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Bitcoinplus pumped
Bitcoinplus (XBC) prices rise on a massive surge on volume. It look very much like a classic ‘pump and dump’ scheme and looking at the other coins with ‘bit’ in the name also rising, it has the sniff of a rumor being spread to draw in the sucker money.
Yes that’s right, you are seen over 1000% rise in one 24 hour period. There is still plenty of irrational exuberance in the crypto currency markets.
So it a pump and dump? well wait a few days and see. From the chart it seems that there was a chosen support level of 0.04 BTC that the pumper seem to be trying to maintain. Bitcoin dark was supposedly up on the news it was being merged into a new coin called Komodo. Maybe it was the day for bit-anything.
Graphics from Poloniex.
Bitcoin worth more than gold ounce
Prices in US dollars.
http://www.coindesk.com/bitcoin-price-sets-new-all-time-high-second-day/
Unlike the 2013-2014 price spike this trend seem to long term growth.
Venezuelan Hyperinflation
The perfect storm is brewing in Venezuela. An over reliance on oil export revenue, a falling global oil price, and over a decade of poorly thought out socialist reforms have left the Venezuelan economy with rising inflation and unemployment. The Inflation is of course caused by the printing of money with no actual asset to back its value, once value production in the economy stalled, the inflation started and just accelerated.
Half of the remaining value of the Venezuelan Bolivar ( VEF ) could be destroyed this week if current trends continue.
This is what hyperinflation looks like at street level, shop owners begin to actually weigh money rather than count it, as its quicker. A pack of cigarettes may cost 20 notes. Higher denomination notes are being printed and ATM’s are running out of money in as little as 3 hours.
The Bolivar (VEF) has lost value to the US dollar (USD) significantly since oil revenues dropped, but now a spike in inflation may push Venezuela to crisis point. The official exchange rate from the ‘living in denial’ government has been 10 VEF :USD.
Bitcoin vs VEF
Bitcoin has played interesting roles in this crisis. This is probably the first serious hyperinflation situation during the existence of Bitcoin, and it has been used in many ways. For the IT savvy people, Bitcoin has been a stable and lucrative job with some miners claiming to be making 1200 USD per day. The profitability of Bitcoin in Venezuela has been due to the fact that electricity is virtually free, and electricity is the largest cost associated with bitcoin mining. Bitcoin hasn’t been with out risks, as the government has attempted to crack down on miners, and in some cases corrupt secret police have extorted miners. Bitcoin profits have enabled some miners to escape the country, which they find to be an increasingly dangerous place to live in.
Bitcoin has also played the role as a safe haven from inflation, and a medium of exchange to get around the official exchange rate and official currency exchange rules, VEF:BTC and then BTC:USD. Bitcoin has also been a way to purchase and import scarce commodities from foreign countries, and when we say scarce we mean shampoo, toilet paper and toothpaste; that is how bad it has gotten. So it seems Bitcoin has shown its strength against a currency collapse. As long as there is internet and the rest of the world is not crumbling, Bitcoin could be the most convenient safe haven in a currency crisis. Of course in an economic collapse one should take steps to conceal ones source of wealth, as thieves and kidnappers are all to happy to take it away from you.
DDoSCoin the Troll age begins
https://www.usenix.org/conference/woot16/workshop-program/presentation/wustrow
PDF here
Stone age, Bronze age, Iron age, Steam age, Nuclear age, Space age, Internet age.
These ages should be familiar to us, they represent changes in society and civilization due to changes in technology. A new age has begun, the Troll age. The internet gave the average person a voice that could be heard (or rather read) all over the world. The playing field was never level and due to the nature of the technology, the control of the internet centralized.
Government censorship, major corporations, and media companies, shills all should sought to stifle and derail debate. This control was all centralized and relied on hubs in a network to control thought itself.
Then it all changed.
