Monday, December 13, 2021

Orchid OXT

                   Orchid is a decentralized bandwidth marketplace

       With digital privacy and censorship growing as concerns for people around the world, VPN services (“Virtual Private Network”) have become a popular tool for privately and securely browsing the internet and interacting with online services. Orchid (OXT) was launched in December 2019 as the first peer-to-peer network for matching incentivized VPN-like service providers with online-privacy-seeking users.

Orchid is a crypto-powered VPN service that aims to extend the functionality of traditional VPN services with the security and anonymity benefits of blockchain technologies. OXT is an Ethereum token that serves as a secure means of paying for the use of Orchid's VPN service. 

A San Francisco-based “new internet” startup, Orchid Labs has built a surveillance-free layer atop the internet, a sort of ring-fenced liberty zone that's decentralized, scalable and sustainable. This one-fell-swoop dynamic gets achieved via an optimally aligned bandwidth marketplace where node providers, staking tokens, relay their VPN services over the Ethereum blockchain, matching supply with demand, as needed, users’ paying as they go. 

Buyers use the Orchid app to get protection from snooping ISP's, unblock websites cutoff by firewalls, and for many other privacy benefits. Sellers receive payments in real-time as they provide service and stake OXT to compete for service requests. Orchid Technologies charges no fees, and the community maintains the Open Source software that powers the entire ecosystem.

Fund in-app with your native fiat currency or use the DApp to fund an account with your crypto.
Tap "Connect" to match with a VPN server that has locked up OXT to compete for your business.
Orchid nanopayments mean you are never locked into a subscription and pay only for actual use.

The Orchid network enables a decentralized virtual private network (VPN), allowing users to buy bandwidth from a global pool of service providers.

To do this, Orchid uses an ERC-20 staking token called OXT, a new VPN protocol for token-incentivized bandwidth proxying, and smart-contracts with algorithmic advertising and payment functions. Orchid's users connect to bandwidth sellers using a provider directory, and they pay using probabilistic nanopayments so Ethereum transaction fees on packets are acceptably low.

The OXT price prediction from forecasting site DigitalCoin estimated that the coin could average $0.93 in 2022, rising to $1.52 in 2025, based on historical data. Nov 29, 2021

The price of Orchid’s cryptocurrency, OXT, has seen a numer of spikes in recent weeks. An upgrade in September introduced enhanced privacy features for the virtual public network (VPN) service lifting it to $0.477. It then hit three more in October/November culminating in a peak of  $0.7809.  A sell off has seen the price drop to the current (29 November) level of $0.5118.

So, although down 34% from the November high, the Orchid coin price (OXT/USD) is still 230% up for the year.  

The protocol’s recent development and the long-term outlook for the OXT future price is strong.

Orchid Labs, which is developing the protocol, was founded in 2017 by Steven Waterhouse, Jay Freeman, Brian J. Fox, Gustav Simonsson and Stephen Bell. The founders bring together experience across open-source software, technology management, blockchain investment, app package management and security – Waterhouse co-founded cryptocurrency-focused venture capital company Pantera Capital; Freeman created Cydia, an alternative to the Apple App Store for jailbroken Apple devices; Fox created the first interactive online banking system at US bank Wells Fargo; and Simonsson was one of the core security developers for the Ethereum network when it launched in 2015.

The Orchid network brings cryptocurrency to the cybersecurity space, providing a blockchain-based, peer-to-peer VPN service that connects users with a decentralised pool of providers with surplus bandwidth. It operates what the Orchid website calls a “VPN protocol for token-incentivised bandwidth proxying, and smart-contracts with algorithmic advertising and payment functions”. The decentralised nature of the network allows users to maintain their security and privacy as they browse the Internet.

OXT is the native Orchid token used to exchange value on the network, which operates a pay-per-use model. The token was launched in December 2019.

The service runs on the Orchid bandwidth marketplace app, which is similar to a typical VPN client. The Orchid protocol runs on top of WebRTC, a common web standard used to transmit audio and video in browsers. Bandwidth users and providers need to hold OXT in a secure Web3 cryptocurrency wallet to be able to use the service. Web3 refers to the next-generation Internet, which introduces a governance layer that enables individuals to take control of their personal data and privacy.

The OXT price climbed to $0.7634 on 2 November, its highest level since mid-May, when cryptocurrency markets sold-off their highs. It had previously spiked as high as $0.8631 on 17 April. The price briefly slipped to a small year-to-date loss in June, trading below the $0.20 level, having started the year at $0.2228. OXT then moved up to $0.5146 on 25 August during the summer rally, and bottomed at $0.2874 in late September as the markets dipped.

At the time of writing (29 November), cryptocurrency data tracker CoinCodex was bullish on the price outlook for OXT in the short-term, with 27 technical analysis indicators giving bullish signals and four bearish. Its Orchid (OXT) crypto price prediction expected the price to rise to $0.459 by 4 December.

CoinArbitrageBot listed OXT as a buy based on technical analysis. The site predicted that the OXT cryptocurrency price could average $0.544 in 2022, $1.01 in 2023, $1.64 in 2024 and $2.65 in 2025.

I recommend that you always do your own research, and consider the latest market trends, OXT news, technical and fundamental analysis, and expert opinion before making any investment decision. Keep in mind that past performance is no guarantee of future returns, and never invest more than you can afford to lose.

                     Orchid OXT Review: Complete Crypto Overview         

 https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/orchid/ https://www.orchid.com/ https://www.gemini.com/prices/orchid?utm_source=google&utm_campaign=USA_Search_Prospecting_Exchange_DSA_Orchid&utm_medium=cpc&utm_content=126115634619&utm_term=&gclid=Cj0KCQiA2NaNBhDvARIsAEw55hgV7JLcrmjf6q6GMcRBUoVc1zkOZy3-qniGcO7Icvl5EGm3iJF_ovsaAkUyEALw_wcB https://uphold.com/assets/crypto/buy-oxt?campaignid=15432229638&adgroupid=&adid=&gclid=Cj0KCQiA2NaNBhDvARIsAEw55hiPBPyqFEOwr2m1uPVphbEkzDn6c80g09YmNuViUnCUJUlbB1n9N1AaAsIkEALw_wcB https://capital.com/orchid-oxt-price-prediction-2021-2025

Friday, December 3, 2021

Monday, November 29, 2021

Thursday, November 25, 2021

Solana’s Proof of History is a Huge Advancement for Block Time

             Solana’s Proof of History is a Huge Advancement for Block Time 

 Cryptocurrencies use a consensus algorithm, which is a method of securing the blockchain and ledger of a cryptocurrency. The thousands of cryptocurrencies out there today use a wide variety of consensus algorithms, each with its own advantages and disadvantages. Anatoly Yakovenko, founder of Solana, has designed a unique consensus algorithm for the Solana network, called Proof-of-History. 

  Anatoly Yakovenko - Medium.com

Solana has created a cryptographically secure and trustless time source – and built a blockchain around it. This allows nodes in the network to verify the time and order of events without witnessing them directly, drastically reducing messaging overhead and unlocking massive network optimizations.

Solana is the world’s first web-scale blockchain. On current iterations of the Solana Testnet, a network of 200 physically distinct nodes supports a sustained throughput of more than 50,000 transactions per second when running with GPUs. Achieving as such requires the implementation of several optimizations and new technologies, and the result is a breakthrough in network capacity that signals a new phase in blockchain development. 

