[THE NATURE OF CURRENCY NOTES]

THE NATURE OF CURRENCY NOTES
In the course of money functioning, regardless of the commodity acting as a common equivalent, its notes sporadically emerge in the form of monetary liabilities and bonds. A monetary liability is a security establishing its issuer’s liability to exchange the note for a predetermined amount of money (those are commercial drafts and classic banknotes, which are a drafts for a banker). A bond is a security establishing its issuer’s liability to exchange it for a commodity worth a predetermined amount of money (those are gift certificates and bonus money assigned to loyalty program members). Thus, monetary liabilities and bonds are nominated in money, but the former are redeemed with money, and the latter with commodities.
The main purpose for currency notes is the necessity of credit in capitalist economy. For instance, by signing a commercial draft, a customer obtains a commodity today for a promise to provide money in the future. A gift certificate’s seller gets their money today in exchange for the promise to provide the commodity later. However, currency notes do not stay in the creditor’s hands as mere credit tools, they start traveling from one hands to another, i.e. in fact they circulate along with money, thus starting functioning as money themselves. Whatever money product is the basis for a system, distribution of notes thereof is an objective regularity of economic behavior.
Any commodity may in fact become money. Certainly, if the commodity, say, a prepaid single-purpose card like a petrol station card or mobile communication card, is used for the intended purpose, its manufacturing should not trouble monetary authorities. However, if market agents, regardless of the manufacturer’s and the authorities’ intent, start using it as money, the authorities will have to pay their attention to it.

“MOBILE MONEY” AS CURRENCY NOTES
Mobile company bonds may be used as money. Circulation of mobile operator bonds may take two forms, as circulation of top-up cards and as movement of assets through accounts of the subscribers.
There also is a specific intermediate state, when the same security may act as a bond for one owner and as a monetary liability for another. Money at the mobile account are bonds for the subscriber (as they are the operator’s liability to provide the commodity, i.e. communication service, for a particular sum of money). A seller who accepts those assets from the subscriber’s account as payment for the commodities provided, and who can convert it into money with the mobile operator, those assets are monetary liabilities. This could compare to a gold bar standard, when national currency was credit money only for those who could redeem it with a sum sufficient to obtain a standard gold bar. For the rest, the currency was fiat, i.e. they could not redeem it with gold with the issuer.
As for 'mobile money’ like M-PESA, which exists as records in accounts of Safaricom’s subscribers, it is monetary liabilities, not Safaricom’s bonds. In that case, a subscriber’s account splits: along with bonds in the account, there are also monetary liabilities which the operator undertakes to redeem with money, not mobile services.

[IBM, ETHEREUM, AND SMART CONTRACTS]

Ethereum went up in price following the news stating that Microsoft had presented developer toolkit for creation of Ethereum-based apps. At the moment of writing, 1 ETH costs $1.2.
Thanks to the corporation’s partnership with ConsenSys, business customers of Mircosoft-owned cloud service Azure may access the Ethereum system named Blockchain-as-a-Service, which is expected to be announced at Ethereum’s DEVCON1 in London.
Integration of the cryptoplatform will allow Microsoft customers to create private and public blockchains, as well as using Ethereum’s public nodes with a single click at Azure.


IBM, ETHEREUM, AND SMART CONTRACTS

Developer toolkit issuance for Microsoft Azure is yet another step towards mass adoption of cryptotechnologies. One might reasonably assume that IBM is the next in line to use Ethereum products; it already operates IBM Bluemix, and hatches some ambitious plans regarding smart contracts.
Bluemix is a cloud platform for development and management of applications. If combined with cryptotechnologies and smart contracts, it could serve as a perfect base for establishment of decentralized autonomous entities.
The aforementioned assumption aligns with IBM’s latest statements. This September, the company declared it was going to launch an open source platform for work with smart contracts. This year dozens of the company’s scientists were engaged in development of a proprietary blockchain-based technology to maintain security for smart contracts.

