Nichiren's Turtle, & the Network Effect

THE CHANCE THAT SOMETHING LIKE BITCOIN COULD ARISE IN OUR WORLD IS A ONE-IN-A-MILLION EVENT. Encountering it in our lifetime, we are as lucky as Nichiren's One-Eyed Turtle, colliding with the sandalwood log which alone can cradle his body, and heal him from his defects. The turtle has neither flippers nor limbs, and lives on the bottom of the ocean, his belly is as hot as a heated iron, and his back as cold as the Snow Mountains. Once in a thousand years he ascends to the surface, hoping to can find a log that can simultaneously cool his belly and warm his back. But logs are scarce, and the turtle has only one eye, so his chances of locating them are astronomically remote. You can sense how this ends: what are the chances the one-eyed turtle will chance upon his log, with now flippers nor logs to direct his chase? To put it in more familiar parlance: given that Bitcoin is such an unlikely development, what are the chances that lightning could strike twice? To be honest, I consider it exceedingly unlikely.

Bitcoin will always be king, but there are things it cannot do well, such as execute a smart contract, or enable a micropayment. According to Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin, transfers should not cost anymore than US$0.05. So, Bitcoin has the Network Effect behind it... that cannot be denied. But It is the gold of the digital age, is there room for a silver too?

Namecoin was the first fork of Bitcoin, and it won't be the last. Forks, clones, and outright ripoffs are common in this biz..

ALTCOINS A-Z

Audiocoin: ADC: website here.
Built on the Peercoin protocol... Earn money for listening to music and promoting it on social media. On joining the site, users receive 50 ADC (roughly US$0.08). After that, you will be paid 0.5 ADC for every track you listen to, and share on Facebook or Twitter. Music can be found on Aurovine.

Arweave: AR: website here.
I often worry about what will happen to my writings and photography after I die. Even while I am alive, linkrot is a problem; pages need to be continually edited to remain usable, and dead links are punished by search engines. While Filecoin intends to become a global hard-drive, Arweave offers your data permanence. It in fact allows a browsable sister to the Internet, called the permaweb, which will live forever... or at least a couple of centuries!.

Arweave rests upon an innovative proof-of-access protocol which incentivizes miners to store all data. It is therefore an alternative to the Internet Archive, which has its limitations (such as storing images). AR holders have governance rights which increases the longer that they are willing to hodl. You can in fact get free data for free, if you use this faucet.

Arweave features a web application where you can load your files and deploy them to the permaweb. There are hundreds of apps already developed, including this potential rival to Google Photos. Once a document has been stored on the weave, it is cryptographically linked with every other block on the weave. Any wallet is capable of reading and writing data, and it can be done through a Chrome extension if necessary. While a user requires to spend AR to write to the permaweb, reading data is free.

Bitcoin Gold: BTG. Website: website here.
Forked off from the Bitcoin blockchain on October 25, 2017. Unlike other versions of Bitcoin, Bitcoin Gold uses Equihash as a Proof-of-Work. This is intended to make easier for the average person to mine this coin.

Bitcoin Cash: BCC: website here.
Bitcoin Cash was born from a contentious hardfork of the original Bitcoin blockchain in August 2017. Transaction speeds and fees had been rising as Bitcoin gained popularity, and its users were riven over how to resolve this problem. All Bitcoin holders as of block 478558 were granted ownership of equivalent amounts of Bitcoin Cash. Since that time, Bitcoin Cash has become one of the top of five altcoins, behind Ripple, but ahead of Litecoin. Electron Cash is a wallet you can use to store your Bitcoin Cash... (For more details about Bitcoin Cash, click here.)

Cardano: ADA: website here.
Cardano is described as a third-generation blockchain platform, following on from Bitcoin and Ethereum as the first and second. Like Ethereum, it is competing to be a global computer with its own native dApps, and even NFTs.

Chainlink: LINK: website here.
Chainlink aims to provide decentralized oracles for use by smart contracts on Ethereum and other blockchains. This could overcome the scams which currently hinder such applications as Augur prediction markets. Oracles need to earn reputation in order to be trusted.

Dogecoin: DOGE: .
TRADE ANALYSIS: click here.

Dogecoin is a prime example of seduction as an alternative to production, and the gratuitous expenditure of a meme economy. Started as a joke in the heady year of 2013, forking off from Litecoin, Dogecoin took inspiration from the Shiba inu meme popular at the time. Unlike many other cryptocurrencies, however, Dogecoin has a steady inflationary supply making it perfect for spending, rather than hoarding. The coin maintains a cultish following, with a slow tiny coinrot that makes it suitable for trading.

Ethereum: Ξ: website here.
TRADE ANALYSIS: click here.
In 2016, the Ethereum community was torn in two by an ideological schism, and now there are two coins for competing networks: Ethereum Classic (ETC), and Ethereum (ETH)... (For more details about Ethereum and its amazing ecosystem, click here.)

Filecoin: FIL : website here.
This could soon become a competitor of Google Drive, or Amazon Cloud! With Filecoin, you can buy space on somebody else's computer; or rent out your own for a fee! This coin is actually connected with the groundbreaking Interplanetary File System (IPFS) protocol. Here is how it works: say you want to jump in on some viral content, such as a video of a kid being bullied, or a shooter's manifesto.

