Thursday, February 16, 2023

Cardano Daily Discussion - February 17, 2023

Hello everyone,

Welcome to the Cardano Daily Discussion!

The standard sub rules apply here (see sidebar), with the exception that price discussion is allowed in this thread, though we encourage you to try not to make this the focus and talk about the project itself. Please ask questions, help others and be civil - be sure to get involved in Project Catalyst too!

If you're new, please make sure you're read through the newbies guide and share it with others (use the ?newbies comment command to reference it).

⚠️ Scam Warning ⚠️

Please read the Cybersecurity guidelines for Cardano Users.

There are ongoing giveaway scams on youtube and many scammers lurking in Cardano's social channels impersonating ambassadors/moderators/official staff contacting users via direct messages.

For example, searching 'cardano' on youtube and sorting by most recent upload date shows several giveaway scams running (all videos in screenshot are scams):

Ongoing 'giveaway' scams on Youtube

The youtube scams are automated; use stolen footage usually of Charles Hoskinson and are restreamed so to appear to be 'live'; appear to have many watchers (which are bots); use bought hacked channels and are edited to appear like official channels.

See this post for more examples of what they look like

Do not be fooled!

To be clear:

⚠️ There is no such thing as a Cardano giveaway
⚠️ Never share your seed phrase with ANYONE
⚠️ Never send ADA to someone promising to send you more ADA back
⚠️ You will never be contacted by ambassadors/moderators/staff

Please report scams on the Cardano Fraud Detection Bureau.

⚠️ Scam Warning ⚠️

https://preview.redd.it/60ofludzpq8a1.png?width=284&format=png&auto=webp&v=enabled&s=7d58fc8aaa2eb5f125624608b97bdd7b943a1111

Midnight Subreddit

In anticipation of Input Output's new data protection blockchain 'Midnight', I've managed to acquire r/Midnight through some negotiation and repurpose it for the Cardano Community (the sub was created for a card game back in 2011 but was mostly unused).

I decided to do this as I thought the project will eventually need a home on reddit and best to setup now before any scammers do. Obviously there's not much to post about on there right now as it's early days as the project is yet to be released, but if you'd like to be kept up to date on the project please feel free to join the new subreddit if the project interests you and I'll be sure to post updates as and when they become available.

Right now the sub is mostly a carbon copy of r/cardano, I've copied most of the automod and rules over, so certain aspects may seem a little incongruent atm, but I'll tailor and tweak the sub as we go. Feel free to send me or post any input if you want stuff to change.

Cheers all

How to backup your bitcoin using time locked transactions

I have recently been thinking about cold storage fund recovery and stumbled across nTimeLock, a special function that allows you to create transactions that are only spendable once you reach a certain timestamp. This allows you to create transactions that recover your funds to a new wallet at a certain timestamp but can also be easily revoked at anytime.

This experimental and open source tool that I just built allows you to do just that. In a nutshell, it allows you to create a time locked transaction to another wallet and save it as a backup. This backup also includes a revoke transaction that sends the funds to the signer’s wallet, thereby invalidating the backup.

You are free to set the recipient of the funds to any address and if none is set, the tool will generate a fresh wallet, set it as the recipient and add it to the backup, allowing you to fully recover the funds in the event that you lose access to your cold storage keys. Such backups can be stored on your google drive or iCloud accounts and only become sensitive when the transaction date has been reached.

As I already mentioned, these backups can and should be invalidated close to their timestamp, as you would only want to use them as a last resort in the event that you have truely lost access to your keys.

Here is an example of a real time locked backup file.

Links:

https://github.com/James-Sangalli/btc-timelocked-backup-web (web interface that works with Trezor, COMING SOON)
https://github.com/James-Sangalli/crypto-timelocked-backup/tree/master/scripts/bitcoin (hot wallet edition that works with private keys pasted in environment variables using node.js, fully functional and used to create the backup above)
https://james-sangalli.medium.com/utxo-based-backups-an-idea-for-bitcoin-cold-storage-21f620c35981 (article describing the method in greater detail)

Note that these tools are only experimental and should not be used with serious amounts of bitcoin!

How to backup your bitcoin using time locked transactions

Here is an example of a real time locked backup file.

