There are report that Kasa de la Muntanya has been raided by Spanish police for its connections to Anarchist activity in an operation that has been described as being "Counter-Terrorism" in nature. At least 11 people have been arrested. Kasa de la Muntanya had in the past been profiled by the BBC as being a 'Cyber Squat' and has been described by Julia Tourianski on Twitter as a place that housed several families. An online profile describes Kasa de la Muntanya as a social center which has been occupied since 1989. Continue reading
Category Archives: People
Additional Information On A Normal Man AKA John D Powell
As John D Powell took a plea deal and plead guilty to two charges of operating an unlicensed money service business, few court documents are available. The documents that are available depict an articulate man who experienced a run of misfortune prior to his involvement with Bitcoin.
In a letter to Judge Shadid, Mr Powell cites the break down of his marriage and stress of surviving an aortic dissection as explanation for his decision to operate an unlicensed Bitcoin exchange. One could be forgiven for mistaking Powell's letter as one penned by a murderer who is remorseful for his crimes and if as claimed by the State, Powell did process USD $3 million in Bitcoin, it's clear it was a beacon of light for him despite yielding to the court in his apology letter. Continue reading
MasterCard: Not Completely Comfortable With Bitcoin
Matthew Driver, who is the President of MasterCard in South East Asia, has appeared in a video in which he criticised Bitcoin for being unstable, lacking consumer recourse, lacking a clear purpose and electronifying cash despite MasterCard's attempts to move beyond such transactions. Continue reading
Bitcoin History: Heroin Store Joe Job and the Bitcointalk Subpoena
Earlier today Theymos of Bitcointalk revealed that he satisfied a subpoena by prosecutors in the United States related to the yet to be tried Ross Ulbricht case. He offered that he turned over posts related to the account "altoid" alleged to be connected to Ross Ulbricht. He also admitted turning a number of posts, including posts deleted by users from a thread titled "A Heroin Store" which posed and interesting thought experiment: Continue reading
MoneyBeat, A WSJ Blog, Confirms GAW Miners Is A Ponzi
MoneyBeat, a blog hosted by the Wall St Journal, has published a second article discussing accusations levied against Josh Garza's GAW Miners. Michael J Casey, who authored the piece, concludes that his research is unlikely to placate the "highly vocal critics" of GAW Miners. Garza appears to be quite happy with the article, proudly tweeting it to his followers via @gawceo. Continue reading
GAW Lawyers Attempt To Bully CoinFire
CoinFire have published a copy of a cease and desist letter they received from Baker Marquart on behalf of GAW Miners. The C&D comes on the back of yesterday's threat by Josh Garza to pursue CoinFire for making what he claims are libellous and false statements about GAW Miners. Continue reading
Ken Hess: Bitcoin Illegal, Tom Coburn: Maybe for Congress?
In a piece appearing on ZDnet today Ken Hess wrote a about his letter campaign to inform United States Senators of "Bitcoin's illegality" and of how Tom Coburn's office responded. Mr. Hess's case for Bitcoin illegality consist of his reading of Article 1, Section 8, Clause 5 of the United States constitution which enumerates as a power of Congress: Continue reading
Ben Bernanke & Mervyn King Share Their Thoughts On Bitcoin
Former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and ex-Bank of England Governor Mervyn King both spoke at the CME Group conference held in Florida this past Monday through Wednesday where they were asked by an audience member what they thought about Bitcoin. Continue reading
Buterin Beats Zuckerberg for Award
Vitalik Buterin beat Mark Zuckerberg for the 2014 World Technology Network award in IT software. The award is presented for Buterin's role as co-creator and inventor of Ethereum which has yet to exist and co-founding Bitcoin Magazine. The event was held at the Time & Life building which no longer houses Time Inc. Time was of course spun off Warner Communications earlier this summer to a chilly reception by investors.
Jim Robinson, Tim Draper Confirmed Bidders On Next USMS Bitcoin Auction
Jim Robinson, a co-founder and managing partner at RRE Ventures stated in an interview with Bloomberg his intention to bid on the next USMS auction. Tim Draper also confirmed his intention to bid via an email sent to Bloomberg News earlier today. Both men are investors in the exchange "Mirror" which recently re-branded from the name Vaurum. Continue reading