I think that the best "feature" of a coin is adoption. Technology is not that important as long as the coin has no flaws in source code/network.

According to Hearn’s calculations, Bitcoin capacity will run out this year, and this is why he and Gavin Andresen have begun talking about and working on getting ahead of this issue. Bitcoin usage seems to have fallen into a fairly consistent pattern of stagnation in the Spring and Summer, and growth in the fall and winter, going back to Mt. Gox in 2013. Mike Hearn worked for three out of his eight years at Google doing capacity research within their Geo Team for Google Maps/Earth, so this is not his first rodeo when it comes to network capacity issues.

“Quite simply, we are out of time. There are no credible technical proposals that could gain widespread adoption within the next twelve months, beyond simply raising the capacity on the existing system,” says Mike Hearn.

Am i the only one who thinks this is the only alt that has a decent chance to reach the average joe, teens, girls etc? I mean it's the simplest one to use and available on iOS which is unheard of from an alt (besides some tickers), it has to do marketing in non bitcoin related channels, but the app is not ready yet.

Something like this has been expected for some time. I have a number of ideas I've wanted to explore by issuing a cryptocurrency and it's exactly this kind of thing that has really made me hesitate to do so.  Definitely in grey legal areas to say the least.

I'm not seeing it as a big problem for cryptocurrencies in general, but I think that exchanges might have some issues in near future.

one small step for future upscaling one Giant Leap towards complete centralisation 

That would be a goldmine for the one who would offer it in a professional way.

I'm not aware of any altcoin exchanges that allows you to short a coin. Wouldn't it be nice if we could find one? Just pick an alt at random and short it. It would be like printing money.

Hello guys, although I have just registered here I have been holding some cryptocurrencies for a while now. (Starting in mid 2013)
I've never got the tech-side aspects though and never stepped into altcoins (except for LTC and DOGE), as I never actually saw them as anything else but pump and dump ripoffs.
So lately I have sold all my DOGE for BTC and have been looking for some Alts that will take the place in my holdings (long term).
After reading a lot of threads on this board I pretty much pinned it down on NxT, XEM and Stellar.
The Problem I see is that I read scam here, scam there, in every thread. It's like a common catchphrase on this board.
This makes it hard for people like me, which don't have as much knowledge about cryptos to actually decide where to get into the market.

So, please excuse if there have been threads like this already, but can you give me your (honest) opinion on NxT, XEM, Stellar and possibly others, which you may recommend for a long term holding?
I know there is no promise that any of these will be paying off, nor I expect any of you to tell me the future, but I'd like to have some more knowingly opinions than mine.

Thanks in advance.  

FinCEN Fines Ripple Labs for Bank Secrecy Act Violations

The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) has fined Ripple Labs and its subsidiary XRP II a combined $700,000 for "willful violations" of the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA).

According to a 5th May press release by the US regulator, Ripple Labs failed to register as a money services business (MSB) with FinCEN prior to selling XRP, a digital token used to settle payments on the Ripple network. Additionally, the company is said to have failed to implement appropriate anti-money laundering (AML) procedures concurrent with its responsibilities as an MSB.

Basic summary:

GetGems is a decentralized social messaging app built on open-source software provided by popular encrypted messenger Telegram. The app allows users to send and receive both bitcoin (BTC) and its native digital token, GEMZ.

Billed as "the first messaging app that pays you", users earn GEMZ by helping to grow the network, with rewards of 25 GEMZ given for every referral that generates a new participant. Additionally, 27,500 GEMZ are distributed to users daily, with users receiving a part of this amount proportional to the number of users they have invited to the network.

As the app is updated, users will have more ways to earn, including viewing in-app ads.

A token created on top of the Counterparty protocol, GEMZ are currently traded on exchanges such as BTER and Poloniex at a press time value of $0.01 per GEMZ.