Quote from wiser:
DNotes Telegram Channel today:

My desktop wallet stopped staking sometime yesterday. It was showing unlocked but not staking. This morning I restarted it and unlocked it for staking only, and after a few minutes, maybe 15, it still wasn't staking. I'm not in front of it now so can't troubleshoot, but I was wondering if it was just me having that problem. My computer does need to be replaced, so that may be my issue

Thank you all. After four long years of foundation building, we are ready to be among the ranks of industry leaders. To those who seek long-term investment in a coin that has solid fundamentals that are verifiable you will find DNotes refreshing. We are rare, disciplined, innovative, agile, and relentlessly committed to mass adoption of DNotes in global commerce. We invite you to join us early while we are still on the ground floor.

DNotes 2.0 is only four days away from being listed on Cryptopia (May 12th, 2018). In many ways, this could be historic. I trust that this is an opportunity for our industry and its investors to take a closer look at DNotes to establish a fair-trading value relative to our industry peers. I am anxiously looking forward to seeing how the market reacts.

In terms of technology, DNotes 2.0 is on par or a few notches above par when compared to others in our industry within the ranks of 51st to 100th on Coinmarket cap. Coupled with DNotesVault and our CRISP reward programs we are clearly a breed of our own. Thanks to your support we have accomplished an immense amount essential to help DNotes gain mass adoption one day. 

Very well said, Tim. "we have the best people work on them in the best interests of DNotes".

Our best in class mindset in all things that matter will set DNotes further and further apart from the pack in an increasingly crowded market. Protecting and promoting the best interest of DNotes may sound a little foreign to most people in our industry. We are for real. Check us out:  https://dnotesglobal.com/white-

You are very welcome, Amadeus82.  Our industry needs a lot more people like you who is willing and able to share their experience and opinion objectively. We appreciate your mention of DNotes and DNotesEDU. It is perfectly fine to cite examples. We are grateful and honored and always wish the best for everyone.

Thank you, Amadeus82 for sharing another well thought out article with us. It is commendable that you expressed your observation in such simple terms that we all can understand and relate to. I could feel your sincerity of wanting to help others to avoid from being scammed.

Highly recommended read.  And here is my favorite paragraph:

“Scams come in many different ways and shapes. One of the recent ones I see very often is that on some coin Tweeter channel appears add for free ETH giveaways, which looks just like the team itself would post it. You just have to send them 0.5 ETH and they promise to send you back 5 ETH. When you think about it, it's a total nonsense. Ask yourself, why would any team want to you to send them 0.5 or any other specific amount of ETH, just so they would later send you back 10-times greater amount? This is utter nonsense, but still some people fall for it. It would be easy to call them stupid, but that would also be unfair. I think that maybe naive or too optimistic would be better word. But still, why are they naive?”

I believe that we were all innocent and naïve one time. Until we went through a few bad incidents of being burnt we were a lot more trusting. It is sad that we are in an industry that is often referred to the “wild west” infiltrated with an elevated share of bad actors. 

Why is DNotes a viable Industry Contender? We will lead and not just follow.

DNotes will be very successful because it is managed as a business with a clear vision; a defined destination. With that we mapped out the best path to get to that destination – mass adoption of DNotes in global commerce as an inclusive trusted digital currency mutually beneficial to everyone.

We will never be short of great ideas but still encourage our supporters to continue to feed us with more great ideas.

Here is how they are processed. Mindful of our vision and the strategic path we have laid out – is the “great idea” a good fit?  If it is a good fit, how would it rank in priority? Of course, we always focus on our highest priorities and work our way down.

 We are a lean mean team – adaptive, agile, relentless, and decisive. These are the hallmarks of exceptional companies that consistently outperform the competition. They are the Amazons and the Googles of the world. But remember, they did not get there overnight. They took their time to build a solid foundation. Once they started to gain momentum they began to scale rapidly and dominate. Such is our plan at DNotes.

Correct. "Any DNotes purchased or mined after April 16th, and deposited in the DNotesVault will be discarded". In short, they are worthless.

