Day: February 9, 2018

Netherlands at the forefront of digital economy, but clearer regulation is needed #EXPERT_TAKE

Bithumb is now accepting new investor registrations after a successful integration of “know-your-customer” procedures.

Crypto exchange Binance’s relaunch today, Feb. 9, will feature a trading fee discount for users as a gesture of goodwill and “gratitude for their support” during delays. #BREAKING_NEWS

Users are reacting with suspicion and confusion to a sudden decision by one of MyEtherWallet’s original developers to launch her own competitor project, MyCrypto #NEWS

For years, scientists have been working on neuro-controlling technology. Various studies and tests have been conducted to ascertain the long-term viability, merits and demerits of using these technologies. Among various concepts, the notable ones include prosthetic limbs that could be attached to bone, muscles and nerves of the patients, instead of conventional procedures where sockets are used to connect prosthetics to the body and surface electrodes to help control them. This could allow people who have lost their limbs to overcome the loss to lead a close to normal life without much hinderance. But so far, the ability to control objects using the power of thought has been limited, and it could soon change for good.

What is Neuro-Control?

It is a technologically facilitated process which allows a person to directly manipulate a device using a thought transmitted by brain waves/electrical signals. A neuro-control device is one that is configured to give a human the ability to control their environment directly through thought. Given the right ML algorithms, the thoughts can be interpreted into action.

The potential uses for neuro-controlled devices are vast. This could be a breakthrough in treatment, control, prevention and improvement of medicine, electronics, virtual reality, robotics, transportation, manufacturing, among other possible applications. Building on this vision, Neurogress, a company based in Geneva, Switzerland, already integrates its software and mechatronic control into thought-controlled prostheses and robots.

Enriching Neurogress’ vision.

Neurogress develops software for neuro-controlling electronics and machinery. Ultimately, Neurogress aims to create an entire ecosystem made out of a library of ML algorithms connected to neuro-controlled devices based on its software platform developed to bring the limitations of existing neural interfaces to a minimum. The company intends to do so by building a decentralized platform of neutro-control systems to make the control of electronics easier than ever.

These emerging devices will be informed by aspirations and design requirements drawn from diverse fields of human endeavor to help boost the acceptance of this technology in everyday aspects of life. Software and hardware developers are at the starting point, but the inputs from of designers, artists, technology enthusiasts and philanthropists will also play an important part in shaping the solutions that takes Neurogress one step closer to making its vision a reality.

The goal for Neurogress is to go beyond encouraging developers to bring innovative new neuro-controlled devices to the market. Neurogress will revolutionize how people interact with machines by developing the right technology to move the world away from reliance on cumbersome physical interfaces. The company is at the forefront of the realization of this vision to transform how people bring their creative and intellectual pursuit to fruition.

There is an abundance of neural interfaces in the market today. Currently available devices can read basic brain signals. However, these devices are not capable of achieving a high level of specificity in reading and responding to brain commands. They simply cannot be relied upon to achieve complex objectives. To solve this limitation, Neurogress is looking to introduce a solution that actively generates an evolving algorithm for interpreting individual’s brain signals and greatly increase the potential for sending detailed and precise commands to a device for an equally precise action.

The Role of Blockchain

Neurogress is in the process of building a technology that can train AI for neurocontrol and the use of decentralized infrastructure will prevent the cutting-edge tech with widespread applications from being monopolized by any single entity or corporation. At the same time, to achieve its goal, the company’s ecosystem revolves around the Neurogress SDK and big data of user neural activity. The big data collected will be stored for now on centralised servers until solutions like IPFS mature to fill the complex needs of Dapps. The individual input of each person training the specific purpose algorithms will be hashed into the Blockchain, minimising storage of data. Only quality data from the training pools will be validated, stored, and rewarded with NRG.

