Bitcoin in the News : 2017-04 More++

In contrast to the price news -- 'Bitcoin Price Breaks All-Time High', etc. (see Bitcoin in the News : 2017-04 Price) -- April was a relatively quiet month for other bitcoin news. Of the more significant stories, another contrast appeared in the adoption of bitcoin by two of the planet's more important economies. While Japan moved forward...

• 2017-04-03: Japan Finally Recognizes Bitcoin After Long Battle (investopedia.com)
• 2017-04-06: By This Summer, Bitcoin Will Be Accepted at More Than 260,000 Stores in Japan (futurism.com)

...India moved backward in political circles and sideways elsewhere.

• 2017-04-05: ‘Bitcoin Should be Declared Illegal’ Demands Indian Politician (cryptocoinsnews.com) • 'Kirit Somaiya, a member of the Indian Parliament who belongs to the BJP, India’s conservative ruling party at the center, questioned if bitcoin is a "pyramid ponzi scheme"'
• 2017-04-08: Bitcoin Startups Fear No Ban in India, Say Technology Will Make Inroads (entrepreneur.com)

Other news included a typical story related to bitcoin's mysterious origins...

• 2017-04-13: Bitcoin: Self-Proclaimed Inventor's Firm Sold to Private Equity (fortune.com) • 'A company built around the research of Craig Wright, who has claimed to have invented the bitcoin cryptocurrency, has been sold to a private equity firm in a deal the company says is the biggest to date involving bitcoin's underlying blockchain technology.'

...and a couple of stories that enhance bitcoin's bad boy reputation:-

• 2017-04-11: Mirai botnet variant turns IoT devices into bitcoin mining slaves (theinquirer.net)
• 2017-04-15: Bitcoin Wallets Under Siege From 'Large Collider' Attack (fortune.com)

That last story leads back to the mysterious origins.

But some speculate the goal of the project is not to rob a whole lot of wallets, but instead to strike a mother lode from a long-lost wallet from bitcoin's early days: "About 10% of Bitcoins were created early, before 2012, and have never been traded. If somebody ever finds the key of the early lost Bitcoins, they'll have a huge payoff, over a billion dollars. Speculation is that either "Satoshi Nakamoto", whoever he is, is holding onto them for a big payoff, or somebody lost the private key for all those early Bitcoins."

With that in mind, it takes a business school professor to ask the question:-

• 2017-04-18: Can Bitcoin Be the Foundation of a Fairer Financial System? ([MIT] technologyreview.com)

If your answer is 'Yes!', then the next story is for you.

• 2017-04-22: The Need for Bitcoin Evangelists and How to Be One (themerkle.com)

Does having a bitcoin blog make me an evangelist? Short answer: 'No!'. Long answer: 'No, of course not!'.