The BitGive Foundation: A Bitcoin-powered Nonprofit Doing a World of Good

Bitcoin conferences have been the birthing grounds for many a successful startup. They have attracted some of the best business minds and biggest VC investors. But when Connie Gallippi went to San Jose for her first conference in back in 2013, she saw a different sort of opportunity altogether; the opportunity to create a philanthropic organization that would use the power of bitcoin to help the disadvantaged citizens of the world.It’s been a whirlwind...

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Credit Suisse Publishes Paper on Bitcoin: Explores Integration with Traditional Financial System

Mainstream banks and financial institutions are warming up to Bitcoin and digital blockchain-based fintech, often with a surprisingly positive and open-minded attitude.In a recent research paper titled “One Bank Research Agenda,” the Bank of England said that Bitcoin could reshape the financial industry and called for further research to devise a system that could use distributed ledger technology without compromising a central bank’s ability to...

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Bitcoin Companies Join Payment Giants At Transact 15

The Transact conference is a yearly trade show that brings together the latest in payments and technology. Payments giants including American Express, PayPal, Visa, Bank of America, Chase, and many others gather at this yearly event to learn about new technologies and form partnerships. In its very essence, this is a traditional payments conference. And now Bitcoin gets to be part of the conversation.BitPay, a member of the Electronic Transactions...

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BitReserve Tool Lets You Watch Bitcoin Transactions in Real-Time

Bitreserve has launched Changemoney.org, a real-time visualisation tool to show its users how money is held, used and transferred on its platform.The microsite enables users to filter the results by currencies and plots the data on a 3D interactive globe, offering behind-the-scenes insight into activities. At press time, the site showed that the storage platform held $1,259,153 in bitcoin in its wallets.Speaking about the launch, Halsey Minor,...

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Intel Joins the Blockchain Technology Race, Forms Special Research Group

Last week Bitcoin Magazine reported that IBM is considering adopting the blockchain technology behind Bitcoin to create a digital cash and payment system for government and central banks. Now another technology giant is joining the digital fintech technology race: Intel is planning to investigate the potential of blockchain technology.Intel has posted a job announcement for a new researcher to join its special innovation projects group to “investigate...

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UK Government to Fund Research in Digital Currencies and Explore Regulation

UK Government Funds Research in Digital Fintech and Promotes Firm Regulations In November, the U.K. government launched a call for information on digital currencies, with a focus on their function as a payment method rather than as a speculative investment.After receiving more than 120 responses, the government released a Treasury document titled “Digital Currencies: Response to the Call for Information,” which summarizes the submissions received...

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Bitcoin Companies Take the Stage at SXSW Interactive

The 2015 South by Southwest Interactive, held March 13-17, offered an exciting glimpse into the future for cryptocurrency users. Products that generated the most buzz focused on security for bitcoin users and the general public. Here are the top five products that caught the attention of the judges, experts and the media.Fitcoin Fitcoin, an iOS app from Chaotic Moon Studios in Austin, Texas, allows users to receive bitcoin for workouts. Simply pair...

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Facebook Instant P2P Payments and the Future of Money

The prestigious MIT Technology Review has published a Business Report on “The Future of Money.”The report surveys emerging digital money and online payment technologies, including Apple Pay, Alibaba’s Alipay and Bitcoin, and concludes that promising advances will be integrated with mainstream fintech and controlled by large players.“As technology-driven payment ideas give cash a run for its money, the big winners could be established banks and credit...

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Overstock Reveals Items Most Often Bought With Bitcoin

Online retail giant Overstock has released new insight into the buying behavior of its bitcoin customer base, revealing bed sheets have become the demographic’s favorite item to purchase.The top five items bought on Overstock with bitcoin are now sheets, donations to non-profits, headphones, cases and holders, and area rugs, respectively. Cables and tools, mattresses, coffee tables, A/V cables and fashion sunglasses round out the top 10 categories.Addressing...

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Japanese E-commerce Giant Rakuten to Accept Bitcoin Through Bitnet

Rakuten announced that it plans to enable customers to choose bitcoin as a payment option by integrating Bitnet’s payment processing platform on a number of its marketplaces.The Internet services giant will begin accepting the new payment method first in the United States, then in Germany and Austria. The integration with Bitnet’s platform will make Rakuten one of the largest e-commerce companies in the world to accept bitcoin payments.“Rakuten’s...

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Purse.io Partners with Coinbase to Make Bitcoin Shopping Easier

Today, Purse.io is announcing a new partnership with Coinbase in an effort to increase its mainstream user base by making it easier for customers to shop with bitcoin on Amazon.com.Purse is a peer-to-peer marketplace that connects spenders and buyers of bitcoins. Customers shop for items on Amazon.com by creating a wishlist.Then they exchange bitcoins for items on the list with customers who are interested in buying their bitcoins. Shoppers typically...

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Factom Announces Launch Date for Token Crowdsale

Factom has announced it will launch its forthcoming crowdsale on 31st March at 15:00 UTC.Billed as a “software sale”, the event will allow consumers to exchange bitcoins for Factom tokens that will be available upon the blockchain-based recordkeeping network’s beta release.Factom president Peter Kirby indicated that final launch date was set after his company met key objectives, including a certain threshold of confidence in its beta version as...

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Isle of Man Preparing to Pass Digital Currency Regulatory Framework

The Isle of Man wants to become a leading Bitcoin hub and attract digital fintech businesses, entrepreneurs and developers, Business Insider reports. The government of the tiny island is about to pass a new regulatory framework to create a true paradise for digital currencies.The Isle of Man is a self-governing British Crown dependency located in the Irish Sea between the islands of Great Britain and Ireland.While the United Kingdom is responsible...

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Bringing Back the Best: This Week on Decentral Talk Live

by Bitcoin Magazine Staff on March 16, 2015 { } Decentral has recently moved its offices. As a result, decentral.tv is in the process of creating a new and improved studio. So this week, we revisit some of our best episodes that also aim to shed some light on topics that you’ll see in the news this week.We start off with an episode from December 2014 when Dmitry Murashchik of Mycelium was our guest. This week, Mycelium will be shipping out their...

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Former OKCoin Product Manager Joins Bitfinex

Former OKCoin manager of international operations Zane Tackett has announced he will join Hong Kong-based bitcoin exchange Bitfinex.Tackett became the latest public-facing figure to resign from OKCoin on 10th March. At the time, he cited a “difference of opinion” as well as “unsolved problems” facing the exchange as motivating factors.Tackett revealed his position at Bitfinex will be familiar, as he will take over community outreach and product development,...

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