Links:

https://github.com/James-Sangalli/btc-timelocked-backup-web (web interface that works with Trezor, COMING SOON)
https://github.com/James-Sangalli/crypto-timelocked-backup/tree/master/scripts/bitcoin (hot wallet edition that works with private keys pasted in environment variables using node.js, fully functional and used to create the backup above)
https://james-sangalli.medium.com/utxo-based-backups-an-idea-for-bitcoin-cold-storage-21f620c35981 (article describing the method in greater detail)

Note that these tools are only experimental and should not be used with serious amounts of bitcoin!

How to backup your bitcoin using time locked transactions

Here is an example of a real time locked backup file.

Links:

https://github.com/James-Sangalli/btc-timelocked-backup-web (web interface that works with Trezor, COMING SOON)
https://github.com/James-Sangalli/crypto-timelocked-backup/tree/master/scripts/bitcoin (hot wallet edition that works with private keys pasted in environment variables using node.js, fully functional and used to create the backup above)
https://james-sangalli.medium.com/utxo-based-backups-an-idea-for-bitcoin-cold-storage-21f620c35981 (article describing the method in greater detail)

Note that these tools are only experimental and should not be used with serious amounts of bitcoin!

Oracle forms a powerful, systematic, organic,Shared digital economy ecology

Oracle combines the high-performance aggregated cross-chain oracle protocol to help create a global leading decentralized exchange through efficient data interaction, massive data storage, and reliable operating mechanism .

Build the world's leading "value decentralized" digital asset trading platform

Combining high-performance aggregated cross-chain oracle protocol, the Oracle trading platform is committed to building a world-leading "value decentralization" digital asset trading platform, with "transaction is mining, promotion is income, contribution is value" as the construction guideline , make full use of the technical system composed of blockchain, smart contract, AI, big data, 5G, Internet of Things, cloud computing, edge computing, etc., to build a set of one-click trading, spot trading, bulk trading, contract trading, leveraged trading.

https://preview.redd.it/ielqf55ptoia1.png?width=1328&format=png&auto=webp&v=enabled&s=8657c26af75f61ab5f3849b3bb113a0643fa32e4

A digital asset ecology integrating Staking, Launchpad, DEX, investment research center, innovation system, and asset security system, and created a world-leading decentralized platform currency economic model to realize the historic production relationship of "users are shareholders" Change, absorb global digital economy participants to build, co-govern and share, form an international consensus DAO organization, and continue to expand the ecological boundary, and finally form a strong, systematic, organic, and shared digital economic ecology, which greatly promotes the historical process of the digital asset era , to discover and create revolutionary value of the times.

International first-line media help create a new ecology of the digital economy

Oracle has received full support from international first-line media represented by Coindesk, TodayOnChain, CoinTelegraph, NewsBTC, Bitcoinist, and CryptoSlate, as well as many partners from the global digital asset field. Support, meet the future of the digital economy, and strive to create a new ecology of the global digital economy.

https://preview.redd.it/y8h07hartoia1.jpg?width=1266&format=pjpg&auto=webp&v=enabled&s=82403c49106d043a7c94e3e2285196c978632f30

Oracle network system realizes blockchain network data interaction

Oracle can introduce external data sources and events into blockchain insurance applications, help decentralized insurance products make compensation decisions, and arrange future automatic compensation. Technological innovations such as blockchain and smart contracts that have emerged in recent years have the potential to solve the problem of insurance opacity for us and eliminate the mutual mistrust caused by lack of transparency.

Combining blockchain, on-chain smart contracts, and decentralized oracle machines, it is possible to upgrade the insurance infrastructure, not only to solve the transparency problem, but also to simplify the entire insurance process and cover more vulnerable people around the world group. Decentralized insurance protocols can improve operational efficiency, reduce costs, and minimize trust, ultimately shortening insurance claims, arbitration, and payment processes. The starting point of blockchain insurance is the smart contract. Smart contracts are software that run and are stored on a distributed, decentralized ledger (the "blockchain").

https://preview.redd.it/7lemtf5stoia1.jpg?width=850&format=pjpg&auto=webp&v=enabled&s=f927e2b86b11a721542ce471fac3dd8d0298a576

Oracle can realize data interaction with each independent blockchain network through the oracle network, and also adopts the Oracle Hub setting to connect technical resources, business needs, existing blockchain functional components and practical business chains, so that in Achieve scalability while meeting different business needs. If each blockchain network is imagined as a city, then Oracle Hub is equivalent to a trading port extending in all directions, with complete infrastructure, strong technical resources, and efficient circulation interaction, which can meet the needs of different blockchain cities , and is highly scalable.

