{"id":3368,"date":"2017-12-27T14:20:33","date_gmt":"2017-12-27T14:20:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/davidgerard.co.uk\/blockchain\/?p=3368"},"modified":"2017-12-28T08:45:46","modified_gmt":"2017-12-28T08:45:46","slug":"news-ibm-blockchain-sergei-mavrodi-carders-hate-bitcoin-blockchain-use-cases-market-manipulations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/davidgerard.co.uk\/blockchain\/2017\/12\/27\/news-ibm-blockchain-sergei-mavrodi-carders-hate-bitcoin-blockchain-use-cases-market-manipulations\/","title":{"rendered":"News: IBM Blockchain, Sergei Mavrodi, carders hate Bitcoin, blockchain use cases, market manipulations"},"content":{"rendered":"<ul>\n<li>This Bloomberg article on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/articles\/2017-12-26\/blockchain-pumping-new-life-into-old-school-companies-like-ibm\">IBM&#8217;s Blockchain(tm) efforts<\/a> is a complete puff piece, but it does underscore IBM&#8217;s purpose in selling you Blockchain(tm) \u2014 to sell other stuff to you. (I&#8217;ve also been told in detail about how hard Microsoft&#8217;s Azure Blockchain salespeople try to sell you Sharepoint.) It is <em>not philosophically impossible<\/em> that there will one day be an IBM Blockchain(tm) instance that is profitable to anyone other than IBM &#8230;<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Cryptocurrency isn&#8217;t a Ponzi! It&#8217;s a <em>platform<\/em> for Ponzis. <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Sergei_Mavrodi\">Sergei Mavrodi<\/a>, perpetrator of the <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/MMM_(Ponzi_scheme_company)\">MMM Ponzi<\/a> that <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/MMM_Global\">helped sustain<\/a> Bitcoin&#8217;s price in 2015, is <a href=\"https:\/\/siliconangle.com\/blog\/2017\/12\/26\/infamous-mmm-global-scam-operator-sergei-mavrodi-launching-cryptocurrency\/\">launching his own &#8220;cryptocurrency&#8221;<\/a> \u2014 actually an Ethereum token. \u201cThe time for change is now! We can do a lot!! Financial apocalypse is inevitable.\u201d Certainly for anyone who signs up for this.<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>First Bitcoin lost the drug dealers. <a href=\"https:\/\/krebsonsecurity.com\/2017\/12\/skyrocketing-bitcoin-fees-hit-carders-in-wallet\/\">Now it&#8217;s losing the credit card thieves.<\/a><\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/hackernoon.com\/ten-years-in-nobody-has-come-up-with-a-use-case-for-blockchain-ee98c180100\">Ten years in, nobody has come up with a use for blockchain<\/a>. This article has two inaccuracies: it&#8217;s only been eight years, and transactions haven&#8217;t been four cents since before the transaction clog started in 2015. Apart from that, it&#8217;s absolutely spot-on. &#8220;In conversations with bitcoin entrepreneurs and investors and consultants, there was often a lack of knowledge or even interest in how the jobs were being done today or what the value to the end user was.&#8221; Eight years in, it&#8217;s entirely reasonable to ask: &#8220;where&#8217;s the beef?&#8221;<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>From &#8220;Bitfinexed&#8221;: <a href=\"https:\/\/medium.com\/@bitfinexed\/meet-picasso-the-painter-on-gdax-c478ff8f50e5\">Meet \u2018Picasso\u2019, the Painter on GDAX<\/a>. \u201cThe name \u2018Picasso\u2019 is because he\u2019s essentially, painting the charts for Bitcoin however he damn well pleases. This is why I believe TA is pointless with Bitcoin, and crypto-currencies in general.\u201d<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>&#8220;Bitfinexed&#8221; also links <a href=\"http:\/\/jamescrypto.com\/the-christmas-crypto-correction-what-really-happened\/\">this claimed narrative<\/a> of the most recent Bitcoin bubble and crash. &#8220;The 12 million dollar and 13 million dollar spoofs are how you tell the bottom. The entire market is a single group of traders, and it dies with them.&#8221; The price of cryptos is <em>entirely<\/em> made of manipulation.<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Well, <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ruskin147\/status\/945584039783694337\">this<\/a> was a pleasant surprise! And certainly didn&#8217;t hurt sales any:<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Have been reading this very festive book and now even more convinced that the whole crypto \u201ccurrency\u201d, ICO, Blockchain fandango is mostly flimflam dreamed up by extreme libertarian fantasists <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/OI1S43osY3\">pic.twitter.com\/OI1S43osY3<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Rory Cellan-Jones (@ruskin147) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ruskin147\/status\/945584039783694337?