2020 A Decisive Year For Blockchain Via Ethereum? – The Coin Republic

Ritika Sharma Wednesday, 08 January 2020, 06:42 EST Modified date: Wednesday, 08 January 2020, 06:42 EST

What if I say that Ethereum could provide us with a global economy up to $80 trillion? That is indeed a thoughtful idea, as gold-which has a high demand and is much precious, has a market cap of $8 trillion in the present world.

Well before we get into a discussion further, let us first notice what Andrew Keys, the former Head of Global Business Development at ConsenSys and now the managing partner at Digital Asset Risk Management Advisors (DARMA Capital), says.

Keys says that BTC and blockchain would think of individual entities of their own as Ethereum which considered to be the dial-up internet would be more or less compatible as the Broadband. According to him, while Bitcoin can be used for a particular cause, Ethereum can be used to benefit the world and the community in plenty number of ways.

The Open Source, Blockchain-based distributed computing platform, Ethereum, could digitize many of the assets such as gold, software licenses, debt, derivatives, etc. In his blog post of ConsenSys, he also mentions the by far pace of the development of Ethereum 2.0. The phase 0 of the Ethereum would be instead replaced by step 1 by the use of SHARD Chains.

Moreover, as Keys also suggests the benefits of Bitcoin as a way which could bring the peer to peer network, a consensus-building algorithm and a virtual machine for aiming a solution to the double-spent problem and the Byzantine generals problem he also says that Ethereum could kick start the decade with amazing benefits.

The Bitcoin maximalists that believe that Bitcoin is where this decentralizing technology will stop will be in for a rude awakening. Bitcoins ascension to digital gold has been astounding and has signalled the beginning of a whole new techno-economic era. But digital gold is just thata beginning. Keys Says.

Keeping the two technologies aside, Andrew also predicts Web 3.0, which is the 3rd gen of the Internet services, would also see its upliftment by taking Ethereum as a base. To create more connected and open websites, Web 3.0s elements would also see a boom in 2020.

As an instance, the Filecoin, developed by Protocol Labs, would help with the provision of space in hard disks for cryptography.

Thus, as a conclusion, it can be indeed be said that the year 2020 could be a boom in the world of blockchain technology, so let us see what the powerful asset ETH has to offer in its course of making it a superpower.

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2020 A Decisive Year For Blockchain Via Ethereum? - The Coin Republic

Bitcoin Price Will Be Golden in 2020 Thanks to Limited Supply, Increasing Use: Bloomberg Report – CoinDesk

Increasing global uncertainties and a weak dollar will likely push more investors into bitcoin as it becomes recognized as a store of value. The cryptocurrency's fixed supply will further drive price increases throughout the year, Bloomberg analysts predict.

Bloomberg's 2020 crypto outlook report, published Monday, predicts bitcoin's price could move to the top of its 2019 range and retest the $14,000 high at a time when a weak dollar and stock market volatility continue and geopolitical tensions increase.

"Bitcoin's initial reaction to the [Jan. 3] U.S. airstrike that killed one of Iran's most powerful generals was a good test of our premise that the first-born crypto is maturing toward a digital version of gold," reads the report. Bitcoin jumped to a seven-week high Wednesday as gold rallied to $1,600 for the first time since 2013.

Bitcoin has long been seen as "digital gold," in part because it is a limited asset that cannot be easily increased to meet changing demand, much like the yellow metal. The halving event expected later this year will reduce block rewards from 12.5 to 6.25 BTC, further adding to supply pressures should demand continue to grow.

Bitcoin's supply is projected to grow by about 2.5 percent in 2020, which would be an all-time low. That's partly due to the halving of the block reward from 12.5 to 6.25 BTC. Supply in 2021 could well fall below 2 percent, analysts say.

Increasing investment in bitcoin could take many forms, believe the analysts. The rapidly expanding derivatives market a sign of integration into mainstream markets will better enable institutional investors to gain exposure to the asset class. That could have knock-on effects on price and decreasing volatility, thereby reinforcing bitcoin's status as a store of value.

Not everyone is convinced bitcoin and gold share such a strong bond. Mati Greenspan, founder of Quantum Economics, which specializes in cryptocurrencies and foreign exchange, called such a relationship "weak" and noted the correlation between the two assets was negative until recently.