Florin: : .
Used on the Decentralized Library of Alexandria to tip content creators.

Hive: website here.
On Actifit you can earn money for every step you take.


Icon: .
Aims to unify the balkanized blochchain ecosystem.

Libra: website here.

This stablecoin non-volatile cryptocurrency, originally known as Globalcoin, is to be launched by Facebook, possibly in 2020 if it clears regulatory hurdles. According to Andreas Antonopoulos, Libra could transform Facebook into a fintech company like PayPal. It might also pose an existential threat to Ripple. There is talk that Facebook could reward users for actions that they perform, like viewing ads, which might make it a competitor to BAT. According to the Sydney Morning Herald, "at its most grandiose, the ambition is to create not a shadow bank or shadow banking system, but a global shadow financial system."

Libra will run on its own blockchain, permissioned at first, although it may become permissionless over time. Transactions will be pseudonymous, although you will need to provide proof of identity when setting up your wallet.

Litecoin: LTC: website here.
Often described as silver to Bitcoin's gold, Litecoin is one of the oldest cryptocurrencies. Apart from that, it is pretty much a Bitcoin ripoff, with a slightly different hashing method. Nonetheless, its (relative) stability makes it good for trading, and it has pioneered some technical innovations in the field, like Segwit. With Zulu Replublic's Twitter.IM, you can send and receive Litecoin using Telegram even if there is no Internet in your region. I could use this when I am trekking Papua New Guinea! Zulu Republic has its own token on the Ethereum blockchain and it is called ZTX.
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MaidSafe: MAID: website here.
MAID is short for Massive Array of Internet Disks. Along with Arweave, it is one of the aspiring players in the distributed computing field.

MazaCoin: .
Originally launched in 2014, in order to become the currency of a Native American nation. In my mind, this was one of the original "New Kids on the Block", and there was a fad about each polity having its own cryptocurrency.

NameCoin
Namecoin was one of the first generation of altcoins. It allows you to register .BIT domain names. Registering a domain costs 0.01NMC, and for a further 0.01NMC ownership will be yours for the next 36,000 blocks. It is possible to make money from cybersquatting on Namecoin. Blockstack was originally built on the NameCoin blockchain, before it migrated..

Peercoin: .
Also known as Peer to Peer Coin, this was the third biggest altcoin back in early 2014, with a market value of US$100 million.

Polygon: MATIC: website here.
Many potential adopters of cryptocurrencies are deterred by their perceived environmental impacts. Consequently, numerous low-carbon blockchains have sprung up in recent years, among them Polygon, which touts itself as a decentralized Ethereum scaling platform. According to one claim I have read, minting a NFT consumes the same amount of energy as sending a tweet. It is also cheaper, saving hundreds of millions of dollars per day in gass fees (as of April 2022). New blocks are confirmed in a blinding two seconds.

It was due to its green credentials that Icelandic band Sigur Ros chose Polygon to host their Glingur NFTs, to be given free to free to anyone signing into their Heimr fan community. Henceforth, the Glingurs become your pass to enter the community.

I am at the stage in my crypto journey that collaborating is more important than investing, let alone trading. The Glingur are limited edition, like rare baseball cards. The earlier you get in, the better! Then you can use them to participate in the community. Not all fans are happy with the band's embrace of the NFT phenomenon, however. On Reddit, for example, the proposal seemed to cause quite some discord.

Potcoin : POT: .
Designed specifically for the marijuana dispensary market...

Ripple: XRP: website here.
One of the first generation of altcoins, Ripple could function like a gateway between cryptocurrency and the traditional world of finance. The fact that it is not decentralized might make it popular with banks in the early days of the coming Implosion. Yahoo! Japan uses Ripple in its mobile-based e-pay operations. With every transaction,a small amount of XRP is destroyed, making it deflationary.

Solana: SOL: website here.
An energy-efficient alternative to Ethereum, with lower fees. It is touted, in fact, as the fastest blockchain in the world, and one of the cheapest (below one cent).

Solarcoin: SLR: website here.
This is an attempt to incentivise the revolution in renewable energy, and seems to be built upon an early Litecoin fork. If you are a solar energy generator, you are entitled to receive Solarcoins. Basically, 1 Solarcoin equals 1MWh of solar power generation. In essence, this is just an airdrop, and I personally believe PowerLedger is more exciting. .

Telegram: TON.
More like a blockchain of blockchains, and connected with the messaging app of the same name. To be launched in 2018, 232 blockchains are envisaged.

Tezos: .
Built around the concept of on-chain governance, which had become an issue during the Bitcoin civil war of 2017...

VeChain: VET: website here.
While is began as an Ethereum token, VeChain now maintains its own blockchain serving the blossoming ioT.

Zcash: : website here.
If Bitcoin is like http, then Zcash is https. It is more anonymous, and secure.

RECOMMENDED WEBSITES & WEBLOGS
BitInfoCharts
Coin Check Up
Coin Market Cap
CoinWarz
Flippening Watch
Kraken (Exchange)
The Crypto Globalist

Slockit