Cryptocurrency Mass Adoption & Internet Freedom – Mainframe Mick from Mainframe and I discuss the future of ₿itcoin and how to drive adoption. Links Summit https://decentralizedsummit.com/ Dawn of the Dapps https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XVZxjVJz4ds Website https://mainframe.com/Disclosure: This is an unpaid interview for a project that was deemed worthy of research time, recording and posting for educational purposes. Furthermore, I currently hold MFT tokens, and I am excited about its future SUPPORT ME ON BITBACKER WITH CRYPTO https://bitbacker.io/user/cryptolark/RECOMMENDED EXCHANGES BINANCE https://bit.ly/2Dyvpps BINANCE JE – BUY CRYPTO WITH POUNDS & EUROS https://www.binance.je/?ref=35019746 KUCOIN https://bit.ly/2zLJKuv LIQUID – https://bit.ly/2Di72M2 COINBASE – GET $10 Free ₿itcoin for signing up! https://bit.ly/2zqeVfV ABRA – GET $25 IN BTC – https://invite.abra.com/p9lwV0WqCRCRYPTOCURRENCY HARDWARE WALLETS LEDGER NANO S https://bit.ly/2yZp4j5 TREZOR https://bit.ly/2qERryfCERTIFIED CRYPTOCURRENCY BROKERAGE Caleb & Brown https://bit.ly/2Feq8F6SOCIAL MEDIA – These are my only accounts, beware of scammers! TWITTER twitter.com/TheCryptoLark FACEBOOK facebook.com/TheCryptoLark TELEGRAM GROUP t.me/thecryptolark TELEGRAM HANDLE @cryptolark MINDS minds.com STEEMIT steemit.com/@larksongbird D-TUBE d.tube/#!/c/larksongbirdPODCAST – find me on I-tunes “Crypto Waves” https://bit.ly/2B0X1kHCONTACT E-mail [email protected] with business or event enquiries. DISCLAIMER Everything expressed here is my opinion and not official investment advice – please do your own research before risking your own money. This video may contain copyrighted material the use of which is not always specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for research or academic purposes. We believe this constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this video is distributed without profit, for research and educational purposes.Custom intro and tunes created by The Maker’s Initiative – Auckland, NZThanks for watching; please like, subscribe, and share if you found this useful!#bitcoin #ethereum #cryptocurrency #neo #elastos #litecoin #eos #ripple #ontology #monero #stellarlumenes #cardano #nem #dash #ethereumclassic #vechain #tezos #zcash #dogecoin

China’s Center for Information and Industry Development has released its latest crypto project ranking. The center evaluated one more crypto project this month, bringing the total number of ranked projects to 34. Bitcoin has been downgraded while the top two positions remain unchanged.Also read: Indian Supreme Court Moves Crypto Hearing, Community Calls for Positive RegulationsThe Center for Information and Industry Development (CCID), under China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, released its eighth crypto project ranking update on Thursday. Thirty-four crypto projects were evaluated this time, with Ontology as the newest addition.EOS remains number one in the overall ranking, followed by Ethereum. Ontology debuted at number five. BTC dropped from the 13th position in the previous ranking to the 18th position, while BCH fell one place from the 29th spot to the 30th. Dwelling at the bottom is Decred, with NEM and Litecoin ranking just above it.Ontology describes itself as a distributed trust collaboration platform. Its “blockchain framework supports public blockchain systems and is able to customize different public blockchains for different applications,” according to its website. The center specifically evaluated Ont ID, Ontology’s protocol for a “complete distributed identity framework supporting identity verification and authentication for people, assets, objects, and affairs.” According to the CCID:Its [Ontology’s] main network was launched in June 2018. In this assessment, Ontology has outstanding performance in basic technology and application, with a composite index of 112.6, ranking fourth in the [overall] list.The 34 projects were evaluated overall as well as in three separate categories: basic technology, applicability and innovation.In the basic technology category, EOS, Bitshares, Steam, Gxchain, and Ontology top the list this month. NULS has improved rapidly in this category, the CCID revealed. “According to the evaluation model, the basic technology [category] mainly examines the technical realization level of public chains, including functionality, performance, security and decentralization.”In terms of applicability, the top five projects are Ethereum, NEO, Ontology, Nebulas, and Qtum. “The new Ontology replaced Dash in the top five,” the center wrote. “The applicability [category] mainly evaluates the comprehensive level of public chain support for practical applications, including node deployment, wallet application, development support and application implementation.” As for the innovation category, the top five positions are occupied by BTC, EOS, Ethereum, Komodo, and Cardano.What do you think of this crypto project ranking? Let us know in the comments section below.Need to calculate your bitcoin holdings? Check our tools section.International cryptocurrency payroll service provider…Read MoreCryptocurrency news blog and investment strategy guide. All you need to know about ICOs, education, reviews, mining, and more.

Blockchain News – How Cryptocurrency Could Help Mastercard Grow Its Business

Over the last decade, the fintech revolution has dramatically altered the payments landscape. But Mastercard  (NYSE:MA) has adapted admirably, forging partnerships with start-ups and launching new products that supplement its core payment cards.

More recently, cryptocurrencies have taken the investing world by storm. And once again, Mastercard is showcasing its adaptability. Rather than maintaining the status quo, the company is embracing change by supporting digital currencies like Bitcoin. Here’s what investors should know.

According to Mastercard, as many as 20% of consumers now own cryptocurrency in certain countries, and that growing interest has not gone unnoticed by merchants and financial institutions. To capitalize on this trend, Mastercard expanded its cryptocurrency program last year, making it easier for partners to issue crypto payment cards.

In the U.S., Mastercard teamed up with BitPay — a payment processor that allows merchants to accept digital currencies like Bitcoin at checkout — to launch a prepaid crypto card in June 2020.

The BitPay card allows consumers to make in-store and online purchases (anywhere Mastercard is accepted) with funds loaded from their BitPay wallet. In other words, consumers can fund the card with currencies like Bitcoin or Ether (Ethereum‘s native cryptocurrency token), and BitPay converts those funds into fiat currencies like U.S. dollars.

Following the prepaid card’s June launch, BitPay transactions hit a new high in July. And last month, BitPay announced support for Apple Pay, meaning consumers can now use an iPhone to make contactless cryptocurrency-funded purchases in stores. The company also plans to roll out support for Samsung Pay and Google Pay later this quarter.

In Europe, Mastercard has partnered with London-based fintech Wirex to launch a crypto debit card. This product differs slightly from BitPay’s prepaid card. Whereas BitPay offers instant conversion, Wirex allows consumers to spend up to 18 digital and traditional currencies in real time, meaning the funds are not converted until the moment a purchase is made. The Wirex debit card also allows consumers to earn 2% cash back (in cryptocurrency) on any in-store or online purchase.

Despite the differences, these crypto payment cards have one thing in common: They all convert digital currency to fiat currency at some point prior to the transaction, meaning it’s fiat currency (not cryptocurrency) that’s flowing through the Mastercard network. But that’s about to change.

During Mastercard’s most recent earnings call, CEO Michael Miebach announced plans to add digital currencies directly to the company’s network. This will eliminate the need to convert between digital and traditional currencies, making it easier for consumers and merchants to adopt crypto payments.

Ultimately, this looks like a big win for crypto enthusiasts, since it dispels one of the core arguments against digital currencies (i.e., that they are difficult to spend). But it also allows Mastercard to tap into another form of payments, which could be a powerful growth driver for the company if cryptocurrency continues to gain traction.

In the past few decades, numerous titans have been reduced to relics because they failed to evolve as new technologies emerged and consumer preferences shifted.

For instance, IBM‘s mainframes dominated the computing landscape in 1980. But when Apple brought personal computers to the market, IBM failed to adapt and the company faded from relevance. Similarly, Blockbuster‘s failure to embrace streaming media resulted in its downfall as Netflix rose to prominence. There are other examples, but the takeaway is this: Times change, and successful businesses must adapt.

Mastercard’s decision to support cryptocurrencies highlights the company’s strong leadership and forward-thinking culture. That trait is hard to quantify with numbers, but that doesn’t make it any less important. In fact, it’s one of the biggest reasons I’m a Mastercard shareholder, and why I plan to continue being a shareholder for many years.

This article represents the opinion of the writer, who may disagree with the “official” recommendation position of a Fintech Zoom premium advisory service. We’re motley! Questioning an investing thesis — even one of our own — helps us all think critically about investing and make decisions that help us become smarter, happier, and richer.

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World economists finally realize that current financial systems are flawed and unstable. The world needs a much more stable and reliable currency. Blockchains were developed by scientists on an algorithm that could address the issues concerning Sustainability and Scalability. However, there still remained some questions unanswered. Time and again, the hybrid consensus mechanism of blockchain and various tokens revolving around it has also been in heated discussions.