The use of advanced algorithms and large volumes of data will require high levels of data integrity and demanding resources, which is better managed by a combination of distributed storage along with a Blockchain infrastructure. The machine learning process with neural activity data from algorithm trainers constantly enhances the advanced algorithms, which accelerates the process of mastering neurocontrol. Decentralization allows software and hardware developers to make use of Neurogress algorithms to not only run their systems but also provide crowdsourced datasets for training the AI.

The consensus algorithm “Proof of Thought” refers to a distribution mechanism aimed at rewarding only the human input that passes quality checks. Along with it, the platform will have normal ASIC resistant “Proof of Work” that allows machines to race algos that validate the quality of the input data.

In addition, Blockchain has proven itself to be an ideal transaction processing mechanism, which would prove to be handy with the marketplace and for deep learning and machine learning algorithms alongside the Maker Zone marketplace within the Neurogress ecosystem.

The decentralized structure will ensure safe payments and a guarantee of a full user compliance with user agreements while being resistant to hacking attacks and imparting transaction tracking features. Neurogress is yet to decide which platform will be ideal for its long-term needs, be it Ethereum, IOTA, EOS, another emerging technology or a native Blockchain and cryptocurrency – this will be concluded when the project reaches its development stage. The first instance of deployment will be on the Ethereum Blockchain.

A Community-Driven Ecosystem

Creation of a neuro controlled smart environment is achieved through Neurogress Ecosystem which is aimed to deliver mutual benefits of neuro-control developments to all parties via the Neurogress platform. Neurogress decentralized ecosystem ensures that the device manufacturers, control users, software developers and algorithm trainers are supported by the Neurogress AI-based software and the Neurogress Blockchain-Neurotech-AI foundation and brought into a collaboration which allows to constantly improve the quality of brain signal pattern recognition.

This approach guarantees accurate, sophisticated neuro-control for the multitude of devices around us. For the devices requiring specialized control interfaces, neuro-controlled devices will require specialized protocols for every new form of control, which will be easy to achieve with all players under one ecosystem.

Token Generation Event

Approximately 58,500 ETH are required to launch the Neurogress project. The funds will largely be allocated for Software, marketplace and ecosystem development among other allocations. The total volume of company tokens is set at 100,000,000 NRG, where the company plans to reserve 50% of these tokens for project development with a condition of 40% lockout for 1 year after the Token Generation Event ends. The Pre-TGE is scheduled to be held in February to March 2018, while the TGE will be held in May through to June 2018. The tokens will go at a price of 0.0014318 ETH, where accepted currencies include ETH and BTC.

More information about Neurogress is available at – https://neurogress.io/

The post Neurogress: A Decentralized Platform for Neuro-Controlled Systems appeared first on NewsBTC.

Japanese cryptocurrency exchange Coincheck has said it plans to allow users to start withdrawing local currency from their accounts next Tuesday.

Hong Kong-based cryptocurrency exchange Binance has announced the resumption of trading following a systems upgrade.

We are seeing a fair few different cryptocurrencies appreciate in value as of right now. Ethereum Classic is one of the coins seeing a massive uptrend as we speak, although the Ethereum price is still well below its all-time high. As of right now, the Ethereum Classic price has reached $24 again for the first time in a few days. After last week’s dip, things have finally returned back to normal.

Ethereum Classic Price is Shooting for the Moon

In a way, it is good to see so many cryptocurrencies go up in value all week long. After all, we have seen a major dip not that long ago, yet it seems virtually all of these losses have been recovered in quick succession. While this doesn’t necessarily mean this trend will continue indefinitely, things are certainly looking up, for the time being. In the case of the Ethereum Classic price, things have certainly taken an interesting turn over the past few days.

After dipping from $25 all the way to just below $15 a few days ago, things were not looking all that great for the Ethereum Classic price whatsoever. At that time, a lot of people had assumed things would not improve any further and cryptocurrency would enter a permanent bearish mode for several months. As is usually the case with cryptocurrency, things can turn around at any given moment, and the cryptocurrency markets rebounded rather quickly in the process.