Bitcoin has also been prone to periods of short, sharp volatility. The asset surged up above $10,000 after President Xi of China called for his country to accelerate its adoption of blockchain technology before retracing its former range weeks later. For some analysts, that volatility fundamentally undermines the case for bitcoin being a stable store of value, at least for the time being.

But while bitcoin may still be too volatile for many people's liking, it appears investors in the asset class are increasingly valuing digital assets that can maintain some sort of stable price. The Bloomberg report predicts that tether's market cap will likely continue expanding this year, with many alternative cryptocurrencies struggling to keep investors as supply outstrips demand.

"Bitcoin should again outshine most crypto assets in 2020 as the unique and appreciating digital version of gold," the report continues. "Bitcoin is winning the adoption race, notably as a store of value in an environment that favors independent quasi-currencies."

The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk is an independent operating subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which invests in cryptocurrencies and blockchain startups.

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Bitcoin Price Will Be Golden in 2020 Thanks to Limited Supply, Increasing Use: Bloomberg Report - CoinDesk

Bitcoin Just Got Rejected at $8,400, And It Means a Big Fall Ahead – newsBTC

Bitcoin is showing first signs of a weakening upside momentum as traders adjust their sentiments near key resistance areas.

The benchmark asset on Wednesday plunged by up to 3.15 percent in what appears to be a corrective action. The move downhill prompted it to establish an intraday low of $8,202.57 on Coinbase. It also escalated the possibilities of an extended downside action as the market heads into a perceivably relaxed US session.

So it appears, investors are betting that the Iranian missile attacks on American stations in Iraq would not extend the conflict in the Middle East. The perception alone helped oil prices and global stock markets stabilize. Investors now await President Donald Trumps statement on the matter after his all is well comment last night.

Bitcoin rose majorly because speculators believed global demand for the cryptocurrency would increase amid the rising US-Iran conflict.

On the day a US-sponsored airstrike killed Qassem Soleimani, head of Irans Quds force, the cryptocurrency surged in tandem with other haven assets. It almost formed a lagging correlation with gold and oil, eventually topping to register a two-month high of $8,469.39 today.

The US stock index futures edged higher on Wednesday in the aftermath of Irans attacks and Trumps relaxed response to them.

Futures for the S&P 500 index were up 0.17 percent as of the time of this publication while Nasdaq delivered an equally attractive 0.16 percent gains. Nevertheless, Dow Jones looked constrained owing to the aftermath of aBoeing Co. jet crash in Tehran on Wednesday. Its futures were up by just 0.1 percent.

Dow Jones Futures weakest in an otherwise stable US index market | Source: TradingView.com

The visible yet interim correlation could be one of the reasons why bitcoin rejected a potential price rally above $8,400. It gets further validated with the performance of Gold. The yellow metal plunged by 0.12 percent to trade at $1,572.40 an ounce.

From a technical perspective, bitcoins latest correction formed what appears like a traditional Bull Flag pattern.

Bull flag formation on Bitcoins hourly chart | Source: TradingView.com, Coinbase

In retrospect, a Bull Flag formation is a continuation pattern that indicates that the underlying asset would resume its uptrend. That said, bitcoin has a likelihood of continuing the price rally purely from a bulls standpoint.

Nevertheless, larger timeframes such as the weekly one show a crucial resistance area capping bitcoins upside attempts. As long as the cryptocurrency stays below it, its likelihood of revisiting the local bottom of $6,400 is high.

Bitcoin rebounds after testing 20-weekly MA | Source: TradingView.com, Coinbase

The oranged 20-weekly moving average, coupled with the upper trendline of the greened Descending Channel, is behaving as an ideal resistance area for traders to exit their long positions for small profits. More likely, the price would extend the pullback and retest $7,280 as its interim support.

All eyes on how Trump plays out Irans latest attack.

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Bitcoin Just Got Rejected at $8,400, And It Means a Big Fall Ahead - newsBTC

No, Bitcoin Isnt Going For Anywhere Near $24,000 In IranHeres Why – Forbes

Bitcoin spiked earlier this week following an escalation in tensions between the U.S. and Iran, with analysts once again linking bitcoin to so-called safe haven assets like gold.

After the head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards' elite Quds Force, general Qasem Soleimani, was killed by U.S. forces in Iraq it was widely reported the bitcoin price in Iran had soared to around $24,000this is, however, based on a common misunderstanding of exchange rates in Iran.

Some think that bitcoin could eventually join gold as a safe-haven asset, though it has yet to ... [+] consistently perform like one.