However, very few networks have actually gone into addressing the interoperability issues that pose various bottlenecks for the trading community. Enormous transaction fees and lack of transparency are major hurdles in scientifically developed platforms; many cryptocurrencies failed to redress these issues. Cryptocurrencies like Tezos has gradually pervaded the mainstream consciousness and gained traction. It has stood the test of times and shall continue to do so provided it sees a mass adoption.

Even though transactions are recorded in the general blockchain, neither the sender nor the recipient and not even the amount transferred is in any way apparent to other users on the network. The entire framework of Tezos relies on zero-disclosure evidence, thereby allowing mathematical consistency of the entire transaction procedure, which is cross-checked without revealing any data or message on the other party involved in the transaction. Putting the power ultimately in the hands of the user, Tezos has regular upgrade schedules, which means this protocol is adaptable to meet the varied use cases of today and the unforeseen use cases of tomorrow. Tezos can trap fraudulent or spurious transactions by peers wherein a confirmed block can trace the preceding block.

Breaking free from the erstwhile Blockchain, Tezos was coined as another revolution in the world of second-generation blockchain in the year 2018. Fondly called a native cryptocurrency, Tezzie, Tezos blockchain is capable of hosting smart contracts and dApps. Now what makes Tezos stand out from its competitors like ETH, Bitcoin, and others is that here the decision-making is built into the blockchain itself. All the owners, i.e., investors of Tezos, the native crypto XTZ, vote on decisions related to the blockchain, including protocol changes. Approved changes are then automatically applied, as the blockchain is self-change capable.

This unique trait makes the entire protocol bring stability, especially with no major platform-oriented picture changes. Working on Proof of Stake (PoS) makes Tezos bring the advantage of lesser transaction fees to the table. In the DPoS system, where stakers are called bakers can lock up their tokens in exchange for the ability to validate blocks. XTZ Tokens with an average amount of rewards get distributed to bakers to wallets that have delegated tokens to the baker. This enables smaller token holders to participate in the validation (and reward) process if they hold less than the required amount to become a full baker.

Tezos is also actively involved in reshaping legislation and compliance to innovative commercial standards challenging the current ecosystem. Team Tezos realizes that blockchain’s full potential can be harnessed only when the fundamental framework is in place to make this revolutionary technology a dream come true. A well-manned team of dedicated professionals and scientists of Tezos includes Hubertus Thonhauser as the Chairman with Alexis Bonte, Daniel Masters, and Marylene Micheloud as Members of the Tezos Foundation Council. The Executive Committee of Tezos has eminent names like Ulrich Sauter (General Counsel), Arthur Breitman (Co-Founder and CEO), and Roman Schnider as the Chief Financial Officer.

The Die-hard users of Tezos would always advocate using XTZ in place of fiat money. Many Tezos supporters believe that digital currency is the future. The factors leading to XTZ adoption by institutions and companies primarily are based on the following fundamentals:-

Companies can build Tezos-based private / permissioned blockchain networks using its plug and play feature. They can plug the private blockchain solution into the public Tezos mainnet. Tezos interoperability keeps companies’ blockchains updated. It provides them global expansion, a vast network of users and DApps (Decentralized Applications), and continual developments and upgrades. Enterprise Tezos refers to a defined set of guidelines and technical specifications to accelerate blockchain technology adoption among enterprises. The specifications provide businesses with the ability to leverage both Tezos-based private chains and the public mainnet.

As with any other digital currency, Tezos (XTZ) is the subject of absolutely different points of view. Some people like Tezos, while others do not favor it much. XTZ is regarded as one of the most debated digital currencies. Some people think the project lacks an approach plan and the controversial PR stunts of its founder. Nevertheless, there are a lot of others who actually believe in XTZ price prediction.

Currently, XTZ price is trading at $4.19, with an almost 10% hike over the last 24 hours. The market capitalization of Tezos is $3,143,813,826.81 with 759,618,585 XTZ circulating currently. Ever since its inception, the token has been competing hard and strong against its rival cryptocurrencies. Once or twice in the year 2020, it had witnessed the highest escalation in price around $4. But this trend did not last long and fell to $1.03. By November 2020, the Tezos (XTZ) price faced a correction and breached an active support level, but surprisingly pandemic seemed not to affect Tezos. On the contrary, it showed an altogether different movement. In June 2020, it continued to have an upward swing, with Tezos price trading around $2.07.

However, going by the technical price analysis, Tezos has shown tremendous potential consistently performing and recovering the lost value. XTZ today marks a tremendous momentum leading to quite a bullish pattern boosted by strong growth despite the few pullbacks.

XTZ, the native token that is traded on various exchanges by millions of users worldwide, is yet to position itself in the mainframe of investment-worthy currencies. However, this crypto asset is to gain traction with investors as the market shows uncertainty towards its inherent potential. It can be clearly defined that Tezos, listed as XTZ on various exchanges, has positioned itself among many of the top currencies but to stay at that level, it has to exploit its maximum potential.

While the pivotal developments have impacted the XTZ/USD price, pushing them in a positive direction, the market seems to be holding a lot more promise in the years to come. A hurdle in the way of the prosperity of Tezos cryptocurrency is that it is massively reliant on decentralized Apps for which the prices are purely dependent on market movement. The rivals of Tezos viz. ETH, EOS, and Monero are competitors of the equal game. Hence to expect a very high windfall profit on XTZ is entirely DApps market-oriented.

Tezos price prediction 2020 has truly somersaulted in the last year, totally transforming the trend from the beginning towards the end of the year. XTZ has had a historic journey throughout. All said and done XTZ  trend has been quite aggressive, leading to a very optimistic path. The coin may grow in leaps and bounds, especially for alliances. New Partnerships would bring XTZ to the limelight, making it the center stage for investments and a socially esteemed cryptocurrency. In the process, more transactions shall be executed with every passing second, which may prove a tough challenge for crypto rivals of XTZ.

The end of the year 2020 was a challenging year with eagerness to say bye to. Mainly due to pandemic negative trends prevailing bringing the coin to 90 cents. However, the beginning of 2021 meant XTZ could bid a bye to all negative and pessimistic trends for the world of cryptocurrencies, especially for XTZ. It could mean the start of an era of hopes and promises full of optimism. There could be a forecast of miracles in the world of cryptocurrencies like XTZ; there could be magic in the short term. Five years is a long time. Expert investors of cryptocurrencies always plan for the long term rather than the short term.

Mega Crypto: “Tezos price has a bright future. It may have got slightly affected by bears but will see the bullish future price ride around 2024, and its price may blow the roof crossing $50.88.”

Smartereum: “Being based on a logical algorithm, Tezos has both short term rally as well as long term potential advantages. The price may reach $5.40 end of March 2021.”

Long-term technical team: “XTZ price might surprise investors reaching a peak of $20.37 and by 2023 going up to $30.”

Longforecast: “Tezos has attained one of the top 10 positions in cryptocurrencies in 2020, and the performance might be thoroughly maintained in the coming 5 years too.”

Coinliker : “It is regretful that Tezos (XTZ) seems to be showing negative sentiment. The bears will pin it down like other crypto giants too. It may disappoint its investors sailing barely at $3.12 and that too with difficulty.”

Oracle Times : “ Irrespective of its adoption, Tezos will tend to face heat till January 2022. Going by predictions that bulls may be back, the XTZ price should end up slightly higher, say by 2024 $15.38 at best.”

Trading Beasts: “There is hope for consolidating trends that point towards the fact that there is hope for Tezos and show it may go on a higher sentiment.”

Crypto Rating : “Tezos (XTZ) price might grow threefold in six years, say by 2026, it should have a clear rally around $20 to $30.”

Wallet Investor : “It seems Tezos is doomed. It has lost sheen by almost half of current price stooping to as low as $10.25 by the first quarter of 2021.”

Satis Group : “The results are not very encouraging as the bears may be back for XTZ pushing it down to $1.6 in 2021.”

Mati Greenspan : “XTZ is an adventurous project and one of the rapidly growing segments. It is more bulls than bears. It is not a hype that it would cross $50 in 2023.”

Brave New Coin : “ Compared to what Tezos (XTZ) was in the last year, it sounds highly bullish as the currency has shown a reliable consistency. By this year’s end, the Tezos price should easily swing around $15 to $20.”

Volatility, of course, as conveyed time and again, been the apple of discord, but that holds true for any kind of currency wherein factors stated hereinabove influence and impact the price of a digital asset, Tezos being no exception either. There are also specialists involved in the analysis of prices and the execution of transactions online. The cryptocurrency is capable of generating tangible income, which attracts users Tezos community has set higher benchmarks for itself notwithstanding. Tezos shall surpass the expectations of all cryptocurrency investors who have found this platform extremely interactive and uncomplicated.

