Bitcoins in Kreuzberg
Der Guardian über Bitcoins im Kreuzberger Graefekiez, wo derzeit die höchste Dichte von RealWorld-Shops die digitale Währung annehmen.
These […] tradespeople are among around a dozen in the Graefekiez, a cosy neighbourhood established in the 19th century in the southern Berlin district of Kreuzberg, which currently boasts the highest density of businesses accepting the currency in the world. Its growing list of Bitcoin establishments includes a restaurant, a printing shop, a bar and boutique.
Bitcoin: the Berlin streets where you can shop with virtual money
Apple Store Afghanistan
Schönes Posting auf Quartz über den ersten Apple Store in Kabul, Afghanistan.
Mohammed Nasery, the store’s sales manager, told Quartz he sells the 16GB iPhone 5 for $700, about $50 more than its price in America. The merchandise comes from Dubai, where the 16GB iPhone 5 retails for 2599 dirhams (about $710). With discounts for buying in bulk, he estimates that margins vary from $10 to $50 across products. […]
“It’s very trendy to own an iPhone or an iPad. These young Afghans work around foreigners who have iPods and Macs and iPads, and they want them too,” Rahimi told students from USC Annenberg in an interview last year. “If you see a woman using an iPhone, even if she’s wearing the hijab you know she’s got money and that she wants people to notice her. You don’t really look twice if she’s on a Nokia, you know?”
The unofficial Apple store in Afghanistan
Newspaper Downfall-Photography
Großartige Fotoserie von Will Steacy über die schweren Zeiten des Philadelphia Inquirer, der 2009 Bankrott anmeldete und aus einem riesigen Zeitungs-Komplex namens Tower of Truth in ein einziges Stockwerk in einem Bürogebäude umziehen musste. Von Wired:
The extreme downsizing of the Philadelphia Inquirer is a stand-in for what we know has been happening to newspapers across the country for the last decade. Since its bankruptcy filing in 2009 it has moved from the 526,000-square-foot Tower of Truth to a single floor in an office building.
Photographer Will Steacy has been documenting these financially difficult years for the paper, giving a unique perspective on the national downsizing and closures that are easily dismissed as just numbers.
“I wanted to create a portrait that showed the reality,” says Steacy, whose father worked at the Inquirer for 29 years.
Philly Inquirer’s Hard Years Are Microcosm of Newspapers’ Long Goodbye
Economics of Ice & Fire
Großartige Podcast-Serie auf Slate von Matthew Yglesias über die Wirtschaft in Game Of Thrones. Überhaupt: Habt Ihr die Folge vom Wochenende gesehen? Mother of Dragons, fuck yeah! Jedenfalls: Wirtschaft, Drachen und Gold… die dritte Folge des Podcasts bezieht sich halbwegs direkt auf die letzte Folge und den Markt der Drachen. Großartig!
Economics of Ice & Fire I: House Tyrell Is Richer Than House Lannister: „As you watch members of House Lannister and House Tyrell scheme for control over King’s Landing here’s something to keep in mind. The Westeroi conventional wisdom that that the Lannisters are the richest house in the Seven Kingdoms is dead wrong. House Tyrell is number one in all the ways that count.“
Economics of Ice & Fire II: The Lannisters’ Subprime Lending: „A later post will explain why it’s no surprise that the agriculturally oriented Reach supports a larger city than the mining-based Westerlands. But for now let’s consider the other objection, that in addition to its gold mines, House Lannister possesses valuable assets in the form of debts incurred by the Iron Throne.“
Economics of Ice and Fire, Part 3: The Market for Dragons:
There are very few dragon sales happening, so the price of dragons hinges entirely on the idiosyncratic decision-making leading up to a single transaction. Nobody knows what price a dragon would fetch if Daenerys tried to offer it up at a widely publicized auction. What we know (from the books where the transaction is spelled out in more detail) is that Kraznys Mo Nakloz is willing to trade 1,000 Unsullied for the goods carried by the Vhagar, the Meraxes, and the Balerion and to trade 1,000 more for the three ships themselves. But for her plan to work, Daenerys needs to buy all 8,600 Unsullied. Krazynys agrees to sell the whole lot for the three ships, their contents, and a single dragon. Hence a dragon is worth 6,600 Unsullied, a ship is worth 333 Unsullied, and thus a dragon is worth approximately 20 ships.