 The core innovation that underlays the Solana Network is Proof of History, and is exactly what the name suggests — a proof of historical events. Utilizing Proof of History creates a historical record that proves that an event has occurred at a specific moment in time. Whereas other blockchains require validators to talk to one another in order to agree that time has passed, each Solana validator maintains its own clock by encoding the passage of time in a simple SHA-256, sequential-hashing verifiable delay function (VDF). This differs from the current standard of blockchain infrastructure, which relies on a sequential production of blocks that are hindered by waiting for confirmation across the network before moving forward. Proof of History presents a fundamental move forward in the structure of blockchain networks in regards to speed and capacity.

                                          Solana’s Proof of History  
                           What is Solana? SOL Explained with Animations  

 Here’s how Proof of History works: The Solana data structure chains messages together. This provides cryptographic proof of the relative order and time of each message in the historical record. This allows the network to ignore local clocks and gradually accommodate all potential network delays as the data structure is eventually delivered and re-assembled. 

This is why Solana is able to push the limits of confirmation times so that the network provides as effective of an experience as a centralized system without sacrificing security or decentralization. However, Proof of History isn’t necessary for a permissionless blockchain. There is plenty of Proof of Stake-based networks being built without it. What Proof of History — or PoH — adds to the network is a source of objectivity. It allows validators on the network to compute the state of the network from the ledger itself.

 Based on what validation messages are present in the ledger, a validator can decide if any node is considered up (valid) or down (invalid), and if the network has submitted a sufficient amount of votes for the ledger to be considered valid. Messages are not required to arrive at any given validator in a timely manner. The ledger eventually arrives at every validator, and because the messages are part of the ledger, PoH provides the cryptographic guarantee that the messages were created when they claim.

 This property allows us to optimize the network across multiple parameters, particularly in regards to block time, an essential element of blockchain infrastructure in regards to speed and efficiency. In addition to Block Time, PoH allows Solana to optimize for block propagation (log200(n)), throughput (50K-80K TPS)), and ledger storage (petabytes) available on the network. 

 Block time, more so than raw Transactions Per Second, is a parameter that clearly separates centralized systems from decentralized blockchains. Tendermint has a timeout window of 3 seconds, Libra around 10, Aglorand around 5. Solana’s globally distributed test net is deployed with a block time of 400ms blocks with a leader scheduled for 4 consecutive blocks. By the time Libra confirms a single block, Solana has confirmed 25 blocks proposed by 25 different validators. 

Visa has a requirement of a 2.4 second confirmation time for the entire point-to-point path. Neither Ethereum, Bitcoin or Libra are anywhere close to satisfying that requirement. Solana does. In general, there are two ways that classical distributed systems have dealt with clocks. Messages are time-stamped by the sender and the timestamp is signed. Nodes drop messages that are either too old or too new. This calculation is based on the difference between the timestamp and the local clock.

 The second approach is that every state transition has a local timeout before it expires. On Tendermint, for example, a pre-commit state has a one-second timeout. The next block producer can try to propose the next block, but all the nodes in the network will wait for at least 1 second from the start of the pre-commit state transition before considering the new proposal. 

 In both approaches, a proposer’s clock cannot be trusted, and each node takes precautions and forces a delay to the progress of the consensus state machine to ensure that the proposer doesn’t cheat. Although these delays are essential for network security, they translate into slower block times. Nakamoto consensus introduced a third way to deal with clocks. The difficulty adjustment in Bitcoin forces the network to produce a block on average roughly once every 10 minutes. Ethereum difficulty is set such that a block is produced on average once every 15 seconds. The difference between the two networks can be measured in the number of collisions or uncles. The shorter the block time, the higher the likelihood of two nodes producing a block at the same time, and 15 seconds is likely the lower bound of how fast a Nakamoto style chain can produce a block.

 The Solana Approach With Solana, we are introducing a fourth approach that results in a network that is never delayed. The Solana protocol has no dependencies on local computer clocks or local timeouts between state transitions beyond the Verifiable Delay Function. Instead, the VDF ensures that each block producer proves they have waited a sufficient amount of time, and the network moves forward. Unlike Tendermint, the next block producer has to locally generate a portion of the VDF until the scheduled slot. This means that receiving nodes can begin state transition as soon as the message is received because they have cryptographic proof that the producer obeyed the protocol delays.

 Moreover, the messages can arrive out of order and the cost of network delays is gradually accommodated over the delivery of many packets. Once PoH is reconstructed, the entire data structure guarantees that the appropriate delays between all the block producers are correct. The result of this functionality is that the network is never delayed, and can continue producing at lightning-fast speeds despite variations caused by block producers. Proof of History is a powerful mechanism that unlocks network speeds heretofore unseen in blockchain technology. 

Along with innovations like Tower BFT, Turbine, and Replicator nodes, Proof of History makes Solana the first web-scale blockchain with transactional capacity that is akin to the modern internet. We invite you to take a deeper look at all of the technological innovations the Solana team is implementing and to get involved with the Solana community by joining our Discord or checking out ‘No Sharding: The Solana Podcast.’ For developers, it’s a great chance to get information about the project directly from Solana team members.

 Proof-of-History has great potential. But as with any consensus algorithm, there are also drawbacks, and that also applies to PoH. If you want to participate as a validator at Solana, your hardware must meet strict requirements. If you do not meet these requirements, you are excluded from the consensus. This limits Solana's decentralization considerably. Because looking at a Proof-of-Stake validator, any standard computer equipment will do, allowing everyone to participate in the consensus, thus much more decentralized.

 Whereas transaction speeds are a major advantage of Solana, they are also a hindrance in some respects. The tens of thousands of transactions generate enormous amounts of data. 1 transaction is about 250kb. 50,000 TPS of 250kb equals about 40 petabytes of data per year. That is a tremendously high amount of data and many companies, let alone private individuals, cannot store this amount of data. So a solution must be found for this in the future.

 https://anycoindirect.eu/en/blog/what-is-proof-of-history
 https://medium.com/solana-labs/how-solanas-proof-of-history-is-a-huge-advancement-for-block-time- 178899c89723 
 https://docs.solana.com/cluster/synchronization
 https://solana.com/solana-whitepaper.pdf 
 https://techcrunch.com/2021/05/14/solana-a-blockchain-platform-followed-by-top-crypto-investors- says-its-a-lot-faster-than-ethereum/

Sunday, November 21, 2021

Thank you for being our God and Father

 My Father, my Creator, my Lord, my Teacher the first to give me Love. 
 I praise you, I honor you, I thank you, I give you my love, my life is in your hands.  
 Keep me on the path you have drawn for my life, 
 let me be the instrument you intended for my life to be in your great plan.
 Thank you, my God!! my comforter, my rock. Help me to be a large open pipe, that you   can  use as a   conveyor system for the flow of your love into the world. 
 Use me I pray to be a blessing to others and share your Love. 
 Help us God to show your mercy and love, your goodness and wisdom. 
 Be our rock on which we build our life. Help us to know that you gave us salvation thru   your Son over   2000 years ago, thank you, thank you for being our God and Father.

                                             Amen Amen


         We Need You, Lord, by Jonathan Butler

 

Thursday, October 21, 2021

Monday, October 18, 2021

Mary Eliza Mahoney


 

                Mary Eliza Mahoney, the First Licensed Black Nurse in the U.S.