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Bitfork Develop developers have presented their new Ethereum-based project dubbed AIRA DAO. AIRA manages a decentralized autonomous company by adding agents, creating contracts and values, and, generally, automatizing business processes of a company.
The platform employs Ethereum-based cryptotechnologies, which allows creating any values within DAO: it could be coins (like bitcoin) or digital property tokens with extended description of any object all the way to IoT.

AIRA developers pay much attention to the future of artificial intelligence (AI). According to the project’s manifesto, AI also should be a decentralized network of machines, which allows reducing maintenance costs and mitigate risks related to centralized systems.
According to the developers, the platform introduces an important amendment to a usual cryptocurrency platform: a decentralized environment of n-dimensional blockchain (a sidechain). Sidechains allow one to avoid inflating the basic blockchain and storing data that have lost their value or applicability. Thus, if an AIRA-based project loses support, it will exist as long as it remains interesting for at least one person in the world.
The model implies storage of blockchain on a hard drive as long as it is necessary. The issue of information value is automatically covered. Say, someone compiles a collection of 1960’s British poetry – the project will be available for users of the network as long as someone is interested in British literature of the sixties.

There are four fundamental essences within AIRA environment:
1. values;
2. smart contracts;
3. rules;
4. taught machine specimens.

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Bitcoin and blockchain have recently become the most discussed issue in Ukrainan fintech sector. As government institutions gradually become loyal to cryptotechnologies, local community becomes more active, and more and more merchants at least consider accepting bitcoin, even if they have not started accepting it yet.

Even today, when in Kyiv, you may go to groceries and pay with bitcoins, use bitcoins for a movie ticket, ride a cab for bitcoins, and so on. In Odessa, one may pay to a real estate agency, but some stuff or office stationery from a local show rooms – all for bitcoins. Our readers might recall a recent flash mob #takemybitcoin spreading the news of bitcoin among restaurant owners. Buying bitcoin for cash is not a problem in Ukraine; it is available both via localbitcoins-like services and thousands of iBox terminals.

UKRAINIAN BITCOIN EVANGELISM

Local Bitcoin Foundation (BFU) has played a major role in promotion of cryptotechnologies in Ukraine. The foundation’s members actively interacted with banking organizations and the National Bank of Ukraine for the purpose of integration of blockchain and bitcoin into the country’s economy. BFU acts mostly as a consulting entity and knowledge base for financing institutions interested in modern technology.
Active advocacy deployed by Ukrainian bitcoin enthusiasts resulted in propagation of bitcoin in Ukraine shortly after. NBU’s representatives attended Bitcoin Conference Kiev in September, and Natalia Lapko, head of NBU’s payment system department, spoke of blockchain’s / bitcoin’s potential positively and constructively during her speech. National Bank of Ukraine also published an official letter clarifying the regulator’s official stance towards digital currencies.

Recently we mentioned the things that hinder smart contracts from becoming our daily routine. Certainly, no smart contract can exist outside of its environment, where it can be created, verified, and performed. Certainly, Ethereum is a basic component thereof; however, a comprehensive environment shall include an interface for user interaction.

Of course, a command line is not the solution that a market could anticipate. A conceptual model of an application that could allow a wide range of users to employ smart contracts is today’s focus of our interest.

For starters, we should define the scope of problems that our hypothetical app is set to solve. The most typical kinds of deals to be implemented in the application are as listed hereunder:
1. Trading operations with information rights;
2. IoT-compatible trading operations involving material assets;
3. Conclusion of service agreements;
4. Collective decision-making and performance of the decisions made (i.e., voting);
Now, let us delve into possible realization scenarios for each of those deals.
The most obvious use case of smart contracts is selling intellectual property, or, to put it more general, information as a whole. Say, a writer came up with a book, and now he or she wants to sell the publishing rights to a publisher.

