May 23, 2016

Ecosystem News

Spells of Genesis is a popular Android and iOS game that makes use of Counterparty to create in-game assets. Spells of Genesis posted a project roadmap that outlines the steps needed to complete the game by the estimated full release in September 2016. Project lead, Shaban Shaame, posted a project update on Youtube as well.

Storj is having a launch party on June 2nd in Berlin, Germany. The purpose of the launch party is to announce the open beta of the Storj network.

Storj is one of nine partners in Microsoft Azure’s BaaS (Blockchain as a Service) program. Robert Tiger gave a short description of Storj’s offering in a recent Bitcoin.com article:

“Storj nodes sell resources to store and transfer data. In the process, nodes earn Storjcoin X or other select cryptocurrencies in exchange for services. In short, an individual could earn an income by leasing or renting hard drive space or extra bandwidth. Storj has created a data storage system that can not be censored, and is cheaper, faster, and more secure than traditional cloud storage platforms.”

The rest of the article about the BaaS ecosystem can be read here and an earlier CoinTelegraph article on the subject can be read here.

MandelDuck recently released an Android version of their popular iOS game known as “SaruTobi”. According to Jon Southurst of Bitcoin.com:

“MandelDuck also produces the iOS ‘geocaching’ app Takara, in which users ‘drop’ small amounts of bitcoin in specific locations for others to pick up if they visit that location. It has seen users travel physically to coffee shops, houses, bridges and even islands to collect the dropped ‘treasure’.

SaruTobi (which means ‘monkey fly’ in Japanese) uses Counterparty tokens as in-game items, and connects to the IndieSquare Counterparty Wallet. This allows users to receive bitcoin tips and even share items from different games.”

Read more of Jon’s article here.

SaruTobi features a collaboration with the IndieSquare wallet to facilitate the use of Counterparty tokens within the game. Indiesquare shared some thoughts on the partnership in a Medium post:

“The more intriguing addition, however, is the ability to connect to IndieSquare Wallet not only to receive bitcoin tips, but also to use some of the Spells of Genesis blockchain cards as powerups in SaruTobi. Players who hold SoG cards in their IndieSquare Wallet accounts can connect the wallet with SaruTobi easily and enjoy using the game items across the two games seamlessly.”

An interesting aspect of this partnership is the ability to use in-game items across different games. In-game items created as Counterparty tokens exist autonomously allowing for their use on different platforms. Spells of Genesis and SaruTobi are leading the way for this rapidly developing trend in gaming. Counterparty, and by extension Bitcoin, is the technology best positioned to accommodate this niche.

“This kind of cross-game collaboration is possible through the use of Counterparty tokens as game items due to blockchain’s open nature. The SaruTobi and SoG are spearheading this new and exciting field of tokenized game items on the blockchain.”

The full IndieSquare post can be read here.

The SaruTobi game features a Counterparty token called NINJASUIT. The token can be viewed on the Blockchain here.

Adam B Levine’s Let’s Talk Bitcoin continues to create some of the best Bitcoin content available. Jonathan Mohan interviewed York Rhodes of Microsoft to discuss blockchains, technology and the growth in enterprise adoption. Microsoft Azure has nine partners in its BaaS (Blockchain as a Service) Ecosystem, one of which is Counterparty’s Storj project. Listen to Episode 294 here.

Counterparty Content

Counterparty Director Koji Higashi wrote a blog post on the state of Bitcoin and Counterparty in Japan.

A follow-up article to Koji’s blog post was published on Bitcoin.com several days later.

“Not only are we seeing a massive growth of Bitcoin adoption and media coverage here but also Japan has turned into a very interesting place for Bitcoin 2.0 experiments and the token economy.” – Koji Higashi, Counterparty Foundation

CryptoHustle published a speculative blog post on their belief that XCP is primed for a ”Bull Run”.

The Counterparty Foundation published a piece titled “Proposal for Ethereum Smart Contracts on Counterparty Mainnet”.

Counterparty News

A Counterparty Group has recently started on Telegram. It is a public group and all Counterparty users are encouraged to join. The group will remain public for at least the first 200 users. Check it out here.

The Counterparty Foundation released an update several days ago.

The first Counterparty Community Meeting is coming up on June 1st. Community meetings are held once per month on the first Wednesday of the month. Meetings are conducted via Google Hangouts with real-time input from Slack. An agenda for the June 1st meeting will be posted to Slack a few days before.

Core Development Updates

P2SH will be live on Counterparty within 6 weeks!

“We are looking forward to merging P2SH which will facilitate the use of Bitcoin multisig addresses (which start with a ‘3’ instead of a ‘1’) following the industry standard while laying the groundwork for more complex scripts and payment channels.” – Counterparty Core Developer Ruben de Vries