19 Apr
2
15 Oddest Places where Bitcoin is accepted
Nowadays you can buy almost everything with bitcoin.
As well as lots of e-commerce and famous worldwide brand that accept Bitcoin all around the world.
Recently we read about the news about Overstock, for example.
Also, you will find out there are several other shops where you can buy your favorite items with Bitcoin.
Below you can read the full list of the oddest places where bitcoin is accepted (for several of them you can buy a gift card for bitcoins on gyft.com).
TOP 15
- CVS – pharmacy shop
- Victoria’s Secret – Lingerie Shop
- BitcoinTravel – marketplace that provides accommodation, apartments and more
- Pembury Tavern – Pub in London
- Old Fitzroy – Pub in Sydney
- The Pink Cow – Restaurant in Tokyo
- Zynga – Mobile gaming
- OkCupid – Online dating site
- EZTV – Torrents TV shows provider
- PizzaForCoins.com – pay for your pizza
- Whole Foods – Organic food store
- Bitcoincoffee.com – Buy your favorite coffee online
- A Class Limousine – Newark (N.J.) Airport
- Fiverr.com – Freelance jobs for $5
- Seoclerks.com – SEO work
Recently we read about the news about Overstock, for example.
Also, you will find out there are several other shops where you can buy your favorite items with Bitcoin.
Multicurrencies Wallet
If you want to buy somenthing with Bitcoin you must have an online wallet, of course.
Open your free digital wallet here to store your cryptocurrencies in a safe place.
4 Apr
0
How to study with Bitcoin payments
Bitcoin at University
From now on students from all around the world can pay with bitcoin for their university – if they decide to move in Prague.
In fact, the CEVRO Institute University in Prague has announced that it will accept bitcoin among their allowed methods of payment.
Recently the Greek University of Nicosia, Draper University of California, the University of Cumbria and King’s College in the UK started to accept the cryptocurrency.
Why in Prague
The University rector Josef Šíma explained to Cointelegraph:
“As a first school in the Czech Republic we have opened unique Oxford style PPE (Philosophy, Politics, Economics) taught by a team of Czech and foreign professors in English and accepted many foreign students from US and Canada to India and China. One of them asked about the possibility to pay his tuition in bitcoin. And because we have hosted in past several lectures and conferences about this exciting new phenomenon and as a part of the PPE, and we will have courses dealing with alternative monetary schemes, free banking and cryptocurrencies, it was a really easy decision.”
The Prague University, in fact, was the first university to create the PPE class to allow its students to study the connections between Bitcoin and philosophy, politics and economy.
Fees in bitcoin will be calculated based on the current bitcoin price.
Bitcoin worldwide recognition
The acceptance of bitcoin by public institutions could be an important step for the recognition and the increase in popularity of Bitcoin.
“We do not want merely to teach about the beauty of markets, modern technologies and innovation, we want to be innovators ourselves! We want to actively use most modern technologies and offer our students new opportunities which technologies made available” Šíma explained.
Open your free digital wallet here to store your cryptocurrencies in a safe place.
16 Mar
0
Ethereum and Arcade City could kill Uber
A few days ago Don Tapscott suggested the idea that the blockchain could cause the death of services like Uber and Airbnb.
And it seems like this is truly happening, as a service called Arcade City has officially published a press release where they “declare war on Uber over fare cuts and plan to replace drivers with self-driving cars”.
Arcade City is an open marketplace where riders connect directly with drivers. It only works via a mobile app, available for both iOS and Android.
How it works
Let the company speaks for itself:
It works through the Ethereum Blockchain
Most importantly, Arcade City integrates the Ethereum blockchain.
During a recent interview with CoinTelegraph, Christopher David, founder at Arcade City, commented:
“the main deciding factor was that the vision of Ethereum aligns precisely with our own vision of peer-to-peer transportation and distributed logistics”.
Where can we move with Arcade City?
At the moment Arcade City is active in the US.
These are the states: Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, North Carolina, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, Virginia, Washington and Washington D.C.
Drivers are also available in Australia; while Mexico, Canada and Sweden will be launched next spring.
