Thumbnail Photo by Karl Greif from Karl Greif Video www.karlgreifvideo.com
According to The U.S. Department of Transportation (U.S. DOT), blockchain can be used to streamline drone deliveries of essential and important items, such as organs. The institution published an information-exchange document on 15th of April 2020, to communicate their findings and thoughts with the public and begin a discussion about blockchain and drone fleet management.
Drones in the context of the document are considered to be any Unmanned Aerial System, i.e. UAS. This includes UAS for military, commercial, and recreational usage and how blockchain technology can be used as a framework to provide stakeholders with security, identity management on one end. On the other side, blockchain is going to be used to manage conflicts in flight plans, authorization, and general air traffic management.
According to the U.S. DOT, blockchain technology is already mature enough to instantly introduce trust in a group or network of entities, as long as there are known and anonymous participants.
Regina Houston, Chief of the Aviation Safety Management Systems Division of the U.S. DOT Volpe National Transportation Systems Center says: “Blockchain is poised to transform the way we think about and analyze safety data. This is particularly exciting for unmanned aerial vehicles. Blockchain can be part of the solution to collecting and sharing reliable data about drones. When you combine machine learning with the data blockchain can provide on UAS registration, accountability, and tracking, an entire world becomes available for drone safety analysis, decision making, and even regulation.”
While it’s unclear how long the U.S. DOT have been reviewing ideas for blockchain adoption into air traffic systems, this type of sentiment can result in amazing blockchain implementations. In the report they mention Red Cat, because of their beta implementation of a blockchain-based black box for UAS. The black box implementation was portrayed as beneficial to industry regulators, insurance companies, and pilots.
NASA is mentioned for their proposal published in January last year about a blockchain-based framework for automatic dependent surveillance broadcast, which is a system that secures aircraft privacy, protects UAS from DoS attacks, and prevents them from spoofing their identity.
Compared to traditional delivery routes, drones cannot be slowed down by traffic and generally have a straight line to their destination – Photo by DJI-Agras
For their case study they presented the case for Drone Delivery of Organs. Naturally, this is a vital, time sensitive process where minutes can result in organ failure and unnecessary death. The blockchain framework they proposed for this use case contains 5 data sets, with 5 participants on each case. The drone will be able to communicate the status of the organ through sensors in the box, giving hospitals accurate information about the status of the delivery.
Amit Ganjoo, Founder and CEO of ANRA Technologies said: “In case of a package delivery operation, a blockchain-based repository could log information about the operations such as time, location, resources, delivery date, etc., and make the data accessible to authenticated users, and any other stakeholders along a package’s route.”
The U.S. DOT provided this graphic in their document:
Photo by Volpe National Transportation Systems Center
While most of the participants in this case study share a positive outlook and general acceptance that blockchain must be included for this to work as intended, others came out with the concerns about potentially increasing the amount of drones making deliveries.
According to Hy Chantz, Associate Partner for Blockchain Solutions at IBM, massive drone fleets can create a significant security risks. He said: “Drones can fly over people and property and interfere with the operation of full-size aircraft. They could conceivably carry weapons or dangerous materials to critical locations. At a minimum, drones could take pictures, possibly committing privacy violations. There is also some concern that drones could aid in IT hacking by bringing sensors or disruptive electronics near a possible target.”
However, everybody else is looking at the positive facts from the past, especially towards the first organ drone delivery, which was completed in a record 5 minutes and the successful implementation of drones for bridge inspection.
All in all, organ drone deliveries work for shorter distances and this project can severely increase the speed at which these rare and critical elements of healthcare are delivered. Even in scenarios where the destination is a few hours away by plane, these types of drones can significantly increase successful organ deliveries. From the supplying hospital to the airport, onto a plane to the new destination, and directly on a drone to the receiving hospital.
The graph below describes how the U.S. DOT imagines the process of organ delivery through this system.
Photo by Volpe National Transportation Systems Center
Another industry that will benefit from blockchain developments in the Organ Delivery industry is retail, with giants Walmart and Amazon already working on their own drone delivery fleets.
Walmart has been talking and working towards creating a blockchain-based drone fleet since 2017. Amazon Prime Air is another drone delivery service currently in development in the retail sector, however there is no mention of blockchain being used. Amazon however, has been participating in a research project with IBM that use blockchain systems to prevent drones from stealing packages.
In theory, if this project goes live, retail companies can join in on the blockchain to share data with air traffic controllers. Naturally, organ deliveries are far more important than anything else you can purchase, so we are curious to see in what capacity retail drone fleets will be implemented.
For now, we are not sure if there will be a single Air Traffic blockchain that drones will be required to communicate with, or there will be a separate system for each use case.
Photo credits:

