Creating Cryptocurrency: A Crash Course on Mining Bitcoin

Creating Cryptocurrency: A Crash Course on Mining Bitcoin

By Tyler Lacoma — October 29, 2016 7:00 AM

CHOOSE YOUR HARDWARE

The heart of bitcoin mining is the bitcoin miner or mining rig, which is essentially a separate computer that handles all the mining work. A quick glance at the Amazon listings for bitcoin miners will show you that there are many, many types of miners that span a host different shapes and sizes. If you have the tech skills, you may also be able to build your own.

Bitcoin News ... Bitcoin Explained In Details

Bill Gates says ... "Bitcoin is better than currency ..." !

Many people have asked "how does bitcoin work" ... turn up your speakers and listen to the video below

 

Virtual currencies are they the future of finance. Fund your personal projects with Bitcoins and receive donations in bitcoins every month!

Join our winning team ... Click HERE

Swiss Rail Operator to Sell Bitcoins at Ticket Machines

Customers can trade Swiss francs for the digital currency.

Reuters

October 29, 2016 6:50am

Switzerland's national railways firm SBB is branching out next month with the launch of a new service on its ticket machines to sell bitcoins, the web-based digital currency.

Beginning November 11, customers will be able to trade Swiss francs for bitcoins using the ticket machines in a two-year experiment that will test Switzerland's appetite for the cryptocurrency, the state-owned company announced on Friday.

"There have been few possibilities to obtain bitcoins in Switzerland until now," SBB said. "With its 1000-plus ticket machines, SBB operates a dense, around-the-clock distribution network that's suited for more than just ticket sales."

SBB is working with Zug-based digital payments firm SweePay to allow customers to top up their digital 'bitcoin wallet' accounts by mobile phone.

SBB will act as distributor, while the exchange will be performed by SweePay and require users to hold an account with a wallet service that allows storage of the digital currency.

Bitcoin is known for allowing users to move money across the world quickly and relatively anonymously but, on the Swiss ticket machines, users won't be able to procure it without a trace: customers will need to identify themselves using a Swiss mobile phone.

While bitcoins can be purchased, they won't be accepted as payment at the machines, meaning ticket revenues will be unaffected by changes in the bitcoin exchange rate.

Bitcoin Might Soon Replace Physical Currency to Pay For College

Pay your school tuition in BitCoin ... why not?

                                                                                                                          photo by cointelegraph

The first university to adopt the use of Bitcoin is the University of Nicosia in Cyprus. It started accepting Bitcoin as a mode of payment as part of their marketing strategy in promoting a new degree program, Master of Science in Digital Currency. One of the program's subjects tackle the use of Bitcoin and it is just apt to allow its student to use it in paying for their tuition. The publicity stunt worked and attracted international media. Since then, more and more universities are following suit.

Another forward-thinking university that accepts Bitcoin as a payment is the King's College in New York City, a private college known for its degrees in liberal arts. Founded in 1938, the university explained that their decision to accept Bitcoin as a payment was influenced by the U.S. Bill of Rights and the Constitution which support the empowerment of individuals. By doing so, students will have more avenues to use thus, easing the debt problems which a lot of students have been facing.

The University of Cumbria in the UK said they were willing to accept Bitcoin payments from students enrolling on two courses linked to the study of complementary currencies and cryptocurrencies. One course led to a certificate in sustainable exchange. The other gave students a post-grad certificate in sustainable leadership. This meant the university was the first public university to let students use Bitcoin to pay for their tuition fees.

With more and more universities opening their doors in accepting cryptocurrencies, it won't be long before others will follow suit. For those who are planning to take a master's degree program, it will also help if you check if there are other universities accepting Bitcoin and other similar cryptocurrencies.

Bitcoin Raises Questions for Political Funding

Bitcoin currency is popping up everywhere ... did you ever wonder if it has made its way onto the political scene as contributions?  Here is the latest from DCEBrief:

From DCEBrief ... Executive Brief
Posted on Oct 26, 2016 By THOMAS MOORE

Campaign funding is always a hot topic in the usual election cycle, although this year it has been somewhat overshadowed by events in the election itself. However, that has not stopped the US Federal Election Commission deciding to take another look at Bitcoin and other digital currencies and the place they have in campaign contributions. Currently classed as assets, the campaign in receipt can hold the digital currency until they wish to sell. But then must place the funds from any sale within their campaign accounts within 10 days. This can create logistical issues, and if the FEC reassess and classify digital currency donations as cash payments, it could make things much easier to manage.

FREE Money - Let the BitCoin Faucet Drip!

What if I shared with you how to make FREE money?  Sound impossible?  Well, enter the world of the BitCoin Faucet.

Bitcoin faucets are a reward system, in the form of a website or app, that dispenses rewards in the form of a satoshi, which is a hundredth of a millionth BTC, for visitors to claim in exchange for completing a captcha or task as described by the website. There are also faucets that dispense alternative cryptocurrencies.

Bitcoin faucets were developed by Gavin Andresen in 2010 ~ wikipedia

I recently stumbled upon this concept and while I don't devote a lot of time to it, it is a fun way to make a few "satoshis"  which is one-millionth of a bitcoin.

Below is an article written by Gautham that really gets down to the nuts and bolts of the faucet concept ...