Iran-based bitcoin sellers on peer-to-peer trading platform LocalBitcoins were seen to be pricing bitcoin at around 1 billion Iranian rials, worth some $24,000 based on the official exchange rate set by Iran's central bank.

However, the official exchange rate set by the Central Bank of Iran is only ever used by the government and a handful of businesses. Almost all people and businesses in Iran use a market set exchange rate when converting rials to U.S. dollarsthat currently has rials priced at around a third of the official exchange rate.

"The going market rate for the U.S. dollar to the Iranian rial is one dollar to 136,500 rials," explained Mehran Jalali, an Iranian national who follows the crypto market and splits his time between the U.S. and Iran.

"The current bitcoin to rial rate posted on Iranian crypto exchange websites is around one bitcoin to 984,000,000 rials, equal to $7,208 per bitcoin in Iran, which is very close to the going rate everywhere else."

"The official rate is what the central bank says. But literally, no one except some government organizations can get that rate while no one can use it," crypto expert Ali Beikverdi told bitcoin news site Cointelegraph. "Its a joke."

Bitcoin has been known to trade at a small premium in some places around the world, though never at the levels incorrectly reported in Iran.

In South Korea, the bitcoin price traded around 10% higher until early 2018 when the country introduced tighter regulation.

Elsewhere, bitcoin can regularly see a premium of around 4% in Hong Kong due China's strict bitcoin trading ban forcing people who want to buy bitcoin to use the stablecoin tether.

Meanwhile, some bitcoin and cryptocurrency watchers dismissed suggestions bitcoin was acting as a safe-haven asset in response to the U.S. killing of Iran's general Soleimani.

"Heightened geopolitical risk has resulted in both gold and bitcoin moving higher, but for different reasons," Peter Schiff, the chief executive of Euro Pacific Capital and outspoken bitcoin critic, said via Twitter. "Gold is being bought by investors as a safe haven. Bitcoin is being bought by speculators betting that investors will buy it as a safe haven."

The bitcoin price leaped this week but has been steadily falling for the past six months.

Last year, some in Iran turned to bitcoin to try to evade U.S. sanctions on the country.

"With exchange offices closed, sanctions and the rial dropping like crazy it seems like a good idea to use bitcoin," one person in Iran, who wished to remain anonymous, said at the time, adding bitcoin was "literally the only way to get money out of the country."

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No, Bitcoin Isnt Going For Anywhere Near $24,000 In IranHeres Why - Forbes

Bitcoin Will Moon If There Is War With Iran – Forbes

Protesters burn US and Israel flags as they shout slogans against the United States during a ... [+] demonstration following a US airstrike that killed top Iranian commander Qasem Soleimani in Iraq. Photo by Arif Ali

It behooves a speculator to speculate, and nothing gets the attention of the speculator more than the classic market catalyst of war in the Middle East. So last nights U.S. strike, killing Iranian General Soleimani, is the sort of event that gets markets moving.

As one might expect, oil jumped and so did gold. Oil is up 3% and gold jumped 2%.

In this new world there is a third safe haven asset, bitcoin (BTC). It is up 5%.

Here is a chart of that action:

Bitcoin is up on the news of the US air strike on Iran

This is a very interesting chart because it shows the global professionals reacting to the news much faster than the private traders and it might be suggested this hike is the result of Middle Eastern retail piling into BTC as a flight to safety rather than the relatively non-existent institutional money.

In any event, bitcoin has the most beta in this situation and whats more there appears to be plenty of time to get your trade on in response to the news.

This, of course, is a gift to all skilled traders, a three-hour warning to buy.

Longer term, however, it is clear to see that in instances where there is trouble in capital controlled countries like Iran and China, bitcoin will be a key asset when times get sketchy.

As such, for those speculators who think of gold and oil as the place to trade when war in the Middle East is on the rise, then bitcoin is the place to be.

For those wanting to trade what might be a U.S./Iran escalation, bitcoin is the place to do your thing because while there are trillions in gold and oil to suck up demand, there is only a smattering of bitcoin to take the sort of buying surge a country like Iran could create were the situation to spin up into a large scale conflict.

Bitcoin is the best place for flight capital and haven capital for those in Iran wishing to protect their assets, and that alone is enough to drive Bitcoin back towards its previous and all-time highs. Then there is the exaggerated Beta of Bitcoin that will draw in the global speculators and their wall of money, so that in an extended and fraught US/Iran conflict only one thing is certain about the price of Bitcoin and that is, it will be far higher than it is now.