The gradual but steady rise in the price of Tezos may not have won it the topmost cryptocurrency award, but smart investors have learned to wait and watch for this asset to perform and work wonders on exchange. More importantly, even though the recent performance of Tezos has not skyrocketed on the exchange rising to glory, one prominent fact that emerges here is Tezos is here to stay, rise, grow in the markets in full bloom. 

Competing and bracing in the tough markets, XTZ is a digital cryptocurrency that has elevated its own stature, being called a digital or virtual asset with no logistics or state borders constraints. It is one cryptocurrency that refuses to bow down to central government pressures or be chained in defective and regulatory monetary shackles. Pandemic has brought to its fore a technological revolution that has shown a beacon to investors in the form of XTZ, and guesses what? All with just an internet connection and a smartphone! Tezos has made it possible for everyone to store and transfer value in a currency that is resistant to manipulation.

Tezos saw the opportunity to take power out of the institutions and provide a better service, and the people responded. XTZ operates universally, i.e., for the first time, there is a possibility of a global currency. With a truly international currency, possibilities for global economic growth and social equality are endless.

Backed by an enhanced decentralized accord and reinforced network, XTZ aims to offer a deep-seated advantage to its users by distributing its rewards mechanism. The vision is to aid the decentralized applications in XTZ, consuming lesser energy and offering more reliability -all with a rocketing speed. All the same, this vision is achieved by providing the unending capacity of XTZ’s main network.

Working hard to change the world map of technology, the entire ecosystem ensures that participants benefit from blockchain-enabled functional advantages. XTZ facilitates gains and builds hope; XTZ enables convenience and nurtures faith, helping users build fortunes deploying different Decentralised App functions. Once the developers join the brigade, they are benefitted from a vast range of rights, including deploying DApp in Tezos net, growing their businesses exponentially gaining traction as influencers and thought-leaders.

It would not be an exaggeration that this priced cryptocurrency might break all the barriers and withstand the test of time, scaling a peak of $30. With fiat currencies unable to sustain themselves in the wake of the pandemic, this might come as a reprieve for all XTZ investors leading them to the path of high hopes and aspirations to transact in Tezos. For informational purposes, one may read the technical analysis with RSI level, bands, etc., and news reports of the crypto market and keep tracking the XTZ coin price forecast every 24 hours.

No doubt, an easy-to-use Tezos (XTZ) is good; it is more functional and promising when it is easy to spend. Tezos established a fast, reliable network and worked with the user experience of the product. These features can help the XTZ price increase much higher to the new all-time high around the $20 mark. If the drive for functional crypto continues into 2021, the Tezos price changes may even see a parabolic move in 1 year. 

If all market factors turn in favor of Tezos, this cryptocurrency price shall perform exuberantly, scaling the peak as aforesaid. Transgressing all limitations over the next year, even though it may show some sluggish trends, it would surely show signs of fortune for its investors. Backed by robust smart contracts, the Tezos price may easily touch $30 by the end of the year 2022.

The masterminds carve the functionality behind Tezos cryptocurrency. Hence over a period of, say, 3 years, the token is set to pick up the pace with other coins to arrive at a price of $35-40 clearly. Investors, however, need to watch out for any unforeseen factors. Nobody could predict the Pandemic!

Keeping in perspective, there are no boomerang effects in the cryptocurrency markets, Tezos is all set to affirm its strong position as a major attraction among its investor community. The road ahead is full of petals provided the investor confidence keeps booming, resulting in a major push to the Tezos coin price, taking it across all barriers scaling $50.

A jaw-dropping optimism is also predicted for the XTZ price, mainly due to its consistent performance over the years. Hence this year will be a mega bonanza for the cryptocurrency market as the prized digital asset will surpass all expectations and surge ahead of its major resistance level. Seeing a rise like never before, the Tezos price is sure to cross a new all-time high of $60 from where it stands today.

Many crypto market mentors fear that it may see some ups and downs. However, these apprehensions may not hold for long. As finally, the Tezos coin will stabilize to bring gallant returns for its investors.

It all depends on the team activity, potential technological breakthrough, or high-level partnership. As agreed before, Tezos has to do a massive overhaul in building partnerships and collaborations that increase visibility and infuse more funds into the project, making it relevant for all the users and investors alike. It would be then increasing in price manifold.

Pandemic has been a true touchstone for fiat and cryptocurrencies. With regulated world economies moving towards recession, it is proved beyond doubt that digital currencies shall rule the financial kingdom. Most certainly, Tezos is going to be one of the most crucial kings of this wild. Emerging as an extremely dynamic and vibrant force, Tezos is going to be the pick and choice of investors to buy or sell, mainly because it has stood the test of time, and also investors have found a factor of reliability embedded in this token.

Undoubtedly, Tezos (XTZ) has great potential and would tend to be the most attractive cryptocurrencies mainly because of high transaction security coupled with speed scaling a peak of $40 for sure on a more in-depth technical analysis.  What remains to be seen is how the mining gets the attention of Governments worldwide and whether they too recognize the inherent value of this crypto asset at par with other valuable assets—no wonder the ever-active team of qualified mathematicians and cryptographers are developing and maintaining the cryptocurrency.

Hence it would not be an overstatement to name the function of Tezos (XTZ) as catalysts in implementing smart contracts and transfer funds. The most valuable factors that propel the price of Tezos (XTZ) are the speed and affordability that enable quicker improvements implementation.

Predicting price fluctuations of risky asset classes is a thankless task – the best answer is no one knows. It is always recommended that investors do their own due diligence and go through the price trendlines to make their own wise decision.  

Being a tough nut to crack, XTZ has given sleepless nights to many competitors. The list is endless like (TRX), Fantom (FTM), Nervos (CKB), Binance Smart Chain, dForce (DF), ICON (ICX), Elrond (EGLD), Gravity, Waves (WAVES), and others too.

Tezos stands out as a unique digital asset. One does not face any privacy issues with Tezos mainly because of its salient characteristics. Tezos gives you the major advantage of keeping your information in the process highly private and non-transparent.

A plethora of product portfolio makes Tezos an apple pie. Tezos is a great attraction for those looking to make money in the short term with wise decisions. From offering crypto loans, earning interest to making huge savings, Tezos gives an investor all the benefits packed in one. Of course, many other cryptocurrencies depreciating have made the investors look for greener pastures, why not Tezos be that one?

No false promises absolutely. What Tezos guarantees are a world full of benefits. It all depends on your wisdom to invest your money in Tezos with due diligence and prior spadework done.

The scientists and mathematicians have been mathematicians for Tezos. They have evolved a system whereby all transactions are regularly monitored, and any minuscule suspicion is eliminated to protect the data. Allowing no dubious key image or transaction similarities, the miners of Tezos ensure sure there is no double-spend.

People these days are turning wiser. They do not fall for advertisement propaganda. They see the real worth, they see the real performance over a period of time demonstrated by XTZ and make wiser moves. Naturally, Tezos stands tall on all scores of transparency, science, and decentralized asset advantage.

Many investors have this small trouble that sometimes pops in. The reason is some software does not allow Tezos considering it could harm your system. However, with some KYC in place and creating an exception in your anti-virus, you can smoothly sail in with Tezos.

Based on a typical scientific algorithm and harvesting on the advantage of blockchains, Tezos offers its investors a foundation they can rely upon with the wonderful gift of XTZ. This digital coin incentivizes a global network of computers to provide reliable, real-world data to smart contracts.

The credit goes to investors. They have confided in Tezos, assuming it would scale zenith, making its mark in the world of cryptocurrencies. Tezos has bagged their confidence purely based on its merit. Tezos has proved its mettle against its competitors. Undoubtedly Tezos would be worth an investor’s hard-earned money.

Currently, the trending supply is 759,724,391 XTZ in the market. It all depends on how fast the Tezos price rises or how quick the demand? Users need to watch out on exchange to track for their contracts.

Even though the Pandemic is on a receding stage, most of the world economies have dwindled. Some of them have even got their roots shaken. Even the biggest Sams have a tough time catching up equilibrium with fiat. Why not give Tezos a chance? It may be a small fish in the crypto ocean, but it won’t take long to become a big shark.  A timely decision and a strong faith are all an investor needs!

All renowned major exchanges of the world carry the hallmark presence of Tezos. Compliant exchanges also give you the facility of directly trading Tezos for fiat currencies like USD, EUR, GBP, etc., or other cryptocurrencies on many exchanges. Investors can also benefit from the block rewards program on Tezos.