The function of Oracle Hub is specific to the blockchain world, which can be cross-chain services, such as chain register , automatic market maker , Ethereum bridge , Bitcoin bridge, and the establishment of a close connection with the wider digital economy; it can also be for the new The blockchain shared security and fundraising, providing cross-chain accounts and equipment for capital formation.

epilogue

Oracle continues to expand the ecological boundary, and finally forms a powerful, systematic, organic, and shared digital economic ecology, which greatly promotes the historical process of the digital asset era, and discovers and creates revolutionary value of the times.

https://preview.redd.it/wydlwhqstoia1.jpg?width=600&format=pjpg&auto=webp&v=enabled&s=c371af335c0ed73ba31bd0000e76a969d180aee0

The Most Prodigious and Largest Blockchain and Crypto Conference Hub 2023

https://preview.redd.it/jkpj1tk1zjia1.jpg?width=800&format=pjpg&auto=webp&v=enabled&s=219bc4777ba11074977474c25bde07d5e61c04e8

Blockchain Economy Summit London is the biggest blockchain event to ever take place in the UK, bringing together leading figures in the cryptocurrency sector and industry professionals to reimagine the future of finance.

The fantastic 5th Edition of the Blockchain Economy Summit featured dozens of sponsors, including GARI, Chingari, NAGAX, Codego, Point Network, Gton Capital, and many more. This event took place in Dubai with more than 3000 incredibly happy attendees from 74 different nations.

6th Edition of the Blockchain Economy Summit

The World’s Leading Blockchain and Cryptocurrency Event’s 6th edition will take place in London, UK, on February 27 and 28, 2023. The highly anticipated event of the blockchain and cryptocurrency community is now prepared to welcome its supporters to the heart of the world’s financial capital.

The UK’s largest blockchain event, which will bring together top crypto industry players and experts to reimagine the future of finance, will draw attendees who are enthusiastic about the direction of the financial and fintech industries.

Speakers include:

Dr. Lisa Cameron, UK MP, Chair of the Crypto and Digital Asset APPG
Lennix Lai, Managing Director, Financial Market at OKX
Ilyas Vali, Co-Founder, rLoop
Pieter Vanhove, Program Manager Security & Governance Azure Database, Microsoft
Adrian, Founder, The Birb Nest
Delphine Forma, Senior Compliance Manager, BitMEX
Ben Armstrong, Founder, BitBoy Crypto
Daniel Antcliff, Head of Business Development and Operations, Gate.io
Eloisa Cadenas, Moderator, Cointelegraph Spain
Lex Sokolin, Head Economist, ConsenSys
Brad Yasar, CEO, EQIFi
Adam Andrews, Co-Founder, JustCubesNFT
Tom Busby, Co-Founder, Crypto Busy
Patrick Sweeney, CEO, DaVinci 3.0
Matthias Weissl, CEO & Co-Founder, Verum Capital
Jonathan Dunsmoor, Founder and Principal, Dunsmoor Law

Event Information:

Name: Blockchain Economy London Summit
Date: February 27 & 28, 2023
Venue: Magazine London, 11, Ordnance Crescent, London, UK.

According to Servi Aman, CEO of the Blockchain Economy Summit, “London has already demonstrated its commercial and financial usefulness. As the UK government moves towards a blockchain-based economy, the appeal of crypto firms will significantly rise. It’s a fantastic chance to highlight the advantages of cryptocurrency and blockchain technology”.

People all throughout the world, from commoners to experts, are watching the industry’s development as the future draws near.

The Blockchain Economy London Summit will focus primarily on use cases and widespread adoption of blockchain, cryptocurrencies, blockchain gaming, regulation of virtual assets/cryptocurrencies globally and in London/UK, Bitcoin, Web 3, NFT, Metaverse, De-Fi, mining, investment and trading of cryptocurrencies, adoption of blockchain technology in business and government, and many other topics.

Over 3,000 attendees from more than 65 nations are anticipated for the sixth edition of the Blockchain Economy Summit.