BitCoin News - Buying into the Blockchain

Buying into the Blockchain ... 
How Bitcoin and Blockchain Cryptography are Upending Traditional Ideas of Investing

By NuWire
October 24, 2016

One of the biggest buzzwords within the banking and financial technologies at the moment is blockchain. Blockchain is decentralized technology that is revolutionizing the way people all over …

Bitcoin News - How the Blockchain is Changing Money and Business

How the blockchain is changing money and business | Don Tapscott

What is the blockchain? If you don't know, you should; if you do, chances are you still need some clarification on how it actually works. Don Tapscott is here to help, demystifying this world-changing, trust-building technology which, he says, represents nothing less than the second generation of the internet and holds the potential to transform money, business, government and society.

 

________________________________

BitCoin News - Red Bull BitCoin Machine!

This article was just released by Cointelegraph ... they always come up with the latest information. Guess what, Austrian company Red Bull is on the cutting edge with their latest "invention" ... check it out!

How Red Bull Bitcoin Machine Was Built Using LEGO for Bitcoin Applications

Author Joseph Young

Last week, Cointelegraph reported Red Bull’s introduction of a Bitcoin-only Red Bull vending machine at Hackers Congress in Prague. Martijn Wismeijer, representative of General Bytes, the manufacturer of the machine, tells us about manufacturing Bitcoin ATMs, 3D printing process and future collaborations.

BitCoin News: Sir Richard Branson - I Think Bitcoin Is Working

Sir Richard Branson: I Think Bitcoin Is Working

Sept. 10 (Bloomberg) -- Billionaire Sir Richard Branson, chairman and founder of Virgin Group, comments on the future of Bitcoin and space tourism. He speaks with Trish Regan on "Street Smart." (Source: Bloomberg)

BitCoin News - Top 5 Best Places to Spend Bitcoins

The Top 5 Best Places to Spend Bitcoins 
by reminesjoseph  October 14, 2016

One of the reasons bitcoin has been hard for some people to accept is because of its common association with use by dark net criminals. When I first heard of bitcoin, I thought it had very few other uses. As all beginners find out, that’s not the case. In fact, dark net criminal usage is probably the smallest usage bracket bitcoin sees these days. So, in light of this, I’ve put together another “noob” friendly list of the top 5 places bitcoin beginners can spend their newly gotten bitcoins.

1. Bitcoin Store

It’s your basic online store platform with one big catch: your payments are made in the form of bitcoin. Expect the same look and feel of other online shopping sites. At bitcoin store you can pick up bitcoin related items like clothes, wall art, and stickers. They also feature various electronics, as well as fine art, mining hardware, and the occasional random themed items.

Bitcoin News ... To Invest or Not?

Bitcoin: to invest or not?

Harvey Jones  October 14, 2016

In another volatile year for global currencies, one has stood head and shoulders above the rest.  It isn’t a traditional currency such as the US dollar, Japanese yen and certainly not the British pound.  In fact, this year’s big winner isn’t a currency at all in the traditional sense, but a digital currency, otherwise known as a cryptocurrency – the Bitcoin.

Bitcoin began the year priced at around US$430. By October 12, the price had risen to $641, a rise of almost 50 per cent.

This is no flash in the virtual pan. In January 2011, you could buy a Bitcoin for just 25 cents. Growth since then has been a spellbinding 2,564 per cent, reaping large rewards for early adopters.  That isn’t bad for a paperless currency that exists only on computers, with none of the traditional underpinnings and the security of a state, government, central bank or regulatory authority.  No wonder ordinary investors have been sitting up and taking notice. Is this something you should be investing in?

Before you even consider investing in Bitcoin or any other digital currencies that have followed in its wake, such as Litecoin, Namecoin and Ethereum, you have to understand what it is and how it works.

What is Bitcoin?

It is a decentralised digital currency created by a small group of hackers and developers in 2008. Their identity largely remains unknown. It is an open-source software that no one person actually controls.

DARPA May Borrow Blockchain Tech from Bitcoin to Secure Military Networks

DARPA may borrow blockchain tech from Bitcoin to secure military networks
By Ryan Whitwam on October 12, 2016 at 9:30 am

You’ve probably heard about blockchain technology most often in the context of digital cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, but the blockchain can be much more than that. In fact, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is looking into an implementation of the blockchain that could fundamentally alter how sensitive military systems are secured. Blockchain technology could even help keep nuclear weapons safe and sound.

With Bitcoin, the blockchain is the universal record of all the transactions that take place. Although there are some ways to game the system in Bitcoin’s case, the blockchain is supposed to make sure bitcoins sent from one wallet to another are tracked and accounted for. That’s really all a blockchain is — a decentralized timeline of activity. Because of its distributed nature, it’s exceedingly difficult to modify data to hide activity, and that’s what makes blockchains so interesting in security. A centralized or distributed ledger is easier to hack.

Timothy Booher, who leads the DARPA blockchain efforts, describes the use of blockchains with the analogy of defending a castle. You can build walls higher and higher (i.e. network security measures), but people might still be able to find a way in no matter how well you think you sealed up all the cracks. It’s actually more important to know who has been inside the castle and what they did while inside the walls. A blockchain could log that sort of information, making it considerably harder to steal or modify files in a system.

 

In September, DARPA awarded a $1.8 million contract to a computer security firm to perform testing on a blockchain implementation provided by another contractor. This process is called “formal verification,” which means using mathematical processes to ensure code operates only in the intended fashion. It’s the closest thing to unhackable code, basically.

If the verification process goes well, DARPA could move to implement blockchain information integrity monitoring in high-security military systems, like those that control surveillance satellites or even nuclear weapons. This immutable record would be able to show if any files are changed or accessed with none of the guesswork that goes on now. Agencies and companies are often not even aware they’ve been hacked until their private data shows up for sale online.