The Monero Moon is a new curated weekly newsletter regarding all things Monero.

September 3rd 2018 — September 9th 2018

Development, Releases, and Tech

Surae Noether provided his August 2018 update which includes a link to his research paper on Multisig, and discussion of his analysis of churning. Read more here.

Anonimal’s Kovri presentation at a recent LA Monero meetup has been shared on YouTube. Kovri is a free, decentralized, anonymity technology developed by Monero. It is based on I2P’s open specifications, and uses both garlic encryption and garlic routing to create a private, protected overlay-network across the internet. More information about Kovri can be found at GetKovri.org.

Justin Ehrenhofer published Estimating an Upper Bound for the Impact of Chain Splits on Monero in which he explores the impact chain splits have on user privacy. You can read it here on Medium.

dEBRUYNE published A Post Mortem of The Multiple Counting Bug on the GetMonero website.

Jonathan Cross shared How to use an SSH tunnel to connect to a Monero node from desktop GUI or Android (Monerujo) on the Monero subreddit. Head over to Github here to check it out.

X-Wallet v1.7 is now available and supports 2FA with your Apple Watch. X Wallet claims to “focus on delivering the most innovative and robust security and privacy features for Monero users to iOS. No privacy leaks through exchange integrations, no sockpuppets, no parties, no tokens, no bullshit”. Check out the update by downloading their wallet from the App Store, or give the new MyMonero IOS wallet or Cake Wallet IOS apps a try. It is recommended you avoid using the Freewallet wallet app due to ongoing user complaints and the inability to hold your own private keys.

For those interested in mining, u/WasabiDevs shared XMR-STAK v2.4.7 : WASABI EDITION v2.0 (hardware monitoring features and other cool stuff) on Reddit.

u/anticassette made an open source plugin for accepting Monero on WooCommerce sites. Check it out here on Github.

u/hokkjoy recently posted on Reddit that they created a Linux distribution that boots up and immediately starts to mine Monero using CPU and all available graphics cards. More info here.

General News

Initial Coin Offering (ICO) advisory service and research firm Satis Group issued its own Cryptoasset Valuation. It forecasts that Monero will be one of the best performing cryptocurrencies, potentially reaching a price of $18,498 in five years time.

Crypto Briefing published an article about Monero’s use cases beyond crime. The article reiterates that Monero will be a vital tool of the future, stating that “internet anonymity is important, not just for the sake of privacy but to protect confidential information and even citizens in oppressive or dictatorial regimes”. Read the full article here.

Sarang Noether from the Monero Research Lab was a guest on the relatively new Monero Talk podcast hosted by @chowabungaman and @bkunzig01.

The September Monero NYC meetup hosted by xCubicle is planned for Thursday the 27th of September. Special guests include the Cake Wallet IOS Monero Wallet App founder, Monero contributor Diego “rehar” Salazar, and the Monero Talk podcast hosts. More info can be found here.

Sarang Noether from the Monero Research Lab and Diego “rehar” Salazar will both be speaking at Discover Blockchains in Houston on the 16th of September. More info and tickets can be found here.

Jamie Holmes published Monero Primed for a Strong Q4 Performance: Price Analysis XMR-BTC last week. It is well worth the read, and discusses Monero’s fundamentals, development, and price.

There are now an abundance of Monero Telegram channels that everyone is welcome to join. There are numerous channels for those who speak languages other than English, as well as beginner and mining focused channels. A compiled list of the Telegram channels can be found here.

Xeagu, the founder of the Church of Monero, recently held a weekly Monero Mass and Ring Ritual in which participants send each other a small amount of Monero around in a circle of trust. I’m unfamilar with the Church of Monero’s proceedings, but it seems like a bit of harmless fun. More information can be found here, by contacting @realXeagu on Twitter, or join the Telegram channel @churchofmonero.

The Mega Chrome Extension was reported to have been recently hacked and updated with a functionality to steal your cryptocurrency from webwallets. A summary of this was provided on the Monero subreddit here. It is highly advised you immediately uninstall the Mega chrome extension.

u/xmrhaelan, the Monero Outreach organiser, provided a highly detailed mid-FFS update on their progress of marketing Monero in a meaningful manner. Marketing has always been a contentious issue within Monero, so it is worth taking the time to check out Monero Outreach’s progress to fully appreciate their efforts.

The Release Name for October 0.13.0 Hard Fork (Network Upgrade) has recently been discussed over the past few weeks and is likely to be named Beryllium Bullet.

Help is still required translating the Monero website and applications. If you are bilingual and have a few hours to spare, contact u/ErCiccione on Reddit, or head over to the Monero IRC channel #monero-translations.

The Monero Defcon Crypto Puzzle remains unsolved. It is a very cryptic puzzle, which is an image featuring many hidden images and symbols. Although the prize for solving it may be claimed before you view the image, the puzzle itself is a true work of art. Check out this Reddit post for all the information and a link to the puzzle.

The Monero Defcon Crypto Puzzle

Exchanges & Merchants

There were recent user reports on Reddit with users stating that Changelly have been flagging certain Monero transactions. In addition, Shapeshift has recently heeded to the government regulators, announcing it will require users to now sign up and provide personal information in order to use the service. Both Changelly and Shapeshift have been relatively popular ways to quickly and easily exchange cryptocurrency for Monero. Shapeshift is still fine to use, however if you are in dire need of privacy, at this point in time it is recommended that you seek an alternative service such as Bisq, Local Monero, MorphToken or XMR.to.

Alagoria is a new website which allows users to purchase anything from Amazon using cryptocurrency. If you pay with Monero you get a 10% discount. Be sure to double check the Term and Conditions before using the service to ensure it’s right for you.

TheBigCoin is another service which allows you to purchase anything, from any online store, using Monero. It is reported the service works as advertised, however it may be worth double checking fees and shipping costs before using it.

Forum Funding System

Funding for Surae’s next quarter is now open, so it would be great if you could help financially support the Monero Research Lab by sparing a few Monero. Contribute to the FFS here.

Performance

Total Monero in Circulation — 16,390,913 XMR

Monero Total Marketcap — $1,695,427,223 USD

Monero Coinmarketcap Ranking — 10

USD Price — $106 USD

BTC Price — 0.0167 BTC

Average Transaction Fee — $0.22 USD

Hashrate — 574.8Mh/s

Monero Mining Pools Hashrate Distribution —

Memes

u/Febos from reddit.com/r/moonero

u/xm-arghhh-pirate from reddit.com/r/moonero