Running of the Bulls The resistance at 95 turned out to be exactly the catalyst we expected it to be. The Mt. Gox DDoS slowed volume and delayed the break-out, but as we noted yesterday via twitter while it was happening, there were still strong signs of bullish sentiment. Contrary to prior DDoS attacks, the market remained largely […]
The post Bitcoin Trading: 24 Hour Update – Upward Breakout Realized appeared first on The Genesis Block.
Running of the Bulls
The resistance at 95 turned out to be exactly the catalyst we expected it to be. The Mt. Gox DDoS slowed volume and delayed the break-out, but as we noted yesterday via twitter while it was happening, there were still strong signs of bullish sentiment. Contrary to prior DDoS attacks, the market remained largely unfazed and used the opportunity to take a breather from the aggressive swings that have characterized the last few days. The 95 level quickly turned into support, further confirming the market was prepared for a breakout.
Bitcoin looks to have put in a solid double bottom over the last week and has repeatedly pushed through upwards resistance. Looking at the 4-hour chart, the 7-period EMA proved to be a strong resistance during the latest downward trend, but we’ve now broken through it and are now printing above it consistently. There was also a bullish crossover of the EMAs yesterday indicating a change in sentiment.
The post Bitcoin Trading: 24 Hour Update – Upward Breakout Realized appeared first on The Genesis Block.
By Jon Matonis
Forbes
Sunday, April 14, 2013
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jonmatonis/2013/04/14/flerovium-tangible-nanomoney/
I need a break from Bitcoin. Let’s discuss the real future of money.
Beyond stable isotopes and naturally-occurring materials are the superheavy elements or SHEs. Scientists have recently added
two new man-made elements to the periodic table — flerovium (element
114) and livermorium (element 116), with chemical symbols Fl and Lv.
After being created by smashing atoms together, these materials decay within seconds but long-lived SHEs are a theoretical possibility. This undiscovered
region in the periodic table where heavy elements become stable again
is known as the “island of stability,” first proposed by Glenn Seaborg
in the late 1960s. If individuals prefer something more tangible over an
amorphous cryptocurrency like bitcoin, then the edges of molecular
matter in a nanotechnology future may hold the answer.
If some form of physical specie is even useful in an era of
ubiquitous artificial molecular machine systems, money would still
require certain attributes such as being a store of value, divisible,
portable, safe, unable to counterfeit, and self-validating.
Nanotechnology scientist Robert Freitas suggests that the future of money lies with elements like flerovium, or what he refers to as tangible nanomoney. Flerovium
is a radioactive chemical element first created in 1999 at the Flerov
Laboratory of Nuclear Reactions in Dubna, Russia by colliding
Plutonium-244 and Calcium-48 nuclei. Prior to May 30th, 2012, the
unstable isotope was known as ununquadium.
After restricting his analysis to ordinary matter, as opposed to
antimatter, Freitas compares the rarest elements along the natural
isotope spectrum of potential monetary candidates such as technetium,
helium, xenon, osmium, tantalum, and gold (however in a nano-age, easily
extractable inert rare elements will have alternatives). Ultimately
concluding that a man-made superheavy element like flerovium best fits
the overall criteria for physical specie, he describes how the element
could likely be introduced into society circulating as coinage.
A flerovium coin would be fused with cheaper bioinert materials of
the nano-age such as gold, platinum or diamond. Such a coin would be
sufficiently costly to manufacture and have a relatively long half life,
possessing negligible radiation and biotoxicity risk due to the very
low concentration of SHE trace amounts.
These hypothetical SHE coins would be stable and long-lived. Freitas estimates that a coin with $1 million face value would only need to contain 10⁹ SHE atoms worth $0.001/atom. Therefore, assuming a
10⁶-year half life, there would be only ~2 disintegration events per
day putting it well below the disintegration levels of today’s base
metal coinage. Rather than suffering from the insidious effects of
government-induced inflation and coin clipping, market-based nanomoney
would lose value due to radioactive decay. A million-dollar coin would
lose approximately ~$0.50 per year or ~$500 per millennium from
disintegration.
In addition to flerovium, Freitas admits that some other relatively
stable superheavy elements may also be “coined” for the ultimate
tangible nanomoney. So that’s the choice for our nonpolitical money of
the singularity — low radiation coinage or digital bitcoin, you decide.
By Jon Matonis
Forbes
Sunday, April 14, 2013
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jonmatonis/2013/04/14/flerovium-tangible-nanomoney/
I need a break from Bitcoin. Let’s discuss the real future of money.
Beyond stable isotopes and naturally-occurring materials are the superheavy elements or SHEs. Scientists have recently added
two new man-made elements to the periodic table — flerovium (element
114) and livermorium (element 116), with chemical symbols Fl and Lv.
After being created by smashing atoms together, these materials decay within seconds but long-lived SHEs are a theoretical possibility. This undiscovered
region in the periodic table where heavy elements become stable again
is known as the “island of stability,” first proposed by Glenn Seaborg
in the late 1960s. If individuals prefer something more tangible over an
amorphous cryptocurrency like bitcoin, then the edges of molecular
matter in a nanotechnology future may hold the answer.
If some form of physical specie is even useful in an era of
ubiquitous artificial molecular machine systems, money would still
require certain attributes such as being a store of value, divisible,
portable, safe, unable to counterfeit, and self-validating.
Nanotechnology scientist Robert Freitas suggests that the future of money lies with elements like flerovium, or what he refers to as tangible nanomoney. Flerovium
is a radioactive chemical element first created in 1999 at the Flerov
Laboratory of Nuclear Reactions in Dubna, Russia by colliding
Plutonium-244 and Calcium-48 nuclei. Prior to May 30th, 2012, the
unstable isotope was known as ununquadium.
