Coin News

A bitcoin blockchain notarization project has developed a customer on-boarding tool for a Russian payments service.

Payments giant PayPal has announced the appointment of founder and CEO of bitcoin startup Xapo, Wences Casares, to its board of directors. In an official release today, PayPal described Casares as a “recognized next-generation payment and crypto-currency thought leader,” who will serve on PayPal’s Compensation Committee. PayPal’s press release also references bitcoin explicitly, stating Casares’ […]

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 CoinDesk, one of the leading bitcoin news sites, has been acquired by Digital Currency Group according to a post on the company’s site. A source close to CoinDesk tell TechCrunch the price of the deal was around $500-600k. The bitcoin news site, which launched in 2013, had raised around $2 million in undisclosed funding from investors and according to our source had been trying to sell… Read More

JackPocket, a startup that lets you buy state lottery tickets using a mobile device, has integrated bitcoin payments.

Australian bitcoin mining firm Bitcoin Group is expected to make its long-awaited debut on the Australian Securities Exchange next month.

For the past ten years, astronomers have puzzled over cosmic ripples in the structure of the Milky Way that didn't have a known cause. Thanks to a trio of pulsing stars, we now suspect a dwarf galaxy made of dark matter swung through our galactic neighborhood 500 million years ago -- with results we can still see today

Referred to as the Satoshi client, Bitcoin QT, Bitcoin Core , or simply Bitcoin’s reference client, the original Bitcoin implementation as introduced by Satoshi Nakamoto has always set the standard for Bitcoin’s consensus rules. While alternative implementations were launched over the years, these were programmed to follow or even enforce existing conduct.

Bitcoin XT , the Bitcoin implementation by recent R3CEV -hire Mike Hearn, was a first attempt to break with that concept. Regarded a controversial move by many, Bitcoin XT is programed to break existing consensus rules in order to increase Bitcoin’s block-size limit from 1 megabyte to 8 megabytes, set to double every other year until it reaches 8 gigabytes. So far, Bitcoin XT has failed to gain sufficient adoption among the mining community.

But its intended strategy does seem to have started a trend. Over the past weeks and months, three additional Bitcoin implementations were introduced, all with the intention of breaking Bitcoin’s existing consensus rules in order to set a new block-size limit.

Bitcoin Unlimited

Bitcoin Unlimited , a fork of Bitcoin Core, was the first of three new Bitcoin implementations set to increase the block-size limit, and is maintained by lead developer Andrew “thezerg” Stone. Dr. Peter R. Rizun, aspiring managing editor for Ledger , the first peer-reviewed academic journal dedicated to Bitcoin and cryptocurrency research, is prominently involved with Bitcoin Unlimited as well.

Rizun, in particular, rose to fame within the Bitcoin community as one of the loudest voices in favor or a block-size limit increase, after publishing a controversial paper claiming a block-size limit is not required to establish a fee market.

Bitcoin Unlimited’s main differentiator, as the name suggests, is the absence of a hard-coded block-size limit. Instead, it allows users to manually set this limit on their own nodes; the Bitcoin Unlimited team expects consensus on a limit to emerge naturally at a so-called Schelling point . (Though it should be noted that setting the limit above 160 megabytes would be pointless, as the implemented message-size limit will invalidate blocks larger than this.)

Bitcoin Unlimited does include a default maximum block-size setting, or rather, two. The block creation limit, which is used by miners, is set at 1 megabyte. As such, miners will not create blocks that break existing consensus rules, unless they manually choose to do so. (Additionally, Bitcoin Unlimited nodes will not forward blocks larger than 1 megabyte to other nodes.)

The block acceptance limit is also set at 1 megabyte, but with an important exception. If a block up to 16 megabytes manages to be included in the longest chain at four blocks deep – meaning it has four confirmations – Bitcoin Unlimited nodes will consider these blocks (hence, the chain) valid. This number of required blocks is configurable by users as well, and is intended as a fail-safe to ensure Bitcoin Unlimited users accept only larger blocks if a significant amount of hashing power supports it.