Open your free digital wallet here to store your cryptocurrencies in a safe place.
9 Mar
0
AirBnB wants to use the blockchain
Some months ago Don Tapscott, author of Blockchain Revolution book, explained how blockchain technology could replace services like Uber and AirBnB.
In fact, at the World Economic Forum (WEF) held in Switzerland, Tapscott suggested:
“Why do you need a 60 billion dollar corporation called Uber? You can have a real sharing economy which it would be a distributed application on the Blockchain […] and the same is for AirBnb”.
AirBnB replies…
Well, even if might not be because of Tapscott’s suggestions, AirBnb is now interested in using the blockchain technology for its service.
During a recent interview conducted by City A.M., in fact, Airbnb co-founder Nathan Blecharczyk annonunced the possible blockchain application among the company plans for this year.
These were Blecharczyk words:
“I think that, within the context of Airbnb, your reputation is everything, and I can see it being even more so in the future, whereby you might need a certain reputation order to have access to certain types of homes. But then the question is whether there’s a way to export that and allow access elsewhere to help other sharing economy models really flourish. We’re looking for all different kinds of signals to tell us whether someone is reputable, and I could certainly see some of these more novel types of signals being plugged into our engine”.
Open your free digital wallet here to store your cryptocurrencies in a safe place.
8 Mar
0
Ethereum used for Car Charging in Germany
A German power company, RWE, started a partnership with the Ethereum-based startup Slock.it, to develop proofs-of-concepts (POCs) using the Eth blockchain.
Germany supports green power
On May 2011 the German Environment Minister Norbert Rottgen announced the government’s decision to close all the nuclear power plants within 2022.
During an interview conducted by the BBC, in fact, Mr Rottgen commented:
“It’s definite. The latest end for the last three nuclear power plants is 2022. There will be no clause for revision.”
So, RWE, company who provides coal and nuclear energy infrastructures in Germany, has now decided to invest money in a new sustainable energy and in an Ethereum project to reduce expenses.
To do so, RWE created a working team to test the blockchain technology to aim at trim costs by lowering expenses related to energy transmission.
Car Charging with Smart Contracts
In a recent interview conducted by CoinDesk, RWE Carsten Stöcker commented on a possible application of the blockchain: electric car charging stations that use smart contracts to authenticate users and manage the billing process.
“We would like to solve the problems and really push electric vehicle deployment forward by looking into establishing a seamless and affordable electrical charging infrastructure.”
This project debuted at the Lift 2016 conference in Geneva, Switzerland and it will play out within 2017.
According the RWE project, customers will use charging stations by accepting a smart contract programmed on the Ethereum blockchain.
Through this system users will save money thanks to a payment that is connected to the consuption of electricity during the charging, instead of paying according to the time connected to the station.
“What’s really exciting here is that people are going to be able to use smart contracts to contract with a machine directly, rather than contracting with a human being or a corporation,” he said to CoinDesk.
Open your free digital wallet here to store your cryptocurrencies in a safe place.
3 Mar
0
Visa is working on a secure and scalable Blockchain
The American multinational financial services corporation Visa annonuced its “secure and scalable” blockchain project.
To do so, Visa opened a position for software engineers who have to “explore and develop technologies that are critical to the payments industry in the future”, as stated in the job advertisement.
Job Description
The researches will cover three key areas: data analytics, security and future of payments, so the team will work on develop a sort of proof-of-concept for the Visa blockchain network.
“Working on Future of Payment research at Visa is a unique opportunity at a time when the payments industry is undergoing a digital transformation with data as a critical differentiator. We offer you the opportunity to be at the center of innovation in the payments industry and unleash the power Visa technologies and massive data in innovating the future of payment concept.”
The perfect candidates must have programming experience, cryptography and “competency in data structures, algorithms and software design optimized for building highly distributed and parallelized systems”.
Visa partners with Chain
Some months ago, Chain raised $30 million in a new venture funding, drawing funds from some financial companies including Visa.
Chain is a a blockchain developer platform that serves an enterprise market.
The blockchain is no longer a choice
Previously, on December 2015, Visa Europe stated that “the blockchain is no longer a choice”.