After restricting his analysis to ordinary matter, as opposed to
antimatter, Freitas compares the rarest elements along the natural
isotope spectrum of potential monetary candidates such as technetium,
helium, xenon, osmium, tantalum, and gold (however in a nano-age, easily
extractable inert rare elements will have alternatives). Ultimately
concluding that a man-made superheavy element like flerovium best fits
the overall criteria for physical specie, he describes how the element
could likely be introduced into society circulating as coinage.
A flerovium coin would be fused with cheaper bioinert materials of
the nano-age such as gold, platinum or diamond. Such a coin would be
sufficiently costly to manufacture and have a relatively long half life,
possessing negligible radiation and biotoxicity risk due to the very
low concentration of SHE trace amounts.
These hypothetical SHE coins would be stable and long-lived. Freitas estimates that a coin with $1 million face value would only need to contain 10⁹ SHE atoms worth $0.001/atom. Therefore, assuming a
10⁶-year half life, there would be only ~2 disintegration events per
day putting it well below the disintegration levels of today’s base
metal coinage. Rather than suffering from the insidious effects of
government-induced inflation and coin clipping, market-based nanomoney
would lose value due to radioactive decay. A million-dollar coin would
lose approximately ~$0.50 per year or ~$500 per millennium from
disintegration.
In addition to flerovium, Freitas admits that some other relatively
stable superheavy elements may also be “coined” for the ultimate
tangible nanomoney. So that’s the choice for our nonpolitical money of
the singularity — low radiation coinage or digital bitcoin, you decide.
Russian malware mines bitcoins via botnet, security firm warnsPCWorldBitcoin is a virtual currency that can be transferred for free using peer-to-peer software. New bitcoins are created by mining, or contributing computing power that is used to verify …
|
Russian malware mines bitcoins via botnet, security firm warnsPCWorldBitcoin is a virtual currency that can be transferred for free using peer-to-peer software. New bitcoins are created by mining, or contributing computing power that is used to verify transactions, which are entered into a public ledger called the ... |
Raw StoryInternet drug dealing on the rise thanks to Bitcoin currency and coded listingsRaw StoryThe internet is starting to rival the backstreet as a place to buy illicit drugs, according to findings from the 2013 Global Drugs Survey, with 22% of user…
Minneapolis Star TribuneFrom Boston to bitcoin: How change catches us off-guardMinneapolis Star TribunePerhaps in part because of the rather rapid emergence of an alternative that is an even purer expression of distrust: the bitcoin, a virtual currency…
The fourth largest Bitcoin exchange in the world, BitFloor, has announced that it is closing …
The post BitFloor Shuts Down appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.
The fourth largest Bitcoin exchange in the world, BitFloor, has announced that it is closing its doors, and will soon be refunding deposits to customers. The announcement has nothing to do with recent technical problems that all exchanges have been facing for the past week to due the sudden massive increase in trade volume; rather, the root cause behind the shutdown is the closure of BitFloor’s US bank account. Founder Roman Shtylman writes:
I am sorry to announce that due to circumstances outside of our control BitFloor must cease all trading operations indefinitely. Unfortunately, our US bank account is scheduled to be closed and we can no longer provide the same level of USD deposits and withdrawals as we have in the past. As such, I have made the decision to halt operations and return all funds. Over the next days we will be working with all clients to ensure that everyone receives their funds. Please be patient as we process your request.
– Roman
founder – bitfloor.com
Trading has been suspended, and BitFloor founder Roman Shtylman assures users that they will get all of their current deposits back over the next few days, including USD holdings which will be refunded directly to depositors’ bank accounts by ACH transfer. International users are asked to await further instructions.
The exchange was a very popular way of buying bitcoins in the United States, so BitFloor customers will now have to look for alternatives. Some BitFloor users will undoubtedly be picked up by the dominant exchange MtGox through its North American partner Coinlab, although other options include Coinbase, CampBX and BTC-e.
Particularly affected by the shutdown are those users who had lost their deposits when the exchange was hacked in September. BitFloor lost $250,000 from the hack, normally a fatal loss for an exchange of its size, but BitFloor soon came back online with the promise that it would eventually pay back its depositors over time. The exchange even started fulfilling its promise, paying back 1.7% of the money owed in November and another 1% in March, but the remainder of the debt remains unpaid, and although most people had already written off the loss in September, there is now no longer any hope at all that the money will ever be recovered.
The announcement is also an unfortunate one because it represents a step backwards in the progress of the exchange industry as a whole. BitFloor is far from the first Bitcoin exchange to fall victim to this kind of shutdown; many Bitcoin exchanges around the world, including several times even MtGox, have had their bank accounts shut down, although in MtGox’s case the exchange’s main bank account in Japan has remained unscathed. The number of shutdowns has waned in recent months, but the risk has remained as risk for every exchange in the industry since exchanges first began to appear en masse in 2011. Now, when the need for more exchanges is clearer than ever, a reinforced precedent of banks shutting down smaller exchanges may instead push more users to larger and generally more resilient exchanges like MtGox out of fear for the safety of their funds. Fortunately, today exchanges do place much more emphasis on maintaining a healthy relationship with their banks and ensuring legality, and new alternatives are constantly appearing. Tradehill intends to launch a new, high-quality Bitcoin exchange soon, the cash-based Bitcoin ATM continues to be under development as a completely fresh alternative, and we can be sure that there are other projects now under development. Although Bitfloor will certainly be missed, hopefully it will soon find an even better replacement.
The post BitFloor Shuts Down appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.
