By: Daniel Thwaites Sr.
What’s What in the Heliosphere
Hello and welcome back to the Helios Report! We’re here with the first report of 2020. So far this year it has been low-key, background progress. We’ve been throwing many different scenarios at our new features on the Testnet and continuing writing code. We’d like to take a moment to reflect on 2019 and the amazing milestones we hit throughout the year but it’s just too long to include! Watch for Helios Protocol 2019: A Year in Review coming soon right here!
ICYMI… We recently launched our DApp Incubator program. Here are some details if you haven’t already heard. Developers who would like to deploy their DApp on the Helios Protocol platform are able to receive a variety of great benefits for doing so. Devs will receive $HLS from our DApp Incubator Fund to use to develop their project and, for example, offer free transactions to their users for trying out their DApp, professional design and developer services, plus experienced Blockchains professionals are on-hand to advise your project. As we reported in the Helios Report #13, as a bonus, until the 21st of January, any DApp that is deployed on the Helios Protocol Hypothesis Testnet will be entered to randomly win a 1-year subscription to any JetBrains IDE of the winner’s choosing. This is up to a $500 USD value! Details can be found here. On that note, we will bid you all a fond farewell from the What’s What section and pass you along to the appreciation section…Over to you, Bob!
Bounty Hunters of the Week:
azisjesika and kirconman
This week we’d like to congratulate two Bounty Hunters of the Week. One for last week and one for this week. Congratulations goes out to azisjesika and kirconman for their superb Helios Protocol videos! You both will be receiving a 50% bonus on those bounty submissions. The videos can be viewed here (azisjesika) and here (kirconman). Thank you both and all who submitted bounties! Keep them coming and it just might be YOU getting that $HLS bonus!!!
Meme of the Week
This Week in Mass Adoption
“Mass adoption is mostly a slow process, usually defined as being the point where enough people use something for its growth to become self-perpetuating”. This is a quote from a great article about mass adoption from The Startup that can be read here. It uses email as an example to back up the quote. Email technology, just like blockchain was used by a select group of people and evolved into what it is today. From the stories we report on here, we can see the parallel line that Blockchain tech is following to email. More and more companies and banks and governments are turning to Blockchain tech to solve issues that their outdated technologies are plagued with. Just recently, there were tidbits of mass adoption news concerning shipping ports, food tracking improvements, and central banks fix broken stuff with the Blockchain. Check out more on those stories and more right below…
TradeLens, the IBM and Maersk Blockchain shipping platform welcomes the Port of Salalah to its growing list of users said a Times of Oman report. End to end information will be available to anyone in the supply chain at any time. This allows for transparency and, since it’s Blockchain-based, will also be “seamless” and secure. The TradeLens platform’s network is used by more than 100 entities in the shipping field including “carriers, ports, terminal operators, 3PLs, and freight forwarders”. With the Port of Salalah having had a record 4 million TEU-year by volume recently, this will be of tremendous benefit to all involved in the shipping process.
According to Bihai123.com, and, providing that Google was accurate with the translation, Vice President of Ant Financial’s Blockchain division, Jiang Guofei, said the financial giant intends to launch its Blockchain called, “Union Chain” this month. The platform is intended to help small businesses get the benefit of blockchain and the opportunity to build applications at little cost or hardship. If successful, they will be the second to launch in an ever-growing “Blockchain race” in China. First place goes to…
Baidu who just released a public beta version Blockchain called Xuperchain. BeInCrypto reports the tech giant’s Blockchain will support “Smart Contracts and transactions” with the upcoming ability to “allow small-to-medium-sized businesses to issue their own dApps”. The race has been heating up as of late with the Blockchain craze in China. Baidu is leading the charge with the first release of a public (beta) Blockchain. Will Ant Financial be next before the end of the month or will another snipe the number two spot???