Business Depends on These Four Pillars
By Alan Yong

As a serial entrepreneur, for many years, I wondered why sixty percent of businesses failed within five years and up to 80% failed within ten years of their existence. Many of those that are still in business only enjoy intermittent success, barely enough to continue to keep the doors open. Instead of thriving, they continue to flounder.

One would think that ten years is enough time to master any business, but the reality is that it’s not - unless you truly understand that business success depends on four key pillars. They are the support pillars that anchor your business to your foundation. If you damage or neglect any one of these pillars, then your chances of business success will greatly diminish.

Here are the four key pillars vital to every business — and how to make sure they’re all as strong as possible:

1. The Leader..

Everything begins with you and your vision. The founder of any company is the head coach, star player, and creator of the business story. In that role, you must ensure that your vision is distinct, coherent, and so well-articulated that others understand it and buy in. Your vision needs to have an ultimate destination too, so team members can chart a clear path to reach it. Leaders must be truly passionate and deeply committed about what they do. After all, this is anything but another job, and everything depends on them. That approach, combined with a favorable and productive environment, will inspire employees to feel confident about their career path and align their personal goals with that of the company.

2. The Leader’s Great Idea
The leader’s great idea is what started the enterprise. It could be a product, a service, or a concept so new there isn’t even a term for it yet - so radically innovative that nothing like it has ever been tried before.  But the strength of an idea is not its novelty, but its power to solve a real-world problem that customers face. At its core, every great idea is simply an answer to the question: How can we solve this problem for our customers? A leader’s challenge is to make sure this great idea is also connected to a unique selling proposition and a well-developed strategic plan. Innovation by itself isn’t enough.

3. The Employees.
You will not benefit from the economy of scale as a one-man operation and expect to be the lowest cost producer. To grow your business, you must be able to attract and recruit great employees who are the best fit for the business environment and culture you envision or have already created.

Leaders can’t play a “solo game.” Instead, they must transmit their vision to their team so clearly that the team can act like clones, expanding the leader’s reach outwards to every employee. To leverage the power of every employee, you need an overall strategy of effective hiring and a continual focus on employee training and development. If employees are treated like worker drones, business goals can’t be achieved. In this cutthroat economy, everyone needs to be engaged, committed, and aligned with the same vision set forth by the leader. And leaders can’t be everywhere at once or do everything themselves. They need like-minded, high-performing employees.

4. The Customers.
It takes great leadership, strong ideas and engaged employees to create the right conditions to attract customers. But the decision to buy products or services rests entirely in the customers’ hands. Customers are why the company exists in the first place and they determine its survival. They are the real boss. Learn everything you can about your company’s customer base and make sure it’s going to not only sustain the business but grow over time. That requires full engagement with customers — and a nimble approach to allow the business to adapt to their changing needs.

No company ever becomes the best in class by accident, and there’s no magic bullet or special sauce for long-term survival. It takes a passion to excel and a disciplined focus across all four fronts, which means every department, every desk, every function, every exchange. No leader can afford to be blindsided by overconfidence or a misguided faith in a singular ability. Superiority in one competency will not mask mediocrity in others: brilliant ideas will not overcome uninspiring leadership; employees that don’t bring their skills to bear won’t help the business sustain or grow; and a shaky customer base is a foundation for failure. Imagine a panel of judges scoring the business: whichever organization scores highest on each of the four categories will be the one that wins.

Conclusion:
When you focus on the things that matter, you can drastically beat the odds of succeeding in business. Be cognizant of your strengths and select a business that you are truly passionate about. Then, make sure that there is true potential for real profitability and growth. With that foundation laid, you can then focus on these four key pillars to improve your odds of achieving lasting and sustainable business success.

These four key pillars apply equally to DNotes Global as our core mission is to provide the leadership and management to help DNotes gain mass adoption. After all, DNotes is managed as a business but not controlled as one.

