A US senator is asking the federal government to take this remarkable step: completely ban Bitcoin.
Joe Manchin, a Democratic senator representing West Virginia, sent a letter Wednesday to the Treasury Department, the Federal Reserve, and other regulators characterizing the virtual currency as encouraging “illicit activity” as well as being “highly unstable and disruptive to our economy.”
The brothers, known for their legal battle over the creation of Facebook (FB, Fortune 500), are going to space and paying for it with Bitcoins. Take that, Mark Zuckerberg.
The twins bought tickets, valued at $250,000 each, for a ride to space with Virgin Galactic. That’s about 375 Bitcoins, at Wednesday’s price.
They think of their purchase “as seed capital” supporting new technologies they have high hopes for.
Matthew Herper — Forbes
A linguistic analysis done at Forbes’ request indicates that Newsweek fingered the wrong man when it tried to unmask the creator of the digital currency, Bitcoin.
Bitcoin allows users to conduct transactions with no or low fees and a relative degree of privacy. There is close to $8 billion of the currency on the Internet. But the identity of its creator (or creators), who went by the name Satoshi Nakamoto, has remained shrouded in mystery.
Despite the collapse of Bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox, digital currencies are one of the fastest growing, disruptive technologies of the past several decades.
But the only places in the United States that are speaking up about Bitcoin are those who want to add additional layers of regulations and red tape.
Remarkably, it’s the two states that would benefit most from this innovation and from greater adoption of Bitcoin: the nation’s financial center (New York) and the hub of innovation (California).
New York’s top financial cop, Benjamin Lawsky, has railed against Bitcoin because of concerns about usage by criminals. He said that it is better to stop all possible money laundering before one knows it really exists than to let “1,000 flowers bloom on the innovation side.”
That line was immediately mocked by Bitcoin fans with analogies like “it’s better to let 500 car companies die than to let one car be used in a getaway”.
Brian Armstrong — TechCrunch
Mt.Gox is gone. The one-time biggest Bitcoin exchange closed its doors this week and filed for bankruptcy this morning. Questions about the future of Bitcoin have once again been up-leveled to the headlines of nearly every major media outlet.
Over the past few weeks, we’ve seen a string of issues in the Bitcoin space, from the transaction malleability bug that ultimately closed Mt.Gox’s doors to a corresponding distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack that delayed transfers on multiple exchanges and services. These attacks, along with recent phishing scams and money-laundering arrests, have cast doubt on the Bitcoin space and caused consumer panic — which is fair.
But what hasn’t been communicated well is how those who are truly invested in the future of Bitcoin remain totally confident, because with every attack, breach, and arrest, Bitcoin is getting stronger and proving to consumers and businesses it is not going away.
Here is what is not being said about Bitcoin that should be.
By Phil Wahba — Reuters
(Reuters) — Robocoin said on Tuesday that later this month it will install the first automated teller machines in the United States that let users buy and sell bitcoin, the latest step into the mainstream for the digital currency.
The kiosks, to be installed in Seattle, and Austin, Texas, are similar to ATMs but have scanners to read government-issued identification such as a driver’s license or a passport to confirm users’ identities.
The ATMs will allow people to swap bitcoin for cash, or deposit cash to buy more bitcoin by transferring funds to or from a virtual wallet on their smartphones.
By Andrew Couts - Digital Trends
Bitcoin vending machine manufacturer Lamassu announced today the launch of the first known Bitcoin sales kiosk operating in the United States. The Bitcoin Machine, which allows users to quickly buy Bitcoin with US dollars or other currencies, is permanently located at the Imbibe Nob Hill cigar bar in Albuquerque, New Mexico, near the University of New Mexico.
Unlike other Bitcoin ATM models, the Bitcoin Machine only allows transactions in one direction: Scan your Bitcoin address QR code into the machine, insert money, and the device transfers the proper amount of Bitcoin into your digital wallet.
Written By: Cameron Scott — Singularity Hub
We’re tempted to file this one under “the more things change, the more they stay the same.” A wristband, called Nymi, that taps the user’s heartbeat as a biometric marker, will also double as a bitcoin wallet.
“The wallet is physically stored on the Nymi,” Yevgeniy Vahlis, the manufacturer’s chief cyrptographer, said in a release.
Startup Bitcoin Kinetics, which aims to create hardware that can allow vending machines to accept bitcoin, is offering 10 billion shares of common stock on the website Cryptostocks. This isn’t your typical IPO—Cryptostocks, where Bitcoin Kinetics will be “listed,” describes itself as both a crowd funding platform and a place to “buy shares… and earn dividends.” It’s not clear what the legal status of Cryptostocks is, since it’s not licensed or registered as an exchange. One commenter called Cryptostocks “another of the play-pretend Bitcoin financial exchanges.” (We reached out to Cryptostocks for comment, and will update this when we hear back from them.)
By Zach Schonfeld — Newsweek
Spurred by a host of recent converts to the peer-to-peer digital currency, Newsweek has become the first magazine to accept Bitcoin PR pitches. The digital currency’s visibility in popular retailers remains modest, but its presence in our email inboxes has frankly never been higher.
If the volume of recent press releases is any indication, Newsweek will be shortly accompanied by the first Indian e-Commerce store, Swiss dentist, HFT service provider, and public university to embrace the currency form.