In an interesting blog post entitled “Why 2015 was the year of payments”, in fact, they commented on financial technologies including the subject of digital currencies, by saying:
“2015 has turned blockchain into something the industry has to live with. It is no longer a choice anymore. Recent news speculating about the identity of its creator and the formalisation of virtual money as a commodity just makes it more real than ever before.”
To know more about Visa perspective on the blockchain, you can read the full post here.
Open your free digital wallet here to store your cryptocurrencies in a safe place.
2 Mar
0
ISITC Survey Reveals Financial Industry focus on the Blockchain
On March 1st, 2016, ISITC, the International Securities Association for Institutional Trade Communication, published the results of its annual survey about the financial services progress which it gives also a specific forecast on how the industry will be during the current year.
This annual survey polled 45 members who work in several sectors within the financial industries.
The survey revealed that 62% of companies want to invest in technology with a lot of interest in blockchain and cybersecurity technology and 55% of those companies are studying or already developing solutions based on blockchain technology.
Also 74% of those companies have concrete plans to invest in cybersecurity by the end of 2016/17, up from 57% in the 2015 survey.
Interesting facts about the 2016 survey
This annual survey also revealed:
- 82% anticipate no operational issues related to the move to a T+2 settlement cycle in 2017
- 80% of firms see cost reduction as the biggest challenge for them in 2016/17
- 63% of firms measure operations success on the ability to reduce risk and cost
- 62% of firms named investment of infrastructure an area of operational focus in 2016
A word from the experts…
Jeff Zoller, Chair of ISITC and Vice President at T. Rowe Price commented:
“New and emerging technologies have taken the financial services industry by storm. The results of our annual member survey confirm this sentiment, as firms plan increased investment in blockchain and cybersecurity technologies, as a method for combating long-term risk and cost. We look forward to continuing the dialogue around the challenges and opportunities these disruptive technologies bring to the industry at our March event in Boston”.
In addition, according to Nigel Solkhon, CEO of ISITC Europe, the current interest and investment in the blockchain among financial companies will have a significant impact within the next 18 months.
The ISITC 22nd Annual Industry Forum and Vendor Show will be held March 20-23, 2016 at the Renaissance Boston Waterfront Hotel.
Open your free digital wallet here to store your cryptocurrencies in a safe place.
21 Feb
0
Helperbit wins the Blockchain startup competition in Amsterdam
On February 18th Helperbit won the blockchain startup competition held at the d10e in Amsterdam.
Helperbit is a “natural disaster management platform” that aims at helping stricken people with a simple peer-to-peer donation system.
Blockchain + GIS
Obviously this is possible thanks to the blockchain technology that allows a smart and fast transfer of values. Also, thanks to the interaction between the blockchain and the geographic information system (GIS) Helperbit can store all the information concerning the effects of the natural disasters.
The platform will be active in case of earthquakes, but also it will be extended to all the different natural disasters, such as hurricanes, fires and floods.
Blockchain Space
Again on February 18th, it was held the inauguration of the Blockchain Space, a “focused startup accelerator for talented visionaries creating disruptive solutions to real-world problems using blockchain technology”.
Among their selected startups, obviously there is Helperbit, who presented its project during the event held in Barcelona.
Helperbit team members are: Vincenzo Agui, Davide Menegaldo, Guido Baroncini Turricchia, Davide Gessa, Roberto Tudini, Gianluca Carbone and Luigi Angotzi.
Open your free digital wallet here to store your cryptocurrencies in a safe place.
19 Feb
1
Burger King accepts bitcoin
The well-known fast food company, Burger King, has started to accept bitcoin among its allowed payment methods, but only in Arnhem, Netherlands.
Located in the city center of Arnhem, this Burger King venue will accept bitcoin and anyone that will pay with in this way will receive a second burger (a whopper) for free.
Another interesting news is that Burger King will host bitcoin meetups to increase the number of people who know what bitcoin is.
But, why Arnhem?