Stay informed and ahead of the crowd with Forbes Crypto Confidential, a free weekly e-letter delivered to your inbox. Sign up today.

-

Clem Chambers is the CEO of private investors webssiteADVFN.com and author of 101 Ways to Pick Stock Market Winners and Trading Cryptocurrencies: A Beginners Guide.

Chambers won Journalist of the Year in the Business Market Commentary category in the State Street U.K. Institutional Press Awards in 2018.

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Bitcoin Will Moon If There Is War With Iran - Forbes

SBI, GMO to Rent Capacity at Massive Bitcoin Mine in Texas: Report – CoinDesk

Potentially the world's biggest bitcoin mine is said to have signed up two top corporate customers, SBI Holdings and GMO.

The Japanese corporate giants will be renting mining capacity at the facility in Rockdale, Texas, recently put into construction by Whinstone Inc., according to Bloomberg sources. The firms are to begin mining "within coming months," the report says, adding that the firms involved would not comment when asked.

As CoinDesk reported in November, when the facility gets up and running it will likely be the biggest bitcoin mine in the world, starting at 300 megawatts and expanding to 1 gigawatt by the end of 2020.

That puts the rival mine being built by Bitmain also in Rockdale and touted as the biggest in the world in the shade. That's planned to start at a capacity of 25-50 MW and possibly expand to 300 MW.

Internet giant GMO was also said to have been involved in setting up the Rockdale facility, as per CoinDesk's earlier report. In November, Whinstone estimated the data center will cost $150 million to build and fit out. The initial 300 MW of power was expected to come online in the first quarter, with 1 GW planned to be achieved late in the year.

Soon after Whinstone broke ground on its Texas project the company was acquired by Germany-based Northern Bitcoin, which already runs a bitcoin mine in Norway that harnesses renewable power. Similarly, Texas may have been chosen as the site for this major venture in part due to its availability of cheap wind power, according to Bloomberg.

The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk is an independent operating subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which invests in cryptocurrencies and blockchain startups.

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SBI, GMO to Rent Capacity at Massive Bitcoin Mine in Texas: Report - CoinDesk

Bitcoin and the Primacy of the Digital World – Bitcoin Magazine

As a fervent bitcoin enthusiast, I frequently come across the following objection: In contrast to physical, analog things, bitcoin and similar crypto assets are completely virtual and digital. As such, they are neither tangible nor graspable and would thus lack any real basis of value.

Because of their digital nature, many people still object to bitcoin, refuse to take it seriously or consider it altogether too scary. Some even lump the crypto asset in with other eerie and unsavory developments in tech and the ongoing digital transformation.

Among greatest digital threats seems to be the phenomenon of deepfake media. This is a term that has been in common use since 2017 for the technology used to create deceptively authentic-looking images and videos. Many politicians, actors and other celebrities have already fallen victim to this practice. Deepfake videos put words into their mouths that they never said or make them perform actions they never did. What is real and what is not?

Some technophobes fear that because the capabilities of the digital world are increasingly blurring our notions of reality and what is artifice, political as well as societal life could become ever more confused and agitated. Democracy hinging on the fact that civil discourse and public debate happen among educated and enlightened citizens is very much in danger because the fake will become indistinguishable from the truth.

Within the reactionary mistrust of all things digital, bitcoin is getting its share of blowback as well. If this sort of mistrust resonates with you, I am here to tell you some of these hazards associated with an increasingly digital world are certainly true. But Bitcoin is your ally, not your foe in this.

When looking at bitcoin, the juxtaposition of analog and digital might seem obvious at first glance dissecting it further though reveals some interesting twists. Although bitcoin is virtual and non-corporeal, as a new manifestation of money it has actually overcome many characteristics of what is typically associated with the digital realm.

Interestingly, bitcoin as an asset does experience increasing marginal costs in production, a feature that can be seen in conjunction with gold, a tangible asset of the corporeal world. The more gold is produced, the more expensive it becomes. In the case of bitcoin, the production of new units is algorithmically set to a maximum per block/time interval. In other words, no matter how hard one tries, one can never produce more bitcoin within a period of approximately 10 minutes than the amount specified by the code. It is this digital scarcity imported via the real world that makes bitcoin potentially valuable.. The potentiality of value is being actualized as more people are persuaded of its absolute digital scarcity, since any realized value is always the result of subjective value judgements by individuals.

