Issue #7 – February 19th

Morning everyone!I hope your start of the week will be great. I have prepared for you a very decent portion of information, and to be honest this one will be a blast! Also, I would like to thank you for all the great feedback I received so far – I am really grateful you find the newsletter helpful, and nothing makes me happier than you spreading the word about it to your friends or anyone who is into crypto! So let’s see what February brought us so far.

Bitcoin:

– Some banks in some countries started to ban bitcoin purchases via credit cards.
– Coinbase on the path to roll out Segwit upgrade soon!
– There is another fork ahead – have your coins ready a tthe end of February!
– There was another Satoshi Roundtable — Jameson Lopp wrote about his experiences there.
– Greg Maxwell intends to focus on Bitcoin smart contracts development.
– Meet Glacier — the high security Bitcoin storage protocol.
– What does Metcalfe’s Law says about valuation of Bitcoin and Ethereum?
– Sometimes, it’s good to step back and make a big picture of the whole thing. This piece makes a good job at it.
– As shocking as it may sound — JP Morgan published The “Bitcoin Bible“!
– One piece on payment channels.Ethereum:

– Some of the Ethereum projects got together and created a fund for ETH projects.
– Could Dappchains be a scaling solutions for ETH apps?
– Have you heard of Decentralized Derivatives Association? Maybe you should!
– A bit more on Casper, and the cryptoeconomics in it.
– Aragon announced decentralization of their development.
– The list of Ethereum token standards you should know about. And beyondERC20.

Altcoins:

– Some more predictions on trends in cryptocurrencies for 2018.
– Some folks are getting excited for developments in IOTA. Others claim its useless. Decide for yourself.
– Melonport released a new update on their progress.
– And so did guys from Kyber Network.
– Dfinity is one of those more exciting platforms out there. Check the review of their consensus mechanism.
– Masternodes are getting increasingly more popular as a way to receive passive income.
– Blockgeeks made an extensive primer on Zcash.
– This piece provides an insightful take on crypto trading.
– Could Monero change their Proof-of-Work? Did you know you can make a paper wallet for your XMR?

ICOs:

– Telegram just raised the new ICO record, during pre-sale!
– So what does it take to succeed in an ICO? Some experts shared their exp.
– It seems that most of the token sales are done via pre-sale.

Blockchain Tech & Trends:
– US Government will spend loads of money on blockchain research.
– Some other US regulators got together to talk about cryptos – you could watch them live.
– Then European regulators said they are kinda chilled and there is no hurry to regulate crypto.
– Then Canadian regulators said they are happy to announced the new settlement platform based on blockchain.
– So how does blockchain compare to traditional databases?
– If you trade on Bitifinex, you might want to hear this.
– In case you missed it, one of the most exciting things about blockchain is transition to the Web 3.0. You better get ready for the paradigm shift.
– Given that, it is interesting to see developments in the various economic models that tokens have to offer.
– Ledger HW wallet patched the man-in-the-middle-attack.
– All kind of coin lovers seem to be settling down in Puerto Rico.
– There was another hack. And one particular exchange went crazy about it.
– We talked about hashgraph previously, but let’s dive into it a bit deeper.
– Very nice guide on consensus algorithms.
– Decentralized exchanges are the buzzword in the cryptoworld. Let’s sum up development in this area.
– A bit of philosophical contemplation on Social Order and cryptocurrencies.

BONUS:
A16Z made a nice list of reading on various aspects of crypto, from basics to more advanced concepts.

I will be always happy to read your feedback, and suggestions on possible topics to include to the newsletter. If you would like to share some with me, please do so at stancel@blockchainslovakia.sk.

In case you want to show me some crypto love:

BTC: 3M5bzL8GDhDJoJ2RoRFcza917L1tEcPp3P
ETH: 0x62cE83a2C24686957d769bFd940B69ff568E760A
LTC: MVrjVKmQ5sGoMHJ1Np8Q2YEqWMCqkuu1yz
PIVX: DMJxf4ce3Le4qUyDVSA5TS2CRwFuatec75
DASH: XpQCnerF4wq1fQk9FVCjKE22juyYgqUMUo