Biden on Wednesday stumbled his way through a virtual event about rural issues with Democrat Congressman Ron Kind and other guests.
77-year-old Biden is still hiding in his basement but his gaffes and bloopers are piling up.
“And we’re going to create a new bio-based multi-facturing – multi-manufacturing job pro..uh uh…environment to deal farmers in on the benefits of a changing economy,” said Biden.
Blockchain e-sports streaming platform THETA.tv will soon be available on Samsung’s flagship Galaxy S20 smartphones shipping to the U.S.
According to a Medium post published Wednesday, THETA.tv will be included in the Samsung Daily app, which is also being upgraded to bring the TV service to all existing Galaxy S10, S9, Note10 and Note9 devices. That will extend Theta’s potential global reach to more than 75 million smartphones and tablets, according to the post.
THETA.tv is supported by the Theta blockchain, which allows users to earn its native TFUEL token while watching or streaming content.
“Theta has been collaborating with various Samsung groups for the last two years after Samsung NEXT invested in the company in 2017. We’re excited to continue growing our relationship with Samsung by launching THETA.tv powered by our blockchain technology and TFUEL rewards to millions of Samsung mobile users.” said Mitch Liu, co-founder and CEO of Theta Labs.
Samsung Daily is a content discovery platform for news, multimedia, sports, games and more, and comes pre-installed by default on all new Samsung Galaxy and Note devices. Rewards earned on THETA.tv can be spent on favorite streamers and/or content producers within its ecosystem.
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.
New Delhi (Sputnik): The government of India has eased policies, permitting the nation’s start-ups and private firms to be part of deep space missions that would be undertaken by the country’s apex space body ISRO. Access to ISRO’s geospatial data would ensure the development of newer technology at lower costs for Indian firms.
Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Monday acknowledged the work being done in the space sector by private Indian companies. In a bid to open up a level playing field for private and start-up sector companies eager to be part of Indian space missions, the minister announced assistance to them from ISRO’s data assets.
In the coming days, a special geospatial data policy will be released by the government of India which will help tech companies in the country to use satellite-based data collected by ISRO to develop different apps and technologies that would benefit the nation.
ISRO confirmed the news on its Instagram handle as well.
Until now, Indian companies that were, for instance, working on agricultural or geo-positioning apps have been emptying their pockets, trying to mine out data from international sources.
But, with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi planning to go bullish on making India “aatma-nirbhar” (self-sufficient), the new geospatial data policy will save Indian tech companies a lot of money, because all the data they need will be made available to them from the country’s space agency, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).
As of December 2019, India has had 17 national-level geospatial policies and rules (four in the draft stage) under six ministries and departments – that are not bonded by an agreement even with each other to share data collected by them or withing their agencies.
A national geospatial policy has been under construction in India since 2015, which is expected to be released soon now that Sitharaman has confirmed aid to Indian tech players concerning space-collected data for their use.
ISRO has over sixty space missions in its kitty for the next five years, including deep space explorations on Mars and Venus along with a second-landing attempt on the lunar surface.
One of ISRO’s main missions for 2020-2021 is “Gaganyaan”- a manned mission which will send a three-member crew to orbit around the lower parts of Earth.
On Wednesday, New York City became the latest city to pass a cap on how much food delivery apps like Grubhub can charge restaurants for deliveries.
Mark Lennihan/AP
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Mark Lennihan/AP
On Wednesday, New York City became the latest city to pass a cap on how much food delivery apps like Grubhub can charge restaurants for deliveries.
Mark Lennihan/AP
For an idea of why independent restaurants have long complained about food delivery apps, just ask Anil Bathwal, who owns The Kati Roll Company, a group of New York City restaurants serving Indian street food.
Bathwal relied on a handful of food apps to supplement his dining-in purchases, despite hefty commissions the apps tack on to every sale; he used Grubhub-owned Seamless, Uber Eats, Postmates and other food-ferrying services.