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This Wednesday was marked by the news on launch of Russia’s first blockchain accelerator, which also combines a fintech accelerator and a co-working space. The accelerator is a part of fintech accelerator FutureFintech. The accelerator’s founders haven’t pinned down the blockchain part’s name as yet, so everyone is welcome to offer their own version. The platform is dedicated to search, support, and development of fintech start-ups, as well as blockchain researching projects. The accelerator’s address is as follows: Moscow, 8 Presnenskaya embankment, City of Capitals business center.

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After the advent of cryptocurrencies specialists in business automation engaged in discussions on smart contracts as they deemed them the method to eliminate third parties and reduce operational costs for businesses. It is hardly surprising, because, in fact, a cryptocurrency transaction is particular case of a smart contract recorded in a public register unreservedly transferring a value equivalent from one entity to another.
Actually, any deal may be executed in the form of a smart contract which will to some extent guarantee performance of contractual liabilities to the parties.

Before delving into the reasons why smart contracts have not experienced a widespread adoption yet, it might be useful to see whether business is directed that way, and if so, how it happens. Indeed, market is a kind of a life form where laws of evolution prevail. Particular species of that life form (economic entities) survive due to obtaining specific features from their engineers (founders) providing them with competitive advantages.
If the specialists are right, and smart contracts really provide businesses with all the advantages they talk about, therefore, those species that get equipped with that amazing stuff, must be surviving more effectively, and finally outnumber those who failed to adopt the feature. May this evolutionary process be already launched, but in a form hindering recognition of ‘pure’ smart contracts?

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В сентябре крупнейшая российская платежная система QIWI анонсировала планы по запуску собственной критовалюты под названием Битрубль. Эта новость вызвала ажиотаж не только в криптовалютном сообществе, но и далеко за его пределами. Буквально сразу после первого упоминания о Битрубле, в России появилось множество противоречивых высказываний как об этом проекте, так и о криптовалютах в целом. Редакция ForkLog связалась с директором по развитию криптотехнологий QIWI Алексеем Архиповым и руководителем по развитию внешней проектной среды QIWI Константином Кольцовым, чтобы узнать подробности этого резонансного события.
Об особенностях регулирования криптотехнологий, позиции ЦБ РФ относительно цифровых валют, а также об исследованиях QIWI и сути проекта Битрубль читайте в эксклюзивном интервью представителей QIWI ForkLog.

Earlier this September, Russia’s largest payment processor QIWI has announced its plans to launch its proprietary cryptocurrency dubbed ‘bitruble’.
The news agitated people within cryptocurrency community and beyond. Almost immediately upon the announcement Russian media environment got filled with often controversial musings as to the project itself and cryptocurrencies in general. ForkLog contacted with Alexei Arkhipov, QIWI’s cryptocurrency development executive, and Konstantin Koltsov, QIWI’s external project environment development executive in order to find out some details behind the mere news.
Below is an exclusive interview on cryptocurrency regulation peculiarities, Russian Central Bank’s stance as to digital currencies, and QIWI’s research and Bitruble project essence according to its managers.

=http://forklog.net/cryptotechnology-beyond-prohibition-an-interview-with-bitruble-project-managers/

The biggest Russian search engine Yandex, which acts as a local counterpart to Google within the CIS, and successfully outruns the worldwide giant across much of the former USSR, is interested in integration of bitcoin into its own payment system Yandex.Money in order to allow merchants deal with cryptocurrencies. This was announced at FinTech forum in the city of Kazan.

In particular, Maria Gracheva, CEO of Yandex.Money announced the company is analyzing the options of supporting bitcoin payments.
Nora Kirkizh, PR manager at Yandex.Money, stated that bitcoin perfectly fits payment solutions as offered by the service.

“The technology underlying cryptocurrencies may be applied to a multitude of diverse products. For instance, Yandex.Money offers processing solutions for online stores. By using those solutions merchants may get their money from the customers via credit cards, web wallets, online banking, and other payment tools. Currently there are over 76,000 online stores using Yandex’s payment tools to process their transactions,” she said in an interview

However, according to the company’s spokesperson, insofar as cryptocurrencies are not regulated in Russia whatsoever, Yandex cannot proceed with using them:
“Cryptocurrencies have their pros and cons. It’s a pretty inexpensive technology which may be easily integrated anywhere, and as soon as bitcoin enters the legal environment, any payment processor would integrate the technology right away.”

