBlock Professional platform.

Bitcoin Analysis: Week of Dec 28 (Year in Review)

Bitcoin Analysis from Tone Vays.

Monday, December 29, 2014

The Nakamoto Institute's First Podcast Rebuts Buterin's Defense of Competing Cryptocurrencies

Poor cryptocurrency devotees would love to know, are they good investments? Or not? Many believe that a few good soldiers—or maybe many—could endure the storm of investments. But the Satoshi Nakamoto

Cloud Mining Service Hashie.co Disappears With User Funds, Replaces Site With ARG

Hashie.co was a cloudmining site that claimed to have over 40,000 users. Its owners disappeared and users are missing their funds, but the scammer has stuck around to tease the victims with an Alterna

Reserve Bank Governor: India “will adopt digital currencies at some point”

The Governor of the Reserve Bank of India has said he has “no doubt” that digital currencies will play a role in India's future society. Drawing a comparison between the rise of debit and credit cards

Correction: Christmas Price Prediction Contest Winners (Please Read)

A few days ago we announced the winners of CoinTelegraph’s Christmas Price Prediction contest sponsored by Virtex and EgoPay. It has since come to our attention, however, that those named as winners d

Hyprkey: Almost Unhackable Authentication

A company based out of New York City called HyprKey aims to accomplish a three-factor level of security that credit cards, Apple Pay, CurrentC and Bitcoin haven’t.

The Federal Reserve Publishes Another Paper on Bitcoin

The Federal Reserve Bank in Washington, D.C. has issued a report entitled Bitcoin: Technical Background and Data Analysis. The recently released report, dated October 7, is a technical analysis of Bit

Sunday, December 28, 2014

Ecuador Officially Launches Its Own E-Money System

Banco Central del Ecuador (BCE) announced it has officially entered into the first phase of the establishment of its own electronic cash system, asking citizens over 18 years old to open an account us

Coinbase Is Tracking How Users Spend Their Bitcoins

Coinbase has recently been demonstrating why consumer regulation is such a problem.

Future Alert: Wealth Sharing May Become the New File Sharing

Here’s a breakdown of the main points of the full piece, written by redditor aliensyntax.

Weekend Roundup: Remittance Innovation for Philippines, Tor Attacked, Coinffeine’s Decentralized Exchange

Bitcoin Weekend Roundup from CoinTelegraph.

Russian Ministry Questions Proposed ‘Quasi-Money’ Ban

Politicians rarely think about the long-term implications of policy proposals and nowhere is this more evident than in the Russian Federation.

Saturday, December 27, 2014

Epicenter Bitcoin Ep. 58: Vitalik Buterin on Proof-of-Stake and the Future of Crypto-Economics

In the latest episode of Epicenter Bitcoin, our guest was a man who needs little introduction in this community, Vitalik Buterin. We were very excited to finally have him on the show and go deep in so

Bitcoin Review 2014 Part II: VC Investment and Regulatory Environment

CoinTelegraph continues its Bitcoin Review 2014 with the second of three installments, this one covering VC investment and the international regulatory environment. The aim of the review is to provide

‘Bitcoin Was the Real Winner’ at the First Annual Bitcoin Bowl

The buzz from the entire Bitcoin community united across the world was amazing to see, as the first major, national Bitcoin-sponsored event came to an end last night.

Bitcoin Could Help US Protect Against Rising Card Fraud

Most people have no idea how insecure their credit and debit cards are. Scary Fact: A child with an old-style VCR can use it to obtain the information stored on a bank card's magnetic strip. It is tha

Bitnation Will Test Whether “Basic Income” is Actually Workable

Because coercive, state-run welfare is woefully ineffective (to say the very least), the cryptocurrency revolution has some people wondering if welfare schemes like a “basic income” might actually wor

Friday, December 26, 2014

Everything You Need To Know To Watch The Bitcoin Bowl

Everything you need to enjoy the first college football game sponsored by a Bitcoin company