One can say Yes and No. It depends, as said previously, how wisely you invest in Tezos. Have you read our XTZ price prediction diligently. Are you watching the movement of XTZ on the exchange meticulously? Then indeed, you have your dreams of becoming a millionaire coming true soon. To have a big gain, you need to dream big and invest big. The responsible platform of Tezos does not guarantee any overnight billionaire dreams coming to fruition.

Over the years theres been no shortage of creativity when it comes to innovative new Bitcoin mining efforts. Weve seen mining rigs built in the back of Teslas, mining rigs powered by wind or human breath, and even mining rigs that harvest human body heat. The latest creative effort: reconfiguring an old Apollo guidance computer to mine Bitcoin, poorly. Tinkerer and software engineer Ken Shirriff has a rich, amazing history taking archaic systems and nursing them back to life. From old IBM 1401 mainframes to antiquated computers like the Xerox Alto, Shirriff can often be found restoring and reverse engineering systems of the past to help give us a better understanding of the hardware and software of the present, and future. Shirriffs latest project is the restoration of a 52 year old Apollo Guidance Computer (GDC), used on board each Apollo command module (CM) and Apollo Lunar Module (LM) during the Apollo programand our adventures to the moon. In a blog post, Shirriff notes that after getting the GDC up and running (the only one currently operational anywhere, he says), he decided to give it a more modern task: mining Bitcoin. Implementing the Bitcoin hash algorithm in assembly code on a 15-bit computer from the 60s took some elbow grease to get working, he says. The AGC doesnt actually have a microprocessor, since it was built years before microprocessors were even developed. As such, its not going to rival, say, the latest $120,000 oil-submerged bitcoin mining rig any time soon. In fact, its not going to even mine a single block, well, ever. At 10.3 seconds per hash, it would take a billion times the age of the universe to mine a block, Siriff said of the effort. Still faster than mining by hand or punch cards, he noted. For some perspective, a $70 USB stick miner performs 130 billion hashes per second. One of the first computers to use integrated circuits, the AGC was 70 pounds and under a cubic foot in sizesomething revolutionary for technology emerging from the mainframe era. That said, the computer was only capable of 40,000 additions per second; sluggish but still enough to help manage guidance, navigation, and engine control. In a YouTube video, Shirriff shows his Bitcoin program running on the Apollo guidance computer with the results displayed on a custom made DSKY (Display/Keyboard)since nobody was able to provide him with a working, original DSKY. The Apollo Guidance Computer took 5.15 seconds for one SHA-256 hash, resulting in a hash rate of 10.3 seconds per Bitcoin hash, Shirriff notes. Currently, the Bitcoin network is performing about 65 EH/s (65 quintillion hashes per second), he says. At this difficulty, it would take the AGC 410^23 seconds on average to find a block. Since the universe is only 4.310^17 seconds old, it would take the AGC about a billion times the age of the universe to successfully mine a block. Shirriff notes this isnt his first run in with what he calls absurd Bitcoin mining. Hes also documented his efforts to mine bitcoin by hand using just pencil and paper, which resulted in a hash rate of 0.67 hashes per day. Hes also toyed with using an IBM punch card mainframe computer (obtaining a hash rate of 80 seconds per hash), as well as the 1973 Xerox Alto, which also netted him a still tepid 1.5 hashes per second. While Shirriff isnt getting rich any time soon from his experiments, the because I can efforts are invaluable in terms of preserving older software, archiving computer history, and reminding modern engineers not to take current processing power for granted. Tagged:

News this week that R3 and IBM are working together raised eyebrows, because each entity has been on different and competing sides since the early days of enterprise blockchain.

From next month, the commercial version of Corda (the version big banks and the like are paying R3 for) will be made available via IBM’s LinuxOne servers, delivering a hybrid of on-premise and cloud offerings. R3 announced the news at its annual developer conference, CordaCon.

Blockchain tribalism – R3’s Corda competes with Hyperledger Fabric, the enterprise blockchain heavily backed by IBM – has been put aside in favor of commercial sense, it seems. IBM’s LinuxOne business is far bigger than its nascent blockchain concern, while many large banks that have vendor relationships with IBM use Corda.

“This started an interesting conversation in IBM, where LinuxOne came to us and said they wanted to work with us,” Charley Cooper, managing director at R3, said in an interview. “If you’re a highly complex, heavily regulated industry, and you want the best technology but you want the name brands to take to your risk manager to say, ‘Trust us, we’re picking the best vendors,’ now they’ve got the best of both worlds.”

The enterprise blockchain space, which attempts to retrofit Bitcoin’s distributed ledger technology within the private settings of big companies, has evolved into three broadly separate camps: R3 Corda, Hyperledger and enterprise variants of Ethereum such as Quorum.

There has been some crossover between these tribes. IBM, for instance, has also experimented with other DLTs such as Hedera Hashgraph, and also with the Stellar blockchain, but the vast majority of Big Blue’s blockchain efforts are focused on Hyperledger Fabric, which is the basis of the IBM Blockchain Platform.

“While there’s some sort of tribalism within the blockchain community, it’s not so in the broader technology community,” said Cooper. “They’re not tribal, they want to see if they can deliver for clients. And if they can, the flavor of blockchain is not a concern for them.” 

R3, while also being a member of Hyperledger, is known to be a scrappy contender when it comes to closing commercial transactions.

Times have changed, said HACERA CEO Jonathan Levi, one of the original engineers working on Hyperledger. The market is moving very fast, and these business networks are becoming specialized, he said.

“R3’s decision to leave the table and to build their own ecosystem on one framework, helped them move a lot faster,” said Levi, referring to the early days with IBM, Intel, Cisco, R3, Digital Asset and others around the engineering whiteboard back in 2016.

“This is a great moment for our friends R3 and the Corda ecosystem, and for some of IBM’s customers who rely on mainframes,” he added. “I believe that we will see more multi-party systems that rely on open standards and provide more optionality and security by having multiple vendors involved.”

Hyperledger Executive Director Brian Behlendorf said that IBM’s services unit offering support for R3’s product is not unlike its support for Oracle databases or Microsoft operating systems.

“This is yet one more example of what we’ve been saying since our inception, which is that the enterprise blockchain space is really big and will continue to be served by more than one protocol,” Behlendorf told CoinDesk via email.  

There is support for Corda in four different Hyperledger projects, said Behlendorf, pointing specifically to Hyperledger’s interoperability layer, Cactus, which offers an integration toolkit between Hyperledger Fabric, Corda, Quorum and Hyperledger Besu-based networks.

“Congrats to R3 for their continued commercial success, it helps all of us in the enterprise blockchain space,” Behlendorf said.

The DeFi lending platforms have promised to fill the gap lagging in traditional banking. Consequently, it serves as the new financial service enabler while fulfilling the mass adoption needs of Blockchain and cryptocurrency. It is popularly called open finance because it takes pioneering the open banking movement where individuals don’t need a central party for financial services.

Meanwhile, this article tells you what you need to know about DeFi lending while sharing a few details about the top DeFi lending platforms. However, it is important to clarify what a DeFi lending is and draw a few distinctions about DeFi borrowing.

In DeFi lending, investors and lenders issue a loan or deposit fiat for in interest through a distributed system and a decentralized application. On the other hand, an individual or business borrows money for interest through a decentralized network. Both lending and borrowing make use of DApps, Smart contracts, among other DeFi protocols.

While Decentralized finance gave finance a new meaning, Decentralized lending provided various lending opportunities and benefits to lenders. Therefore, DeFi lending has the under-listed benefits:

The cryptocurrency space, in general, are volatile, which often sends investors packing. Therefore, if the investor doesn’t want to get burnt in the market, frustrating price swings, the investor, or holder sell-off at bull run, however, DeFi lending provides an opportunity for the investors who want to hold Crypto for a specified time.

Also, DeFi lending allows traders or investors to deposit Crypto for fiat to fulfil other needs without selling off. For instance, a business that holds crypto assets and won’t want to sell to execute a project could simply approach a DeFi lending platform to deposit Crypto for fiat to execute the project.

As a crypto asset holder, you don’t need to sell off to avoid the bears. Rather, you lend it out with agreed interest rates defined in the smart contract. Within the stipulated time, you earn your money with interest.

Consequently, DeFi lending becomes a haven for panic sales.

Meanwhile, the underlying technology of DeFi doesn’t demand rigorous documentation, as seen in the traditional lending system. Rather, it is a function of clicks through a Decentralized Application. I’m currently, lenders earn interests without stress in a distributed and centralized network.