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Крупнейший российский поисковый сервис Яндекс интересуется интеграцией биткоина в свою платежную систему Яндекс Деньги, чтобы предоставить возможность мерчантам работать с криптовалютой. Об этом стало известно во время ФинТех форума в Казани.
В частности CEO сервиса Яндекс Деньги Мария Грачева анонсировала, что компания анализирует возможность поддержки биткоин-платежей.

PR-менеджер сервиса Яндекс Деньги Нора Киркиж прокомментировала, что биткоин идеально сочетается с платежными решениями, которые предлагаются сервисом.

«Технология на которой основаны криптовалюты может быть использована для множества различных продуктов. К примеру, Яндекс.Деньги предлагает процессинговые решения для онлайн-магазинов. Используя наши решения, мерчанты могут получать средства от клиентов через банковские карты, электронные кошельки, онлайн-банкиг и другие платежные инструменты. На сегодняшний день более 76 000 онлайн магазинов используют платежные инструменты Яндекса для обработки транзакций» — прокомментировала Киркиж

Как стало известно редакции ForkLog, глава ЦБ России Эльвира Набиуллина положительно оценила инициативу платежной системы QIWI по разработке криптовалюты Битрубль и исследованию криптотехнологий.
«Достаточно положительно оценил нашу деятельность и Центральный Банк. Эльвира Набиуллина сказала, что Центробанк не собирается запрещать криптотехнологии, и в данный момент регулятор их изучает. Центробанку просто необходимо некоторое время, чтобы понять, как регулировать эту абсолютно новую сферу», — рассказал редакции ForkLog руководитель проекта Битрубль Алексей Архипов.

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As it became known to ForkLog, head of Russian Central Bank Elvira Nabiullina took a favorable view of QIWI’s initiative to develop cryptocurrency called ‘bitruble’ and cryptotechnology research in general.
“The Central Bank also takes a favorable view of our activity. Elvira Nabiullina told that the Central Bank wasn’t going to ban cryptotechnologies. Moreover, according to her, now the regulator is researching the technology. The Central Bank just needs some time to understand how it could regulate that brand new domain,” said Bitruble project manager Alexei Arkhipov speaking to ForkLog.

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Now Ukrainian residents may pay for cinema, theater, and other tickets with Bitcoins. Cryptocurrency payments for those services became possible due to event aggregator and online store 2show.mobi.
“We expect to enter global market to make it possible for people to buy tickets, say, to a dolphinarium in Sochi for Bitcoins. I should emphasize that we don’t know of any 2show’s counterparts in terms of cryptocurrency payments, so probably we are the world’s first service allowing people to integrally interact with entertainment industry by means of cryptocurrency,” says Oles Slobodenyuk, the service’s founder.
Previously Mr. Slobodenyuk launched Ukraine’s first grocery store accepting Bitcoin, and also initiated #takemybitcoin flash mob performed to increase cryptocurrency awareness amongst restaurant owners. Also he designed a Bitcoin heater for a private mansion.

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[NEVYANSK: FROM PETER THE GREAT TO BITCOIN BLOCKING]

January 13th of 2015 has every right to bear the name of ‘black Tuesday’ in all history books of Bitcoin industry. That day, Bitcoin price dropped to $218, and comprised $166.45 the very next day. Russian Bitcoin community, however, suffered more than just Bitcoin price falling. Notorious Roskomnadzor blocked access to several Bitcoin sites within Russia under the Nevyansk court decision.

The blocking covered such portals as bits.media, bitcoinconf.ru, and coinspot.ru. International Bitcoin sites also suffered the blockage: those were bitcoin.org and Bitcoin wikipedia bitcoin.it.