Warren Buffet Wrong About Bitcoin ‘Mirage’ in 2014 (Op-Ed)

Warren Buffet is one of the most well-known investors in world. He has been in the news a great deal over the last few years after he publicly criticized the wealthiest members of society for paying l

Andreas Antonopoulos and Jeffrey Tucker Speak at Bitcoin South

The Bitcoin South conference in beautiful Queenstown, New Zealand was a smashing success, but don’t just take our word for it. All you need to do is keep an eye on Jeffrey Tucker’s twitter feed

Bitcoin Review 2014 Part I: Price and Commerical Activity

CoinTelegraph has put together a research report on Bitcoin’s journey through 2014. This year has seen many unprecedented events in cryptocurrency, and we’d like to highlight the main ones for readers

An Reo and Raduque AK win CoinTelegraph’s Christmas Price Prediction Contest with Virtex and EgoPay!

CoinTelegraph is pleased to announce the winners of the Christmas price prediction contest sponsored by Virtex and EgoPay!

NYC's Department of Finance Issues RFI on Mobile Solutions for Payment of Parking Tickets

New York's Department of Finance (DOF) is issuing a Request for Information (RFI) on mobile solutions for payment and hearing scheduling for parking tickets, and identifies Bitcoin as one of the poten

Op-ed: Gold Versus Bitcoin: Quest for Supremacy

Even if gold were becoming hard to find on Earth recent discoveries on the asteroid Eros indicate that there is more gold on that one small space rock, 20,000 times more, than is produced on Earth in

OKCoin Adds New Trading Tools, Features in Bid to Lead Market

Things are moving fast at OKCoin. The Beijing-based Bitcoin exchange launched its international exchange website OKCoin.com in July, bidding on the wider global market.

Thursday, December 25, 2014

Map of Coins joins the CoinTelegraph Media Group

The move adds yet another resource to the growing range of CoinTelegraph partners from across the cryptocurrency industry, providing unparalleled reach and variety for our advertising partners.

Join CoinTelegraph in Choosing the Winners of Our 2014 Bitcoin Industry Awards

We at CoinTelegraph would like to invite you, our readers, to participate with us in choosing the winners of our 2014 Bitcoin Industry Awards.

Maria’s Christmas Riddle and a Letter to Our Readers at the End of 2014

As 2014 draws to a close, CoinTelegraph is already looking forward to the next 12 months of news and innovation, from the uniquely exciting realm of digital currency.

Did The 500 Richest Bitcoiners Buy the Highs AND Lows?

A chart of the 500 Bitcoin addresses with the highest balances shows that all or most of them increased their holdings at every price (from the US$1 bitcoin to the US$1,100 bitcoin).

Wednesday, December 24, 2014

Bitcoin Is (Still) Not Doomed

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by John Light

Washington Post columnist Henry Farrell has just added himself to the Nakamoto Institute’s running list of skeptics making bold assertions about the certain demise of Bitcoin. In a post entitled “Bitcoin’s financial network is doomed,” Mr. Farrell demonstrates his short-sightedness in the face of Bitcoin’s subtlety and allure, perhaps as a cunning-though-not-so-original means of acquiring cheap coins for himself. Regardless of his motivations, I couldn’t resist a full rebuttal, if only to reassure the weak hands among us that no, Bitcoin is still not doomed, and yes, Mr. Farrell is in for a rude awakening if he really believes the poor arguments he makes in his Post article. Without further adieu, a rebuttal to Mr. Henry Farrell, Bitcoin Skeptic:

“There is a reason why you have to “comply with hundreds of pages of regulations” to use the Visa network that goes beyond Visa’s selfish corporate interests. That reason is government.”

No, the reason you have to comply with hundreds of pages of regulations is that those networks are run by centralized entities that reside in a particular legal jurisdiction and are therefore vulnerable to attacks by the government and other powerful adversaries. The centralization of the networks precedes their vulnerability. Without this vulnerability, government regulation is as effective and enforceable as a law against breathing. See: Bitcoin.

