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Bitcoin Tracker | Week 54

This week’s bitcoin trivia: Which bitcoin figure compared himself to a mythical Greek figure? Hint. The same guy who will find new residence in prison very soon.

If you struggle to come up with a safe conversation topic at the holiday dinner table, why not start a conversation about bitcoin? You could be really helping the cause. According to new research, one of the big things holding bitcoin back, is the lack of public understanding of what bitcoin is and how it works. Never mind that the idea of a global currency is DOA or that the notion that we’d outsource the movement of trillions of dollars of money daily to an unregulated, distributed group of exchanges a la Mt. Gox, the public just doesn’t get it. So, in an effort to try to close that gap around the holiday table this year, here’s how members of the bitcoin community have explained bitcoin and the blockchain technology and the world of cryptocurrency to the average internet user.

“Bitcoin is a secure digital form of money; that lets you store value without a bank or 3rd party. You can send payments anywhere in the world, for a fraction of the cost and time associated with traditional payment methods.” Founder of Casheer, William Burton

“Bitcoin is digital cash. It is secure, easy to send and receive, and doesn’t require having an “account” with anyone in order to use. Bitcoin sits in your digital wallet, just like physical cash sits in your leather wallet. You are free to fully control it, and it can’t be taken from you unless you do something silly like leave your wallet out in the open or choose to let someone else hold it for you. Most money is digital now anyway (think bank account balances). But we’ve hacked traditional money in order to make it work electronically, which is why it takes so long and costs so much to wire money between banks or accept credit cards as a merchant. Bitcoin was built from the ground up as native money for the internet. It is, therefore, global, secure, and just about free and instant to use.” Web developer, Dan McArdle

“It’s magical internet money.” Creater of dogetipbot, David Dvorak

This week is a better one than last to have bitcoin in one’s stocking with a rise up from big 310.51 to 326.46 according to the PYMNTS.com Bitcoin Price index.

As always, if you have any news you’d like to share, please send it our way at contactus@pymnts.com.

On the Plus Side …

The cure for student debt? Bitcoin. A new service, Brawker, thinks that they have cracked the code on how bitcoin can wipe out the $1 Trillion liability facing the US by allowing users to post bitcoin in exchange for a Tution.io giftcard, which they may use in turn to pay tuition. Okay. Unfortunately, not all loans will qualify (there’s always that fine print).

December 23, 2014 – A Hong Kong-based bitcoin exchange platform, KBBEX, formed a partnership with Taiwanese bitcoin platform BitoEX, to supply bitcoin to more than 5000 convenience stores in Taiwan. The goal is to increase the general public’s faith in bitcoin.

December 23, 2014 – Burning Man, a mecca for tec-savvy and futuristic people has announced that they will accept bitcoin next year in an effort to support the blockchain.

December 23, 2014 – K. Chancellor George Osborne is leading the U.K. government’s charge for London to become the world’s bitcoin hub and the Bank of England has released a study with details on digital currency’s virtues.

December 23, 2014 - A new service plans to help students reduce their student debt by 17% using bitcoin. Brawker will combine with Tuition.io to offer tuition gift cards to students.

December 22, 2014 – The Spanish cryptocurrency startup Coinffein launched will allow users to buy and sell bitcoins anonymously without having to depend on a centralized entity.

December 22, 2014 – The rapper, Nas, told his followers that he was opening up a contest on theraptest.com and would be awarding bitcoin to the top scorers. He will be awarding the bitcoins through a partnership with Coinbase. Rapper 50 Cent explained why he accepted bitcoin by stating “all money is money”.

On the Dark Side …

Looks like Australia may not be quite the cryptocurrency loving country as bitcoin advocates previously thought. The Australian tax authorities declared that bitcoin transactions are subject to goods and services tax (GST), and so now the operation of a bitcoin exchange will become an expensive proposition and transactions for spending bitcoin will become even more complicated. And problems dealing with the Silk Road continued for Charlie Shrem who was sentenced to two years in prison for helping Silk Road users swap cash for digital currency.