This means two things. First, Bitcoin Unlimited will not break existing consensus rules by default, even if it were the only Bitcoin implementation people would even run. After all, miners would never create blocks larger than 1 megabyte. And even if one or several miner(s) manually increased their limit but were unable to find four blocks in a row, nothing would change for these miners exept that they would waste resources mining blocks no one accepts.

Second, if one or several miners create blocks larger than 1 megabyte (but smaller than 16 megabytes), and find four in a row, all default Bitcoin Unlimited nodes will consider these blocks valid. But since all nodes still adhering to a 1 megabyte block-size limit would consider these blocks invalid, the blockchain would split into two irreconcilable versions. This situation would last as long as the Bitcoin Unlimited chain remains longer, or until all non-Bitcoin Unlimited nodes switch to accept larger blocks.

Other than the default settings, Bitcoin Unlimited does not include an automated solution to make sure all nodes apply the same block-size limit. The implementation will, however, include methods for miners and nodes to signal the limits they have set.

Lastly, Bitcoin Unlimited intends to introduce a level of democracy into development and management of the implementation. Most importantly, the Bitcoin Unlimited lead developer is to be elected every other year by Bitcoin Unlimited members, and can be removed through a vote of no confidence. Bitcoin Unlimited will also have an elected president in charge of high level management, and an elected secretary to deal with administrative issues. No position has yet been elected, with first elections on January 15.

Anyone who wants to become a Bitcoin Unlimited member can do so, anonymously if they so please. The Bitcoin Unlimited team intends to limit vote manipulation, but is still considering possible solutions.

Bitcoin Classic

Bitcoin miner and developer Jonathan Toomim, FinalHash CEO Marshall Long and former Bitcoin Foundation board member Olivier Janssens launched another Bitcoin implementation this week. Named Bitcoin Classic , the Bitcoin Core fork intends to increase the block-size limit to 2 megabytes later this year.

Two megabytes was picked based on data collected by Toomim, who forked the Bitcoin testnet earlier this year to test global block propagation with large blocks. Additionally, Toomim talked to many Bitcoin miners and – particularly – mining pools, and believes the consensus among them also is to increase the block-size limit to 2 megabytes.

Similar to Bitcoin XT, Bitcoin Classic will probably increase the block-size limit to 2 megabytes once 750 of the last 1,000 blocks include a message in favor of such an increase. If that happens, a grace period of several weeks will commence, after which all Bitcoin Classic software will automatically accept blocks up to 2 megabytes. If, at that point, other Bitcoin nodes have not changed their software to accept 2 megabyte blocks as well, the blockchain might split into two incompatible versions.

Like Bitcoin Unlimited, Bitcoin Classic also intends to establish democratic decision-making on code changes, using miner and user input. To establish preference topics, Bitcoin Classic has collaborated with Consider.it to establish bitcoinclassic.consider.it . Anyone can create an account on the website, open polls on development topics and vote. If a majority of both users and miners (the latter will need to provide proof they are indeed a miner) supports a change, it should be implemented.

That does not mean, however, that votes on bitcoinclassic.consider.it are binding. If there are signs of vote manipulation, Toomim will judge whether the voting procedure was conducted fairly. Furthermore, neither Toomim nor other developers are obliged to write code they don’t want to, even if the poll shows a preference for a specific solution that requires coding. And since an automated process to merge code has not been installed (yet), Toomim will still need to manually approve of any change as well.

According to its website and this GitHub page , Bitcoin Classic is so far endorsed by former Bitcoin Core lead and Bitcoin XT developer Gavin Andresen (who has done some code review), mining pools AntPool (24 percent of hash power) and BW Pool (6 percent of hash power), companies Coinbase and OKCoin and more.

‘BitPay Core’

Lastly, major payment processor BitPay released a fork of Bitcoin Core . In a series of blog posts, CEO Stephen Pair announced that the company will experiment with an adaptive block-size limit, in an implementation we will dub “BitPay Core” for now. BitPay might soon start to officially convince others (most importantly, miners) to adopt this proposal as well.