“Governments regulate payment networks very heavily, for a wide variety of reasons, which include making sure that people don’t use these networks to support activities that governments don’t like. They use financial intermediaries as ‘points of control’ that allow them to control who does business with whom.”

Yes, and politically marginalized journalists and businesses are great examples of how this power is abused. And Bitcoin is a great example of how this power becomes irrelevant.

Quoting Obama administration official David Cohen, “Carefully designed and customized to maximize pressure, [economic sanctions] have impeded Iran’s ability to acquire material for its nuclear program, isolated it from the international financial system, drastically slashed its oil exports, and deprived it of access to a sizeable portion of its oil revenues and foreign reserves.”

This sounds like a great argument for Iranians to convert their oil into electricity to mine bitcoins, which can then be sold locally, exported to be sold abroad, or sent anywhere in the world to buy whatever they need directly for bitcoin.

Continuing the quote from David Cohen, “Not surprisingly, the impact on Iran’s economy has been dramatic: its budget deficit and inflation have spiked, the value of its currency has sharply declined, foreign investment has all but dried up, and overall economic activity has stagnated.”

Collectively punishing an entire population of millions of innocent, peaceful people for the actions of political leaders that are forced on them doesn’t sound like something to brag about. But like Madeline Albricht before him, I’m sure Mr. Cohen would say that the Iranian people’s suffering is “worth it.”

Continuing the quote, “Put simply, financial institutions everywhere need dollars to serve their customers, and thus require access to U.S. banks through correspondent accounts to settle their customers’ transactions.”

They need dollars, until they don’t. And with many fiat currencies growing weaker by the day, people may elect to do an end-run around their rulers and choose a politically-neutral option like bitcoin instead of trusting their government not to mess up the next attempt at fiat currency.

“Now, imagine the likely response of the U.S. (and the E.U., and, for that matter, China) to a payment network which is designed from the ground up to be decentralized, so that it is impossible for any specific intermediaries to really control payment flows from one actor to another.”

I imagine it looks something like the nation-state equivalent of a young child throwing a tantrum because their parent didn’t buy them a particular toy at the store. Baseless threats. Pounding fists. Bargaining. And, finally, acquiescence.

“Such a network would be impossible for states to control.”

Yes, and that is a good thing.

“While Bitcoin allows consumers to buy illegal drugs on Tor Hidden Services sites like Agora and Evolution, they don’t do so on a sufficiently large scale to really cause enormous alarm.”

‘They’re just subverting a decades-old policy of prohibition out in the open, no big deal.’ Keep downplaying bitcoin’s revolutionary effects, it just makes the rest of the arguments look even more absurd. In reality, politicians probably learned after the first “enormous alarm” that they raised about this capability that they should just shut up and let law enforcement do their job rather than draw too much attention to the fact that people can easily go online and buy “any drug imaginable” using bitcoin.

“But if Bitcoin were ever to threaten to become a truly decentralized payments network, owned by no one, and with no one e.g. capable of implementing Know Your Customer rules…”

In case you didn’t notice, Bitcoin already is a “truly decentralized payments network, owned by no one…”

“If Tim Lee and other Bitcoin fans want to make the case that Bitcoin can become a major payment network, they need to do one of two things.”

Bitcoiners don’t need to “make the case.” Bitcoin is.

“First, they could show that the U.S. and other major states would not feel threatened by a well-established payment system that they couldn’t control.”

Telling such a story would be lying. The good news: the sooner they assimilate, the less painful it will be.

“Second, they could show that a Bitcoin financial network would survive the opposition of hostile states that have enormous control over the actually-existing financial systems that Bitcoin needs to connect to, as well as regulators, police, etc.”