Trolls; be they pranksters, devils advocates, malicious individuals, or just individuals having a different opinion and just as insistent as you, well they have always existed. Now trolls may have one of the most powerful destabilizing tools conceived of; DDosCoin
Ever hear of Bitcoin? Dogecoin? Bitcoin was conceived of after a technical paper published in 2008. Three months later a working wallet was created and then 7 years later every one new about Bitcoin. Bitcoin has become a significant and somewhat irksome for centralized banking.
DDoSCoin operates in a similar way to Bitcoin but rather than solving a innocuous mathematical puzzle to award Bitcoin to miners, DDosCoin rewards proof of DOS (Denial of service, a malicious attack against an internet server). It was claimed Australia’s 2016 census was subject to s DDOS attack but it was most likely the result of shoddy planning and too few census severs.
The Hashrate (measure of computational power) of Bitcoin the Bitcoin is impressive. Imagine a hashrate of Bitcoin directed against the hubs of internet control. This is the threat of DDosCoin. Why stand outside Monsanto with a cardboard sign in the rain waiting for OC spray, when you could just click a few buttons at home and join a DDOS attack against Monsanto and have a picnic at the beach (or what ever else you were planning). Best of all rather than expending your precious time to protest you would be fianacially rewarded for your participation. It goes without saying one would need to have good OPSEC (aka being clever and covering your tracks). DDosCoin does not exist yet as a publicly available application yet, but it will, whether the inventors want it to or not. Its possible other people may have something in the works now or be inspired by the technical paper. One thing is certain DDosCoin will exist, and the future will not be the same again. The mighty may fall and be replaced by the troll, someone with the audacity to say, no I disagree and you can’t shut me up.
Be alert not alarmed.
Artists impression of what a DDosCoin could look like in the real world.
MaidSafe the new internet
Imagine if bit-coin was invented the same time the internet was. Stop imagining. It’s about to happen in the next few months.
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encrypted
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private
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distributed
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free and open source
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incentivised
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no gate keepers
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no snoops
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no censorship
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no bankers
It’s this cloud thing that tech companies have been banging on about for years except you are truly part of it rather than just a customer. A giant shared network storage with encryption.
http://maidsafe.net/
Bitcoin mania! Doubles in a week on Chinese grey money
Bitcoin surges to over $800USD doubling its price in less than a week.
Bitcoin sis certainly not dead. This latest price hike is apparently based on Chinese businessmen seeing the real estate market tank and tired of capital flight (and other) laws are moving into Bitcoin. Of course many use Bitcoin as a way of avoiding taxes and regulations, avoiding regulations (and making a deal) is somewhat of a Chinese tradition. You only have to see a Chinese Buddhist monk in the middle of a group ceremonial dance stop dead to answer his mobile phone to know that making an arrangement is a very serious matter. People ate already talking about $10,000USD Bitcoins. Of course there are about 12M bitcoins in circulation and there is a limit of 21M (by 2140), and fiat currencies (like the US Dollar) keeps spewing out more worthless paper and plastic. I doesn’t take a genius to work out scarcity is a fundamental driver of economics.
In trying to get a local take on the bitcoin market I stumbled into this local Bitcoin trader, who ran out of Bitcoins today. I’m sure s/he will try to get more.
Local ‘Bitcoin for bank deposit’ merchant runs out of coins today
Sillk road gone: bitcoin still strong
On October 2nd 2013 Silk road (the notorious and biggest ‘no question asked’ online bit coin market place) went offline, most likely forever.
It’s founder arrested on a number of charges.
Silk road and other market places like it (which are now competing for silk roads formerly commanding market share) are the places that created the perception that bit coin was only for shady deals.
Any currency can be used for shady deals, Australian dollars, US dollars or Euros it really makes little difference. Following the shut down of Silk road bit coin prices took a large initial hit in price dropping 10% in a day but recovering most of the losses in the following 3 days. This means either the competitors to silk road a really stepping up to the plate ( and hoping they are better at staying out of jail) or the shady deals are only a small part of the bitcoin market that it can survive without. Most likely both reasons are somewhat true.
OCCUPYMELBOURNE.NET 
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