Learn more: https://www.worldmagzine.com/blockchain/the-most-prodigious-and-largest-blockchain-and-crypto-conference-hub-2023/

UFC Arbitrage pt 4 - 16% ROI

This weeks UFC card I've found some matches that we can arbitrage on to get a 16% return.

Last weeks card we made 21%

Pt 2 we made 9%

Pt 1 we made 18%

For those that don’t know arbitrage betting is laying bets on both sides of a match on two different books to guarantee a profit. This works when there is a discrepancy in the odds between the two betting sites.

The two books I’m using are punthub.io and stake.com. They’re both books that I use regularly and have never had trouble with. These two books accept Bitcoin and that's the currency I'm betting with.

Each fight we are betting with the same $1000 of btc, when a fight cashes you need to move some of the winnings to the other book to bet on the next match quickly. If you have the bankroll you could just bet all matches in one hit and relax for the day (obviously ROI changes then but the profit remains the same).

Fight one:

AJ Fletcher v Themba Gorimbo

Thumb Gorimbo @ 3.90 (+290) odds - Bet $105.55 on punthub.io

AJ Fletcher @ 1.39 (-256) odds - Bet $894.45 on stake.com

Total payout $1024.76

Profit = $24.76

Fight two:

Lina Lansberg v Mayra Bueno Silva

Lina Lansburg @ 5.70 (+470) odds - Bet $177.49 on punthub.io

Mayra Bueno Silva @ 1.23 (-435) odds - Bet $822.51 on stake.com

Total payout $1011.69

Profit = $11.69

Fight three:

Nazim Sadykhov v Evan Elder

Evan Elder @ 3.20 (+220) odds - Bet $327.73 on punthub.io

Nazim Sadykhov @ 1.56 (-179) - Bet $672.27 on stake.com

Total payout $1048.74

Profit = $48.74

Fight four:

Jim Miller v Alexander Hernandez

Alexander Hernandez @ 1.57 (-175) odds - Bet $656.46 on punthub.io

Jim Miller @ 3.00 (+200) odds - Bet $343.54 on stake.com

Total payout $1030.63

Profit $30.63

Fight five:

Jordan Wright v Zac Pauga

Jordan Wright @ 3.85 (+285) odds - Bet $262.45 on punthub.io

Zak Pauga @ 1.37 (-270) odds - Bet $737.55 on stake.com

Total payout $1010.44

Profit $10.44

Fight six:

Jessica Andrade v Erin Blanchfield

Erin Blanchfield @ 2.40 (+140) odds - Bet $423.08 on punthub.io

Jessica Andrade @ 1.76 (-132) odds - Bet $576.92 on stake.com

Total payout $1035.38

Profit $35.38

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Total profit from $1,000 = $161.64

ROI = 16.16%

💵

These odds could change so best to get on quick.

Use your profits to bet on whatever you like or cash it out. Either way it's basically free money.

Note:

If a draw happens then the bet is voided and we get refunded. Stake also charges a tx fee of around $1.50 to withdraw funds when using bitcoin, Punthub is free to withdraw from so factor this costs in if you like.

One more time I'm betting all my starting funds on the first match and then using the winnings to bet the next match and so on.

Cardano Rumor Rundown February 16, 2023

Hey Everyone!

Let’s go….

Newly Covered Today:

While I hate it as a metric, Cardano TVL is definitely looking up. https://defillama.com/chain/Cardano
Operation Chokepoint 2.0 continues. https://twitter.com/jespow/status/1625887480556974081
Here’s the rebuttal to the crypto custody rule from Hester Peirce. https://www.sec.gov/news/statement/peirce-statement-custody-021523
Interesting thread alleging who in the current administration is pushing this attack on crypto and why. https://twitter.com/ThinkingCrypto1/status/1625621477365096449
Binance expects to pay fines to settle U.S. investigations. https://www.wsj.com/articles/crypto-giant-binance-expects-to-pay-penalties-to-resolve-u-s-investigations-f1e3c9d2

Previously covered, but still interesting:

Anticipation is building for what’s coming in Cardano this year and next. https://twitter.com/conraddit/status/1618409005621342208
Charles dropped a video on the settlement layer vs. the computation layer. https://youtu.be/cvROzVEAxAM
Here’s a great thread on validator recovery in Cardano (Nakamoto consensus) vs. BFT (Solana, Aptos, Cosmos). https://twitter.com/hans_the_crypto/status/1619513935656542209
The value of Cardano’s true liquid staking is being massively slept on when liquidity-by-derivative staking arrangements are subject to depegging that has toppled even large crypto institutions in the past. https://twitter.com/jconorgrogan/status/1619782908826521600
Coti has dropped a new article describing Shen stakepool delegation & minting/burning minimums. https://twitter.com/COTInetwork/status/1619784132447567873
The Cardano Foundation has released a video on its core focus areas: 1) operational resilience, 2) education, and 3) adoption. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89d8t72C4Uk
Liqwid has deployed to the preview testnet. https://twitter.com/liqwidfinance/status/1620198616550998016
New messaging on crypto from the Biden Administration. Apparently, deeper ties between crypto and tradfi would be a “grave mistake”. https://www.whitehouse.gov/nec/briefing-room/2023/01/27/the-administrations-roadmap-to-mitigate-cryptocurrencies-risks/
This CoinDesk article from a former regulator makes the point that regulators think we already have regulatory clarity on crypto. What we really want are changes to the status quo. https://www.coindesk.com/consensus-magazine/2023/01/27/regulatory-clarity-financial-watchdogs-could-not-be-more-clear/
Coti has announced that the Djed minimums are to bootstrap liquidity at launch and may be reduced in the future. https://twitter.com/DjedStablecoin/status/1619962502418407426
Djed is now live. https://twitter.com/COTInetwork/status/1620392034124328960
SundaeSwap has announced their own Governance Portal. https://twitter.com/SundaeSwap/status/1620485846125412357
Given the history of AgeUSD type algorithmic stablecoins, some ecosystem members are expressing heavy doubts regarding the future position of Shen holders. https://twitter.com/zygomeb/status/1620427967179681794
Paima Studios has joined the Microsoft for Startups Program. https://twitter.com/PaimaStudios/status/1620335885131862017
It looks like FutureFest debuted some new features in their event on Feb. 1 with Fever Dream Friends and Skull Candy. https://twitter.com/futurefestxr/status/1620902250720927744
This is actually very big progress on the mainstream exposure front courtesy of Lex Fridman. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=beZdNf_mO1o
The UK Treasury has released its long awaited proposal for crypto regulation. Looks like they’re trying to be technology agnostic and focused on a principle of “same risk, same regulatory outcome”. https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/future-financial-services-regulatory-regime-for-cryptoassets
The Fed has hiked the federal funds rate by 0.25% bringing the target range to 4.5-4.75% This is a much smaller raise than the 0.50% in December and the four consecutive 0.75% increases just prior to that. https://www.cnbc.com/2023/02/01/fed-rate-decision-february-2023-quarter-point-hike.html
Here’s a great thread from Sooraj of This Week in Cardano on the Cardano Settlement Layer (CSL) vs. Cardano Computation Layer (CCL) and Cardano Sidechains including the new Cardano Sidechain Toolkit from IOG. https://twitter.com/Soorajksaju2/status/1620564722515861505
Here’s an interesting new Cardano statistics site. https://peerreview.money/
Liqwid has launched on Mainnet (Feb 2). https://twitter.com/liqwidfinance/status/1621129278518890497
Cardano is now arguably “DeFi feature complete” depending on your definition. https://twitter.com/cardano_whale/status/1621092500093145088
Plus….Liqwid has dark mode on Day 1. Let darkness reign! https://twitter.com/liqwidfinance/status/1620985328118157313
The World Mobile exhibit (fan built) in Carda Station looks pretty good. https://twitter.com/JoyeousT/status/1621225742435745793
World Mobile says it’s going to increase its Youtube efforts. This will be good for visibility of a very large Cardano RealFi project. https://twitter.com/WorldMobileTeam/status/1621191509218365444
Paul did a great interview with DC and Florian of Liqwid today (Feb 2). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K8F_f4rLipA
COTI has published a Djed launch recap. https://medium.com/cotinetwork/djed-launch-recap-b5ec293e20dd
Charlie Munger at 99 years old thinks we should ban Bitcoin. Also thinks the leader of the CCP is awesome. https://twitter.com/ODELL/status/1621151302838525952
There is now a proposal in the Liqwid governance forum to reduce LQ token emissions. https://twitter.com/liqwidfinance/status/1621351623887917056