As former Executive Director of the Bitcoin Foundation Jon Matonis pointed out in Forbes almost two years ago, a ban on bitcoin would “fail miserably.” The only remaining option to curb adoption would be to attack the network itself (as opposed to the endpoints that a ban would target). Given the time and resources required for such an attack, bitcoin adoption could spread to the point that a concerted attack on the network would be too expensive before such an attack would even be feasible. As suggested earlier in this post, it’s not unimaginable that marginalized States (like Iran) would contribute resources to secure and utilize the Bitcoin network. I have already heard rumors that a government in China is converting locally produced coal into electricity to mine bitcoins because it’s not worth exporting the coal itself. Assimilation may be occurring sooner than expected.

Even if a State were to marshal the resources necessary to launch a credible attack against the Bitcoin network, developers could change the code within hours to render an attack impotent, and a game of whack-a-mole would ensue which would likely be a) politically unpopular since, presumably, a lot of people actually want to use bitcoin b) financially draining, since new specialized computers would need to be manufactured for each attack, consuming huge amounts of electricity in the process and c) pointless in the long run, since there are hundreds of alternative cryptocurrencies people could choose to use instead of bitcoin if things got really ugly – good luck trying to attack them all!

“Bitcoin is doomed as a payments network — the very point at which it looks as though it is likely to be widely deployed is the point at which governments, like that of the United States, will crack down on it.”

Even if this were true, it would not render false any of the above arguments in favor of Bitcoin’s survival. Bitcoin can – and would – survive a direct attack.

“US understands the value of its influence over the global financial system, and is demonstrably willing to upset business in order to pursue its strategic aims.”

Yes, and like a bull in a china shop, destroying all that is good in the process – except Bitcoin.

“Moreover, much of this power comes from the fact that any individual payment system, if it is to be effective, needs to be interoperable with other payment systems which, by and large, rest on transactions in US dollars.”

Bitcoin already coexists with fiat payment networks via payment processors such as BitPay, but if hyperbitcoinization were to occur, that wouldn’t even be necessary anymore. Bitcoin would not need to interoperate with other payment systems because it would be THE payment system. And it would not “rest on transactions in US dollars” any more than the auto industry rests on the supply of horse feed. Given sufficient liquidity post-hyperbitcoinization, a bitcoin wallet and an Internet connection is about all that will be needed to conduct commerce of any magnitude with anyone in the world.

“The sorry recent history of financial flows to and from another stateless financial system, Somalia, provide some evidence of how difficult life can get for financial networks that have been targeted by the US state.”

The history provides evidence of how difficult life can get for centralized financial networks! As pointed out at the very beginning of this piece, this is a vulnerability that Bitcoin explicitly by design does not share. For this reason, Bitcoin will survive where others have failed. With this in mind, cue the dramatic music and bring on the doom!

If you or anyone you know would like to learn how to use bitcoin to gain some monetary freedom for yourself, I am running a crowdfunding campaign through New Year’s Day 2015 for an online course and companion e-book entitled “BYOB: Using Bitcoin to Be Your Own Bank.” This course and book would make a great gift for the bit-curious who haven’t yet found the time or place to learn about bitcoin in an easily accessible format. Even if you can’t contribute, please share the campaign on social media – you might be surprised at who gets turned on to bitcoin when presented with an opportunity to learn!

by John Light

BTC address: 12sJXtV8aQ8orQFhmaqe5KRsKoC7tsRuoT

Blockchain 2.0 arms race: Blocknet declares first shots fired between nodes on separate blockchains

Two individual blockchains have been successfully linked, as Blocknet announced last night that Xbridge technology had for the first time allowed communications between nodes on two separate blockchai

Professor Kevin Dowd: “The regulations in NY regarding BitLicense are a kiss of death”

Kevin Dowd is a professor of Economics and Finance at Durham University. A libertarian and fierce advocate of private money over government-issued and controlled alternatives, Dowd has written extensi

Peter Todd and the Expansion of Bitcoin

BIPS often start from a discussion on the developer mailing list or on Github. Such discussions are what inspired Peter Todd, a long time contributor to Bitcoin core and related projects, who is curre