NEVYANSK: FROM PETER THE GREAT TO BITCOIN BLOCKING

Interestinly enough, the Nevyansk court delivered its judgement to block the sites as early as on September 30th, but none of the involved sites’ owners has ever received an invitation to the court session or has ever been notified their projects violate Russian laws. Anyway, it is hardly surprising – just as the fact that the judgement had to be passed in a nowhereville in the very heart of Russia.

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Криптовалютная биржа Cryex получила $10 миллионов инвестиций, большая часть которых приходится на White Star Capital и Northzone Ventures. После окончания инвестиционного раунда стартап планирует расширить свое присутствие на европейском рынке и представить свои финансовые сервисы для объединения традиционных регулируемых финансовых рынков с «экономикой блокчейна».

Управляющий партнёр White Star Capital Эрик Мартино-Фортин объяснил, что инвестирование в Cryex позволит биткоин-стартапу «ввести финансовые учреждения в экосистему цифровой валюты». Он выразил уверенность в квалификации опытных финансистов из Cryex, среди которых бывшие исполнительные руководители банков и бирж, а также ветераны инвестирования и управления активами. Мартино-Фортин также заявил: «Мы в восторге от того, что сможем поучаствовать в развитии подлинно инновационного решения, при котором технология блокчейна сможет взаимодействовать с биржами и технологиями взаиморасчётов в регулируемом экономическом пространстве, что сможет наконец-то привлечь финансовые учреждения в экосистему цифровых валют».

Отметим, что Northzone Ventures в свое время инвестировали в такие компании как Avito.ru, Spotify и SpaceApe.

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[BANNER PLACING CONDITIONS]

ForkLog announces sales of commercial areas in lifetime format on “Highway to the Moon” web page. The banner area also acts as 404 page. The offer is a part of a development & support campaign for the project.

Don’t miss a unique opportunity to put yourself on cryptocurrency record by gaving a lifetime banner at ForkLog. Popularization of your product or service may become an integral part of our project via your banner on that page.

Our loyal readers must have noticed that recently the site experienced some significant changes including launchin of English version of the magazine featuring selected materials to maintain communications between Russian-speaking and English-speaking Bitcoin communities. This, however, resulted in 24/7 work mode for the editorial board which comes at some cost including that in financial sense of word.

Further existence of the project implies some financial certainty. It’s you who can help both us and active promtion of cryptocurrency, blockchain and decentralization in Russian-speaking areas.

BANNER PLACING CONDITIONS

The page’s area is marked by a framework of 10×10 pixel squares. A square represents a minimum order to place. Price of a square changes respectively with a sales round. Currently it comprises 0.22 BTC per one square.

For instance, if you want to place a 100×50 banner, you should buy 10 squares along horizontal line and 5 squares along vertical line, which makes 50 squares overall. Total cost of placing in that case would comprise 11 BTC.

All you have to do to place the order is choosing the squares in question and contact us via e-mail as provided on the page. Payments are effected in Bitcoin, Dash (Darkcoin) or other cryptocurrency as agreed.

You also may reserve the squares if as yet you don’t know for sure what it is you’re going to place there. Owner of the bought-out squares may replace their banner for a different one as agreed by the ForkLog administration.

If there are any worries about our project’s life span, we hereby obligate to support and develop ForkLog for at least 5 more years. In case the magazine ceases updating, the project will remain in the web for at least 10 more years.

Buying a banner at our Bitcoin exchange rate page you not just support ForkLog and get an opportunity to place any information you like for the whole term of the project’s existence, but also put yourself on record of cryptocurrency and decentralized technologies development.

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After Darkcoin’s rebranding into Dash justified primarily by a necessity of expansion and finding new markets, cryptocurrency community might as well join the rebranding trend like domino.

In April 2015 Litecoin developers announced their rebranding to attract new users and augment awareness. Charie Lee, leading developer, told that no technical tricks could help a cryptocurrency succeed.

Lee’s views may seem quite weird and make one think that Litecoin developers have chosen a path of least effort by solving marketing issues instead of developing the technical part.