Devin Crudup - AfroTech

Mary Eliza Mahoney was the first Black woman to become a licensed nurse in the United States, according to the National Women’s History Museum. After working as a janitor, cook, washwoman, and nurse’s aide at the New England Hospital for Women and Children, Mahoney was admitted into their nursing program. She became one of only four students out of a class of 42 to complete the program in 1879 making history as the only African American to do so. 

Born May 7, 1845 (other sources say April 16) — in Boston, MA — Mahoney was the daughter of freed slaves who moved from North Carolina to Boston to distance themselves from the heavily racist south. As a child, Mahoney attended the Philips School in Boston, one of the first integrated schools in the country.  


After fifteen years of working several roles at the New England Hospital, Mahoney entered the nursing graduate program at the age of 33. Mahoney completed the rigorous 16-month program sealing her place in history as the first African American licensed nurse. 

Instead of following the path of public nursing like many of her colleagues, Mahoney decided to bypass the negative discriminatory encounters that came along with public nursing, and instead, she devoted her career to the private nursing sector. 

In 1896, she joined the Nurses Associated Alumnae of the United States and Canada but faced racial discrimination as the association’s members were unwelcoming of Black nurses. The discrimination led Mahoney to establish the National Association of Colored Graduate Nurses (NACGN) in 1908. She served as a lifetime member and chaplain to the organization. During her nursing career, Mahoney also served as director of the Howard Orphanage Asylum for Black children from 1911 to 1912.


 

After 40 years of service as a nurse, Mahoney retired, but continued to lead the charge against discrimination and pointed her efforts toward women’s rights. She is said to be one of the first women to register to vote in Boston after the ratification of the 19th Amendment. 

Mary Mahoney died after a three-year fight with breast cancer on Jan. 4, 1926, at the age of 80. She has since been honored and recognized by the American Nurses Association with her induction into the Hall of Fame in 1976. She was also inducted into the National Women’s Hall of Fame in 1993. The Mary Mahoney Award, founded by the NACGN in 1936 is still awarded to nurses by the ANA. Today a monument stands at the gravesite of Mary Mahoney in Everett, MA to honor her legacy in nursing and civil rights.

When Mary Eliza Mahoney graduated in 1879 as America’s first Black professional nurse, she stood on the shoulders of giants. Jamaica’s Mary Seacole nursed soldiers during the Crimean War; Harriet Tubman and Susie King Taylor tended the Civil War’s wounded; and Namahyoke Sockum Curtis battled typhoid, yellow fever, and malaria as a nurse during the Spanish-American War.

The New England Hospital for Women and Children operated one of the first nursing schools in the United States. In 1878, at the age of 33, Mahoney was admitted to the hospital’s professional graduate school for nursing. The program, which ran for 16 months, was intensive. Students attended lectures and gained first-hand experience in the hospital. Many students were not able to complete the program because of its many requirements. Of the 42 students that entered the program in 1878, only four completed it in 1879. Mahoney was one of the women who finished the program, making her the first African American in the US to earn a professional nursing license.

She had always wanted to be a nurse when she started working at the New England Hospital for Women and Children, known today as Dimock Community Health Center. NEHWC was the first hospital in New England, and the second in America, established and operated by women for women. Exceptional for its place in the history of women in medicine, it had an all-female physician staff.

Mary Mahoney (bottom row, center) became an activist and advocate for the integration of African Americans into the nursing profession.


https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/mary-mahoney

https://historylink.org/file/8925

https://afrotech.com/meet-mary-eliza-mahoney-the-first-licensed-black-nurse-in-the-u-s

https://wednesdayswomen.com/mary-eliza-mahoney-first-african-american-graduate-nurse/

  

Thursday, October 14, 2021

Mr Bitcoin: How I became a millionaire at 21 – Mpho Dagada

Top 10 African Women To Watch In Blockchain And Bitcoin

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Paxful Launches A List Of Top 10 African Women To Watch In Blockchain And Bitcoin, In-Line With International Women’s Month

Paxful Press

Blockchain technology is one of the most notable developments of our age. A recent Deloitte survey of senior executives worldwide in 2019 found that 53% of respondents said blockchain has become a critical priority – an increase from last year. And 83% of respondents believe there are compelling use cases for blockchain.

In honor of International Women’s Day celebrated annually in March, the global peer-to-peer bitcoin marketplace, Paxful, is shining the spotlight on the contribution women are making to the rapidly growing blockchain and bitcoin industries.


Paxful has launched an annual list of the leading female professionals and entrepreneurs in the African Blockchain and Bitcoin industries, to highlight some of the most influential women in these emerging sectors. In no particular order, the individuals on this year’s list are all innovative and inspirational leaders who are actively making a difference and carving the pathway for other females to enter and make their mark in a space that has been predominantly occupied and led by men.

Ray Youssef, co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Paxful says: “This year’s International Women’s Day theme, #EachforEqual is drawn from a notion that ‘collectively, each one of us can help create a gender-equal world. The tech sector rightly gets a bad rap for not yet being inclusive enough. As an industry, we can all do better. Beyond a moral imperative, there’s no question that tech businesses and our society can only benefit from embracing talent with diverse backgrounds, experiences, values, and ideas.”

“Personally, I think women are better at tech. Women add a new dimension to innovation, they’re better collaborators, community builders and in many ways better problem solvers. And as such are absolutely critical to the future of the blockchain and bitcoin ecosystem. Paxful is committed to growing female participation in the sector, and especially championing female talent from emerging markets,” adds Youssef.

Leading by example

While in a 2018 study by blockchain incubator and VC Longhash, only 14.5% of blockchain startup team members were found to be women, more than 40% of Paxful’s employees are women and the company is set to further increase female appointments across all its offices, which include Estonia, New York City, Philippines, as well as South Africa. Female representation is a priority in every department with many women fulfilling leadership and managerial roles across the various offices.

As an advocate for inclusion, Paxful treats every employee equally no matter gender, race, culture or skill set; providing deep training and development opportunities to all employees and ensuring that wellness and health remain top of mind.

Understanding the challenges that come with juggling work- and family-life, fully-paid parental leave is provided with mothers also receiving a special one-time bonus with the arrival of a newborn. Paxful offers all employees remote work options, flexible hours, gym membership, personal training, supplements and vitamins, team sports activities, massages and chiropractic services, as well as nutritious lunch and dinner meal options at the office.

Priority: Education


Well known for its investment in bitcoin education, Paxful started rolling out mini bitcoin-economy training seminars at tertiary institution campuses across South Africa and Kenya last year. Female participation in the training sessions was high.

The company later launched a global ambassador program called the Paxful Peer Program aimed at connecting young bitcoin users across the globe. African female participants have been among some of the top performers in the program. Through its #BuiltWithBitcoin charitable initiative the company has also awarded bursaries to women from underprivileged backgrounds and plans to build 100 schools across emerging markets.

The Inaugural List – 2020

Top 10 Influential Female Leaders In Blockchain & Bitcoin In Africa:

1. Ojuedeire Doris (Nigeria)


Title: Founder, Blockchain African Ladies (BAL)

LinkedIn  

As a professional accountant, Doris is a true blockchain evangelist. She is the founder of Blockchain Ladies Africa (BAL), a 3 000-member all-female group that focuses on uniting African women and leading blockchain education. She is a serial entrepreneur and business advisor with a unique combination of experiences in entrepreneurship, business development, and strategic marketing. Doris is passionate about women in Africa and believes blockchain represents freedom for African women.