If someone ordered two kati rolls for about $12, the apps took a hefty chunk of that sale: roughly a 17% commission on top of a fee for delivering the food to someone’s door. In the end, Bathwal said, that kati roll purchased on the delivery app would net his restaurant about $7.
App commissions were more manageable when it represented a smaller segment of overall revenue. But the pandemic changed that.
“That’s the only game right now. There’s no other way for people to get business because of the lockdown,” Bathwal says. “If it starts becoming 30, 40, 50 percent of your business, it is not incremental business — it is your business.”
With already-thin profit margins further diluted by the app fees, Bathwal could not justify keeping his six locations open. He temporarily shuttered all of his restaurants with hopes of reopening, when he can, on a pared-down menu emphasizing items that are the most affordable to make.
He expects food delivery apps to represent a sizable portion of his sales when he can restart his business, but he is not yet sure whether he will be able to make the numbers work out.
In a bid to help struggling restaurants, cities from Seattle to Washington, D.C., are passing caps restricting how much food apps can charge to deliver meals. The food delivery apps have different ways of devising fees, but they tend to be in the range of 20% to 40% of how much a restaurant makes in app-generated revenue.
On Wednesday, New York became the latest city to pass commission limits: third-party delivery services will not be able to charge more than 15% per order, and the tech companies cannot add more than 5% for other fees, like credit card processing and for better placement on the apps.
Councilman Mark Gjonaj, who sponsored the bill, said the food delivery apps have placed some restaurants on life support, but it is not sustainable.
“Without them, it’s an instant death. With them, it’s a slow death,” Gjonaj said in an interview.
Grubhub, which controls two-thirds of New York City’s food delivery market, claims the commission ceiling could have an unintended consequence for restaurants.
New York’s fee cap was passed as an emergency measure and applies for as long as restaurants remain closed and for 90 days after eateries are able to reopen.
“Any arbitrary cap — regardless of the duration — will lower order volume to locally-owned restaurants, increase costs for small business owners, and raise costs on customers,” Grubhub spokesman John Collins said in a statement. “Delivery workers would have fewer work opportunities and lower earnings. We also believe that any cap on fees represents an overstep by local officials and will not withstand a legal challenge.”
A spokesperson for Postmates said in a statement that limiting commissions makes it harder to operate and “kills the whole industry’s ability to provide the services restaurants need to stay open during this national emergency.”
Lawyer Gregory Frank is skeptical about this reasoning. Frank filed a federal lawsuit in Manhattan last month seeking class-action status accusing Grubhub, DoorDash, Postmates and Uber Eats of ripping off both customers and restaurants.
Frank points to a clause in the contracts restaurants and the food delivery apps agree to that prohibits owners from charging delivery customers more than people who dine in, even though delivery cost more.
“By not forcing those purchasing on apps to bear the whole amount of the fees, instead forcing all menu prices to rise together, in-restaurant diners are effectively subsidizing Grubhub’s high rates,” said Frank, who argues such an arrangement is anti-competitive and illegal.
Grubhub and the other food delivery apps have not yet filed legal responses to the complaint.
Despite the commissions, PitchBook analyst Asad Hussain notes that none of the major food delivery apps are turning a profit.
“Capping these fees will present a headwind for these companies. It’s going to have an impact on growth and ultimately some of these costs are going to be passed on to consumers and that’s going to reduce demand for these services,” said Hussain, who expects the coronavirus to hasten consolidation among the delivery apps.
With or without the food delivery apps, some restaurants that have had revenue wiped out will never come back after the pandemic.
A survey from the National Restaurant Association found that the pandemic has caused four in 10 eateries to close, and some will never be able to open again.
Bathwal with The Kati Roll Company said one of his top tasks ahead of any reopening is trying to negotiate with his landlords.
“Landlords have been understanding. Some of them are deferring. Some are giving us a little bit of a rent abatement,” he says. “So we’re hopeful, but we really don’t know what’s going to happen.”