Thank you for making that observation, doraemon928.  The Four Pillars of Business Success membership site will be especially helpful to struggling businesses, entrepreneurs contemplating in starting a business, and business owners committed to achieving greater business success. It is also inspiring for employees who aspire to align their ambitious career goal with the right company.

Eighty percent of startups failed within the first ten years of existence. There are many reasons for it. Most entrepreneurs are blind sighted by the trust that their exceptional skill-sets in one of two areas assured business success. That is far from sufficient. We teach a best in class mindset in all things that matter. But business success depends of four key pillars. You, your great idea, your employees, and your customers. Stayed tuned for my next post.

From DNotes Telegram Channel
May 1, 2018

Quote from wiser:

wiser, [01.05.18 15:09]
From Alan, "The problem is there's always a new lesson to learn." That is so true. Part of the bigger picture, then, is striving to create an environment where it's safe to learn, and where you can hold a certain level of ignorance and still be safe. That's where specialization and complex civilization comes in. At the end of the day, I may know many important things but there will always be important things I don't know, and I'm counting on others to have my back on those things. For example, this morning I drove on a road. I know very little about how to build a good and safe road. I'm counting on others to take care of that for me.

wiser, [01.05.18 15:14]
In the US we're pretty trusting. We expect people to do what they say they'll do, and we assume certain foundational things have taken place when certain claims are made. If I tell you I'm a business owner, you will assume certain things are true even if I didn't tell you, for example, that I pay taxes, that I'm licensed in my specialty if that's required. When I read an ICO whitepaper, I tend to make a lot of assumptions like that. I don't realize they are assumptions that need to be looked into. I'm learning to not make those assumptions.

wiser, [01.05.18 15:17]
However, Alan's point I think is that it really shouldn't always be wrong to make those assumptions. It shouldn't be a fault to basically trust people. I like living in a society where for the most part you can trust people to be decent. It would be awful to have to always be looking over my shoulder. But that is what the ICO craze is kind of doing.

wiser, [01.05.18 15:19]
Sure, you can always blame the victim for being too trusting, expecting too much that words put in writing are actually true, for not being cynical enough. But is that really the world we want, where only the least trusting will make it?

Quote from Alan Yong:

Wiser, thank you for some very thought provoking comments. May be our industry can use a whole lot more of that.

As an industry, we are guilty of following the crowd like mindless zombies. Why do we follow the crowd and not a trustworthy leader?

Are we too clueless, ill informed, too greedy, naïve, or too trusting? There is a touch of all that and more. And that makes us vulnerable to be easy targets of those who have no problems in taking advantage of others. Worse yet, such environment attracts and grooms scam artists. It gives our industry a bad name, slows down mass adoption, and increases the risk of aggressive law enforcement and over regulation. It is very damaging to our industry.   

“I may know many important things but there will always be important things I don't know, and I'm counting on others to have my back on those things”. (wiser)
That works in a situation where trust and respect can be taken for granted.

We cannot know it all. Those who tried ended up not being good at anything. In an environment where trust and respect are the norms, everyone thrives in building a unified single culture for mutual benefits. Trust is rewarded in such environment. In contrast, trust is abused and taken advantage of in an environment where self-interest and personal gain trumps regardless of others pain and loses.

I believe that we all will learn from painful and expensive lessons. When there are options and choices, majority of the people will settle with the best choice. DNotes is fully committed to be a viable choice, especially to those who place high value on trust. I also believe that we will eventually be rewarded by doing what is right and beneficial to our industry. When more investors begin to understand and appreciate the DNotes difference we will be valued relative to our industry peers. That may not be that far in the future.

Quote from wiser, “I actually have noticed in some of the ICOs I have come across, that they are raising funds for a company that doesn't exist. There might be a company entity registered, but no history of the executives having profitably worked together before.”

I can see that happening. Our industry is notorious for providing false information and claims because, in general, there have been little to no consequences for doing so. A light weight registration that can identify the people behind the project and how the funds are used is an effective way to start. People behave more responsibly when they know that they can be held responsible for bad behavior.