Spoilers are involved in the details, but from the books we know that Sallador San has at least 29 ships left after the Battle of Blackwater, so in pure financial terms, three dragons does not seem to make House Targaryen all that rich compared to the great houses of Westeros. Certainly, though, it’s valuable property.
Data Visualizing the Identity of Satoshi Nakamoto
Spannendes Posting auf Bitslog, wo man die ersten Bitcoins visualisiert hat. Ich steig’ selbst nicht ganz durch, aber anscheinend lässt sich anhand dieses Verfahrens, wenn die Identität auch nur einer Bitcoin-Transaktion rauskommt, die Identität von Bitcoin-Erschaffer Satoshi Nakamoto quasi per Reverse Engineering herausfinden. Ich tendiere bei Bitcoins mittlerweile zu „Größtes Netz-Wirtschafts-Kunstprojekt aller Zeiten“, wer weiß, was da am Ende bei rauskommt…
In the following graphs each dot is the creation of 50 BTC. I have only analyzed and printed graphs from block 0 upto block 36288. […] I can’t assure with 100% certainty that the all the black dots are owned by Satoshi, but almost all are owned by a single entity, and that entity began mining right from block 1, and with the same performance as the genesis block. It can be identified by constant slope segments that occasionally restart. Also this entity is the only entity that has shown complete trust in Bitcoin, since it hasn’t spend any coins (as last as the eye can see). I estimate at eyesight that Satoshi fortune is around 1M Bitcoins, or 100M USD at current exchange rate.[…]
One of the consequences of these graph is that if the real name of the sender of a single transaction belonging to the entity is identified, then Satoshi mystery identity will be revealed. I bet that this will happen in the days following this post.
The Well Deserved Fortune of Satoshi Nakamoto, Bitcoin creator, Visionary and Genius (via Adafruit)
Zimbabwe may make BitCoins official national currency:
Ist mir eigentlich noch zu gerüchtig für’s Blog und ich finde auch keine weitere Quelle, aber ich klebe mir den Link schonmal als Vierzeiler hier rein: Zimbabwe makes history. BitCoins now official national currency: „This may signal adoption by several other Africa nations throughout central and south Africa.“
Monster-Hardware mining Bitcoins
Die Rechenpower, die derzeit für Bitcoin-Mining draufgeht, verschlingt derzeit rund 982 Megawatt – mehr oder weniger ein halber Large Hadron Collider. Gizmodo hat sich die Mining-Hardware angesehen und mal abgesehen davon, dass Bitcoins nicht so richtig umweltverträglich sind: Das hier ist purer Hardware-Porn.
An average CPU can run four instructions per clock cycle, and offer a few thousand to a few million hashes per second. This was never exactly great, but a few years ago it was enough for a low-rent mining operation. But then miners discovered that they could use their GPU instead, which can 3,200 instructions per cycle. […]
And because mining is a repetitive task better suited to muscle than smarts, miners suddenly found themselves with an 800-fold increase in hashing power on their hands. Before long, the number of GPU mining rigs—combined with Bitcoin’s regulatory difficulties—made massive amounts of power not just an advantage, but table stakes.
The jump from GPU rigs to FPGAs didn’t bring on a power-increase of multiple orders of magnitude, in the way the jump from CPU to GPU had. It did, however, provide a modest power bump, and actually reduced the amount of electricity necessary to get competitive hash-rates. But perhaps most importantly, FPGAs servered as a final vaulting point into the next—and final—massive revolution in Bitcoin machinery: truly specialized hardware.