It seems like enterprise blockchain is between finding its “killer app” and being killed.
“Everyone had a killer app three years ago. That was the state of blockchain business,” Shyam Nagarajan, a director at IBM, said during a marathon session at Consensus: Distributed. “People have wisened up since then.”
There are a number of roadblocks obstructing the possibility of adoption and successful implementation of business-grade blockchain. Cited most frequently is the problem with scalability.
It turns out, it’s difficult to get other people or competing companies to join onto someone else’s private network, CoinDesk’s Ian Allison reported Thursday.
Sometimes this is the result of the market itself. Microsoft’s Riccardo Trubiani pointed out the total size of the Italian blockchain industry is 30 million euro. “Market opportunities define where people will invest,” he said.
But enterprise blockchain isn’t dead, yet. It’s a developing industry, with a learning curve.
Take We.Trade, the first enterprise-grade distributed trade financing platform. In a candidate appraisal of his firm’s performance, General Manager Ciaran McGowan said the firm has been going through growing pains.
Nearly everything that could have gone wrong, did. McGowan said the firm didn’t have the right governance structure – “plenty of ideas and talk, but no action” – infrastructure, or communications initially. The firm also over engineered its platform, building “a Ferrari,” McGowan said, while underdelivering on its compliance requirements – making it impossible for merchants or banks to feel comfortable signing on.
After a period of reorganization, (McGowan replaced the firm’s first Chief Operating Officer Roberto Mancone) We.Trade has its foundations in place, and is on the pathway to profitability, he said.
While McGowan is comfortable with the value proposition of blockchain for trade financing, there are other industry use cases where it simply doesn’t make sense. “The less we can talk purely about blockchain and solving problems with business leaders, the better off we are,” Linda Pawczuk, global head of blockchain and digital assets at Deloitte, said in a separate program.
As the industry matures, it’s likely there will be greater consolidations and collaboration between former competitors.
The CoinDesk 50
The CoinDesk 50 are the most innovative and influential organizations in the crypto and blockchain industry.
The CoinDesk 50 is an annual list celebrating the most important organizations in crypto. We’ve been announcing five nominees per day, and have highlighted Binance, Cosmos, Brave, Bitmain, MakerDAO, Besu and the People’s Bank of China as particularly noteworthy. Today we honor Silvergate Bank. You can read the full list here.
Silvergate, the Bank That Wasn’t Afraid Crypto’s first IPO was a 30-year-old bank. Southern California’s Silvergate Bank, which went public in November 2019, is one of just a handful in the U.S. willing to bank cryptocurrency firms. It was also one of the first, entering the space in 2013, a period when the bank was loaning more than it had on hand. Capital-rich crypto firms needing a place to deposit their fiat in some sense, saved the bank. Silvergate aims to stay ahead of its competition, which now includes JPMorgan, by creating new products and services that clients request. Its Silvergate Exchange Network allows customers to instantly move dollars between different crypto exchanges, and the bank is also piloting new features like bitcoin margin lending.
CoinDesk COVID Response
#NYBWGives CoinDesk has joined Gitcoin, The Giving Block and Ethereal Summit to support charities helping communities in difficult times. We’re raising $100,000 and giving you a voice through the quadratic funding model. Learn how it works and how to donate.
New York-based interpretive artist Mr. Star City created an original piece of artwork at Consensus: Distributed for auction to support COVID-19 relief.
In addition, New York-based abstract artist Mr. Star City created an original piece of artwork, shown above, as a part of Consensus: Distributed. The art, inspired by love, unity and technology, will be up for auction this week. Follow @coindesk on Twitter to find out how to bid — the proceeds will go to the same cause.
Consensus Magazine
Generation Crypto Freelance journalist Jess Klein writes about an emerging psychographic of people who see the world through the lens of decentralization. In a series of eight profiles, Klein examines “Generation Crypto,” a diffuse grouping of people of all ages, races and sexes, bound together as “children of Satoshi.”
