Good Morning, Bitcoin - Tuesday, October 15th, 2024
Good Morning, Bitcoin is your daily news roundup delivering key stories, project updates, new releases, guides, research, and all things related to Bitcoin and freedom tech.
What's new
- 5th Circuit rules ISP should have terminated Internet users accused of piracy. Music publishers won a court case against Grande Communications, a broadband provider, for not terminating accounts accused of piracy. The US Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit upheld Grande's liability for contributory copyright infringement but ordered a new trial due to the excessive $46.8 million damages initially awarded.
- Tor Project donations (up to $300,000) will be matched 1:1 until 2025. "Now is a great time to give and spread the word about the Tor Project because through the end of the year, all donations will be matched by our supporters at Power Up Privacy. That means when you donate $25, you’re making a $50 impact," announced the project.
- Mt. Gox postpones repayment deadline to 2025. The trustee overseeing Mt. Gox's assets has deferred the distribution deadline for remaining assets to creditors until October 31, 2025, was announced in a statement on the Mt. Gox website.
- Digital asset adoption to hit 8% by 2025. According to a MatrixPort report, global cryptocurrency adoption is nearing a significant milestone, with 7.51% of the world's population now using digital currencies.
- 7.5% of Salvadorians use Bitcoin for transactions. A study by Francisco Gavidia University (UFG) found that 7.5% of El Salvador citizens use Bitcoin for everyday transactions. Conducted in September, the survey involved 1,224 participants, predominantly aged 18 to 29, reports Atlas21.
- Mayor of Rockdale: 'Bitcoin saved the town's economy.' Bitcoin mining revitalized Rockdale’s economy by injecting over $1 billion into the area, supporting local causes, and creating over 22,000 jobs. Additionally, Bitcoin companies donated to local scholarships, youth sports, and supported police and fire departments, as well as community events, including the annual Christmas tree lighting.
- Samara Asset Group to issue $32.8M bond to buy bitcoin. "The proceeds will allow Samara to further expand and solidify its already robust balance sheet as we diversify into new emerging technologies through new fund investments. With Bitcoin as our primary treasury reserve asset, we also enhance our liquidity position with bond proceeds," Patrik Lowry, CEO of Samara, was quoted as saying.
- Metaplanet increases Bitcoin holdings to 748 BTC. The company bought an additional 108.999 BTC for ¥1 billion at an average price of ¥9.17 million each (~$61,659). This purchase increased the company's total Bitcoin holdings to 748.5 BTC, worth around ¥6.965 billion or $46.8 million.
- Craig Wright files lawsuit against Bitcoin Core and Square. The UK High Court case tracker indicates that Wright, representing himself, filed a lawsuit on October 10. According to the documents, Wright accuses Bitcoin Core and Square of falsely presenting Bitcoin as the genuine version of the cryptocurrency.
- Ark Labs partners with Boltz. The collaboration aims to enable seamless, cheaper, and faster off-chain Lightning liquidity management using the Ark Node interface.
"Using virtual swaps, we can close Lightning's "liquidity loop" by providing participants with an interface to batch their channel management operations off-chain. We anticipate many infrastructure providers will find interesting ways to leverage the efficiency of Ark swaps and we encourage anyone interested to reach out," said the company.
- bitcoin++ ecash edition talks. bitcoin++ took place in Berlin on October 11-13, 2024. Check out some of the available talks and workshops here.
Use the tools
- LDK v0.0.125 fixes an issue where channels may be force-closed upon upgrade to 0.0.124.
- Fedimint Web SDK offers tools for developing robust, privacy-focused fedimint clients powered by WebAssembly, designed specifically for browsers.
- BDK Swift Example Wallet is now available for testing on TestFlight. It uses BDK v1.0 for creating, sending and receiving transactions on test networks, and comes with native iOS support.
- Lightning Welder is a tool for converting BOLT-12 offers to BOLT-11 invoices.
- MyNode v0.3.31 packages the following software upgrades:
- Boltz Client Update: v2.1.8 and v2.1.9:
- stacker.news update adds two 'easter eggs' for attached wallets, and includes Mathjax bug fix.
- The project announced that its wallets will transition to non-custodial on November 5th. Users' sats will remain available for withdrawal, but using real bitcoin will require attaching an external Lightning wallet.
- There's a simple guide on how to do that using Alby Hub.
- Liquid Wallet Kit (LWK) v0.8.0 has been released. It adds support for unblinded outputs, enables sync without locking, and more.
- Breez SDK Core v0.6.2 introduces a de-sync fix for Greenlight signer.
- Simfony.dev is a playground for writing smart contracts in Simfony. Here's a set of example programs to demonstrate a range of possible use cases.
- Amethyst v0.92.2 brings more animations, improved search functionality, bug fixes, and performance improvements.
- Nostrastic is a proof-of-concept for publishing Nostr posts and handling DMs over LoRa using Meshtastic devices.
- Notspy Relay v1.2.0, a nostr relay designed for portability and ease of deployment, has been released. It includes a Tor proxy container, WoT bootstrap script, additional menu options, and updated installation documentation.
- Bitcoin Prediction Market launched. It allows you to bet on events with Lightning and receive winnings directly to your Lightning address. One needs a wallet with a Lightning address to participate.
- NodeWatch is a CLI dashboard that monitors your Bitcoin fullnode, providing essential information such as node status, transaction fee estimates, bitcoin price, and more.
- Latest updates for Zaprite Bitcoin invoicing platform include checkout web sockets, UTM tags, a web manifest file, PayPal connection updates and fixes, and the addition of up to 2,000 visible characters for payment link descriptions.
- Zaprite has also launched Sandbox Environments. It lets merchants to experiment with Zaprite API and Webhooks features.
- SimpleX Chat v6.1.0 is now available. The latest release enhances call reliability and usability, including the ability to activate the camera and share the screen (desktop app) during voice calls. Additional improvements include fixes for iOS notifications and notable UX enhancements in conversation layouts, profile switching, and message forwarding and moderation.
- I2P v2.7.0 features various bug fixes and performance improvements.
- Tor Browser Android v13.5.8 backports the remaining Android-specific security fixes from Firefox 131 to Tor Browser 13.5. "This is due to a release-process failure on our part during the 13.5.7 release," was stated in a blog post.
- GrapheneOS v2024101200 is the latest update for an open-source, privacy and security-focused mobile operating system based on the Android Open Source Project (AOSP).
Other stuff
- Bitcoin.review launched Nostr Rising series. In Episode 1 of Nostr Rising, NVK, jb55, Holdbod and Miljan discuss permissionless algorithms.
- Michael Saylor published a Bitcoin crash course for investors. Check it out here.
- BTC Sessions shared a new tutorial on using the Blitz Wallet. Watch it here.
- Do you want more? Subscribe and get No Bullshit GM report straight to your mailbox.
- Follow No Bullshit Bitcoin on Nostr.