Flashgame: Tax Evaders
Hübsches Flashgame: Tax Evaders, Steuer hinterziehende Firmen und Konzerne und Offshore-Bankster als Space Invaders inklusive Vorstellung der einzelnen Business-Aliens mit weiterführenden Links und Schnickschnack. Und: Ein kleines Flashgame ist jetzt bereits aufklärerisch allemal besser, als #Offshoreleaks und der „größte Datenleak der Geschichte“, für den sich Holzmedienjournalisten grade feiern lassen und wo genau nichts passiert. Ich übertreibe natürlich, aber bislang war da vor allem viel heiße Luft zu lesen, leider. Jedenfalls: Tax Evaders, nettes Flashgame.
Incredibly, some of the wealthiest, most powerful corporations pay less than you or I do in taxes. While the rest of us pay our fair share, these corporate Tax Evaders are stealing nearly $100 Billion a year out of our national economy – every year. Meanwhile, drastic cuts to our public services are taking place, threatening social security, health care, education, and much more.
It’s time to stop talking about cuts, and start talking about the corporations who have changed the laws in order to avoid paying their fair share. It’s time to make them pay. Join us in shining a light on corporate Tax Evaders.
Tax Evaders (via Free Indiegames)
OffshoreLeaks: Journalism crashes Banksters Paradise
Das ist doch mal was: Ein Netzwerk aus Journalisten hat anonym rund 2,5 Millionen Dokumente über globale Steueroasen erhalten, jede Menge Daten zu Unternehmen, die Briefkastenfirmen in der Karibik betreiben und Prominente Steuerpreller. Die Recherchen kommen unter anderem vom Guardian, der Washington Post und in Deutschland von der Süddeutschen, das Projekt wurde koordiniert vom washingtoner International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. Der OffshoreLeak ist umfassender als die Cables von Wikileaks, dürfte in den kommenden Wochen für einige Aufregung sorgen, dabei jede Menge dreckiger Wäsche bei Banken und Konzernen ans Licht bringen und bei den Businesskaspern und ihren Bankster-Komplizen für einige Panik sorgen. Bravo!
A cache of 2.5 million files has cracked open the secrets of more than 120,000 offshore companies and trusts, exposing hidden dealings of politicians, con men and the mega-rich the world over. The secret records obtained by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists lay bare the names behind covert companies and private trusts in the British Virgin Islands, the Cook Islands and other offshore hideaways.
They include American doctors and dentists and middle-class Greek villagers as well as families and associates of long-time despots, Wall Street swindlers, Eastern European and Indonesian billionaires, Russian corporate executives, international arms dealers and a sham-director-fronted company that the European Union has labeled as a cog in Iran’s nuclear-development program.
The leaked files provide facts and figures — cash transfers, incorporation dates, links between companies and individuals — that illustrate how offshore financial secrecy has spread aggressively around the globe, allowing the wealthy and the well-connected to dodge taxes and fueling corruption and economic woes in rich and poor nations alike.
ICIJ: SECRECY FOR SALE: INSIDE THE GLOBAL OFFSHORE MONEY MAZE
SZ: OffshoreLeaks – Steuerparadies in Bedrängnis, hier der SZ-RSS-Feed zu den Offshore-Leaks: rss.sueddeutsche.de/rss/Thema/OffshoreLeaks
Guardian: Identities of the rich who hide cash offshore
Listen To Bitcoin:
Vertonte Echtzeitdaten der Bitcoin-Exchange MTGox: „Realtime Bitcoin transaction and trade visualizer.“
Tresor in Tokyo for Rent
Im Tresor feiern kann jeder, in einem Tresor leben nicht. In Tokyo vermieten sie grade einen Tresor als Wohnraum, kostet mit 2200 Dollar gar nicht so viel – zumindest hätte ich mit mehr gerechnet.
As luck would have it a chance to rent your very own bank vault has popped up as a listing on the Real Tokyo Estate website. […] It’s a spacious safe with 26.11 m2 of floor space including the lobby and safe with three chambers. The safe door is the real deal with one of those spinning handles and is dozens of centimeters thick. […]
The vault is located on the basement floor of a building which used to hold an undisclosed bank back in 1991. If I rented it I would just try to crack into it every day. Unfortunately, the rent is exorbitantly set at 207,375 yen (US$2,200), probably to keep nudnicks like me out.