“I’d say not all crypto people are into libertarianism, but most libertarians are into crypto,” says Preston Byrne, a conventional-looking lawyer in his thirties.
A partner at the Anderson Kill law firm as of March 1, his specialty, as it has been for years, is “understanding the nuances” of blockchain technology. He’d only just moved from Connecticut to Washington, D.C. to start at the firm on March 14 when work-from-home orders came through, so he high-tailed it back to Connecticut, where he’d already had a bunch of food stored in his mom’s freezer in case of this exact scenario.
“Those of us who were paying close attention began getting ready for this,” he says, citing a “conspiratorial” article he discovered back in February. Later banned by Twitter, the article suggested the coronavirus came from a Chinese bioweapons lab. “Is that true? I don’t know…but that was an alternative media outlet focused very, very early [on the] outbreak in China,” Byrne says.
Anti-censorship is one of the main reasons Byrne is drawn to blockchain and cryptocurrency. “Bitcoin doesn’t care what we’re using it for,” he says, pointing out it’s been a reliable alternative for those banned from establishment payment systems for political reasons, like Alex Jones and Laura Loomer. At work, he’s dealt with such cases where bitcoin has come to the aid of those “booted” from online platforms (but as an attorney, he can’t discuss them — nor can he hold cryptocurrency himself, due to potential conflicts of interest).
Since he holds no cryptocurrency, Byrne hasn’t gotten too deeply involved in any individual crypto community, but he goes to various Bitcoin and Ethereum meetups. His real “tribe,” however, is the libertarian activist members of the New Hampshire Free State Project. “They were among the earliest adopters of bitcoin at various events they held,” Byrne says. The group’s aim, as he puts it, is to overwhelm New Hampshire’s population with enough libertarians to influence the state’s politics.
Byrne’s libertarian views have only been “validated” by both the government and human response to COVID-19 in the U.S. Since the government didn’t prepare people for the pandemic in time, those who didn’t make the decision to prep for themselves were the ones standing in long lines at the grocery store and panic-buying all the toilet paper. “This really makes the libertarian case,” he says, “because our world fell apart all around us, and the only thing that really mattered was whether you yourself were ready.”
Because of the government’s poor handling of the crisis, Byrne believes more people will want to “exit the system,” he says. “I think bitcoin is one of those exit pathways.”
Money Reimagined
Money Reimagined, Consensus: Distributed
Is bitcoin the answer for a global monetary system not longer served by the dollar standard? Airing Friday, May 15, episode 3 of The Breakdown: Money Reimagined examines bitcoin and permissionless stablecoins – both of which are forcing the global monetary system to examine deeply ingrained beliefs.
The Breakdown: Money Reimagined is a podcast crossover micro series exploring the battle for the future of money in the context of a post COVID-19 world. The four-part podcast features over a dozen voices including Consensus: Distributed speakers Niall Ferguson, Nic Carter and Michael Casey. New episodes air Fridays on the CoinDesk Podcast Network. Subscribe here.
Phil Gomes takes us on a tour of his crypto crib. This is his home office, which he’s been working from since 2018 when he joined Bloq. “Built into a former walk-in closet under the pitch of the roof. I consider myself especially fortunate to have this available to me in these current times,” he said over email.
CoinDesk Confessionals
CoinDesk sent out a questionnaire meant to gauge the innermost feelings and thoughts of the crypterati. Loosely based on the “Proust Questionnaire” popular during the fin de siecle, we’re hoping their honest answers will reveal insights about our own age of transition.
Sunny Aggarwal, a Tendermint and Cosmos developer, answered our questions.
Your favorite blockchain protocol? Cosmos, obviously
Your # 1 favorite crypto hero? Vitalik
Your favorite quality in an entrepreneur? Ability to stay true to values
Your biggest fear? (crypto specific) Crypto adoption goes nowhere and all this time and energy we’ve spent will be naught.
What should crypto disrupt next? Let’s finish disrupting money/finance first.