ImperatorLang made a great thread about how to get started building on Cardano with no prior programming experience. https://twitter.com/ImperatorLang/status/1622283773759950849
Shocker! VCs are not going to do what’s best for crypto communities. https://twitter.com/Dogetoshi/status/1620602151830704129
Some are pointing to A16Z’s involvement in a rival bridge and calling it anti-competitive behavior. https://twitter.com/ChrisBlec/status/1622201701921964035
Apparently, there is now 30 million ADA locked in the Djed contract. Not bad in the first week. https://twitter.com/DjedStablecoin/status/1622298562628407298
Behold the Cardano media blackout in all its glory! https://twitter.com/cz_binance/status/1622528162499383299
At Messari you can see that our recent 24h active address count is 73k (as of Feb 6). https://messari.io/asset/cardano/metrics/all
Having watched Martin throughout the '90s and Bad Boys (about a million times), it's surreal & amazing to see that the content is interesting to a guy who entertained me so much. Thank you immensely! https://twitter.com/realmartymar/status/1622710686647287808
Binance dot com (but not binance dot US) has announced a temporary pause of US dollar & US bank transactions. https://twitter.com/binance/status/1622669988560609293
Some are linking this to issues with its banking partner, Signature. https://gizmodo.com/binance-bank-transfers-crypto-ftx-1850079035
Liquid has published a summary of what’s happening with LQ tokenomics and utility. https://liqwidfinance.substack.com/p/lq-tokenomics-and-utility
A very legitimate point about the stark contrast between ETH and Cardano on governance. Do you want a bunch of guys locked in a room for a week or transparent on-chain governance? https://twitter.com/StakeWithPride/status/1623064762610499586
If you held all of the Cardano Summit 2021 NFTs at the Virtua snapshot in November and still haven’t grabbed your free miner bot, there is a window open right now (Feb 7). https://twitter.com/landbots_virtua/status/1623005985324380181
Some in the traditional finance world already see where crypt is going. https://www.forbes.com/sites/ninabambysheva/2023/02/07/how-mastercard-goldman-sachs-and-other-tradfi-titans-are-using-blockchain-to-rewire-global-finance/
Here’s the one-tweet summary of that article if you run into the paywall. https://twitter.com/Blockworks_/status/1622966028299902977
Artifact Moon has released their beta 3d Moon Map with the ability to buy parcels from the map. Seems beautiful and responsive. https://twitter.com/ArtifctApp/status/1623045948690800640
Fed Chair Jerome Powell was interviewed at The Economic Club of Washington today. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkC4LuuxOg4
CoinDesk wrote an article about the activity in SundaeSwap governance. https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2023/02/08/cardano-dex-sundaeswap-floats-first-on-chain-governance-proposal/
Ladies and Gentlemen, allow me to present the king of all bad crypto policies. https://twitter.com/brian_armstrong/status/1623459203150131201
Unsurprisingly, the crypto crackdown that was long predicted for after the mid-term elections is also taking place via banking access (once again). https://twitter.com/AP_Abacus/status/1623346563069116417
Nice try, Coin Center! The real difference is between custodial staking and non-custodial staking. https://twitter.com/NeerajKA/status/1623469303545593856
Liquid protocol was temporarily paused via multisig today for a security issue fix. https://twitter.com/liqwidfinance/status/1623345076016406530
The UK has released a consultation paper on plans for the Digital Pound saying “it is likely” to be needed. https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1134845/CBDC_WEB_PDF_-_7_FEB_2023_1130am.pdf
Apparently, you can now invite the public to come check out your Cardano Island Crib. https://twitter.com/VirtuaMetaverse/status/1623365199032946697
Get ready for lots of Cardano essays. Twitter Blue people now have 4k characters. https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1623411400545632256
Looks like Kraken was the first staking target of the SEC. https://www.sec.gov/news/press-release/2023-25
Gensler released a video which very specifically described staking in terms of “escrow” or “if you transfer your tokens to a staking-as-a-service provider”. Neither of these is common in normal Cardano staking or delegating. But, it sounds a lot like the Ethereum staking world. https://twitter.com/GaryGensler/status/1623777842000539648
Rumors are that other exchanges & stablecoin providers will receive letters outlining charges soon. One posted rumor is mentioning Circle (USDC) & Paxos specifically. https://twitter.com/AP_Abacus/status/1623785788725944322
Here’s some wild speculation from one poster: if Circle agrees to limit/censor USDC in some way, it might lead to demands from ETH users to employ some kind of social slashing, which could cause a schism (and create fork potential) in that ecosystem. https://twitter.com/jessebabies/status/1615769704353734656