The decentralized lending is as simple as putting your hand in the pocket to lend a borrower. However, the Decentralized application and Smart contract represent your intermediaries and negotiators, respectively.  Assuming you have $50,000 to loan through a DApp, you only need to press some buttons on your PC, and that’s all.

What happened is that you opened a DApp which hosts a smart contract and a pool of borrowers. So at the click, you decide what interest rate you want to give out a loan, if favouring, then lending is on the way. Concurrently, the smart contract automates lending and borrowing agreement.

A DeFi lending platform is similar to the traditional lending platform except that there is no central authority. Consequently, all you do is done across a trustless network. However, there are several DeFi lending platforms you may like to know. They are as follows:

It is an Ethereum based open source and non-custodian protocol that enables the creation of money markets. Although it offers other services, it is popular for lending and borrowing. Like several DeFi lending platforms, it offers a dual DeFi token model: aToken and LEND.

aToken is an ERC-20 token where lenders interest compound while LEND is the governance token Aave offers varieties of loans and lending services such as uncollateralized loans, “rate switching,” Flash Loan, and unique collateral types.

The interest rate varies from originating and flash loans at 0.25% and 0.09%, respectively.

However, it is one of the DeFi lending platforms that support many assets including Basic Attention Token (BAT), Dai (DAI), Ethereum (ETH), Kyber Network (KNC), Aave (LEND), ChainLink (LINK), Decentraland (MANA), Maker (MKR), Augur (REP), Synthetix (SNX), TrueUSD (TUSD), USD Coin (USDC), Tether (USDT), Wrapped BTC (WBTC), 0x (ZRX), and Synthetix USD (SUSD).

Maker protocol, popularly called Multi-Collateral Dai (MCD) system, is one of the most reputable DeFi lending and borrowing platforms. It was founded in 2015 as a means to circumvent the volatility of the cryptocurrency. Hence, it’s DAI is pegged to the dollar for lending and borrowing once the smart contract terms are met.

MakerDAO, an open-source protocol built on Ethereum, enables users who have ETH and access to MetaMask to lend in the form of DAI. Similar to many other DeFi lending platforms, it hosts a dual token model: Maker, and Dai. Dai is a stablecoin pegged to the dollar to allow users to lend and borrow accordingly. On the other hand, Maker Token is the governance token that maintains stability in the system.

The platform offers users a 9.05%, 4.6% interest rate, and 30D average rate. If you are ETH, WBTC, USDC, and BAT holder, you can lend and borrow on the Maker protocol.

The compound is another popular openly accessible smart contract built on Ethereum Blockchain. It allows borrowers and lenders alike to lock their crypto assets into the protocol.

Unlike other DeFi lending platforms, it allows the tokenization assets locked in their system through the use of cTokens. Tokenization allows users to have a digital representation of their assets to trade, lend, and so on.

Consequently, when you deposit ETH, you get cToken, which can be used as collateral. On the other hand, the COMP token is its DeFi token. However, it supports a wide range of nine assets issued on Ethereum, including BAT, DAI, SAI, ETH, REP, USDC, WBTC, USDT, and ZRX.

It has a varying DeFi lending and borrowing rate depending on the supported currency. The lending rate for BAT, DAO, ETH, USDC, WBTC, USDT, and ZRX are 0.03%, 2.99%, 0.14%, 3.08%, 0.29%, 2.2%, 2%, respectively.

This is a multi-purpose DeFi platform that manages digital assets. It provides varieties of DeFi services like lending, borrowing, swap, leverage, etc. Look at it as a DeFi bank that allows you to integrate your services to serve your purpose.

The platform offers users one-click switching platforms to easily switch to cheaper lending platforms with lower interest rates, especially for Maker and Compound.

By implication, it offers you a smart wallet portal for DeFi protocols. However, it is as simple as owning a Coinbase wallet or MyEtherWallet or any related one to loan, borrow, trade or swap.

However, the platform is free to use except that you must have enough ETH for transaction fees.

dYdX brought margin trading, options, and derivatives to the blockchain space, which are normally found in fiat markets and common for traditional investments. On the platform, users can trade, lend, and borrow ETH, DAI, and USDC. It also offers cross margin trading and isolated margin trading as well as using a perpetual market contract of BTC/USDC of 10x leverages

Loans on the platforms are on 125% collateral and 115% self-liquidation. Meanwhile, unlike many other DeFi lending platforms, it doesn’t have a native token as such charges trading fees in the supported tokens.

It is a tokenized debt and funding decentralized platform where lenders, borrowers, and other fund managers trade and transact with the other. It boasts of Dharma Settlement Contracts, which mimics the traditional financial instruments and stakeholders like agents typically present in the loan facilitation process. Four main agents operate the network: Borrowers, Lenders, Underwriters, and Relayers. Borrowers and Lenders are simple operators. Relayers are agents that host the order book for potential lenders to browse through, while underwriters are the agents responsible for identifying the possibility of default and structure the terms of the debt issue.

It uses a dToken for governance and Dao as the stable coin. However, it supports only two assets, Dao, and USDC at the moment. It operates an open-source and non-custodial-custodial wallet where users have 100% control of funds. Dollar deposits earn 2.7% APR through the Compound Protocol, while deposits are guaranteed by over $1B in cryptocurrency collateral. However, the platform allows up to $1,000 per day.

The platform provides a unique alternative to decentralized margin trading dYdX. It leverages bZxR token to relayers to collect trading fees. Unlike some other DeFi platforms, Relayers matches borrowers and lenders order such that borrowers may receive margin loans. However, the platform relies on the upkeep of a deep insurance fund. Therefore charging lenders 10% of their earnings and aggregating it into the funds to ensure that lenders will always be covered if borrowers are unable to pay back their loans.

However, since rebranding in 2018, it has integrated two other DeFi platforms: Fulcrum Trade and Torque, a decentralized lending and margin trading platform, and a DeFi borrowing platform.

It supports lending and borrowing with Basic Attention Token, Kyber Network, 0x, Chainlink, Ethereum, Augur, sUSD, USD Coin, Bitcoin, Dai, and Sai.

Lending and borrowing depend on iToken and pToken, while bZxR token is for governance.

Since it uses iToken for lending, the lending rates are as follows: Dao, USDC, and ETH are 1.03%, 1.29%, and 0.95%, respectively.

This is the first innovative DeFi lending platform that uses a gamified approach to provide lending for gamers and other crypto users. It added gaming as a way of adding liquidity using yield farming and incentivized tournaments. While gamers and developers receive incentives for hosting DApps, and rewards for playing respectively, they have the privilege to win KTY tokens and lending ETH.

However, many details about DeFi lending rates and supported currencies are not available now, as they are doing IDO. Meanwhile, it could be inferred that the platform supports ETH and its native governance token KTY.

The mainframe is formally launched in 2018 as a decentralized communications platform.  It was relaunched as a DeFi lending platform after the acquisition of  Sablier, a protocol for real-time finance on the Ethereum blockchain.

Upon relaunch, its selling point is the novel Guarantor Pools, which hopes to protect collateral vaults, collateralization ratios can be much lower without increasing risk to the system, unlike the Crypto-loan collateral ration of 150%.

The platform uses Mainframe token, MFT for governance, and yToken to reward Lenders.