And, in more Blockchain news out of, you guessed it, China, CoinTelegraph had some interesting news this week. China’s Blockchain-based Service Network or BSN will officially launch in April of this year. Built by China Mobile, China UnionPay, and China’s State Information Center, the project was made to “provide a trusted and scalable infrastructure for supporting new blockchain projects as well as the development of smart cities and the digital economy”. It is clear that China is leading the worldwide race to Blockchain mass adoption.
Flip to the other side of our mother, Earth to little old Illinois in the US of A. On their website you can find Public Act 101-0514 which is short-titled The Blockchain Act. It is a bunch of legalese you can read here if you want but is, in essence, defining what Blockchain tech is, what it can be used for, and laying down the law for its use in public contracts. What you see here is the legalization of Smart Contracts as a means of securely conducting transactions in the State of Illinois. What is needed for Blockchain tech to not leave the US in the dust, is the powers that be take a lesson home from this. Rant over, thank you!
Scooting back across the pond to Switzerland and a story reported by CoinDesk, it seems PricewaterhouseCoopers-Switzerland has acquired Smart Contract audit firm ChainSecurity to up its formal verification game. As more and more companies and individuals use Blockchain tech and Cryptocurrencies in their daily lives, the need for transparency and security is in high demand. With this collaboration, PwC members will be able to put their trust in a company’s Smart Contract platform knowing it has been professionally audited.
Just over 400 miles away from those beautiful Swiss Alps, we have a story of criminals and the Blockchain solution that Italy has turned to. A national blockchain network for sureties and guarantees is in the making to fight phony guarantees and fraud in the Italian sureties sector. Ledger Insights said in a story this week SIA, CeTIF, and tech company Reply are in collaboration to fight an estimated “€1.6 billion of fraud over the past four years” which has plagued the sector for years. Blockchain will plug those pesky loopholes the financial criminals have been exploiting and bring security and transparency to the industry.
Unbeknownst to many, that morning cup of brew that you carefully sip in the morning while driving the backroads to work and trying not to spill on your last clean pair of chinos is part of a $200 Billion industry. IBM has a plan to significantly improve this massive industry via the Blockchain. IBM’s Farmer Connect platform will be used to run an app called Thank My Farmer. As per a Venture Beat report, IBM is working with large coffee suppliers around the world including “Beyers Koffie, The Colombian Coffee Growers Federation (FNC), Itochu, Jacobs Douwe Egberts (JDE), The J.M. Smucker Company, Rabobank, RGC Coffee, Volcafe, Sucafina, and Yara International”. From the farm to your “World’s Best Air Guitarist” mug, the coffee will be traceable, transparent, and secure. This is just another example of how Blockchain tech can improve existing methods used by industries to trace their goods.
Hey, Did Ya Hear That…
…a branch of Burger King in Caracas now accepts SBTC, $ETH, $LTC, $BNB, $DASH, and $USDT. 3 Whoppers, please!
…Binance donated $1 million dollars to help with the Australian bush fires? Thoughts and prayers to all involved!
…the CoinbasePro app is out for Android devices and there are over 50 trading pairs available at launch? iOS coming soon?
…Poloniex issued a “change your password” email to users of its exchange? Hmmmm
…Spencer Dinwiddie is launching his own “contract-based” digital token? Insert slam dunk joke…or don’t
…Binance has added AUD and Thai Baht to its platform? Groovy
…StrainSecure is releasing its Medicinal Cannabis “from-seed-to-sale” tracking app? Pass it here, Man
…the Samsung Blockchain phone will feature the Elrond gaming platform? Interesting…
…the upcoming Blockchain-based social media platform hired former Forbes CDO, Salah Zalatimo? A cousin to trybe?
…the $HEX origin address has had all of its almost $7 million worth of crypto withdrawn? That’s not suspicious at all
…Andy Cheung has left his position as COO OKEx to start a Blockchain consultancy firm BitWork in Hong Kong? Good luck AC!
…Venezuela will sell gold and oil for the $PETRO? Interesting!
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