April was an exciting month for Intense Coin! Here are the highlights:

Development on the ITNS blockchain has been the hot topic lately as the network upgraded to version 4.

VPN and browser extension development has continued and we are progressing according to schedule.

The ITNS team has undergone further growth and reorganization.

As mentioned at the end of this post, our content manager’s position is now vacant. Therefore, you can expect this post to get down to brass tacks with minimal frills. Hope you don’t mind!

There is a shared sense that Intense is turning a corner. The Version 2.0 release was symbolic in many ways, but especially for our team and products as they have grown and matured.

The Intense Coin blockchain has been upgraded to version 4 bringing new features including:

Updating the proof-of-work algorithm to the ASIC-resistant “Monero v7”, also known as CryptoNight variant 1.

Activation of Ring Confidential Transactions (RingCT) which offer enhanced privacy and anonymity compared to classic CryptoNote transactions. The network also requires four mixins for all transactions, further promoting privacy.

Improved difficulty algorithm from Zawy, which allows better response to hash attacks and fluctuations in hash power.

In order to be compliant with these changes, you must be running version 2.0.1 or later of the software (see CLI daemon and GUI wallet releases).

Another little known feature included with the hardfork is:

Difficulty syncing

Due to the fact that many users on the network have not updated to the latest version of the software, sync has been problematic. To resolve these issues, it is recommended you run your daemon with the following parameters:

--block-sync-size=20 --add-exclusive-node 62.48.164.60:48772 --add-exclusive-node 5.249.27.162:48772 --add-exclusive-node=54.37.87.203:48772 --add-exclusive-node=159.89.249.113:48772 --add-exclusive-node 64.99.80.121:48772 --add-exclusive-node 140.82.9.90:48772

A version 2.0.2 release is being prepared now to automatically include these params in daemons until the network is syncing more consistently. We expect the 2.0.2 release to be available in the next 1-2 days.

VPN and Browser Extension

Development continues on our upcoming products. We would like to present some of the GUI wallet wireframes to you. Although the following wireframes are based on the pre-rebase wallet, they are guiding development in the current wallet release. As we draw closer to a functional prototype for public release, we feel confident in releasing these wireframes.

The first feature available in the wallet will be interaction with the browser plug-in proxy. As you can see in the screenshots, the VPN section dashboard will showcase key information including: a list of providers with ratings, a region filter, auto renewing contracts, and provider connection information.

Moving on to our first product coming out by the end of June: the Intense Coin Browser Extension (browser plug-in).

Of course, all graphics will be adapted to our new brand identity, but we were very excited to finally reach a stage where we can share these previews with the community.

Rebrand

Although we still cannot disclose any meaningful details at this moment, our legal team is in the process of registering our new trademarks internationally! After the trademarks are registered, we will proceed with unveiling our new brand and identity, which includes an overhaul of the website and redesign of all brand elements. The Intense Team has discussed the rebrand at length internally, and we are all very excited to share our new identity. Moon did a fantastic job, and we are tremendously confident the Intense Coin community will be pleased!

P.S. There’s a rumor going around that our Version 2.0 software release code name Belaya is somehow related to the rebrand… What do you think? ?

Due to significantly reduced community involvement in our Slack channel, we have decided to migrate away from Slack. Although we are moving away from Slack, we intend to maintain open lines of communication with our community. Community members have asked many times over the previous months for a Telegram channel. We heard your pleas and we will comply! We have made the decision to open a Telegram channel (group, channel) to continue our communications with those that do not wish to join Discord.

If you are still utilizing our Slack channel, we ask that you move to either our Discord server or our newly opened Telegram channel. We hope the community likes these improvements, and with this change we hope to gain a larger audience.

The Slack server/channel will officially close on May 31, 2018.

Welcome, Arvind!

Special Advisor, Business Development

Arvind Upadhyay is an entrepreneur and angel investor who has previously co-founded several successful companies such as Whow Games, Blue Terra Ventures, and Glück Games. He primarily focuses on Online Games (including iGaming), Blockchain-based businesses (as advisor and/or seed stage investor), and IT projects in India, the Middle East, and DACH regions. Apart from his own ventures, other companies where has held an active role in the past: Microsoft, Plinga, LeROI Marketing.

Welcome, Bobby G. (AKA Lastcrazywizard on Discord)!

Community Manager

Ten years ago, he was a part-time repair tech who fixed a now infamous blinking red light. In 2010, he began his management career at a big box retailer. Currently, Bobby is working from home to spend the most time possible with his young daughter. In his search for a cost efficient use of his free time, he stumbled upon our community back in January. Since then, he has continued to foster the welcoming and informative engagement that he was first greeted with. As a moderator, he’s contributed useful resources and guides along with his fellow moderators. Given his background in customer-service, it’s no surprise that Bobby’s greatest passion is other people. The opportunity to grow and empower our community makes him an ideal fit as our new community manager.

Congrats, Casey (AKA Thepigwee on Discord)!

Promotion to Assistant Business Development Manager

Casey has continuously gone above and beyond for Intense since he joined the team as our Community Manager. We are grateful for his dedication and enthusiasm for the Intense products, and he is well deserving of his promotion to Assistant Business Development Manager. Congratulations, Casey!

Drew (ConsensusNode): Resigned

Drew has decided to leave Intense Coin to pursue other interests. We are in the process of searching for a new content creator assistant and/or content manager. If you are interested, please send your resume/CV to francisco at intensecoin dot com.

Community Engagement

As of May 1st, we are proud to acknowledge:

+327 pages of chatter on the Bitcointalk forum

4,460 members after only 7 months on our Discord server

The Discord chat server platform is the easiest and quickest way to have your opinion or concern heard by the Intense team. Intense team members are designated by red coloring in their usernames and Intense Discord moderators members are designated by green coloring. Don’t hesitate to reach out to us with any questions or concerns you may have. Come chat with us!

Although the Intense community is still small and tight-knit group, we are growing at a very encouraging pace. You can continue to follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, Telegram (group, channel) and Github.

Please retweet the posts that strike a chord with you and most importantly, we really encourage you to participate in the Slack, Discord, Telegram and Bitcointalk forum discussion!

Current ITNS Market Cap

As of May 1, ITNS ranks #738 on CoinMarketCap.



Summary

Intense Coin is plugging along. The rebrand is on the horizon, the browser extension and VPN are beyond rudimentary development phases, and the Intense network is stronger than ever with the V4 hardfork. In our internal meetings, there is a shared sense that Intense is turning a corner, and we hope you feel the same way. The version 2.0 release was symbolic in many ways, but especially for our team and products as they have grown and matured. Big things are coming, stay tuned!