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MinerGate Mining Pool

June, 14, 2019
For just a year, the EOS system has proved itself to be worthy of being a next-generation blockchain project with industry-leading scalability and transaction speed. Its philosophy and solutions are giving new opportunities to blockchain developers. Lots of dApps – a crucial part of the system – are now built on EOS. The number has been growing with time; according to DappRadar, 18% of dApps are built on EOS, yet obstacles to implementation still remain. There are two known reasons why the potential of this scalable and efficient blockchain system cannot be fully reached by developers and BPs running nodes. To operate on the EOS blockchain, dApp developers need RAM resources which are not cheap. According to bloks.io, it’s more than 108 EOS (694$)/1 MB as of June 13th, 2019. RAM usage is also capped by supply, which is currently 90GB approx. It is anticipated to increase to 128GB in December of this year, but still, it severely limits the capability of developers to refine a ‘killer app’ that will be able to engage a mainstream audience. Considering these points, LiquidApps introduced the DAPP Network, a set of technical solutions that makes developing on blockchains essentially easier & more affordable. DAPP Network is a system that unites developers, service providers, and users all in one, and DSPs are the driving force of it. Recently MinerGate has become a dApp service provider on the DAPP Network, in order to help developers build scalable dApps with lower costs and no storage limitations. The newly released DSP Portal by MinerGate with intuitive design is serving solutions that will simplify the searching, choosing, and connecting process to the appropriate DSP package. The efficiency of DSP Portal has become possible due to the data provided by Milleneos, a platform that offers trustworthy APIs for blockchain developers. The solutions presented by the Milleneos team allows for keeping track of blocks and transactions in real-time, as well as providing historical data. The team is introducing standard APIs, but they also provide custom ones, for example, DSP APIs.   Lastly, it is exciting to see such projects coming out with great solutions for the good of decentralized development that was previously unimaginable. The resolutions of this scale will be able to pave the way for a new inconceivable level of dApps that will break through the limitations and become a crucial part of mass adoption.

BTC saw an unusual spike in activity yesterday, April 29th. In the past, 24 hours Bitcoin has risen up by 18.66%, the mempool was briefly overloaded, and some exchanges were barely keeping up with the activity. 
Let’s start with the price.
But before that, I just want to let you know that this is not financial advice, I’m not even a professional trader. I’m just a guy that’s invested 3+ years of his life writing about crypto and blockchain tech.
If you ask Billy, yes, suddenly after all of the “blows to Bitcoin” the time for Bitcoin is nigh. Forbes is saying yes it’s going to $10k, Coinbase’s Daniel Cawrey says it’s FOMO time. I mean, it’s crazy, but this is what the news should look like if you ask Forbes.
We also say that it looks like BTC is going to break $10,000. But we also don’t have any expert traders on staff. But in the spirit of trying out new things, we visited Kraken and tried to see how much support is available on the bid and ask sides of BTC.
Keep in mind that these values constantly change, so they may not be accurate at the time you are reading this.
But from the looks of it, there is a lot of resistance (at least on the Kraken exchange) starting at the following price ranges.
And support on the other side on price levels of:
Depending on how strong the push will be, the price can go either way. There is enough room for it to fall and it’s unknown whether investors will be willing to push through 873 BTC worth of resistance to get to $10k. The resistance seems to be growing though.
Today will be a critical day that will decide where BTC will end up. I would be inclined to say that it will fall down, but that may also be to my bias and desire to buy it at a discount, having missed my opportunity.
It’s hard to see on the image, but that’s 50k unconfirmed transactionsOnce the BTC engine had some steam, more and more investors started piling into the market. This caused significant strain on the Mempool, at one point generating a 50k bitcoin transaction backlog. This image above represents the highest peak of activity in the past 30 days.
During the worst of it, Exchange servers across the board were struggling to deal with the demand. Coinbase, Blockchain, and Kraken all reported issues, with Coinbase suffering temporary outage, according to Coindesk.
Yesterday was Coinbase’s one of rare days where their exchange broke down from upward pressure. Most of the other times when this exchange has had trouble keeping up (even though they are the largest US-based crypto exchange) was when BTC was shedding massive amounts of value in a short period of time.
These issues were created by Bitcoin gaining a massive amount of value in a short time.
For us, it’s unclear whether the rise in value is in a direct correlation between influx of cash through the stimulus check and increased interest in investing in BTC, or simply a  masterful manipulation by whales who want to dump the price.
Where is Bitcoin going to go? What is going to happen to the price?
Let us know what you think in the comments!