With the Ethereum Classic price now returning to $24, it will be interesting to see how long this uptrend will last. More specifically, there is a significant demand for cryptocurrency once again, and the Ethereum Classic price is flourishing because of it. With this solid 19.86% gain over the past 24 hours, things have certainly been quite profitable for speculators and long-term holders. Ethereum Classic also gained 21.36% in value against Bitcoin itself, which is another factor that should not be overlooked whatsoever.

With $349.42m in 24-hour trading volume, the global demand for Ethereum Classic is not all that big as of right now. That doesn’t mean there are no people trading it whatsoever. With so many cryptocurrencies appreciating in value these days, it is possible Ethereum Classic may be left behind a bit. However, a few top 10 altcoins can’t even come close to $350m in 24-hour trading volume right now, which further confirms Ethereum Classic isn’t in a bad place as of right now.

OKEx is the go-to altcoin exchange these days, and they are also leading the Ethereum Classic trading volume as of right now. With over 47% of all trades passing through this platform as of right now, interesting things are bound to happen. Bithumb is in second place, although is much less spectacular fashion as of right now. We also see Upbit and Bitfinex make some interesting moves, although their individual volumes are pretty low compared to OKEx and Bithumb. There are three fiat currency markets in the top 5 for ETC, which can only be considered to be a good thing.

For the time being, it remains to be seen what the future holds for the Ethereum Classic price. While things are looking pretty solid right now, cryptocurrencies will remain incredibly volatile for quite some time to come. People should take some profits while the Ethereum Classic price remains high before the market turns around once again. It is impossible to accurately predict cryptocurrency market movements, to say the very least.  It is equally possible the Ethereum Classic price hits $30 in the next few days, for all we know.

The public interest in cryptocurrency mining has never been higher. Graphics cards are flying off the shelves. Everyone with access to relatively cheap electricity wants to capitalize on this cryptocurrency craze. As such, companies such as Nvidia see a nice increase in quarterly earnings. In fact, the concept of cryptocurrency mining boosted the company’s revenue during Q4 of 2017. A positive trend for the company, as AMD has noted similar revenue increases as well.

The most recent Nvidia quarterly earnings call was rather interesting. With company revenue up, no one has any complaints whatsoever. The main catalyst for this revenue increase comes from cryptocurrency mining. With thousands of people buying up dozens of graphics cards to mine Ethereum or other cryptocurrencies, Nvidia cards are in high demand. Even though AMD has some solid cards too, Nvidia’s products offer a competitive advantage in the higher-tier segment.

A Very Positive Quarter for Nvidia

For now, the company isn’t too sure how many sales were generated by cryptocurrency mining. Quantifying such developments is extremely difficult right now. After all, the company sells tens of thousands of GPU’s every single year. Most of those end up as part of regular PC builds. However, Nvidia doesn’t deny the fact cryptocurrency mining has done wonders for their business last quarter. Compared to Q3 of 2017, the projected revenue from mining sales is higher in Q4. That in itself is a positive trend for both the company and cryptocurrency in general.

Although this is great news, Nvidia expects this trend to taper off pretty quickly. With falling cryptocurrency prices, making such a major mining equipment investment is no longer feasible for a lot of people. Cryptocurrency is volatile by nature and so are the trends associated with this industry.  As such, the company will not hold out high hope for future cryptocurrency mining-related sales. This current windfall is beneficial to the company, but things can always turn around rather quickly.

Nvidia investors are quite pleased with the recent earnings call. Some of them remain optimistic about Nvidia’s impact on cryptocurrency mining. Graphics card sales will not go down much anytime soon. Even if the cryptocurrency crowd backs off, their video cards are still the go-to solution for most gamers. Moreover, Nvidia makes a big impact on artificial intelligence and scientific research as well. The revenue will not dry up if cryptocurrency mining is no longer profitable. In fact, the company expects this form of revenue to remain flat or even decline slightly in Q1 of 2018.

The post Cryptocurrency Mining Boosts Nvidia Earnings During Q4 2017 appeared first on NewsBTC.

While the stock market suffers, BTC looks set to make further gains amid mixed action in the crypto markets.