2. Alakanani Itireleng (Botswana)

Title: Founder, Satoshicentre

LinkedIn


Known as “The Bitcoin Lady”, Alakanani is one of the leading blockchain influencers on the African continent. Her story is one of remarkable hope as she tragically lost her son to illness in the late 2010s, but in her battle to fund her son’s treatment, she heard about bitcoin as a way to accept international donations. This led to the start of Alakanani’s journey, which has seen her become one of the first proponents of bitcoin in her country. As a trained teacher, she has transferred her teaching ability from traditional subjects to teaching blockchain technology. She established the Satoshicentre, a blockchain hub in Gaborone where she works with developers to try to increase the understanding of bitcoin and how to utilize blockchain technology in developing solutions to everyday-life problems faced by Africans.

  

3. Yaliwe Soko (Zambia/South Africa)

Title: Founder and Chairwoman, United Africa Blockchain Association (UABA)

LinkedIn


As a blockchain and crypto early adopter, Yaliwe has established her presence in the sector by becoming the Chairwoman of the United Africa Blockchain Association and founder of Essence Crypto Consultants, as well as United Africa Women in Blockchain. Passionate about education, technology, and financial inclusion, she ventured into cryptocurrency and blockchain technology in 2016 upon discovering the difference it can bring to the world, and especially how it can help improve inefficiencies in Africa. As a qualified training facilitator and assessor, she has developed a learner guide for beginners and numerous YouTube tutorials on blockchain technology and cryptocurrency and how to explore opportunities.

4. Monica Singer (South Africa)

Title: Country Lead, Consensys SA

LinkedIn


As a seasoned executive, Monica has not been afraid of ushering in change in the financial sector space. In 2017, she was appointed as South Africa Lead for Consensys, an international venture production studio using blockchain technology to build distributed applications on the Ethereum world computer. Monica has held numerous board and advisory positions including board member of the South African Institute of Chartered Accountants and the Accounting Blockchain Coalition which sets the audit accounting and tax guidelines for crypto assets based.

  

5. Sonya Kuhnel (South Africa)

Title: Founder, Blockchain Academy; Co-founder/Director of Bitcoin Events; Co-founder/COO of Xago

LinkedIn

Sonya was one of the first women involved in the industry in South Africa. In 2013, she started a bitcoin payment company called Bitcoin Payments, a BitPay Affiliate partner, which allowed online merchants in South Africa to accept bitcoin as a payment method for goods and services. She went on to co-found Bitcoin Events in 2014, a company that hosts South Africa’s leading cryptocurrency and blockchain events, namely the Blockchain Africa Conferences as well as the Crypto Fest. Realizing the need for education around blockchain and cryptocurrencies, Sonya established the Bitcoin Academy in 2015 which was later renamed to the Blockchain Academy. Sonya is also the co-founder and COO of Xago, a Cape Town-based company offering an XRP cryptocurrency exchange, gateway, and payment platform for retailers enabling fast and cost-effective payments using the Ripple blockchain.

6. Imen Ayari (Tunisia)

Title: Head of Innovation Factory, Talan Tunisia

LinkedIn


Imen is a Mechanical engineer from Tunisia and an executive MBA graduate from the Mediterranean School of Business with many years of experience working in finance and technology for multinational firms such as Ubitrade, Gltrade, Fis, and Sunagrd where she founded the Sungard Byrsa Lab. She has been the Chief Blockchain Officer and Head of Innovation Factory at Talan since 2017. As a leading blockchain and cryptocurrency expert, Imen has established and managed a number of tech organizations aimed at disseminating consistent innovations in Africa. She enjoys training individuals and businesses on how they can implement the new technology in their operations and make it work for them. She also organizes hackathons and events related to solving problems with tech.

7. Roselyn Gicira Mwangi (Kenya)

Title: Chairperson: Blockchain Association of Kenya; Head of the Kenyan Women in Blockchain Chapter

LinkedIn


Roselyn is the Chairperson of the Blockchain Association of Kenya and also heads the Kenyan Women in Blockchain Chapter. She is very interested in the innovation coming from disruptive technologies like blockchain start-ups and has worked to empower innovative tech start-ups in East Africa. Roselyn is a certified member of the Kenya Institute of Directors, a non-political professional organization of individual corporate directors and senior managers committed to the professional practice of corporate directorship in Kenya. Roselyn previously worked for eight years as a UN Women program officer. Thereafter she went into business for 10 years as a Safaricom business dealer where she opened and operated several Safaricom retail and money transfer outlets.

8. Naomi Snyman (South Africa)

Title: Blockchain Lead, Standard Bank Group; Chair for the South African Financial Blockchain Consortium

LinkedIn


A seasoned corporate executive, Naomi is the Blockchain Lead for the Standard Bank Group, a role that stretches across 16 African countries for both Commercial and Retail Banking. She is also Chair of the South African Financial Blockchain Consortium. She sees the main potential of Blockchain on the African continent to drive economic freedom in the eco-systems that we live and work in, through the distribution of trust and central power. Naomi is also passionate about discovering and developing strategic business ideas throughout Africa by creating value through solving key customer problems that result in commercially viable business opportunities by leveraging emerging disruptive technologies.

9. Michelle Chivunga Nsunsumuco (Zambia)

Title: Founder, CEO, and Investor, Global Policy House; Senior Advisor to Government of Bermuda (Global Fintech Advisory Board)


LinkedIn

Michelle owns her own digital and investment business exploring emerging technologies such as blockchain technology in the context of emerging markets, trade, enterprise, and sustainable development. Referred to as a young thought leader in the blockchain space, Michelle is working across borders to evaluate the impact of emerging technology for different segments of society including women, businesses, governments, and others; as well as drive education on how to leverage digital tools to drive forward social and economic development. Michelle’s first engagement relating to the blockchain was in 2009, which lead to the start of her journey to evaluate the growth of the digital economy and the potential of emerging technologies such as blockchain, quantum computing, Big Data, and others. Michelle has also been undertaking research and education on these technologies with university partners and global institutions such as WTO, UN, World Bank, African Union, and many others. Michelle holds several positions on various boards including the African Union – Digital Trade and Transformation Taskforce.

10. Olayinka Odeniran (Nigeria)

Title: Co-founder, Black Women Blockchain Council (BWBC)

LinkedIn


Olayinka is a highly respected financial services risk management expert and renowned international attorney who specializes in blockchain, crypto and emerging technologies. She has over 15 years of experience in compliance and helping financial firms navigate through international regulations. Olayinka holds an M.S. in Cybersecurity Management and Policy which she relies on to provide information assurance to financial institutions and the blockchain landscape. She now combines her passion for blockchain, cybersecurity and compliance to provide consultancy services for financial institutions. In her spare time and as the co-founder of the Black Women Blockchain Council, Olayinka strives to increase the number of young girls and black women in blockchain, fintech and other emerging technologies. She is also a digital content writer and has produced several informative and engaging articles for major online global magazines. In addition, as a renowned speaker, Olayinka has presented at several blockchain conferences.