Photo by Philip Veater
Kraken added support for 11 new trade pairs on their cryptocurrency exchange on the 30th of April, according to a press release published by the exchange.
This new update increases the total crypto trading pairs to about 155, bringing Kraken closer to becoming a centerpiece in the crypto economy.
What are the new trading pairs?
The newly added pairs are based on GBP, BCH, and USDT, allowing traders to instantly exchange currencies in a single that previously required two trades, such as trading BCH for ETH.
In addition to the increased flexibility, even more cryptocurrencies can now be traded directly for British pound sterling.
Ether Pairs
Pound Sterling Pairs
Tether Pairs
BCH/USDT
LTC/USDT
XRP/USDT
USDT/JPY
USDT/CHF
Photo by KrakenIn March, Kraken announced the introduction of FX trading pairs, allowing users to trade a variety of different fiat currencies directly. This makes it the first (as far as we are aware) real crypto exchange that has enabled trading for traditional currencies.
The reasoning behind this feature is to make things easier for individual and institutional traders to avoid friction when creating their orders. You can read more about this update here.
And lastly, last month, the exchange acquired one of the most acclaimed crypto lawyers Marco Santori, who officially joined their team on the 6th of April. Having Mr. Santori join their team instead of continuing his contract with Blockchain.com is a victory against their competitors.
Kraken is definitely on a “war” path this year, with feature release after feature release , small victory after another, generating a great deal of momentum for the crypto exchange.
The exchange seems to be gearing up for a global expansion, however time will only tell whether this is really the case. The updates about the exchange suggest a strong move in the upcoming months, one that is possibly being delayed by COVID-19
We are quite curious to know which crypto exchanges are being used by our community. We are working on improving our content, publishing times, and our connection with our readers. If you have some time, please go below and write a short comment about your favorite crypto exchange.

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MinerGate Mining Pool

June, 26, 2019
Recently, we released our very own loyalty token – the MinerGate Token.  It’s the token that we believe will empower all parts of the MinerGate ecosystem and positively engage the community in the project’s life.  A few tokens have already been delivered to the most active users as gratitude for their contribution. As well, there have been a lot of questions regarding ‘How can one obtain more/additional tokens?’. Of course more is coming, but currently, there are two ways: Trade and exchange them on HitBTC, EOSDAQ, BTEX, and DEXEOS;  Become a voice of MinerGate, e.g., become a contributor.  The value added by each user is significant, whether it is feedback on social platforms or engagement of new users. But what is appreciated the most is the contribution to consistently making our services better, more prominent, and more welcoming.   To set an example, we reached out to one of our contributors: a moderator of a chat room on our website – @NMR, who implemented an informative bot in our chat rooms, and asked him to share his experience and provide some inspiration for those who would like to engage more in the MinerGate ecosystem. Below is the interview with our faithful moderator:   Q: How long have you been using MinerGate? What do you like most about it? A: I started mining with MinerGate a long time ago when cryptocurrencies weren’t so widespread. What I like most about MinerGate is how easy it is to start mining: everything is simple and clear.   Q: What, in your opinion, should be changed or developed in MinerGate? A: To make MinerGate more convenient, I would introduce account statistics. These statistics would show such info as how many workers are online and how many are offline at the moment, and how many coins are earned per day.    Q: How did you become a moderator in the MinerGate community? What are your responsibilities and privileges? A: I became a moderator because I was an active user and helped other people from the community solve their problems and answered their questions. Being a moderator does not give me any privileges, but it helps me resolve conflicts and inadequate situations.   Q: How did you come up with the idea of introducing a chatbot? What is the main advantage of using a chatbot?  A: When I analyzed new MinerGate users’ questions, I realized that they are all pretty much the same. So in advance, I prepared answers to these questions that will help in such situations. That is how I came up with this idea. The main advantage of a chatbot is that it can help a user at any time of the day. It would never replace live communication between real people, but it can be an excellent assistant to moderators.   Q: What is the main feature of the MinerGate community? As a moderator, how you can influence the community and MinerGate itself? A: For me, it was essential to find not just a pool where I can mine a coin I like, but also a reliable and stable service. If it happens that there’s an issue with MinerGate, the team is always ready to solve it quickly. The other thing I like in MinerGate is the web chat because it improves user coordination on the website.    Q: Recently, you received MG tokens for launching a chatbot as a thank-you for your contribution. Do you already have any plans about how you are going to use them?  A: MG tokens have only existed for a short time, so all I’m going to do is hold.   Q: What do you enjoy besides mining? What is your hobby? A: In my free time, I study new technologies and enhance my programming skills.   Q: What advice would you give to other miners? A: A lot of miners don’t want to get into the details of mining because they think it’s complicated. Thus, they lose their interest. I believe that before starting to mine, it’s better to understand the mining process. Then, you will be ready for all the risks and will be able to make profits.    Once more, we’d like to thank @NMR for taking time to be interviewed and for being such a fantastic part of the MinerGate community.  In conclusion, you can always visit our chat room if you have questions or are curious about things related to mining and the software itself. There, you’ll find like-minded people ready to help and friendly support. 