A bearer instrument refers to an instrument that is payable to anyone possessing the instrument and is negotiable by transfer alone.

Bitcoin is not only digitally scarce but, by its very nature, is similar to a bearer instrument another feature where bitcoin contradicts the usual notion of digital goods. Because bitcoin resembles a bearer instrument, it can be held independently and apart from any third party. While holding bitcoin does not give a bitcoin holder any rights against any tangible issuer, possessing bitcoin does indeed entitle a bitcoin holder to have them spent univocaly that is, the bitcoin protocol automatically and undeniably executes a bitcoin transaction once initiated by a rightful owner. This goes to show that having bitcoin is associated with some sort of underlying right against some sort of issuer, the bitcoin protocol.

Thus the crypto asset has proved for the first time in history that bearer instruments no longer have to be printed on paper to have these characteristics. Bitcoin has solved the double-spending problem and cannot be copied. Its the perfect combination of the advantages from the analog as well as the digital world.

Many still do not appreciate the ingenuity of this combination. However, it is important to recognize that it is based on a way of thinking that is increasingly losing its validity. For more and more people, the digital has become a matter that is taken for granted. While older generations may still make excursions into digital spheres as tourists of an analog world, Gen-Z, millennials and even the slightly older Gen-Xers have long been at home in a digital world where bits dominate atoms.

Having grown up mostly as digital natives, they have cultivated a digital lifestyle from the ground up. This gives them a completely different attitude toward the digital world than people who have been socialized knowing only the analog world. One of the most impressive examples of this development is the video game Fortnite.

For so-called Google kids, Fortnite is much more than a video game it is the reality of their lives in which they socialize and spend more time than in the real world. February 2019 was the biggest moment in Fortnites young history: The American electronic music producer DJ Marshmello gave an in-game concert. His performance took place completely virtually on a stage within the computer game. Fortnite players could participate only as their virtual avatars. And thats what they did: Almost 11 million mostly young people danced as their game characters in the digital concert.

Such events may seem surreal and curious to older generations, but for these Google kids, they are completely normal. Similarly, V-Bucks, the currency within Fortnite, are valuable assets for them. From this famous in-game currency, it is only a small step to bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. This digital mindset also explains why some female millennials may be just as happy to receive a digital bouquet of flowers on their smartphones on Valentines Day as they are to receive roses that have grown in the soil. Similarly, the day is soon approaching when digital gold will seem more real to this generation than physical, precious metal.

As a species, we are in the process of digitizing our reality. This is probably just another iteration, not the last, of a cultivation process that humanity has been going through since time immemorial. We learn to think in gradually more abstract categories and tap into new potentials again and again. The process of cultural adaptation to fully adopt digital values has only just begun.

What makes it more difficult with bitcoin adoption, however, is the fact that it is an exponential phenomenon. Our brains, on the other hand, are designed for linear interpolation. We instinctively understand that if we take 30 one-meter steps, we can travel 30 meters in total. If we could somehow not take linear but exponential steps, the situation would be completely different. The same 30 steps, exponential in nature translating to 2^30 steps would take us around the world 26 times, a fact that we can hardly picture rationally.

Because our thinking is not one of an exponential mindset, exponential technologies have always overwhelmed us. One only needs to think of the internet or the smartphone: These technological advancements seemingly appeared all of a sudden, but shortly afterward, they had conquered the world. Bitcoin is now the next exponential technology to thrive on the back of these two (and other) exponential technologies. Just like the internet or the smartphone before it, the crypto asset is likely to produce second-round and third-round effects which will fundamentally change the world.

With each passing day, it makes less and less sense to perceive the virtual and physical worlds as separate spheres of human action. Our reality is getting evermore digital and, with it, physical atoms might be more and more dominated by digital bits. If you are intimidated by this, this is totally fine. But let me reiterate what I said in the beginning: Because bitcoin is a digital thing without the problems inherent to the digital world, it is your friend and not your foe.

This is an op ed by Pascal Hgli, author of the book Ignore at Your Own Risk: The New Decentralized World of Bitcoin and Blockchain. Views expressed are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of Bitcoin Magazine or BTC Inc.

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Bitcoin and the Primacy of the Digital World - Bitcoin Magazine

Nasdaq Issues Warning to Bitcoin Mining Company – Bitcoinist

According to recent reports, Nasdaq recently notified Golden Bull Limited, warning the company that it is no longer compliant with listing rules due to the lack of Form 6-K.