ICO is proven to be an efficient global crowdfunding program and the most promising tool in capital formation if done within the legal framework of existing laws. No doubt, existing laws are overly burdensome. But laws evolve and can be amended, changed, with new ones added.

I don’t like more rules and regulations. But I hate to see investors being scammed even more. So is there a happy medium that provides consumer protection without stifling innovation.  I believe so and suggest that we all unite and voice our opinion with constructive recommendations.   

Excellent reporting, Ken.

DCEBrief and the entire DNotes team, including DNotesEDU, is committed to educating the public. We truly believe that digital currency coupled with its underpinning blockchain technology is a generational opportunity for everyone worldwide. It should not be squandered by a small minority for selfish gain at the cost of others’ hard-earned money. 

I am appalled that, despite repeated warnings from the SEC that coin tokens are securities when being sold as investment as in the case of all known ICOs in our industry, many are still aggressively promoting ICOs. Out of my 11,352 LinkedIn connections, I estimated that at least 2,000 of them are ICO experts/ advisors. I am constantly being approached by these experts who are clueless about Reg. A+ Mini-IPO or the legal issues confronting ICOs. I have never seen such an elevated level of misguided malpractice of professional “expertise”.

SEC Commissioner pointed out that “Investors are having a hard time telling the difference between investments and fraud,” This is very damaging to our industry and will hurt many retail investors hoping to catch a lucky break. I strongly encourage investors to do some deep research before investing.

Many are still not aware that DNotes does not support or promote ICOs as they stand. DNotes coin is not offered in any ICOs. It can only be purchased from a listed exchange – with Cryptopia starting on May 12th, 2018.

We are hopeful that as we get better established, and gained respect and credibility, we will have the opportunities to work with our law makers and regulators so that ICO can be an effective and viable tool in fund raising to advance capital formation. To that extent, I love the potential ICO has to offer as a funding vehicle. But to ensure consumer protection, it must be done within the framework of existing securities laws.

In the United States the sale of securities is illegal unless registered or exempt with the SEC. Meanwhile, enjoy the following article:

SEC Commissioner on Bitcoin: ‘That Space Is Full of Troubling Developments’
By POLINA MARINOVA

SEC Commissioner Robert Jackson has some strong opinions about cryptocurrency and initial coin offerings.

In a CNBC interview Monday morning, Jackson said his personal view on Bitcoin is that it’s a space “full of troubling developments.” He didn’t elaborate but said his concerns center more around initial coin offerings (ICOs), which are a mechanism for startups or online projects to raise money without selling stock or going to VCs.

“Investors are having a hard time telling the difference between investments and fraud,” he said.

The SEC has been cracking down on fraudulent ICOs in recent months. The agency has targeted ICOs they suspect are raising money for businesses that don’t even exist. It issued subpoenas to firms and individuals behind projects it believes are breaking the law.

“We’ve been doing a lot in the ICO space,” Jackson said. “[SEC] Chairman Jay Clayton has been very clear about this. He said he hasn’t seen an ICO yet that’s not a security. And I’m with him — I haven’t seen one of these yet that’s not a security.”

The cryptocurrency market is still in its “Wild West” phase as regulators try to figure out how to proceed. Clayton has previously said that the majority of ICOs should be registered with the agency because the coins trade on secondary markets like other securities the SEC regulates.

Fortune spoke with Blockchain Capital’s Bart Stephens recently, and he said there is still plenty of regulatory uncertainty when it comes to token issuance. “The SEC has told us a bunch of things that they don’t like, but what they haven’t really told market participants is what is allowable,” he said. “There’s a little bit of ongoing uncertainty, but it’s my hope that they are thoughtful and careful when making these decisions.”
A big part of the uncertainty comes from the fact that many regulatory agencies can’t decide exactly how to define (and in turn, regulate) cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin. There’s been plenty of debate around whether cryptocurrency assets are commodities, currencies, or securities — and no one seems to be able to agree.