by
MinerGate Mining Pool

February, 15, 2020
Monero (XMR) has successfully hardforked on November 30th, at block number 1978433. The fork has changed the CryptoNightR mining algorithm to the new RandomX Proof-of-Work algorithm.   Although the main aim of the upgrade was keeping Monero completely resistant to ASIC mining, thus maintaining the coin decentralized, RandomX has essentially moved XMR mining to CPU, which is no less important. What is the hard fork about? Being one of the top cryptocurrencies by market capitalization, Monero for sure is one of the most popular coins at the moment, not least because of high level of privacy protection and technological advancement. The team behind Monero has continuously put their best effort into keeping XMR mining decentralized. The previous mining algorithm, CryptoNightR, served the purpose well until the first Bitmain ASIC miners for the CryptoNightR were developed. This lead to Monero team developing and implementing the new RandomX algorithm which replaced the CryptoNightR, improving Monero network with special emphasis on its decentralization and operation. The key pillars of RandomX are the following: ASIC miners are removed from the XMR network, along with the issues of botnets and Monero mining malware. Long Payment IDs are phased out Monero tweeted:  “In addition, we will be phasing out long payment IDs during this scheduled network upgrade.” As a fact, Monero is becoming more privacy-protective, improving its privacy and usability for users. Ten blocks lock time, which is approximately 20 minutes, is enforced for the incoming transactions, increasing privacy for the whole network. Transactions require at least two outputs to improve data protection. Why is it particularly important for CPU miners? As the name suggests, RandomX features random code execution as well as memory-hard techniques to discourage ASIC mining. However, ASIC miners are not the only ones affected by the hard fork: the new algorithm is specially optimized for CPU mining. With the focus on CPUs, Monero developers believe that “the network will become more decentralized and egalitarian in the distribution of block rewards.” These recent changes are of particular importance for all laptop miners, that have been experiencing reduced efficiency of their mining hardware: for them, RandomX might be a real game-changer. The RandomX CPU & GPU benchmarks are provided for reference only and may vary depending on variety of factors: Source: https://monerobenchmarks.info/ To sum up, RandomX has resulted in significant efficiency gains for CPU miners while drastically reducing the benefits of GPU mining. This is great news for both experienced miners that are not fond of the idea of spending a fortune on specialized hardware and newcomers that are in the very start of their mining career. 