In his fourth and last blog post of the series, Pair laid out his belief that Bitcoin could essentially work without a fixed limit. However, he believes that would leave a lot of uncertainty for miners – presumably because other miners might reject blocks of a certain size even without a set limit. As such, he prefers there to be a clear and simple consensus rule for it that all miners follow.

Pair essentially wants to implement two types of block-size limits. One “hard limit,” which is the real limit: the maximum block size miners will accept as valid. According to the initially proposed parameters as described by Pair, this limit might be set at twice the size of the medium block size of the last 2016 blocks (about two weeks – like the difficulty adjustment).

Additionally, Pair proposes to implement a “soft limit,” which miners could manually increase or decrease if they choose to. This soft limit is the default limit miners will use to create blocks themselves. Like the hard limit, it will be based on the median of the last 2016 blocks (or so), but with a smaller multiplier – such as 1.5 instead of 2. As such, blocks miners using the default setting could produce bigger blocks than average.

BitPay Core is currently still in an experimental phase. BitPay is (presumably) not using the implementation for their services quite yet, and the company is not yet actively promoting it either.

Thanks go out to aspiring Bitcoin Unlimited secretary “Aquentin” and Bitcoin Classic lead developer Jonathan Toomim for providing additional information.

Note: Bitcoin Magazine has not tested or reviewed the code of any of these implementations. Breaking Bitcoin’s consensus rules prior to network-wide consensus, as well as other potential bugs, could cost users money.

Photo Idaho National Laboratory / Flickr(CC)

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Coindesk, a leading industry news and media outlet has announced today that it has been acquired by Digital Currency Group. Barry Silbert’s Digital Currency Group, an initial investor in Coindesk has now acquired the publication as a whole, with editorial and business teams at CoinDesk to reportedly merge with Digital Currency Group’s events platform to […]

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 It’s that time of month again: micro meetup time. I’m holding two small meetups in Manhattan and Brooklyn: a mini pitch-off on Wednesday, January 13, 2016 and a BTC event on Thursday, January 14, 2016. These are informal affairs and to get the NYC startup world together in one place and eat pizza. You can RSVP here for the pitch-off and here for the BTC meetup. Attend one or both… Read More

Xapo CEO Wences Casares has been appointed to PayPal’s board of directors, the pioneering online payments firm announced today. The former founder of digital wallet firm Lemon Inc, acquired by LifeLock in 2013, Casares would go on to launch bitcoin security startup Xapo, which has raised more than $40m in two public funding rounds. In […]

Following months of repeated delays, Australian bitcoin miner, Bitcoin Group, is now set to make its debut on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) in February. Melbourne-based Bitcoin Group is now gearing up for its official public float on the ASX in February. The miner is offering investors 100 million shares at 20 cents per share. […]

The post Bitcoin Group CEO Claims a ‘Billion Dollar Opportunity’ Ahead of Public Listing appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin & Cryptocurrency News.

Furthering its status as one of the leading forces in the burgeoning cryptocurrency ecosystem, Digital Currency Group today announces that it has acquired CoinDesk, a media company focused on the nascent industry that also holds one of its most high-profile conferences. DCG, one of the most active investors in Bitcoin startups, first invested in CoinDesk two years ago. “We’ve watched the publication grow and establish itself as a leading source of journalism in the industry. In addition, they’ve done a phenomenal job of branching out into new areas like research and events,” said Ryan Selkis, DCG's director of growth, adding that in 2015, the innovation arm of a leading financial institution, Citi Ventures sponsored CoinDesk’s conference, Consensus. The acquisition “aligns with with our overall strategy to bring awareness of digital currency and blockchain tech to mainstream consciousness,” said Selkis, who will head up what will become a new DCG subsidiary named CoinDesk. CoinDesk CEO Jeremy Bonney, said, “As the information needs of the blockchain ecosystem grow, CoinDesk will gain the resources and colleagues it needs to better serve readers with the high-quality, independent journalism readers have come to expect.”