Golden Bull Limited, a company that operates as an online finance marketplace and a lending firm, was recently contacted by Nasdaq with a warning. According to the firms announcement, Nasdaq notified Golden Bull that it failed to provide its Form 6-K financial statements for the period of six months prior to June 30th, 2019.

The lack of the financial statement interferes with Nasdaqs listing rules, which may lead to Golden Bulls removal from Nasdaqs listing if the company fails to deliver the necessary data.

However, Nasdaq will not react immediately, and has given Golden Bull Ltd a 60-day deadline to create and deliver a plan on regaining compliance with the listing rules.

The company responded to the notification by claiming that it intends to deliver the necessary information before the end of January 2020.

As mentioned earlier, Golden Bull Limited started out as a finance marketplace and a lending firm that provided short-term loans to individuals and small businesses. The company serves customers in China, where it recently announced that it had decided to shut down its peer-to-peer lending business.

Since then, Golden Bull focused on becoming a car rental business but also a Bitcoin mining firm. The firm started this transition back in March 2018, right after cryptocurrency prices crashed after reaching its all-time high (ATH) in December 2017/January 2018.

However, this is also not the first time that the firm received a warning from Nasdaq. Previously, it was reported in late September 2019 that the company received Nasdaqs notification letter due to deficiency in the minimum bid price requirements.

According to reports from that time, Nasdaq states that the minimum bid price per share for the firms ordinary shares have been under $1 for over 30 consecutive business days. This is not in compliance with Nasdaqs listing rules, and Nasdaq sent a warning, which did not have an immediate effect either.

Instead, the company was given until March 24th, 2020 to execute a plan that would allow it to regain compliance. In other words, Golden Bull Ltd. needed to raise the closing bid price of its ordinary shares to at least $1 for 10 consecutive business days, or longer.

Now, the Bitcoin mining firm once again seems to have problems with compliance on Nasdaq, and while it will not be unlisted immediately, it will have to work for the privilege of staying on Nasdaq.

What do you think about the Golden Bulls situation? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

Images via Shutterstock

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Nasdaq Issues Warning to Bitcoin Mining Company - Bitcoinist

What good is Bitcoin if the Internet fails? – Decrypt

The Internet isnt invincible. Governments the world over are restricting access to the world wide web; Russia is erecting a China-style firewall, Iran switched off the Internet during recent protests and India makes a habit of it. Intentional shutdowns have more than doubled since 2016, according to Access Now, a non-profit advocating for Internet access.

Then there are man made disasters (missile strikes) and natural onessuch as wildfires in California and Australia, or other scenarios that limit access to electricityas well as the prohibitive cost of Internet use in many parts of the world, lack of security and, of course, Internet surveillance.

The Internets vulnerability isnt great for advocates of cryptocurrency. A single day without access to the Internet can cost crypto exchanges, miners and traders millions. You cant buy, send or steal bitcoin if the Internet is down. Or can you?

Neil Woodfine, director of marketing at Bitcoin development firm Blockstream, took to Twitter on Monday to deliver a blistering riposte to those who believe Bitcoin is reliant on the Internet, based on a presentation he delivered in Zurich, Switzerland last October.

Woodfine admitted that delivering transaction data to miners requires an Internet-connected device. Therefore, any offline solution is really only Internet-minimized, but the scope is still huge.

"Bitcoin endures because the engineers that build it expect the unexpected. Money is a dangerous game, and any weaknesses, no matter how small, will be exploited, he wrote.

His first bit of advice is that people should get into the habit of going offline, and that means looking after their own private keys instead of entrusting them to an exchange or other custodian.

But the first step to really using bitcoin offline is to have your own full node. At first, it seems counter-intuitive; running a Bitcoin node requires serious bandwidthwhich requires a connection to the Internet, which is linked to an IP address, which in turn can be linked to a physical address.

Thats where Blockstream Satellite comes into play. The startup uses teleports around the world to beam bitcoin blockchain data to four geostationary satellites around the Earth. These satellites then broadcast the data to almost all populated regions in the world, said Woodfine.

Currently, Blockstreams satellites transmit only one way, for download only, so its not possible to use the network to transmit transaction datayet.

But its free, theres no bandwidth limit, and to pick up the signal you need less than $100 of equipment, said Woodfine. That consists of a standard TV satellite dish, an SDR (software defined radioavailable for $24 on Amazon), and a basic computer, such as a Raspberry Pi.