Bitcoin is so speculative and volatile that it doesn’t deserve to be considered an asset class, according to Goldman Sachs.
Diving deeper into the realm of the more than 5,000 cryptocurrencies in existence, things get even more speculative – with traders often jumping on fast-moving and thinly traded tokens for a quick profit and then quickly moving on to the next hot trade. 
That’s why it’s so notable that holders of one token, Chainlink (LINK), appear to be in it for the long term. 
You’re reading First Mover, CoinDesk’s daily markets newsletter. Assembled by the CoinDesk Markets Team, First Mover starts your day with the most up-to-date sentiment around crypto markets, which of course never close, putting in context every wild swing in bitcoin and more. We follow the money so you don’t have to. You can subscribe here.
Data extracted from the underlying blockchain and cryptocurrency markets reveal declining balances of the token held at exchanges. In the logic of digital-asset traders, that’s seen as a sign that holders of the token have no near-term intention of selling their LINK tokens: After withdrawing the tokens from exchanges, holders are likely either hoard them or send them to be used in smart contracts on the Chainlink blockchain. 
High market capitalization and real users is a rare combination for blockchain networks. But with Chainlink, backers of the project are so devoted that they refer to themselves on social media as “LINK Marines” – a sly reference to the community known as the “XRP Army” that supports the eponymously named token from Ripple. The idea is that LINK investors are “HODLing,” an expression that dates back to early cryptocurrency chat forums and refers to long-term, often ideologically motivated investors.
“Chainlink is the most successful blockchain network over the last two years and we still feel like the underdog,” said Michael Anderson, co-founder of Framework Ventures, which published a Chainlink investment thesis in late 2017. 
During a year when traditional assets like U.S. stocks are floundering, and bitcoin is up 27%, Chainlink more than doubled, making it the top-performing digital asset among the top 10 ranked by market capitalization, according to OnChainFX. The coin’s market value is now almost $3.8 billion. 
Chainlink is a tokenized decentralized network that provides blockchain networks with price feed data collected from sources both on and off blockchains. The protocol offers a potential solution to what is known as the “oracle problem,” or the ability to get the off-chain data needed in many smart contracts. Given that blockchains are intended to operate as “trustless” networks, using outside data requires integrating with a trusted source – an “oracle.” 
“As time goes by, there are definitely some questionable projects that break the top-10 market capitalization ranking for crypto,” said Anil Lulla, analyst at cryptocurrency research firm Delphi Digital who recently authored a report on blockchain-based oracles. “It’s very easy to point to a lot of names on that list and see very little to no usage.” 
However, the Delphi Digital team was “impressed at some of the early trends we’ve been seeing in usage for Chainlink,” Lulla said. 
So is it bullish that LINK Marines are HODLing? It’s tough to say, according to Lulla. 
“I just don’t see the connection with the token economics,” Lulla wrote in a Telegram message. “But they’re dominating the oracles space so I think the LINK memers can keep this narrative going for a while.” 
A Chainlink spokesperson declined to comment on the data. 
In May 2019, the total amount of LINK held on exchanges began to steadily decrease, a trend that would continue for the next 12 consecutive months, according to Glassnode. 
Source: CoinDesk Research, Glassnode, CoinMetricsExchange withdrawals coincided with the first significant LINK price inflation when the token traded above $1.00 for the first time. And as more tokens left cryptocurrency exchanges, trading volume steadily grew, according to Nomics. 
Source: CoinDesk Research, Glassnode, NomicsSo where where did the LINK tokens taken off exchanges go? 
The data suggest that the Marines are sending their tokens to either their own wallets or Chainlink smart contracts. The percentage of LINK supply held by the top 1% of addresses has grown by almost 25% in the past year, according to Glassnode. 
Median transfer value fell by 77% over the same period, suggesting that when LINK Marines decide to actually transfer tokens, their transactions are increasingly small. 
LINK is also being sent to smart contracts designed to utilize the protocol’s oracle services. According to Glassnode, the year-to-date supply of LINK in smart contracts grew by 1.3% percent. 
Source: CoinDesk Research, GlassnodeThe strong price performance has foiled traders who have taken short positions on LINK, betting on a decline in the token’s price. 
Such challengers have been “getting their faces ripped off” in markets for over a year, Rob Paone, a popular YouTube crypto personality and startup founder, noted in a March 18 tweet. 
At the time of Framework’s investment, according to Anderson, “many of the ‘industry experts’ either said Chainlink was over-engineered,” or that two rival oracle projects, Augur or Uniswap, would ultimately win out.  
Yet the young protocol has inked cross-industry partnerships with Google and Tezos, for example. 
And the LINK Marines are staying faithful. 
Tweet of the dayBitcoin watchSource: TradingView.comTrend: Bitcoin is struggling to maintain momentum after Wednesday’s convincing break above the psychological hurdle of $9,000.
At press time, the number one cryptocurrency by market value is trading near $9,190, having faced rejection at $9,300 during the Asian trading hours. 
The pullback has neutralized the immediate bullish view put forward by a falling wedge breakout on the four-hour chart Wednesday. Further, it has established $9,310 – a lower high created May 24 – as strong resistance. 
If buyers can push prices past that threshold, a price rally to  $9,850 may be seen. That level is currently housing the upper end of the contracting triangle represented by trendlines connecting May 7 and 18 highs, and May 10 and 25 highs. 
The overall bias will stay neutral while the cryptocurrency is held withing the three-week-long narrowing price range on the daily chart. A breakout would imply a continuation of the rally from lows below $4,000 seen on March 13 and open the doors for a test of February high of $10,500.
Alternatively, a move below $8,760 would confirm a range breakdown and shift risk in favor of a deeper decline to support at $8,109 (May 10 low) and $7,900 (100-day average). 
Sign up to receive First Mover in your inbox, every weekday.Disclosure Read More The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk is an independent operating subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which invests in cryptocurrencies and blockchain startups.