“We are right now focused on protecting investors who are getting hurt in this market,” Jackson said. “And down the road, I think we will be thinking about — I think we should be thinking about ways to make those investments work consistently with our securities law.”

Source: http://fortune.com/2018/04/30/sec-commissioner-bitcoin-fraud/

There is a lot going on at Telegram. Just sharing one of my posts.

Quote from DNotes Telegram Channel:

Quote from Mark Gibb:
Thank Frank, im new to telegram and dnotes telegram have noticed admin next to some names.  I was looking for some thoughts and opinions.  How would Dnotes differenciate from TokenPay? They seem like they will be providing the same services or have i missunderstood the white paper.

Quote from Alan Yong:
The biggest difference is that DNotes is solving a different problem – the mass adoption of digital currency in global commerce. In this case all the relevant problems, with viable solutions at different point in time. (Completed, work in progress, those currently on the roadmap, and much more to come).

Think of mass adoption as system consisting of many parts and that system will only work when all the component parts are in the right place performing their functions as intended. How much would you pay for a component, a set of components, or a complete system? That framework of evaluation could help to determine the worth of different crypto currencies.

Every coin is claiming that they are the best, the finest, the fastest, the most secure, etc. … Often they are boasting about their technology as if they just created the ingenious distributed ledger consensus system, blockchain technology, smart contracts, and so on.  Let’s agree that some have added innovative features and improvements – typical of technology evolution. It constantly evolves and get better.

Technology is just one of many components needed to gain mass adoption. Despite that, when it comes to technology, DNotes is not far behind from the best and quite definitely equal to most. And don’t forget, we waited for the technology to become more mature before we jumped in and we did. In short, we are just getting start and already equal to most.

With nothing else considered but just technology DNotes is undervalued relative to technology. Help yourself to figure out what else is DNotes doing and why.

I will be back to support you when I have a chance. Thanks.

Thank you for sharing the link, Amadeus82. Very sad. I don't own any Vcash, and still feel the pain.

One of the biggest problems of the "decentralized world" is being leaderless and no one controls the decentralized entity. Should it become too chaotic self interest rules.

The popular claim that "we have a great community" needs verification. It is not sustainable without strong commitment from a development team. It takes time to build a real business. And time creates a track record that is verifiable. Also look for consistency of messaging and actual deliveries of promises. Be reasonable, no one has a perfect track records because of variables and the uncontrollable.

I was asked this question in a recent interview, published on Medium : https://medium.com/@jwoods1103/interview-with-alan-yong-author-of-improve-your-odds-the-four-pillars-of-business-success-8c9c9bc4b984

In some ways, it applies to DNotes. We acknowledged the challenges of picking a significantly more difficult and costly path while still maintaining the focus, discipline, patience, persistence, and tenacity needed to keep faith in our own vision for success. We picked that path because we believe that it is the best route to reach our ultimate  destination -  the mass adoption of DNotes.

Jennifer Woods:
You bring up the Stockdale Paradox as a pretty gripping example of mindset. Can you talk about why it’s critical for today’s leaders?

Alan Yong:
Certainly. Admiral Stockdale described the mental state he needed to survive his years in a POW camp as one that recognized the importance of acknowledging your current challenges while still maintaining the focus, discipline, patience, persistence, and tenacity needed to maintain faith in your own vision for success.

His principle recognizes that true leaders accept their reality, but never lose their belief that the right team and strategy, skillfully executed, will ensure that they prevail.

Yobit seems to have a mind of their own without any response to our communication. I would recommend caution.

Your first chance of acquiring DNotes is May 12th 2018 when Cryptopia starts listing DNotes 2.x

We just started a Telegram Channel and warmly invite you to join us: https://t.me/joinchat/FB-UaUjrQiji-EBatHLsuA
We are giving away 500 DNotes at the interval of every 50 new owners based on a random draw.

Just to clarify. The main "swap period" ended on April 16, 2016. Any new deposit coming in will be batched for the next round. We want to take the best care of our stakeholders but the processing and verification process is complex and time consuming.