However, any technology, including block chain, consists in two components, namely back-end and front-end. As is clear from the names, back-end refers to technology, be it cryptocurrency exchange operation, payment processing, or any other cryptocurrency service functionality. Fine technologies never miss attention. But, it should be clear, that unless they present a new product right, id est conveniently and in an easy-to-understand way, that person would hardly want to get to the heart of the matter, or, which is more important, use the product in everyday life.
It’s a common knowledge that all capabilities of block chain are beyond revealing. ForkLog editorial board likes to fantasize about implementing blockchain in daily routine. But now it’s time to consider other important aspects of cryptocurrency.

Dogecoin, initially a mem and a joke, is quite an interesting item for rebranding. The currency managed to establish a great community and still occupies 2nd position in Coingecko rating. The community had quite a few interesting campaigns: sponsoring Nascar racers and launching a Dogecoin vehicle at the race, for instance. There were several charity campaigns launched by the community which brought back significant donations. At some time the cryptocurrency got abandoned by its creators and managed to cope only by efforts of enthusiasts.

Recently Jackson Palmer once again claimed he leaves cryptocurrency industry for good as he is disappointed and sees no progress. And now Dogecoin community has to do something to save and improve their beloved currency.

Thus, one of Redditers initiated a discussion on Dogecoin rebradning and actual need for establishing a marketing strategy for cryptocurrency. This might sound strange or weird to some, and some might even think that approach contradicts the very idea of cryptocurrency. But that’s not true.
Nowadays cryprocurrencies ceased being something unusual, and people resigned their minds to their existence, and those who could get interested or become enthusiasts already did so. This is evident in English-speaking community where Bitcoin technologies have reached another level at which major financial entities gained massive interest in the technology.

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Unknown developers published a report on two new malware items capable of introducing dramatic amendments into Bitcoin mining on infected computers. As opposed to their counterparts, those malware programs are made in quite an exquisite way and remain almost invisible to a victim.
Both viruses, being Jellyfish (rootkit) and Demon (keylogger) can operate without launching processes in OS core, thus giving no suspicions to their victim.

The programs use GPU rather than CPU to launch on the infected computer which conceals their operation and enhances computing power. According to the experts, this could empower hidden mining of Bitcoin on infected computers.

Linux-based Jellyfish is a concept project employing LD_PRELOAD technique by Jynx, as well as OpenCL API by Khronos. The malware currently supports AMD and NVIDIA videocards. Keylogger Demon has not been described by the developers in details as yet. They just described it as “proof-of-concept” as provided in a work “You may enter, but cannot conceal: invisible GPU-keylogger”.

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[Ripple Labs оштрафовали за нарушение закона о банковской тайне]

Ripple Labs оштрафовали за нарушение закона о банковской тайне

Сеть по расследованию финансовых преступлений (FinCEN) оштрафовала Ripple Labs и подконтрольную ей XRP II в общей сумме на 700 000 долларов за «намеренное нарушение» закона о банковской тайне.

Согласно выпущенному 5 мая пресс-релизу, Ripple Labs не смогла зарегистрироваться в качестве компании, оказывающей финансовые услуги, но тем не менее продавала XRP, цифровое средство для проведения платежей в сети Ripple. Также утверждается, что компания не исполняла соответствующие процедуры по препятствию отмыванию денег. XRP II же названа противоправно действующей в качестве компании финансовых услуг без рабочей программы против отмывания денег, а также уличена в недонесении о «нескольких» транзакциях, подозрительных в своей сути.

Директор FinCEN Дженнифер Шаски Кэлвери отметила в своём заявлении, что этот случай должен послужить напоминанием всем американским компаниям, занимающимся обменом цифровых валют, приводить свою продукцию к требованиям закона по противодействию отмыванию денег.
Так, она заявила: «Инновации — это похвально, но только если они не подставляют безо всякого основания нашу финансовую систему под удар технически подкованных преступников, которые только рады злоупотребить новейшими и сложнейшими продуктами».

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