1 – American Green installs bitcoin friendly marijuana dispensers in Seattle
This was a historic week for both cannabis and bitcoin, as manufacturer American Green installed their ZaZZZ marijuana vending machines in Seattle. Interestingly, the units accept bitcoin as payment by displaying a QR-code on its native touchscreen. President of American Green, Stephen Shearin, stated:
“This is an exciting time in Seattle’s cannabis community, and is representative of what can happen anywhere — laws permitting. ZaZZZ will simplify, track, and expedite the process in which marijuana users purchase their favorite products.”
2 – Irish University to Explore ‘Bitcoin Credit-Checks’
In an attempt to tackle and reduce fraud, a group of computer science students and professors from Trinity College Dublin is using the blockchain in search of patterns. These patterns could be one way for regulators to find more information about Bitcoin, professor of Computer Science in the School of Computer Science and Statistics at Trinity, Donal O'Mahony, said:
"We wanted to develop systems that would give a 'regulator' a degree of visibility on the flows of bitcoin in the same way that central banks have this visibility over normal currencies."
3 – BitPay released the stats of 2014's Bitcoin performance
Bitcoin's price has been in a slump throughout 2014, but according to stats released by BitPay, that's about the only metric that didn't look great. When it comes to big-name merchant acceptance, active wallets, venture capital investments, and much more, 2014 was a terrific year for Bitcoin.
4 – Coinbase exchange available in North Carolina
Another day another state. Some two weeks after it was launched, Coinbase has announced that it has opened up its exchange to North Carolina. That makes for a total of 25 US states.
5 – Ex-CEO of both UBS and Credit Suisse thinks gold and maybe bitcoin are only safe long term investments
In an interview with the Swiss investing outlet Cash, Ex-CEO of both UBS and Credit Suisse Oswald Grübel strongly criticized central banking policies and banking regulations. The only safe long-term investment, he thinks, might be gold, “and in the future maybe bitcoin.” He added:
“With gold and bitcoin, supply is limited. Not so with money. Central banks can print money without any limit.”
6 – GreenBits launches Android Bitcoin Wallet with multisig and hardware wallets support
GreenAddress and its team announced the availability of GreenBits in the Android Play and F-Play open source stores. GreenBits is a new open source Android Bitcoin Wallet that, according to its developers, combines the improved security provided by multisignature and hardware wallets to enhance both security and user experience.
7 – Peter Todd: Industry centralization not a problem
In a video produced by ZapChain, Core developer and jack-of-all-trades within the Bitcoin world Peter Todd discusses centralization issues, regulation, social media, and more. Key takeaway: neither the industries centralization nor regulation poses a threat to Bitcoin. Protocol centralization does.
8 – GPG maintainer Werner Koch receives dozens of bitcoins as donations
Werner Koch, a 53 year old German, is the man who built the free email encryption software Gnu Privacy Guard (GPG) in 1997, and since then has been almost single-handedly keeping it alive with patches and updates from his home. As it turns out, however, he is running out of money to keep his project alive. The bitcoin community took note, and donated almost thirty bitcoins within the past couple of days. Additional donations can be sent here.
9 – Counterparty co-founders no longer work on Overstock's decentralized stock market project
Counterparty co-founders and developers Robby Dermody and Evan Wagner are no longer working on Overstock's decentralized stock market project Medici. According to Overstock director of communications Judd Bagley, this is because the company will build on a wider variety of protocols and blockchains in addition to Counterparty:
"We’re not limiting Medici to a single blockchain, ledger or protocol – the idea being that long-term, cryptosecurities will undoubtedly be traded on multiple exchanges, and Medici intends to be able to accommodate trading wherever efficient and qualified exchanges pop up."
10 – The New York Observer chronicles quarrel between Ripple and Stellar
The New York Observer published an extensive story detailing the quarrel between decentralized payment network startups Ripple Labs and Stellar. According to the Observer, Ripple founder Jed McCaleb and Stellar executive director Joyce Kim had a personal relationship, which forced him to leave Ripple Labs to found competitor Stellar.
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