Since the opening of the Arnhem Bitcoinstad (also known as Arnhem Bitcoincity), the number of merchants who decided to accept bitcoin increased exponentially, and now Arnhem has 100 shops (including malls, coffee shops and restaurants) where people can spend their cryptocurrency.
In fact, yesterday (February 18th) Arnhem Bitcoinstad stated:
“The project Arnhem Bitcoincity has reached a new milestone: There are now 100 venues that accept Bitcoin in Arnhem. The Burger King in the city center is the latest to join the project. For Bitcoin enthusiasts Arnhem is like heaven as you can practically pay everything with bitcoins.”
Growing bitcoin enthusiasm
Bitcoin enthusiasm is growing fast in Arnhem and merchants have started to keep bitcoin instead of converting them immediately.
“When this project started, all merchants converted their bitcoins to euros immediately through the payment processor BitKassa, but a growing number of merchants now keep their bitcoins, since they can pay some of their supplies with bitcoins themselves at other merchants who accept Bitcoin as well. For instance a restaurant owner who pays for his bread at a bakery that also accepts bitcoins,” Arnhem Bitcoinstad team commented.
Life on Bitcoin
Maybe you have watched the documentary Life on Bitcoin, or maybe not, but all around the world there are a lot of cities where you can at least survive using bitcoin as the only payment method.
In fact, Life on Bitcoin shows how a young married couple could live and travel everywhere with payments only in bitcoin.
Of course, there is still a very long way to go but this couple has proved that it is already possible to conduct a normal life with the crypthocurrency.
For about 100 days, Austin and Beccy Craig decided to eliminate from their life credit cards and cash, relying only on bitcoin and they found several merchants who decided to accept bitcoin in exchange for meals and ground transports.
Life on Bitcoin has also inspired another travel: the one by Felix Weis, a 27 years old programmer who started to live for a whole year using only bitcoin. Felix writes about his adventures on his blog and he also shooted a documentary.
Where to live using bitcoin: CoinMap and BitMap
There are a lot of startups who decided to create platforms where you can read about all the restaurants and shops who accept bitcoin.
One of this is CoinMap, who reports more than 7000 shops all around the world. It is a web platform so you can use it from your laptop.
But, if you prefer a mobile app instead, you can download BitMap, available for IOS or Bitcoin Map for Android.
About the author: Amelia Tomasicchio is a writer and a journalist of Bitcoin-related news and articles. She started writing about Bitcoin in 2014 and she graduated in Rome with an essay about movie industry related to Bitcoin.
Open your free digital wallet here to store your cryptocurrencies in a safe place.
18 Feb
0
How the blockchain can improve the Australian voting system
Flux Party is a new Australian political party that wants to renovate the voting system by using the blockchain.
In fact, they have proposed a new token-based political system based on the Bitcoin technology.
The Flux Party has more than 500 members and its objective is to have six senators on ballots during the next election that Australia will hold in September/October.
How it works
A special feature of this party is that its members are free of its own policies and they can vote for or against a legislation at the bidding of token holders.
“If they didn’t have to be senators, if they could just be software or robots they would be, because their only purpose is to do what the people want them to do”, commented the Flux Party co-founder Max Kaye.
So the bitcoin token could be used by the Flux members for voting but also for trading with other people.
Too old for the Internet era
Australian Flux party is clearly suggesting that the current democratic system is too old for the Internet age and for this reason they want to redistribute the political power by using Bitcoin.
Their own website states: “Our current system doesn’t work well enough; politics gets in the way of policy. Flux is an incremental upgrade to democracy designed to redistribute political power, maximise participation, remove bad policy, and empower voters.”
The Flux Party system will allow voters to be able to set their votes to experts on these issues.
A revolutionary but not so new idea
The idea of a blockchain-based voting system is very revolutionary and it is not developed only by the Fluxa Party.
In fact, Nasdaq and the Bitcoin Foundation have worked both on their own voting systems throught the blockchain technology.
About the author: Amelia Tomasicchio is a writer and a journalist of Bitcoin-related news and articles. She started writing about Bitcoin in 2014 and she graduated in Rome with an essay about movie industry related to Bitcoin.
Open your free digital wallet here to store your cryptocurrencies in a safe place.
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