              What you should know about Blockchain & Cryptocurrency  
                Africa's Bitcoin Lady | #PennydropMoment with Alakanani Itireleng  
          The Blockchain & Bitcoin Africa Conference 3rd & 4th March 2016 - Alakanani Itireleng

          AfricaCom TV interviews Monica Singer, South Africa Lead, Consensys at AfricaCom

Tuesday, October 5, 2021

Monday, October 4, 2021

Blockchain info and Cryptocurrency

 



  

        History of Blockchain
Although blockchain is a new technology, it already boasts a rich and interesting history. The following is a brief timeline of some of the most important and notable events in the development of blockchain.
 2008
Satoshi Nakamoto, a pseudonym for a person or group, publishes “Bitcoin: A Peer to Peer Electronic Cash System."
2009
The first successful Bitcoin (BTC) transaction occurs between computer scientist Hal Finney and the mysterious Satoshi Nakamoto.
2010
Florida-based programmer Laszlo Hanycez completes the first-ever purchase using Bitcoin — two Papa John’s pizzas. Hanycez transferred 10,000 BTC’s, worth about $60 at the time. Today it's worth $80 million. 
The market cap of Bitcoin officially exceeds $1 million.
2011
1 BTC = $1USD, giving the cryptocurrency parity with the US dollar.
Electronic Frontier Foundation, Wikileaks and other organizations start accepting Bitcoin as donations.
2012
Blockchain and cryptocurrency are mentioned in popular television shows like The Good Wife, injecting blockchain into pop culture.
Bitcoin Magazine launched by early Bitcoin developer Vitalik Buterin.
2013
BTC market cap surpassed $1 billion.
Bitcoin reached $100/BTC for the first time.
Buterin publishes “Ethereum Project" paper suggesting that blockchain has other possibilities besides Bitcoin (e.g., smart contracts).
2014
Gaming company Zynga, The D Las Vegas Hotel and Overstock.com all start accepting Bitcoin as payment.
Buterin’s Ethereum Project is crowdfunded via an Initial Coin Offering (ICO) raising over $18 million in BTC and opening up new avenues for blockchain.
R3, a group of over 200 blockchain firms, is formed to discover new ways blockchain can be implemented in technology.
PayPal announces Bitcoin integration. 
2015
Number of merchants accepting BTC exceeds 100,000.
NASDAQ and San-Francisco blockchain company Chain team up to test the technology for trading shares in private companies.
2016
Tech giant IBM announces a blockchain strategy for cloud-based business solutions.
The government of Japan recognizes the legitimacy of blockchain and cryptocurrencies.
2017
Bitcoin reaches $1,000/BTC for the first time.
The cryptocurrency market cap reaches $150 billion.
JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon says he believes in blockchain as a future technology, giving the ledger system a vote of confidence from Wall Street.
Bitcoin reaches its all-time high at $19,783.21/BTC.
Dubai announces its government will be blockchain-powered by 2020.
2018
Facebook commits to starting a blockchain group and also hints at the possibility of creating its own cryptocurrency.
IBM develops a blockchain-based banking platform with large banks like Citi and Barclays signing on.
2019
China’s President Ji Xinping publicly embraces blockchain as China’s central bank announces it is working on its own cryptocurrency
Twitter & Square CEO Jack Dorsey announces that Square will be hiring blockchain engineers to work on the company’s future crypto plans
The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) announces the creation of Bakkt - a digital wallet company that includes crypto trading
2020
Bitcoin almost reaches $30,000 by the end of 2020
PayPal announces it will allow users to buy, sell and hold cryptocurrencies
The Bahamas becomes the world’s first country to launch its central bank digital currency, fittingly known as the “Sand Dollar”
Blockchain becomes a key player in the fight against COVID-19, mainly for securely storing medical research data and patient information
More Stories


  Filecoin
Filecoin is an open-source cloud storage marketplace, protocol, and cryptocurrency.

What Is a Hard Fork?
A hard fork (or hardfork), as it relates to blockchain technology, is a radical change to a network's protocol that makes previously invalid blocks and transactions valid, or vice-versa. A hard fork requires all nodes or users to upgrade to the latest version of the protocol software.

Forks may be initiated by developers or members of a crypto community who grow dissatisfied with functionalities offered by existing blockchain implementations. They may also emerge as a way to crowdsource funding for new technology projects or cryptocurrency offerings.

A hard fork refers to a radical change to the protocol of a blockchain network that effectively results in two branches, one that follows the previous protocol and one that follows the new version.
In a hard fork, holders of tokens in the original blockchain will be granted tokens in the new fork as well, but miners must choose which blockchain to continue verifying.
A hard fork can occur in any blockchain, and not only Bitcoin (where hard forks have created Bitcoin Cash and Bitcoin SV, among several others, for example).

A fork in a blockchain can occur in any crypto-technology platform—not only Bitcoin. That is because blockchains and cryptocurrency work in basically the same way no matter which crypto platform they're on. You may think of the blocks in blockchains as cryptographic keys that move memory. Because the miners in a blockchain set the rules that move the memory in the network, these miners understand the new rules.

However, all of the miners need to agree about the new rules and about what comprises a valid block in the chain. So when you want to change those rules you need to "fork it"—like a fork in a road—to indicate that there's been a change in or a diversion to the protocol. The developers can then update all of the software to reflect the new rules.

It is through this forking process that various digital currencies with names similar to bitcoin have come to be: bitcoin cash, bitcoin gold, and others. For the casual cryptocurrency investor, it can be difficult to tell the difference between these cryptocurrencies and to map the various forks onto a timeline. 

Understanding Bitcoin Hard Forks
In 2009, shortly after releasing bitcoin, Satoshi mined the first block on the bitcoin blockchain. 

 This has come to be referred to as the Genesis Block, as it represented the founding of the cryptocurrency as we know it. Satoshi was able to make numerous changes to the bitcoin network early on in this process; this has become increasingly difficult and bitcoin's user base has grown by a tremendous margin.

The fact that no one person or group can determine when and how bitcoin should be upgraded has similarly made the process of updating the system more complex. In the years following the Genesis Block, there have been several hard forks.

In addition to hard forks, cryptocurrencies, including bitcoin, also undergo soft forks. The difference between a hard fork and a soft fork is that soft forks do not result in a new currency. Soft forks are a change to the bitcoin protocol, but the end product remains unchanged. Soft forks are backward compatible.

During a hard fork, software implementing bitcoin and its mining procedures is upgraded; once a user upgrades their software, that version rejects all transactions from older software, effectively creating a new branch of the blockchain. However, those users who retain the old software continue to process transactions, meaning that there is a parallel set of transactions taking place across two different chains.

Bitcoin XT
Bitcoin XT was one of the first notable hard forks of bitcoin. The software was launched by Mike Hearn in late 2014 in order to include several new features he had proposed. While the previous version of bitcoin allowed up to seven transactions per second, Bitcoin XT aimed for 24 transactions per second. In order to accomplish this, it proposed increasing the block size from one megabyte to eight megabytes. Bitcoin XT initially saw success, with more than 1,000 nodes running its software in the late summer of 2015.

 However, just a few months later, the project lost user interest and was essentially abandoned by its users. Bitcoin XT is no longer available, with its original website now defunct.

Bitcoin Classic
When Bitcoin XT declined, some community members still wanted block sizes to increase. In response, a group of developers launched Bitcoin Classic in early 2016. Unlike XT, which proposed increasing the block size to eight megabytes, classic intended to increase it to only two megabytes. 