Charles posted a reply to Brian Armstrong’s staking tweet that savagely highlights the regulatory problem with Ethereum’s custodial/slashing based staking. https://twitter.com/IOHK_Charles/status/1623530227870896130
Charles also dropped a video explaining how (in the very worst scenario) Cardano staking could still operate via “contingent staking” even if SPOs were regulated. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7y2tvpHY5w
Now the SEC is going after Binance USD stablecoin issuer, Paxos. https://archive.ph/nrgeU
Jessie Powell (founder of Kraken) posted “I don’t think that any minor differences matter to the SEC, which views all forms of custodial staking as problematic.” If true, this is massively bad for Ethereum and confirms the advantage in Cardano. https://twitter.com/jespow/status/1623825932011155457
Here’s the actual complaint in the Kraken/SEC settlement. https://www.sec.gov/litigation/complaints/2023/comp-pr2023-25.pdf
Coinbase has released a comprehensive defense against their “Earn” staking program being classified as a security under the Howey Test and vowed to fight if the SEC goes after them. While I don’t find their reasoning to be bulletproof or extremely persuasive. The value is in the commitment to fight. We need this hard line in the sand right now. https://www.coinbase.com/blog/coinbases-staking-services-are-not-securities-and-heres-why
The community is predictably conflicted about the possibility of contingent staking. https://twitter.com/IOHK_Charles/status/1624937015824510976
Here’s a fantastic thread by Sooraj explaining the huge innovative leap forward provided by Ouroboros Genesis for dynamic participation in proof-of-stake systems and making Cardano more secure than Ethereum or Algorand. This is by far the best explanation I’ve seen. https://twitter.com/Soorajksaju2/status/1623748877152034818
FutureFest obviously understands the importance of proximity audio chat in virtual worlds. https://twitter.com/coc_space/status/1623759580017614848
Congratulations to MinSwap for its highest one day volume! https://twitter.com/MinswapDEX/status/1623322182670508034
And just like that….the legend of “Corando” was born. https://twitter.com/MinswapDEX/status/1623322182670508034
Looks like 3D assets are live for Cardano Island cribs. https://twitter.com/k45tor/status/1623370449869541387
There’s 30 million ADA now locked in the Djed contract (as of Feb 10). Update as of Feb 12: 31.5 million ADA. https://twitter.com/DjedStablecoin/status/1622298562628407298
The messaging against the energy use in Bitcoin is fully ramping up now courtesy of Bloomberg and the Harold and Kumar guy. Knowing that this would happen was a part of choosing proof-of-stake and Cardano for many of us. https://twitter.com/WalkerAmerica/status/1624847319928655874
Here’s the statement from Paxos on the SEC enforcement pressure. They say they will no longer issue new BUSD. https://twitter.com/PaxosGlobal/status/1625091554951004161
Apparently, Circle filed a complaint regarding Binance with NYFDS last year that led NYFDS to direct Paxos to sever their relationship with Binance. https://finance.yahoo.com/finance/news/stablecoin-issuer-circle-warned-york-184748322.html
Here’s Caitlin Long on why the Federal Reserve rejected the application of Custodia Bank and whether this is part of a larger attempt to strangle all of crypto by the current administration. https://twitter.com/YahooFinance/status/1625166752291119105
Charles dropped a new whiteboard (actually blackboard) video on contingent staking. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36WUIyk0T9g
Higher than expected US inflation numbers were released today (Feb 14) with the CPI up 6.4% from a year ago. https://www.cnbc.com/2023/02/14/consumer-price-index-january-2023-.html
Looks like the Cardano Island Condos will be opening tomorrow. https://twitter.com/VirtuaMetaverse/status/1625543057927028752
More rumors circulating that we’ve got a lot more crypto enforcement actions coming our way to “cut off crypto in all its” forms. https://twitter.com/CGasparino/status/1625475673073635330
This one is calling it a “midnight massacre” where Gensler will bring as many enforcement actions as possible before the new congress gets its bearings. https://twitter.com/EleanorTerrett/status/1623796900586573826
Today the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs held a hearing called “Crypto Crash: Why Financial System Safeguards are Needed for Digital Assets”. https://www.banking.senate.gov/hearings/crypto-crash-why-financial-system-safeguards-are-needed-for-digital-assets
To counter the Dragon’s depiction of crypto as basically just a money laundering tool, Chainalysis points out that only 0.24% of crypto volume is illicit transactions. https://twitter.com/clarkcoin1/status/1625641638906277888
Today was the mainnet SECP hardfork combinator event. https://twitter.com/InputOutputHK/status/1625615743470411784