Major crypto exchanges are consolidating smaller, niche services to expand their overall market reach. 23194 Total views 34 Total shares Listen to article 0:00 Follow up The past few months have seen a number of major crypto companies facilitate some serious big-money acquisitions. For example, on Aug. 25, blockchain software firm. Similarly, earlier this year, global cryptocurrency exchange announced that it was acquiring CoinMarketCap, one of the most referenced crypto data websites. In this regard, crypto derivatives exchange FTX, too, announced on Aug. 26 that it had recently to take over the digital asset portfolio tracker for a total sum of $150 million. But a pertinent question that FTX’s latest acquisition raises is: What will happen to all of Blockfolio’s existing user data, and should users be wary of their holdings being disclosed to tax authorities? Cointelegraph reached out to Ian Balina, the founder and CEO of Token Metrics — an AI-based cryptocurrency ratings and price predictions platform. In his view, FTX’s purchase of Blockfolio will not result in a mass exodus of users from the platform because most people who have used the service in the past have grown accustomed to its user interface, something that Balina believes will be hard to replace easily. Regarding user data privacy, he stated: Launched in 2019, FTX has witnessed somewhat of a meteoric rise in recent months, which has been exemplified by the company’s decision to shell out a handsome sum for Blockfolio’s 6-million-strong user base, as the crypto exchange looks to rapidly fuel its ongoing growth.  Speaking on how this latest development will spur FTX’s overall market presence, Jared Polites, a partner at LaunchTeam — a marketing agency — believes that the deal will help raise brand equity and hasten FTX’s growth: “Potential benefits include user growth, doubling down on mobile analytics and UX, and liquidity as more exchange services get integrated into Blockfolio.” Additionally, Blockfolio’s acquisition is going to be a big advantage for FTX when it comes to the liquidity side of things, especially since an established brand is not part of the equation. On the topic, Sam Bankman-Fried, a co-founder and the CEO of FTX, : “From the beginning, our goal at FTX has been to build the best quality trading experiences with the deepest liquidity for the widest possible cross-section of traders.” Lastly, FTX’s deal will also help gear the company’s image toward a more mainstream crypto audience that might include a number of future traders. In regard to how Blockfolio’s acquisition will allow FTX to increase its market dominance, Balina opined: “Blockfolio is one of the most undervalued applications in the cryptocurrency space, and I think this is a smart move by FTX.” Since the start of the year, the digital asset sector has witnessed a number of major deals go through, such as as well as. Similarly, earlier this year, Coinbase, too, , a prime brokerage platform meant primarily for institutional investors. In the wake of these deals, there seem to be several reasons for such high profile consolidations in the crypto space. It’s important to recognize the fact that even though on paper these deals appear to be substantial, the crypto sector as a whole is still in its infancy and has yet to witness any significant merger-and-acquisition-related activity, especially when compared with the traditional finance sector. Expounding his views on the subject, Polites added: Additionally, if and when top tier crypto exchanges reach a stage of “consolidation saturation,” players such as Binance and Coinbase may eventually become as big as various mainstream banks or large media houses that have multiple operational wings and can serve a number of different industrial domains in addition to their existing crypto buy/sell capabilities. When it comes to big-name firms like FTX acquiring platforms like Blockfolio, the goal of these companies seems to primarily be to expand their existing market reach as well as to onboard new users. For example, Blockfolio currently sits at the top of the crypto user acquisition funnel and is one of the first applications that people tend to use when they start investing in digital assets. As the cryptocurrency market continues to evolve and grow, it would be unsurprising to see more of these deals take place on an increasingly regular basis. Also, it is worth noting that not all of the aforementioned acquisitions have been solely for monetary reasons. Doug Leonard, the CEO of Mainframe — a decentralized lending protocol — told Cointelegraph: Lastly, Bryan Routledge, an associate professor of economics at Carnegie Mellon University’s Tepper School of Business, also believes that if one were to take evidence stemming from other, more traditional market settings such as equity and commodities, it would only be natural for the crypto industry to also follow suit and start consolidating around a few big exchanges — something that could eventually lead to an increased amount of investor confidence.

Tezos [XTZ] shoots up by 22% as cryptocurrency becomes latest altcoin to see green Price surges in the cryptocurrency market have been dominated by altcoins, with most of the popular ones witnessing double-digit gains. The latest altcoin to surge on the back of the bulls was Tezos [XTZ].Source: CoinMarketCapAt the time of writing, Tezos was rising by 5.14% on the hourly charts, and by 22.46% on the 24-hour spectrum. The cryptocurrency held a market cap of $367.005 million, while the 24-hour trading volume was at $8.650 million. A majority of the coin’s trading volume was held by UEX and BitMax, two popular cryptocurrency exchanges. UEX contributed to 27.7% of the total XTZ trade, while BitMax posted a trading volume of $1.190 million. (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});Source: CoinMarketCapThe charts show a perpendicular rise in prices, as the cryptocurrency was moving gradually before it shot up. The price rose from $0.573 to $0.602 in under an hour, according to the charts.It was speculated by some users that the price rise was owing to the coin’s addition to the Bitfi wallet. Bitfi’s official handle had tweeted,“Due to popular demand, we are adding Tezos (XTZ). This is a very important smart contracts platform that delivers features that others cannot, like formal verification. #Tezos #XTZ”Tezos has mainly focused on increasing its developer base, as evidenced by the cryptocurrency organization’s recent partnership with Mainframe.Mick Hagen, Founder and CEO of Mainframe said,“We’re witnessing an explosion of developer skills.The blockchain community has turned towards building, and over the next several months with support from Tezos Commons, we’ll host events around the world focused on challenging those developer skills.”Mainframe’s official release also stated that the partnership entailed strengthening the core developing network, (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});  » Read Full Article « AMB Crypto March 20, 2019 Related ItemsAltcoinsBitfiNewspriceSocialTezosTrading ViewXTZ

IBM continued its Red Hat and open-source integration work this week by adding Red Hat OpenShift support to its blockchain platform and bringing a Kubernetes Operator for Apache CouchDB along side its hybrid-cloud services offering.The ability to deploy IBM Blockchain on Red Hat OpenShift, the companys flagship enterprise Kubernetes platform, means IBM Blockchain developers will have the ability to deploy secure software, either on-premises, in public clouds or in hybrid cloud architectures.Blockchain is a distributed database that maintains a continually growing list of records that can be verified using hashing techniques, and the IBM Blockchain Platform includes tools to build, operate, govern and grow protected blockchain networks.IBM says its blockchain/OpenShift combination is targeted at companies that want to keep a copy of the blockchain ledger and run workloads on their own infrastructure for security, risk mitigation or compliance; need to store data in specific locations to meet data-residency requirements; and need to deploy blockchain components in multiple cloud or hybrid-cloud architectures.Since finalizing its acquisition of Red Hat in July, IBM has been assembling an ecosystem of cloud development around Red Hats Kubernetes-based OpenShift Container Platform. Most recently Big Blue fused its new z15 mainframe with IBMs Red Hat technology saying it will deliver IBM z/OS Cloud Broker for the Red Hat OpenShift container platform. This offering will provide direct, self-service access of z/OS computing resources to users through connectivity to Kubernetes containers.IBM said it intends to deliver IBM Cloud Pak offerings to Linux on IBM z and LinuxONE offerings. Cloud Paks are bundles made up of Open-Shift with more than 100 other IBM software products. LinuxONE is IBMs highly successful mainframe system designed specifically to support Linux environments.The vision is for OpenShift-enabled IBM software to become the foundational building blocks customers use to transform their organizations, IBM said.Most of our customers want solutions that support hybrid-cloud workloads and the flexibility to run those workloads anywhere, and z/OS Cloud Broker for Red Hat will be the central point for how we enable cloud-native on the platform, IBM said.In related news IBM announced support for the open source Apache CouchDB, a Kubernetes Operator for Apache CouchDB and that the Operator has been certified to work with Red Hat OpenShift. The Operator automates deploying, managing and maintaining Apache CouchDB deployments. Apache CouchDB is a non-relational, open-source NoSQL database. In a recent Forrester Wave report, researchers said, Enterprises like NoSQL's ability to scale out using low-cost servers and a flexible, schemaless model that can store, process and access any type of business data. NoSQL platforms give enterprise architecture pros greater control over data storage and processing, along with a configuration that accelerates application deployments. While many organizations are complementing their relational databases with NoSQL, some have started to replace them to support improved performance, scale and lower their database costs.Currently IBM Cloud uses the Cloudant Db service as its standard database for new cloud-native applications. Bolstering support for the CouchDB gives users alternatives and backup options, IBM said. And being able to tie it all into Red Hat OpenShift Kubernetes deployments can let customers use database-native replication capabilities to maintain low-latency access to data as they deploy applications and move data across multiple cloud environments, IBM stated.Our clients are turning to containerization and microservice-oriented architectures to improve speed, agility and operational capabilities. In cloud-native application development, applications need to have a data layer that allows for scalability, portability and resiliency, wrote Adam Kocoloski, IBM Fellow and Vice President, Cloud Databases. We believe that data portability and CouchDB significantly improve the capabilities of multi-cloud architectures, allowing customers to build solutions that are truly portable across private clouds, public clouds and edge locations.This story, "IBM brings blockchain to Red Hat OpenShift; adds Apache CouchDB for hybrid cloud customers" was originally published by Network World.Related: Michael Cooney is a Senior Editor with Network World who has written about the IT world for more than 25 years. He can be reached at michael_cooney@idg.com.FollowITWorld DealPost: The best in tech deals and discounts.Shop Tech Products at Amazon