Bank Vault for Rent in Tokyo, Perfect for Aspiring Robbers, 元銀行の本気の金庫、あります
Bitcoin Rave-Anthem
Bitcoins haben in den letzten Wochen nicht nur die Millarde geknackt und sind jetzt mehr wert, als die Währungen 20 souveräner Staaten, jetzt haben’se auch noch ein Rave-Anthem inklusive Musikvideo.
An anonymous bitcoin user today released an anthem of sorts for the alternative currency that’s totally weird, kind of catchy, and slightly inspiring—in other words, a lot like bitcoin itself. The song, set to the tune of Swedish House Mafia’s radio hit “Don’t You Worry Child,” uses the crisis in Cyprus as a rallying cry:
Just when the Cypriots were losing faith
That’s when I learned about the block chain
I still remember how it all changed
Satoshi said,
Don’t you worry, don’t you worry, child
Bitcoin has got a plan for you
Don’t you worry, don’t you worry now
Quartz: The psychology of bitcoin captured in one bizarre, catchy Cypriot anthem
Molly Crabapples Shell Game
Die gute Frau Molly Crabapple hatte sich vor fast genau einem Jahr eine Serie von Gemälden samt Ausstellung um Finanzkrise, Bankster und korrupte Exceltabellenpolitiker namens „Shell Game“ per Kickstarter finanzieren lassen. Die Arbeiten sind jetzt fertig, die Ausstellung wird ab Mitte April in New York gezeigt und Frau Crabapple hat einen großen Teil der Bilder online gestellt.
Shell Game is comprised of nine, 6′x4′ paintings and one 3’x3’ painting about the revolutions and crises of 2011 (six of which have already been sold to collectors) including the mortgage bubble, the Greek anti-austerity protests, and Occupy Wall Street, filtered them through the artist’s distinctive lens of surrealism, satire, and symbolic animals and, for eight of nine paintings, informed by travel to the settings, including Spain, Greece, and the United Kingdom, during which she interviewed activists for her reported illustrated journalism pieces and participated in demonstrations. For Tunisia, she interviewed members of Nawaat, the dissident blogger collective, via Skype. Nine preliminary watercolors, all sold, will also be exhibited. Molly Crabapple will host a public opening reception on Sunday, April 14, from 7-10pm.
“It was the year when everyone sat down in the main squares of their cities and said the old machine is broken,” observes Crabapple. “2011 freed me to do the best work of my career, and it was amazing to see my protest art wheat-pasted on walls and carried by activists around the world.”
Trading Sign Language explained: Blowjobs, Joints and Hitlers Mustache
Auf Trading Pit History erklärt man unter anderem die Zeichensprache auf dem Börsenparkett, von Heroin über Blowjobs und Wichsern bis Joints und Cunnilingus ist alles dabei. Und natürlich Hitlers Schnurrbart. Die Beispiele oben von links nach rechts, oben nach unten:
Deutsche Bank: „Hitler’s mustache“ (2)
Conti (Continental IL): „Creates the shape of a vagina and Conti sounds similar to cunt.“
Conti (Continental IL) 2: „Index and middle fingers opened up downward, tongue licking air between; mimicking cunnilingus. As with version 1 of Conti, the firm name sounds simliar to cunt. Version 2 is a more degenerate usage than version 1.“
IBJ: „Tongue poking side of cheek while other fisted hand motions back and forth. Use of last two letters of firm’s abbreviation for BJ or blowjob. Full name of firm is Industrial Bank of Japan.“
Chemical Bank: „Injecting heroin.“
Babcock & Brown: „Hand moving back and forth horizontally just slightly below waist. Use of the cock in the firm’s name to indicate masturbation/ wanking motion.“
REFCO: „Smoking a joint of reefer.“
