Blog post: Perception is bitcoin’s biggest battle

Along with the general media attention bitcoin has attracted in recent months, there’s been much talk about whether bitcoin is merely a tool for financial speculation … or is a currency as real as any other, capable of being used to buy and sell goods, as well as for investment purposes.The media frenzy accompanying the bitcoin roller-coaster of late has resulted in a surge of demand. Transaction volumes are steadily increasing and more online outlets now accept bitcoin payments. Consequently, players in the bitcoin ecosystem have fared well: With $120 million (US) in trading volumes in March 2013 (as reported by Mt.Gox, the largest bitcoin exchange) and a trade commission of 0.6 percent, this equates to revenues of around $1 million per month.With low operating costs, that means substantial profits. This has led some to speculate that the bitcoin marketplace could create billion-dollar businesses. Even if this might be exaggerated, bitcoin – and bitcoin exchanges in particular – could in fact become attractive investments for venture capital firms at some point.


Published 8 May 2013 on coindesk.com, read the full article here: http://www.coindesk.com/how-investment-worthy-can-bitcoin-be/

Blog post: 7 things you thought you knew about Bitcoin (but that are wrong)

Bitcoin has made headlines again yesterday, reaching an all-time trading high of more than £21. This is a significant development for the fairly new alternative currency, which started at Zero in 2009. Bitcoins has slowly and quietly become a global phenomenon which is featured prominently in the media, and has started to attract the special attention of global regulators.

So how exactly does Bitcoin work? Here are seven myths which describe what Bitcoin is, and – more importantly – what it not is.

Published 01 March 2013 on whiteboardmag.com, read the full article here: http://www.whiteboardmag.com/7-things-you-thought-you-knew-about-bitcoin-but-that-are-wrong/

Blog post: Twitter & American Express introduce “pay with a tweet”: the future of e-commerce?

The announcement that Twitter now offers a fully integrated payments service on its platform via American Express doesn’t come as a real surprise. The logical extension of both companies’ existing collaboration just makes sense, and is in fact good news.

The US card mogul started integrating with major social networks a while ago, including Facebook and Twitter. Amex’ Twitter Sync already allows customers to be eligible for discount deals when they tweet special offer #hashtags. To enable that service, users have to connect their Twitter account to their Amex credit card account.

Published 12 February 2013, read the full article here: http://www.whiteboardmag.com/twitter-is-now-offering-pay-with-a-tweet-for-real-what-that-means/

Blog post: Amazon Coins proves that virtual currencies (real threat or not) are here to stay

Amazon’s announced today that it will launch Amazon Coins in May 2013. Clients will be able to purchase apps on Kindle Fire with Amazon’s proprietary virtual currency. Amazon Coins, which are planned to be launched in May, will be pegged to the US dollar and can be bought using existing Amazon accounts.It’s a move that breathes new life into virtual currencies. At last, as some may say who believe that an alternative money system will make commercial transactions easier and smoother.

Published 6 February 2013, read the full article here: http://www.whiteboardmag.com/amazon-coins-proves-that-virtual-currencies-real-threat-or-not-are-here-to-stay/