Like Bitcoin XT, Bitcoin Classic saw initial interest, with about 2,000 nodes for several months during 2016. The project also still exists today, with some developers strongly supporting Bitcoin Classic. Nonetheless, the larger cryptocurrency community seems to have generally moved on to other options.

Bitcoin Unlimited
Bitcoin Unlimited has remained something of an enigma since its release in early 2016. The project's developers released code but did not specify which type of fork it would require. Bitcoin Unlimited set itself apart by allowing miners to decide on the size of their blocks, with nodes and miners limiting the size of blocks they accept, up to 16 megabytes. 

Despite some lingering interest, bitcoin unlimited has largely failed to gain acceptance.




Segregated Witness
Bitcoin Core developer Pieter Wuille presented the idea of Segregated Witness (SegWit) in late 2015. Put simply, SegWit aims to reduce the size of each bitcoin transaction, thereby allowing more transactions to take place at once. SegWit was technically a soft fork. However, it may have helped to prompt hard forks after it was originally proposed.

Trading Cryptocurrencies
How Does Trading Cryptocurrencies Differ from Stocks?
While you can invest in cryptocurrencies, they differ a great deal from traditional investments, like stocks. When you buy stock, you are buying a share of ownership of a company, which means you’re entitled to do things like vote on the direction of the company. If that company goes bankrupt, you also may receive some compensation once its creditors have been paid from its liquidated assets.

Buying cryptocurrency doesn’t grant you ownership over anything except the token itself; it’s more like exchanging one form of currency for another. If the crypto loses its value, you won’t receive anything after the fact.

There are several other key differences to keep in mind:

Trading hours: Stocks are only traded during stock exchange hours, typically 9:30 am to 4:30 pm ET, Monday through Friday. Cryptocurrency markets never close, so you can trade 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Regulation: Stocks are regulated financial products, meaning a governing body verifies their credentials and their finances are matters of public record. By contrast, cryptocurrencies are not regulated investment vehicles, so you may not be aware of the inner dynamics of your crypto or the developers working on it.

Volatility: Both stocks and cryptocurrency involve risk; the money you invest can lose value. However, stocks are directly linked to companies and generally rise and fall based on those companies’ performance. Cryptocurrency prices are more speculative—no one is quite sure of their value yet. That makes them much more volatile and affected by something as small as a celebrity’s tweet.

 Cryptocurrencies are speculative investments and should only be made if you’re willing to accept wild price swings and a decent risk of losing everything.

    


     Cryptocurrencies:

 A cryptocurrency, broadly defined, is virtual or digital money that takes the form of tokens or “coins.” While some cryptocurrencies have ventured into the physical world with credit cards or other projects, the large majority remain entirely intangible.

The “crypto” in cryptocurrencies refers to complicated cryptography that allows for the creation and processing of digital currencies and their transactions across decentralized systems. Alongside this important “crypto” feature of these currencies is a common commitment to decentralization; cryptocurrencies are typically developed as code by teams who build in mechanisms for issuance (often, although not always, through a process called “mining”) and other controls.

Cryptocurrencies are almost always designed to be free from government manipulation and control, although as they have grown more popular, this foundational aspect of the industry has come under fire. The currencies modeled after Bitcoin are collectively called altcoins, and in some cases “shitcoins,” and have often tried to present themselves as modified or improved versions of Bitcoin. While some of these currencies may have some impressive features that Bitcoin does not, matching the level of security that Bitcoin’s networks achieve largely has yet to be seen by an altcoin.

The field of cryptocurrencies has expanded dramatically since Bitcoin was launched over a decade ago, and the next great digital token may be released tomorrow.
Bitcoin continues to lead the pack of cryptocurrencies in terms of market capitalization, user base, and popularity.
Other virtual currencies such as Ethereum are being used to create decentralized financial systems for those without access to traditional financial products.
Some altcoins are being endorsed as they have newer features than Bitcoin, such as the ability to handle more transactions per second or use different consensus algorithms like proof-of-stake.

 It is impossible for a list to be entirely comprehensive. One reason for this is the fact that there are more than 4,000 cryptocurrencies in existence as of January 2021. While many of these cryptos have little to no following or trading volume, some enjoy immense popularity among dedicated communities of backers and investors.

The field of cryptocurrencies is always expanding, and the next great digital token may be released tomorrow. While Bitcoin is widely seen as a pioneer in the world of cryptocurrencies, analysts adopt many approaches for evaluating tokens other than BTC. It’s common, for instance, for analysts to attribute a great deal of importance to ranking coins relative to one another in terms of market capitalization. We’ve factored this into consideration, but there are other reasons why a digital token may be included in the list as well.

The first Bitcoin alternative,- Ethereum - is a decentralized software platform that enables smart contracts and decentralized applications (dapps) to be built and run without any downtime, fraud, control, or interference from a third party. The goal behind Ethereum is to create a decentralized suite of financial products that anyone in the world can freely access, regardless of nationality, ethnicity, or faith. This aspect makes the implications for those in some countries more compelling, as those without state infrastructure and state identifications can get access to bank accounts, loans, insurance, or a variety of other financial products. 

The applications on Ethereum are run on ether, its platform-specific cryptographic token. Ether is like a vehicle for moving around on the Ethereum platform and is sought mostly by developers looking to develop and run applications inside Ethereum, or now, by investors looking to make purchases of other digital currencies using ether. Ether, launched in 2015, is currently the second-largest digital currency by market capitalization after Bitcoin, although it lags behind the dominant cryptocurrency by a significant margin. As of January 2021, ether’s market cap is roughly 19% of Bitcoin’s size.

In 2014, Ethereum launched a presale for ether, which received an overwhelming response; this helped to usher in the age of the initial coin offering (ICO). According to Ethereum, it can be used to “codify, decentralize, secure and trade just about anything.” Following the attack on the decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) in 2016, Ethereum was split into Ethereum (ETH) and Ethereum Classic (ETC). As of January 2021, Ethereum (ETH) has a market capitalization of $138.3 billion and a per-token value of $1,218.59.

In 2021, Ethereum plans to change its consensus algorithm from proof-of-work to proof-of-stake. This move will allow Ethereum’s network to run itself with far less energy and improved transaction speed. Proof-of-stake allows network participants to “stake” their ether to the network. This process helps to secure the network and process the transactions that occur. Those who do this are rewarded ether, similar to an interest account. This is an alternative to Bitcoin’s proof-of-work mechanism, where miners are rewarded more Bitcoin for processing transactions.

Litecoin, -  launched in 2011, was among the first cryptocurrencies to follow in the footsteps of Bitcoin and has often been referred to as “silver to Bitcoin’s gold.” It was created by Charlie Lee, an MIT graduate and former Google engineer.

Litecoin is based on an open-source global payment network that is not controlled by any central authority and uses “scrypt” as a proof of work, which can be decoded with the help of consumer-grade CPUs. Although Litecoin is like Bitcoin in many ways, it has a faster block generation rate and hence offers a faster transaction confirmation time. Other than developers, there are a growing number of merchants that accept Litecoin. As of January 2021, Litecoin has a market capitalization of $10.1 billion and a per-token value of $153.88, making it the sixth-largest cryptocurrency in the world.