~Army of Spies

where can we find out how much exactly is our claim (in dollar terms)?

Hi guys, I got very devastated by this celsius thing like the rest of you, and I was so frustrated by the non stop extension of whatever unimportant event by celsius or whatever ucc, so i stopped following the entire thing

so we now have a plan, that from what i know is 80 or 90% similar to simon's plan which was proposed months ago...nothing we can do, the "professionals" will do what they need to do to pocket as much money from our misery as possible, because capitalism.

so i have a few questions, would really appreciate it if anyone can help, and i think many of us would have similar quesitons:

1) how do we know how much is our claim in dollar term? i know how much crypto i deposited to the s hole, say 0.5btc/1btc whatever, but how do we value them in dollar term? if they picked a cutoff day at the bottom, then we bascially forced to claim our btc at 16K, if they do the cutoff now, at 25K, a lot of ppl would have more than 5K claim and cannot go for the quick option.

2) say at whatever value day they pick, lets say when bitcoin is at 20K and my total claim in USD term is 5k, then I can get back 3.5K in crypto? but our crypto could have been purchased and deposited into celsius at 60K? is that right? so we lost what is lost in price forever (-67% in price for example by realizing that "lost" and turn them to fiat USD) , and at best we can get back 70% of that price we are forced to sell at the very bottom of the market???

honestly how are any of us going to fully recover from this? am i understanding this correctly? i only managed to find a file before confirming my claim of amount in crypto, and it was correct, and then i dont think i had received anything from celsius at all, everything i heard comes from twitter and simon's channel...

Nerostr: Monero meets Nostr

TLDR; I made a Nostr pay-to-relay Monero-based platform. Source code here.

Hey all, Pluja here!

The Nostr protocol is pretty cool, and I think Monero + Nostr could be a match made in heaven. Below, I’ve added a small text about what is Nostr, and linked some interesting sources if you want to learn more.

Nostr lacks spam filtering and control, so the option that developers came up with is what is known as “Pay-to-relay”.

In order to avoid spam in your feed, you pay a small fee (~$1) to a relay. Your pubkey gets whitelisted in that relay, and then you are free to publish events there. Reading from such relays is free for everyone! This allows getting much more curated and clean results in the global page. In short, paid relays are a pretty neat thing for Nostr.

Personally, I was lacking Monero in this equation. Right now, 100% of the Nostr paid relays are being paid in Bitcoin (via LN). For this, I decided I would create a Monero-paid relay so the Monero community starts having a play in Nostr!

If you are curious, you can take a look at the paywall at https://xmr.usenostr.org, and you can add the relay to any Nostr client using this address: wss://xmr.usenostr.org. Hope you like the project!

Project source code and self-hosting guides: https://codeberg.org/pluja/nerostr

What is Nostr?

It is a lightweight, simple yet extensible open protocol that allows building truly censorship resistant and decentralized social media platforms:

There are two components: events and relays.
Every user is identified by a public key. Every post is signed. Clients validate these signatures.
Clients fetch data from relays of their choice and publish data to other relays of their choice. A relay doesn't talk to another relay, only directly to users.
For example, to "follow" someone, a user instructs their client to query the relays it knows for posts from that public key.
A "post" can contain any kind of structured data, but the most used ones are going to find their way into the standard so all clients and relays can handle them seamlessly.

Some sources to learn more: - https://usenostr.org - https://nostr.how

Things already built with Nostr:

Telegram-like channels: https://anigma.io
Pastebin: https://notebin.org/
Blog (Substack-like): https://blogstack.io/
Polls: https://votestr.com/
Reddit: https://nvote.co/
Twitter: https://snort.social
Instagram / Pinterest: https://nostrgram.co
Online Chess game: https://jesterui.github.io/

Update: added tldr