Bitcoin price dropped through at 2900 CNY and $440 (Bitstamp) and is currently trading in a holding pattern near $430 and 2820 CNY. This analysis is provided by xbt.social with a 3-hour delay. Read the full analysis here. Not a member? Join now and receive a $29 discount using the code CCN29. Bitcoin Price Analysis […]

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As of December 18, 2015, all assets related to MintChip – a digital currency developed by The Royal Canadian Mint – were transferred to nanoPay Inc., a Fintech company based in Toronto that provides loyalty and payments solutions for retail and ecommerce merchants.

According to the Royal Canadian Mint, the MintChip enables consumers and merchants to exchange value almost instantly at a fraction of the cost of other alternatives. The chip itself is a secure smartcard integrated circuit that provides an electronic purse functionality, and can be inserted into all sorts of devices from MicroSDs to USB sticks and hardware Security Modules.

Before The Royal Canadian Mint’s foray into digital currency, the government-owned company offered everything from precious metal storage to spectrometric methods of analyzing gold quality. The Mint produces all of Canada’s circulation coins as well as collector coins. Having tinkered with gold refining in the mid 1960s, the company was able to produce gold with a 9999 fine purity and in 1982, it issued the world’s first 9999 bullion coins. Today, the Mint website offers granulation gold that is 99999 fine.

The Royal Canadian Mint originally announced the MintChip to the public in a contest . Applicants were challenged to “create software applications and proofs of concept utilizing MintChip,” and winners received approximately $50,000 in gold bullion from the Mint.

The MintChip itself was originally designed by a team led by Dr. David Everett. Everett is the CEO of Microexpert and was one of the few cryptographers who represented UK banks on the original research work designed to improve credit card verification. Everett is confident that “MintChip will gain consumer, merchant and regulator trust as a digital replacement for cash.”

Having designed the Mondex smart card electronic cash system used by MasterCard today, Dr. Everett wanted to build a platform that would use secure asset stores to move funds between parties without a central authority, and process transactions both online and offline.

In an interview withThe Wall Street Journalin 2014, Canadian Mint spokeswoman Christine Aquino stated that “plans regarding the virtual currency have ‘matured’ and the Mint considers turning development over to the private sector one of MintChip’s natural next steps.”

In a telling move about the future of money, PayPal has added a Bitcoin entrepreneur to its board of directors.

There is no doubt Bitcoin is now one of the most popular currencies in the world now, despite being only readily accessible via digital platforms. Bitcoin has revolutionized the cryptocurrency market and this has not gone unnoticed by governments and other online payment systems providers. It’s pretty easy to get your hands on Bitcoin in […]

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It has been nearly a year since Ross Ulbricht was convicted in all seven charges filed against him for his substantial role as the figurehead in the running of Silk Road, the infamously anonymous dark web drug marketplace. Now, his defense is filing to appeal. Their strategy is to seek a retrial by citing a […]

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One the most influential inventors of a cryptocurrency doesn’t believe that his invention, or Bitcoin for that matter, are necessarily here to stay. Litecoin was designed by Charlie Lee to be the so-called “silver” to Bitcoin’s “gold” in the popular analogy that compares the digital currency to the precious metal. On Wikipedia, it states that […]

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One the most influential inventors of a cryptocurrency doesn’t believe that his invention, or Bitcoin for that matter, are necessarily here to stay. Litecoin was designed by Charlie Lee to be the so-called “silver” to Bitcoin’s “gold” in the popular analogy that compares the digital currency to the precious metal. On Wikipedia, it states that […]

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Will blockchains that various financial institutions are investing in nowadays create “smart contracts” that perform financial services without the inefficiency or risk of intervention created by an intermediary counterparty agent?   Smart contract technology, like bitcoin, can circumvent regulatory infrastructures, which could reduce costs for financial transactions. An important feature of a smart contract is the […]

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