Cardano -  is an “Ouroboros proof-of-stake” cryptocurrency that was created with a research-based approach by engineers, mathematicians, and cryptography experts. The project was cofounded by Charles Hoskinson, one of the five initial founding members of Ethereum. After having some disagreements with the direction Ethereum was taking, he left and later helped to create Cardano.

The team behind Cardano created its blockchain through extensive experimentation and peer-reviewed research. The researchers behind the project have written over 90 papers on blockchain technology across a range of topics. This research is the backbone of Cardano.

Due to this rigorous process, Cardano seems to stand out among its proof-of-stake peers as well as other large cryptocurrencies. Cardano has also been dubbed the “Ethereum killer,” as its blockchain is said to be capable of more. That said, Cardano is still in its early stages. While it has beaten Ethereum to the proof-of-stake consensus model, it still has a long way to go in terms of decentralized financial applications. 

Cardano aims to be the world’s financial operating system by establishing decentralized financial products similar to Ethereum as well as providing solutions for chain interoperability, voter fraud, and legal contract tracing, among other things. As of January 2021, Cardano has a market capitalization of $9.8 billion and one ADA trades for $0.31.

Polkadot -  is a unique proof-of-stake cryptocurrency that is aimed at delivering interoperability among other blockchains. Its protocol is designed to connect permissioned and permission-less blockchains, as well as oracles, to allow systems to work together under one roof.

Polkadot’s core component is its relay chain that allows the interoperability of varying networks. It also allows for “parachains,” or parallel blockchains with their own native tokens for specific-use cases. 

Where Polkadot differs from Ethereum is that rather than creating just decentralized applications on Polkadot, developers can create their own blockchain while also using the security that Polkadot’s chain already has. With Ethereum, developers can create new blockchains but need to create their own security measures, which can leave new and smaller projects open to attack, as the larger a blockchain, the more security it has. This concept in Polkadot is known as shared security. 

Polkadot was created by Gavin Wood, another member of the core founders of the Ethereum project who had differing opinions on the project’s future. As of January 2021, Polkadot has a market capitalization of $11.2 billion and one DOT trades for $12.54.

Bitcoin Cash (BCH) -  holds an important place in the history of altcoins because it is one of the earliest and most successful hard forks of the original Bitcoin. In the cryptocurrency world, a fork takes place as the result of debates and arguments between developers and miners. Due to the decentralized nature of digital currencies, wholesale changes to the code underlying the token or coin at hand must be made due to general consensus; the mechanism for this process varies according to the particular cryptocurrency.

When different factions can’t agree, sometimes the digital currency is split, with the original chain remaining true to its original code and the new chain beginning life as a new version of the prior coin, complete with changes to its code. 

BCH began its life in August 2017 as a result of one of these splits. The debate that led to the creation of BCH had to do with the issue of scalability; the Bitcoin network has a limit on the size of blocks: one megabyte (MB). BCH increases the block size from one MB to eight MBs, with the idea being that larger blocks can hold more transactions within them, and the transaction speed would therefore be increased. It also makes other changes, including the removal of the Segregated Witness protocol that impacts block space. As of January 2021, BCH has a market capitalization of $8.9 billion and a value per token of $513.45.

Stellar  -  is an open blockchain network designed to provide enterprise solutions by connecting financial institutions for the purpose of large transactions. Huge transactions between banks and investment firms—typically taking several days, involving a number of intermediaries, and costing a good deal of money—can now be done nearly instantaneously with no intermediaries and cost little to nothing for those making the transaction.

While Stellar has positioned itself as an enterprise blockchain for institutional transactions, it is still an open blockchain that can be used by anyone. The system allows for cross-border transactions among any currencies. Stellar’s native currency is Lumens (XLM). The network requires users to hold Lumens to be able to transact on the network.

Stellar was founded by Jed McCaleb, a founding member of Ripple Labs and developer of the Ripple protocol. He eventually left his role with Ripple and went on to cofound the Stellar Development Foundation. Stellar Lumens have a market capitalization of $6.1 billion and are valued at $0.27 as of January 2021.

Chainlink  -  is a decentralized oracle network that bridges the gap between smart contracts, like the ones on Ethereum, and data outside of it. Blockchains themselves do not have the ability to connect to outside applications in a trusted manner. Chainlink’s decentralized oracles allow smart contracts to communicate with outside data so that the contracts can be executed based on data that Ethereum itself cannot connect to. 

Chainlink’s blog details a number of use cases for its system. One of the many use cases that are explained would be to monitor water supplies for pollution or illegal syphoning going on in certain cities. Sensors could be set up to monitor corporate consumption, water tables, and the levels of local bodies of water. A Chainlink oracle could track this data and feed it directly into a smart contract. The smart contract could be set up to execute fines, release flood warnings to cities, or invoice companies using too much of a city’s water with the incoming data from the oracle. 

Chainlink was developed by Sergey Nazarov along with Steve Ellis. As of January 2021, Chainlink’s market capitalization is $8.6 billion and one LINK is valued at $21.53.

Binance Coin  -  is a utility cryptocurrency that operates as a payment method for the fees associated with trading on the Binance Exchange. Those who use the token as a means of payment for the exchange can trade at a discount. Binance Coin’s blockchain is also the platform that Binance’s decentralized exchange operates on. The Binance exchange was founded by Changpeng Zhao and is one of the most widely used exchanges in the world based on trading volumes.  

Binance Coin was initially an ERC-20 token that operated on the Ethereum blockchain. It eventually had its own mainnet launch. The network uses a proof-of-stake consensus model. As of January 2021, Binance has a $6.8 billion market capitalization with one BNB having a value of $44.26.

Tether  {USDT} -  was one of the first and most popular of a group of so-called stablecoins, cryptocurrencies that aim to peg their market value to a currency or other external reference point to reduce volatility. Because most digital currencies, even major ones like Bitcoin, have experienced frequent periods of dramatic volatility, Tether and other stablecoins attempt to smooth out price fluctuations to attract users who may otherwise be cautious. Tether’s price is tied directly to the price of the U.S. dollar. The system allows users to more easily make transfers from other cryptocurrencies back to U.S. dollars in a more timely manner than actually converting to normal currency. 

Launched in 2014, Tether describes itself as “a blockchain-enabled platform designed to facilitate the use of fiat currencies in a digital manner.” Effectively, this cryptocurrency allows individuals to utilize a blockchain network and related technologies to transact in traditional currencies while minimizing the volatility and complexity often associated with digital currencies. As of January 2021, Tether is the third-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, with a total market cap of $24.4 billion and a per-token value of $1.

Monero   -  is a secure, private, and untraceable currency. This open-source cryptocurrency was launched in April 2014 and soon garnered great interest among the cryptography community and enthusiasts. The development of this cryptocurrency is completely donation-based and community-driven. Monero has been launched with a strong focus on decentralization and scalability, and it enables complete privacy by using a special technique called “ring signatures.”

With this technique, a group of cryptographic signatures appears, including at least one real participant, but the real one cannot be isolated since they all appear valid. Because of exceptional security mechanisms like this, Monero has developed something of an unsavory reputation—it has been linked to criminal operations around the world. While this is a prime candidate for making criminal transactions anonymously, the privacy inherent in Monero is also helpful to dissidents of oppressive regimes around the world. As of January 2021, Monero has a market capitalization of $2.8 billion and a per-token value of $158.37.

Blockchain technology is most simply defined as a decentralized, distributed ledger that records the provenance of a digital asset. By inherent design, the data on a blockchain is unable to be modified, which makes it a legitimate disruptor for industries like payments, cybersecurity and healthcare.

