The halving comes and goes, Ethereum wants to hard-fork, and the blockchain does income grants. Want to catch up on the latest cryptocurrency news? Take a look at the stories below.
Also read: Industry Report: The Bitcoin Bill That Became Law
BITCOIN HALVING
The halving has officially come and gone, and the results haven’t been as big as we all hoped for.
At mid-day on Saturday, the bitcoin price fell to the $620 range but jumped back to about $645 within a few hours. Despite all the press and predictions that led up to the event, not much seems to have happened. Following the first halving in 2012, however, the price of a single bitcoin increased tenfold within the first few weeks, so further increases towards the end of the month are not entirely out of the question.
The biggest fight is occurring among bitcoin miners, who face a huge drop in business. Miners are doing everything they can to avoid potential downtime, as the block reward — and potentially their revenue — has been cut in half.
Genesis Mining CEO Marco Streng explains:
“The most important thing is to be the most efficient miner. . .When the others drop out, that means that they leave the market and give you a bigger share of the pie.”
ETHEREUM HARDFORK
In response to a recent DAO “hack” that saw millions in Ether funds stolen, Ethereum holders have voted unanimously for what’s known as a “hard-fork,” which will prevent the purported thief from ill-using any of the funds taken.
According to one source, a hard-fork is “a change to the bitcoin protocol that makes previously invalid blocks/transactions valid, and therefore requires all users to upgrade.” Software engineer Nick Johnson explains that the move is designed to garner greater user protection. He also says things may seem slow at first, but few of the changes incorporated should dramatically change user experiences:
“The actual change is fairly trivial – a balance transfer between blocks. All the code around that in order to prevent bad things happening adds a lot of complexity. Not to mention very thorough testing. For instance, making sure that any nodes that fast sync after the fork, sync to the correct chain.”
GRANTCOIN
Blockchain-based currency Grantcoin is now offering unconditional basic income grants to users.
Launched in 2015, Grantcoin was the first digital currency to be distributed and managed by non-profit executives with the intention of supplying funds to “socially responsible businesses.” The first grant distribution took place in early July, where approximately 255 individuals from 17 nations received funds in their personal Grantcoin wallets. A second “hand-out” will occur in late September.
Grantcoin has been labeled “currency with a conscience.” It’s mission statement says:
“We insist that a new currency be equitable: that it shall be issued to all people as a human right, as a universal basic income to be enjoyed by all — to compensate, at least partially, for the accidents of birth and circumstances of fortune that have blessed or condemned different people and regions of the world to wealth or poverty.”
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Images courtesy of Ethereum Blog, Grantcoin.