IBM continued its Red Hat and open-source integration work this week by adding Red Hat OpenShift support to its blockchain platform and bringing a Kubernetes Operator for Apache CouchDB along side its hybrid-cloud services offering.The ability to deploy IBM Blockchain on Red Hat OpenShift, the companys flagship enterprise Kubernetes platform, means IBM Blockchain developers will have the ability to deploy secure software, either on-premises, in public clouds or in hybrid cloud architectures.Blockchain is a distributed database that maintains a continually growing list of records that can be verified using hashing techniques, and the IBM Blockchain Platform includes tools to build, operate, govern and grow protected blockchain networks.IBM says its blockchain/OpenShift combination is targeted at companies that want to keep a copy of the blockchain ledger and run workloads on their own infrastructure for security, risk mitigation or compliance; need to store data in specific locations to meet data-residency requirements; and need to deploy blockchain components in multiple cloud or hybrid-cloud architectures.Since finalizing its acquisition of Red Hat in July, IBM has been assembling an ecosystem of cloud development around Red Hats Kubernetes-based OpenShift Container Platform. Most recently Big Blue fused its new z15 mainframe with IBMs Red Hat technology saying it will deliver IBM z/OS Cloud Broker for the Red Hat OpenShift container platform. This offering will provide direct, self-service access of z/OS computing resources to users through connectivity to Kubernetes containers.IBM said it intends to deliver IBM Cloud Pak offerings to Linux on IBM z and LinuxONE offerings. Cloud Paks are bundles made up of Open-Shift with more than 100 other IBM software products. LinuxONE is IBMs highly successful mainframe system designed specifically to support Linux environments.The vision is for OpenShift-enabled IBM software to become the foundational building blocks customers use to transform their organizations, IBM said.** From HPE: Achieve Compliant, Cost-effective Hybrid Cloud Operations. An expert guide for fine-tuning oversight and operations of hybrid cloud investments. (Sponsored) ** Most of our customers want solutions that support hybrid-cloud workloads and the flexibility to run those workloads anywhere, and z/OS Cloud Broker for Red Hat will be the central point for how we enable cloud-native on the platform, IBM said.In related news IBM announced support for the open source Apache CouchDB, a Kubernetes Operator for Apache CouchDB and that the Operator has been certified to work with Red Hat OpenShift. The Operator automates deploying, managing and maintaining Apache CouchDB deployments. Apache CouchDB is a non-relational, open-source NoSQL database. In a recent Forrester Wave report, researchers said, Enterprises like NoSQL's ability to scale out using low-cost servers and a flexible, schemaless model that can store, process and access any type of business data. NoSQL platforms give enterprise architecture pros greater control over data storage and processing, along with a configuration that accelerates application deployments. While many organizations are complementing their relational databases with NoSQL, some have started to replace them to support improved performance, scale and lower their database costs.Currently IBM Cloud uses the Cloudant Db service as its standard database for new cloud-native applications. Bolstering support for the CouchDB gives users alternatives and backup options, IBM said. And being able to tie it all into Red Hat OpenShift Kubernetes deployments can let customers use database-native replication capabilities to maintain low-latency access to data as they deploy applications and move data across multiple cloud environments, IBM stated.Our clients are turning to containerization and microservice-oriented architectures to improve speed, agility and operational capabilities. In cloud-native application development, applications need to have a data layer that allows for scalability, portability and resiliency, wrote Adam Kocoloski, IBM Fellow and Vice President, Cloud Databases. We believe that data portability and CouchDB significantly improve the capabilities of multi-cloud architectures, allowing customers to build solutions that are truly portable across private clouds, public clouds and edge locations.Join the Network World communities on Facebook and LinkedIn to comment on topics that are top of mind.Related: Michael Cooney is a Senior Editor with Network World who has written about the IT world for more than 25 years. He can be reached at michael_cooney@idg.com.Follow Now read: Getting grounded in IoT

Where is the Bitcoin Roadmap? 3 min readI attended The Bitcoin Edge conference followed by Scaling Bitcoin this week. This was my first time attending a bitcoin developers conference. As you probably are aware, Im very interested in blockchain scaling and privacy solutions. The purpose of spending four full days in these conferences was to learn about new ideas trending in the industry and perhaps implementing some of the best in my own projects, Ardor, Ignis, and Nxt, in the future.The sessions at the conferences were a strange mix of technology reviews, half-baked scaling ideas, a lot of privacy discussions, a lot of lightning network discussions, and some hands on exercises. I can swear that one of the presentations described a scaling solution that is 99% similar to Ardor without even knowing about it. What struck me the most about this conference was the lack of two highly relevant words for getting these ambitious projects to market, Bitcoin Roadmap. Surprisingly, there were few real roadmap discussions, if any.I feel a bit sorry for all these wonderful entrepreneurs and researchers working on bitcoin scaling solutions. The chance their code is ever deployed to the bitcoin mainnet is so slim. And for me, as a software engineer, seeing my code deployed to a production system is the ultimate satisfaction.Lets face it, bitcoin development has stagnated. Being unable to hard fork to introduce new functionality limits the developers to optimizing the existing code, which they have been doing for years, while speculating about all the wonderful things they could do if, for example, they could just replace ECDSA with Schnorr signatures, use script-less transactions or add this or that OP_CODE to the script.Jimmy Song, in his impressive introductory lecture for bitcoin developers, mentioned again some of the Satoshi bugs that still exist today in bitcoin and cannot be fixed without a hard fork. Compare this to an imaginary Apple engineer explaining that you have to dial 0 on your iPhone before every number since Woz introduced a bug to the original Apple IIe code, or to Linus Torvalds explaining that you need to store signature data using 71 bytes instead of 64 because he had to rely on Open SSL cryptography when developing the first version of the Linux kernel. Lets face it, the inability to make changes cripples bitcoin development.As an anecdote, I recall from my days working on mainframe integration that there was a legend that to add a feature to the IBM mainframe kernel, one would need an approval directly from the IBM CEO. Comparing this to getting changes into Bitcoin, it seems to be a simpler task.The Bitcoin developers themselves seem to be deadlocked in their old beliefs, only being strengthened by the recent increase in bitcoin dominance. For example, Andrew Poelstra said again that proof of stake does not work I wrote a paper about this a few years ago. The whole world is moving to POS, wake up buddy.The only real innovation on Bitcoin these days seems to be on the lightning network. The way I interpret it is that developers realize that bitcoin cannot be changed so they are trying to go to off chain solutions. But sooner or later these guys run into a wall when they need to make a small adjustment to the bitcoin core itself.The results? You see presentation after presentation talking about a wonderful improvement idea that is just waiting in vain for a new bitcoin OP_CODE and is therefore doomed.One of the common practices in the software industry is to publish a product roadmap. This allows users, developers, businesses, customers, prospects and investors a glimpse into the vision of the project developers. This is why Jelurida regularly updates the. Bitcoins lack of such an official roadmap leads to almost no accountability for anyone developing new features for it and this is a major risk factor.My conclusion is that the bitcoin dominance is short lived. It is a result of the blockchain industry as a whole failing to deliver a killer application, yet. Once real-world applications emerge, bitcoin will still enjoy its network effect and position as a transition currency between fiat and crypto for a while, but sooner or later, it wont be able to compete with newer and more flexible solutions.