Blockchain, sometimes referred to as Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT), makes the history of any digital asset unalterable and transparent through the use of decentralization and cryptographic hashing.  

A simple analogy for understanding blockchain technology is a Google Doc. When we create a document and share it with a group of people, the document is distributed instead of copied or transferred. This creates a decentralized distribution chain that gives everyone access to the document at the same time. No one is locked out awaiting changes from another party, while all modifications to the doc are being recorded in real-time, making changes completely transparent.

A blockchain is a database that stores encrypted blocks of data then chains them together to form a chronological single-source-of-truth for the data. Digital assets are distributed instead of copied or transferred, creating an immutable record of an asset. The asset is decentralized, allowing full real-time access and transparency to the public. A transparent ledger of changes preserves integrity of the document, which creates trust in the asset. Blockchain’s inherent security measures and public ledger make it a prime technology for almost every single sector.

Blockchain is an especially promising and revolutionary technology because it helps reduce risk, stamps out fraud and brings transparency in a scalable way for myriad uses. 

The whole point of using a blockchain is to let people — in particular, people who don't trust one another — share valuable data in a secure, tamperproof way.

Blockchain consists of three important concepts: blocks, nodes and miners.

Every chain consists of multiple blocks and each block has three basic elements:

The data in the block.
A 32-bit whole number called a nonce. The nonce is randomly generated when a block is created, which then generates a block header hash. 
The hash is a 256-bit number wedded to the nonce. It must start with a huge number of zeroes (i.e., be extremely small).
When the first block of a chain is created, a nonce generates the cryptographic hash. The data in the block is considered signed and forever tied to the nonce and hash unless it is mined.  

Miners create new blocks on the chain through a process called mining.
In a blockchain every block has its own unique nonce and hash, but also references the hash of the previous block in the chain, so mining a block isn't easy, especially on large chains.

Miners use special software to solve the incredibly complex math problem of finding a nonce that generates an accepted hash. Because the nonce is only 32 bits and the hash is 256, there are roughly four billion possible nonce-hash combinations that must be mined before the right one is found. When that happens miners are said to have found the "golden nonce" and their block is added to the chain.

Making a change to any block earlier in the chain requires re-mining not just the block with the change, but all of the blocks that come after. This is why it's extremely difficult to manipulate blockchain technology. Think of it as "safety in math" since finding golden nonces requires an enormous amount of time and computing power.

When a block is successfully mined, the change is accepted by all of the nodes on the network and the miner is rewarded financially.

One of the most important concepts in blockchain technology is decentralization. No one computer or organization can own the chain. Instead, it is a distributed ledger via the nodes connected to the chain. Nodes can be any kind of electronic device that maintains copies of the blockchain and keeps the network functioning. 

Every node has its own copy of the blockchain and the network must algorithmically approve any newly mined block for the chain to be updated, trusted and verified. Since blockchains are transparent, every action in the ledger can be easily checked and viewed. Each participant is given a unique alphanumeric identification number that shows their transactions.

Combining public information with a system of checks-and-balances helps the blockchain maintain integrity and creates trust among users. Essentially, blockchains can be thought of as the scalability of trust via technology. 

Blockchain’s most well-known use (and maybe most controversial) is in cryptocurrencies. Cryptocurrencies are digital currencies (or tokens), like Bitcoin, Ethereum or Litecoin, that can be used to buy goods and services. Just like a digital form of cash, crypto can be used to buy everything from your lunch to your next home. Unlike cash, crypto uses blockchain to act as both a public ledger and an enhanced cryptographic security system, so online transactions are always recorded and secured.

To date, there are roughly 6,700 cryptocurrencies in the world that have a total market cap around $1.6 trillion, with Bitcoin holding a majority of the value. These tokens have become incredibly popular over the last few years, with one Bitcoin equaling $60,000. Here are some of the main reasons why everyone is suddenly taking notice of cryptocurrencies:

Blockchain’s security makes theft much harder since each cryptocurrency has its own irrefutable identifiable number that is attached to one owner.
Crypto reduces the need for individualized currencies and central banks- With blockchain, crypto can be sent to anywhere and anyone in the world without the need for currency exchanging or without interference from central banks.

Cryptocurrencies can make some people rich- Speculators have been driving up the price of crypto, especially Bitcoin, helping some early adopters to become billionaires. Whether this is actually a positive has yet to be seen, as some retractors believe that speculators do not have the long-term benefits of crypto in mind.
More and more large corporations are coming around to the idea of a blockchain-based digital currency for payments. In February 2021, Tesla famously announced that it would invest $1.5 billion into Bitcoin and accept it as payment for their cars.

Of course, there are many legitimate arguments against blockchain-based digital currencies. First, crypto isn’t a very regulated market. Many governments were quick to jump into crypto, but few have a staunch set of codified laws regarding it. Additionally, crypto is incredibly volatile due to those aforementioned speculators. In 2016, Bitcoin was priced around $450 per token. It then jumped to about $16,000 a token in 2018, dipped to around $3,100, then has since increased to more than $60,000. Lack of stability has caused some people to get very rich, while a majority have still lost thousands. 

Whether or not digital currencies are the future remains to be seen. For now, it seems as if blockchain’s meteoric rise is more starting to take root in reality than pure hype. Though it’s still making headway in this entirely new, highly exploratory field, blockchain is also showing promise beyond Bitcoin.

Originally created as the ultra-transparent ledger system for Bitcoin to operate on, blockchain has long been associated with cryptocurrency, but the technology's transparency and security have seen growing adoption in a number of areas, much of which can be traced back to the development of the Ethereum blockchain. 

In late 2013, Russian-Canadian developer Vitalik Buterin published a white paper that proposed a platform combining traditional blockchain functionality with one key difference: the execution of computer code. Thus, the Ethereum Project was born. 

Ethereum blockchain lets developers create sophisticated programs that can communicate with one another on the blockchain.

Tokens
Ethereum programmers can create tokens to represent any kind of digital asset, track its ownership, and execute its functionality according to a set of programming instructions.

Tokens can be music files, contracts, concert tickets, or even a patient's medical records. Most recently, Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) have become all the rage. NFTs are unique blockchain-based tokens that store digital media (like video, music or art). Each NFT has the ability to verify authenticity, past history and sole ownership of the piece of digital media. NFTs have become wildly popular because they offer a new wave of digital creators the ability to buy and sell their creations while getting proper credit and a fair share of profits.

Newfound uses for blockchain have broadened the potential of the ledger technology to permeate other sectors like media, government, and identity security. Thousands of companies are currently researching and developing products and ecosystems that run entirely on burgeoning technology.

Blockchain is challenging the current status quo of innovation by letting companies experiment with groundbreaking technology like peer-to-peer energy distribution or decentralized forms for news media. Much like the definition of blockchain, the uses for the ledger system will only evolve as technology evolves.

Blockchain has a nearly endless amount of applications across almost every industry. The ledger technology can be applied to track fraud in finance, securely share patient medical records between healthcare professionals and even acts as a better way to track intellectual property in business and music rights for artists.


http://www.kavonichone.co.za/how-easy-is-it-doing-a-withdrawal-from-hyperfund/
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https://builtin.com/blockchain
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https://www.investopedia.com/terms/h/hard-fork.asp