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">December 26, 2017<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"sv\" dir=\"ltr\">Snap! <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/sg6wkX4K5s\">pic.twitter.com\/sg6wkX4K5s<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Dave \u201cData isn&#39;t the new oil\u201d Birch (@dgwbirch) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/dgwbirch\/status\/945597039584440320?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">December 26, 2017<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>And don&#8217;t forget, if you&#8217;re in India, or have friends in India: Kindle India has <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.in\/Attack-50-Foot-Blockchain-Contracts-ebook\/dp\/B073CPP581\/\">Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain<\/a><\/em> at one-quarter price, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.in\/Attack-50-Foot-Blockchain-Contracts-ebook\/dp\/B073CPP581\/\">INR 103.50<\/a> instead of the usual INR 414, for December only! Tell everyone!<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>And the ePub is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.smashwords.com\/books\/view\/739078\">half-price on Smashwords<\/a> until January 1st! (Kindle users can convert it to MOBI with <a href=\"https:\/\/calibre-ebook.com\/\">Calibre<\/a>. On Android, I favour <a href=\"https:\/\/play.google.com\/store\/apps\/details?id=org.geometerplus.zlibrary.ui.android&#038;hl=en_GB\">FBReader<\/a>. On iOS, <a href=\"https:\/\/itunes.apple.com\/gb\/app\/ibooks\/id364709193?mt=8\">iBooks<\/a> should handle it fine &mdash; this is literally the same ePub file that&#8217;s available on iTunes.)<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>And now, the weather:<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">how to get disowned by your whole family this Christmas!! <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/rIunN3nW0n\">pic.twitter.com\/rIunN3nW0n<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Buttcoin (@ButtCoin) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ButtCoin\/status\/944900889587970048?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">December 24, 2017<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>https:\/\/twitter.com\/GMPaiella\/status\/945374251548278786<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">my friend the only crypto currency you wanna get your hands on is this: bird seed. There is a lot of birds and they all gotta eat<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; wint (@dril) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/dril\/status\/945649210455707648?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">December 26, 2017<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<br><br><div align=\"center\"><p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.patreon.com\/bePatron?u=8420236\"><img src=\"https:\/\/davidgerard.co.uk\/blockchain\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/become_a_patron_button.svg\" alt=\"Become a Patron!\" title=\"Become a Patron!\" width=217 height=51><\/a><br><p style=\"align:center;\" class=\"patreon-badge\"><i>Your subscriptions keep this site going. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.patreon.com\/bePatron?u=8420236\">Sign up today!<\/a><\/i><\/p><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A bit of news, a few good opinion pieces, some nice book photos and the Christmas tweet selection. Also, you should sign up for the Patreon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[318,12,21,109,316,6,157,312,317],"class_list":["post-3368","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorised","tag-318","tag-attack-of-the-50-foot-blockchain","tag-bitcoin","tag-gdax","tag-ibm","tag-links","tag-mmm","tag-rory-cellan-jones","tag-sergei-mavrodi"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidgerard.co.uk\/blockchain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3368","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidgerard.co.uk\/blockchain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidgerard.co.uk\/blockchain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidgerard.co.uk\/blockchain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidgerard.co.uk\/blockchain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3368"}],"version-history":[{"count":20,"href":"https:\/\/davidgerard.co.uk\/blockchain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3368\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3449,"href":"https:\/\/davidgerard.co.uk\/blockchain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3368\/revisions\/3449"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidgerard.co.uk\/blockchain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3368"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidgerard.co.uk\/blockchain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3368"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidgerard.co.uk\/blockchain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3368"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}