Concordium, an ambitious project whose founders have close links to companies including Volvo, IKEA, Saxo Bank and Nasdaq, is looking to shake up the seemingly glacial world of enterprise blockchain.  The most striking thing about Concordium, which launches its third testnet next month, is the way it pushes what was once anathema to big corporates: public and permissionless blockchains. Businesses, wary of tipping their hands and giving away any competitive advantage, have traditionally preferred the idea of private and permissioned blockchains. But many advocates of blockchain tech believe only open systems hold true transformational promise. The oft-cited analogy centers on the relevance of internet versus intranet.   By signing up, you will receive emails about CoinDesk products and you agree to our terms & conditions and privacy policy.Read more: ‘Boring Is the New Exciting’: How Baseline Protocol Connected With 600 Corporates Toeing the line between the privacy requirements of regulated businesses and full-broadcast blockchains like those of Bitcoin and Ethereum has led some very smart people to opt for an attenuated architecture when it comes to distributed ledgers.  However, Concordium is confident it has found a third way, keeping sensitive data private using a clever identity and zero-knowledge-proof (ZKP) system, providing firms with a safe, flexible option to deploy open blockchains. The momentum around projects like Baseline Protocol, which now has some 600 big firms using it, is a solid indicator ZKP tech is ready for prime time. According to Concordium CEO Lone Fønss Schrøder, sometimes you need a permission-based ledger; but in order to realize new business models, it has to come in combination with baked-in permissionless possibilities.  “I think that’s really what large corporations are looking for,” said Fønss Schrøder. “If you look at Hyperledger, for example, or R3, I don’t think it is blockchain in the sense of really providing something new. It’s not decentralized. Companies are seeing it as just another way to do their mainframe applications. But when you talk about permissionless blockchain, it’s something totally new.” Blockchain today simply doesn’t meet the needs of corporations, says Fønss Schrøder, and a lack of permissionless flexibility has led to no uptick in business adoption.  Concordium’s chief marketing manager, Beni Issembert, went further: Businesses underwhelmed by today’s enterprise blockchain offerings are squarely in Concordium sights. “Businesses that are open-minded feel a lot of frustration and desolation when it comes to using Hyperledger and R3 Corda. And we are talking to those disappointed businesses,” Issembert said. It would be easy to write Concordium off as some kind of naive newcomer – both R3 and Hyperledger declined to comment on the Concordium white paper.  But the project, which has its roots in Denmark, features an impressive cast of players from business and academia. On the science side, Concordium’s research center at Denmark’s Aarhus University is run by widely cited cryptographer Ivan Damgard. Last September, Torben Pryds Pedersen, creator of the Pedersen Commitment cryptographic primitive, was appointed as Concordium’s CTO. Read more: Staying Alive: Why the World of Enterprise Blockchain Has Turned to Collaborations In terms of corporate clout, Fønss Schrøder is a boardroom director at IKEA, vice chairman of Volvo and spent 22 years at A.P. Moller Maersk. Concordium’s founder, Lars Seier Christensen, founded Saxo Bank in 1992, while the blockchain’s advisers include former Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen, and heavy hitters from Nasdaq, Mastercard and Skype. It’s one thing to announce a paradigm shift in the way businesses intend to use blockchain technology, but another to show hard evidence of this new permissionless demand.  “We are already in contact with those people [Volvo and IKEA] and looking at ways to fulfill what they would like to do. But we are not only targeting 20 or 40 businesses,” said Issembert. “We are focused on the next generation of commerce, the new unicorns; firms that you don’t have to convince the best approach is an open system.” It should be pointed out that Volvo has blazed a trail when it comes to tracking the minerals used in electric car batteries with the help of Hyperledger Fabric. IKEA has also done some interesting blockchain experiments with the likes of Tradeshift using the Maker protocol.  Neither Volvo nor IKEA would confirm to CoinDesk whether they were testing Concordium at this time. Read more: IKEA in ‘World First’ Transaction Using Smart Contracts and Licensed E-Money If large corporations have been mostly happy with proofs-of-concept using closed enterprise blockchains, what are the new use cases that open systems like Concordium can offer?  Fønss Schrøder said a major opportunity exists in rethinking the way procurement and supply chains work, for example. (In terms of new entrants to the enterprise blockchain space, there have also been some interesting moves from the EOS ecosystem, particularly in Latin America.) “It could be smart contracts, which actually will function as marketplaces for you and your whole procurement sector,” said Fønss Schrøder. “I think about what Maersk has been doing, but the disadvantage for Maersk is that this should never have been built on a permission-based blockchain; it should have been permissionless. But that’s the kind of logistical use case I’m sure we will be able to support.” Volvo board member Fønss Schrøder also sees plenty of uses for open blockchains in the car industry, across secondary markets, for instance, and the service agreements that come with that. “Nearly every car sold by Volvo has some kind of lease arrangement or car-care, and blockchain is well suited to support this on the insurance side and on the service side,” said Fønss Schrøder. As far as the ZKP secret sauce, Issembert called this the “backbone of the network,” but could not disclose details. “For the ZKP design approach, we are going to come to the market with our own solution. It’s not something that has been seen yet,” he said. Read more: WATCH: ‘Big Four’ Exec Says Privacy Is Key to Enterprise Blockchain Adoption Next month sees Concordium’s third testnet come into being, with a view to going live in January 2021.  “We will have the smart contract layer ready and then we will see which corporations will build on it,” said Fønss Schrøder. “It will be very interesting. I don’t think we will disappoint you.” Zero-Knowledge ProofsEnterprise BlockchainConcordiumIKEAVolvoDisclosureThe 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.What is undefined?

Bitcoin has been glorious by several to be the foremost illustrious decentralized cryptocurrency. However, besides bitcoin, there exists different altcoins that confer a good worth still. square measure you concerning|inquisitive about|fascinated by} learning about different cryptocurrencies? Well, bitcoin isn't alone. Here square measure others.1. Litecoin (LTC)Statistics show that as of Gregorian calendar month 2018, Litecoin had per token worth of $87.56. The coin was created by a former Google engineer and Massachusetts Institute of Technology graduate named Charlie Lee. a bit like bitcoin, Litecoin isn't controlled by any central authority. It uses ''script'' as proof of labor. different from bitcoin, Litecoin has a quicker block generation rate. this implies that it offers a quicker dealings confirmation.The coin is predicated on Associate in Nursing open supply international payment network. The coin is usually accepted by merchants with the amount growing day by day. In Gregorian calendar month 2018, it had a market cap of $5.03 billion.2. Ethereum (ETH)It was launched within the year 2015. ETH could be a decentralized software package platform. It permits Distributed Applications and good Contracts to be engineered and run while not period, fraud, the management or third party interference. There exists a part known as the ether that acts sort of a vehicle among the ethereum platform. Developers seeking to develop and run applications among ethereum and investors going to purchases different digital currencies square measure the foremost interested parties in ether.Value per token of ethereum as of Gregorian calendar month 2018 was $474.66 and a market cap of $ forty seven.84. Ethereum is the second most vital cryptocurrency from bitcoin.3. Zcash (ZEC)Just like different altcoins, Zcash is Associate in Nursing ASCII text file and decentralized cryptocurrency. it had been launched within the year 2016. This cryptocurrency is understood to supply privacy and selective transparency of transactions. it is a distinctive feature different from different altcoins, isn't it?ZEC claims to supply additional security wherever all the transactions square measure recorded and printed on a blockchain. However, finer details involving the sender and recipient, and therefore the quantity square measure unbroken non-public. Statistics show that as of Gregorian calendar month 2018, Zcash had per token worth of $206.23. It had a market cap of $904.85 within the same month.4. DashIt was originally referred to as darkcoin. Dash could be a lot of tightlipped version of bitcoin. The operating of Dash makes transactions nearly untraceable. This as a result of it provides obscurity since it works on a decentralized mastercode network.Dash was launched on Jan 2014. Since then it's toughened a rise in fan following despite the short amount of your time. The cryptocurrency was created by Evan Duffield. It is often deep-mined employing a GPU or a mainframe. Studies indicate that in Gregorian calendar month 2018, Dash had a market cap of $2.19 billion and worth per token of $266.58.Other high cryptocurrencies embrace Ripple (XRP), Monero (XMR), Bitcoin money (BCH), NEO (NEO), Cardano (ADA) and Eos (EOS).Bottom lineIn conclusion, it might be correct to mention that bitcoin has distinguished itself as a trendsetter. the globe has toughened a wave of cryptocurrencies that square measure engineered on a decentralized peer-to-peer network. thus bitcoin has become the actual normal for cryptocurrencies.

Cryptocurrencies are already used to pay college and university tuition fees, buy Lamborghinis, and pay for space travel. Now you can also assist in protecting journalists and whistleblowers by donating to the Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF) using bitcoin, ethereum, bitcoin cash, litecoin, and zcash.The donations will support current projects of the free speech nonprofit including SecureDrop, a whistleblower platform that allows journalists to get messages and documents from sources anonymously.Other projects that FPF is currently involved in include the US Press Freedom Tracker, a site dedicated to counting and documenting press freedom violations that occur in the United States. FPF is also the fiscal sponsor of encrypted phone call and text message app, Signal.Already the San Francisco, California-based free speech organization has received a donation of 1,000 ETH from Mainframe, a firm in the blockchain space which is developing a censorship-resistant communication and decentralized applications network.“We are deeply grateful Mainframe has made this critical donation to help Freedom of the Press Foundation protect journalists and whistleblowers, and are excited Mainframe, through their technology, shares our commitment to protecting privacy and freedom online,” wrote FPF on its website following the donation.Mainframe had previously raised approximately $1.4 million in a campaign branded “Proof of Heart”. During the campaign the total number of ETH that was raised by mainframe was 2,019.57, with the highest single contribution being 19.84 ETH – a relevant reference to the George Orwell novel, 1984, which covers themes such as propaganda and suffocating government surveillance.Technically, FPF, which was started six years ago and counts whistleblower and ex-National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden as one of the members of its board, had been accepting bitcoin donations since 2013 through online payments processor Stripe.However, earlier in the year Stripe ended bitcoin support citing high fees and an increased transaction failure rate making it impossible for FPF to continue accept bitcoin donations. Now the nonprofit will accept cryptocurrency donations directly from digital wallets.Besides FPF, other nonprofits and charities which accept cryptocurrency donations include several branches of humanitarian aid organization UNICEF. While UNICEF New Zealand accepts cryptocurrency donations directly, UNICEF Australia asks well-wishers to donate the processing power of their computer which is then be used to mine monero using a variant of the Coinhive JavaScript-based crypto mining software.