This is where things gets really interesting. Because a single node connected to a satellite can provide bitcoin blockchain data to a whole area via Wi-Fi rebroadcasts using simple, low-cost, equipment.

For sharing transactions, mesh networksa network of nodes that are not centrally-owned or controlled, connected directly to each otherare the best known option. They relay transactions data from and to other nodes in transmission range. Only one node needs to be connected to the Internet in order to relay the data to the rest of the mesh.

To hook up to a mesh network, a popular option is an inexpensive, low-powered messaging system called goTenna. It has a range of approximately four miles, which can be extended via a relay method. But mesh networks are not infallible, the technology is still nascent and its impractical in confrontational situations, say protestors.

One option thats quickly catching on is the so-called Low Range Wide Area Network (LoRaWAN). Widely used for IoT applications, LoRaWAN chips work in extremely low-power devices, and offer a four mile range. However, bandwidth is tiny, and transactions need to be broken up and sent slowly, said Woodfine.

Another alternative is relaying transactions via mobile text messages to Internet-connected devices. Tools to enable this include Samurai Wallets Pony Direct, txTenna, a collaboration between goTenna and Samurai Wallet, and SMSPushTX.

Using these various methods, one satnode and one Internet connected device can produce an entire network, said Woodfine.

There are other methods for getting transactions data through, he said.

Using amateur radio, users can transmit low-bandwidth transaction data around the world on very little power.

Satellite phones, such as Iridium Go, allow users to send and receive low bandwidth data anywhere in the world.

And, if all else fails, theres Opendime, a small USB stick that allows you to physically spend Bitcoin, just like a dollar bill, and pass it along multiple times.

But hang on a minute. Isnt that going back to where we all started?

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What good is Bitcoin if the Internet fails? - Decrypt

Bitcoin SV Mining Fees Just Got Even Lower: CoinGeek Follows TAAL Mining With Fee Reductions – PRNewswire

LONDON, Jan. 8, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Yesterday, the Canadian listed crypto mining giant TAAL, announced it was to lowering its mining transaction fees for the BSV network to support enterprise blockchain applications that generate high transaction volumes. In response, CoinGeek Mining has decided to follow suit and match these fee reductions:

CoinGeek will regularly review these fee rates with respect to fiat equivalents in order to maintain a fiat stable transaction fee rate; this will provide the price predictability that enterprises want for their data applications.

Recently, Bitcoin SV (BSV) application development has exploded globally, including across Europe, Australia and China, to take advantage of BSV's greater data capacity and micropayments capability. Growing usage has led BSV to show consistently more transactions and consistently bigger average block size than BTC: https://coin.dance/, and recently surpass the Ethereum network on some days.BSV is also the only project that adheres to the original design of Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto. In short, BSV is Bitcoin.

Calvin Ayre, owner and founder of CoinGeek Mining, commented: "We are following TAAL in reducing these transaction fees in order to support long-term growth of applications which generate high volume transactions on the BSV blockchain. We are doing this in order to generate, and highlight, the ability of BSV to accommodate a huge volume of transactions to sustain blockchain profitability for both miners and enterprise applications - in the years to come."

Additionally, CoinGeek Mining will follow TAAL's lead to increase the restrictive limit (inherited from Bitcoin Core) of unconfirmed transaction ancestors on BSV from 25 to 50. Although this change is unrelated to the reduced transaction fees, it has a similar goal to support big enterprise applications on BSV. A higher limit of 50 unconfirmed ancestors will enable business applications to create longer sets of chained transactions before they are mined in a block.

Precautions for BSV network participants

It should be noted that until a lower relay fee rate is widely adopted, it is NOT zero-confirmation safe to send transactions with a fee rate below the old default rate of 1 satoshi/byte. For transactions that involve two parties without trust, the fee rate should remain at 1 satoshi/byte until after the Genesis hard fork of the Bitcoin SV network (scheduled for February 4, 2020). Transactions that do not involve a counterparty (e.g. data transactions from applications like WeatherSV who negotiated BSV transaction fee deals directly with miners) can take advantage of the lower fee rates immediately.

For more on BSV, visit BitcoinSV.comand come to the next major BSV event the CoinGeek conference in London, February 20-21, 2020.

SOURCE CoinGeek

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Bitcoin SV Mining Fees Just Got Even Lower: CoinGeek Follows TAAL Mining With Fee Reductions - PRNewswire