Public or private? A mix realistically. Private chains that can prove particular properties publicly.
Permissioned or permissionless? Once again a mix. Pemissioned chains in a permissionless network of blockchains.
Your best example of sovereignty? Israel’s ability to be surrounded by “enemies” but stand its ground. Nuclear weapons are sovereignty.
Your net worth Enough for now.
What gets you out of bed? My sister who wakes me up every morning cause I sleep too much
What is your motto? “A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.”
What would you like to be? Impassioned
Where would you like to live? Just moved to NYC a few months ago, but had to leave cause of covid situation. Looking forward to getting back there asap!
Your favorite television show or movie? Mr. Robot
Your most vivid memory? The day I joined my fraternity in college.
Your greatest achievement? Created UC Berkeley pirate party.
What do you rely on? Support of family and friends
What would you change about yourself? Lose weight.
Where will you be in 10 years? Working on solving problems in education.
Your favorite fiction character? Captain America
How do you spend your free time? Reading, motorcycling, watching television.
What do you want your legacy to be? Having built something that brings people more sovereignty to their lives.
How would you like to die? Preferably not in a motorcycle accident. My mom would kill me.
Media Diet
Binance Quashes Upbit Hackers’ Attempt to Launder Stolen Funds Binance has frozen funds linked to the $49 million breach of the Upbit crypto exchange after hackers tried to liquidate some of their ill-gotten gains.
Overstock Files to Dismiss ‘Meritless’ Fraud Lawsuit Over Its Digital Dividend In a filing on May 12, Overstock took aim at the two main allegations made in a class action suit: that the firm had made false declarations in 2019 about its financial future, and that it had deliberately launched the digital dividend (a tokenized security planned for listing on its affiliate company tZero’s trading platform) in order to create an artificial squeeze on short sellers.
Bequant Launches Crypto Prime Brokerage to Compete for Institutional Money Digital asset services firm Bequant launched a prime brokerage service for institutional clients to have easier access to liquidity, custody, lending and other products, the company announced Thursday.
Polymath Eyes June Testnet Launch for New Blockchain Designed for Security Tokens Polymath is closing in on the launch of the first test network for its new blockchain – one designed to bring new safeguards for financial institutions working with security tokens. With the Aldebaran testnet, the security token issuer is implementing a relatively new type of protocol scheme known as nominated proof-of-stake (NPoS).
Industry Group Led by Polychain, Coinbase Seeks to Get Ahead on Staking Regulations The Proof of Stake Alliance (POSA), an industry advocacy group, is publishing a series of recommended standards for companies participating in a proof-of-stake consensus protocol in an effort to reduce regulatory clampdowns on different networks.
Ledn Launches USDC Stablecoin Savings Accounts With Focus on Latin America The crypto loan startup Ledn, which primarily serves users in Latin America, is now offering USDC stablecoin savings accounts through a partnership with the lending and trading conglomerate Genesis.
Who Won #CryptoTwitter?
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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.
New Delhi (Sputnik): When there is a will there is a way. The saying perfectly sums up the attitude of unfaithful partners across India who are seeking some extra excitement amid the coronavirus lockdown, according to extramarital dating website Gleeden.
Discreet extramarital dating app Gleeden on Monday announced it had hit the milestone of 1 million users in India, as the country remains under a strict lockdown.
“We are proud and humbled by Gleeden’s performance in India. What is even more pleasing is the rise in the women user base in the country. Gleeden has always strived to be a platform that wishes to comfort women who are strangled in unwanted relationships..,” said Ms. Solene Paillet, Marketing Director of Gleeden.
One recent survey by the app found that 48.1% people believe that it is possible to fall in love with two different people at the same time while 44.5% were against it.
“Among the cities, Delhi holds the highest percentage of people who voted in affirmation to the question with 57.7% followed by Ahmedabad at 48.7% and Mumbai at 48.5%,” said Paillet.
Sybil Shiddell, Country Manager for India stated that online affairs are the safest choice for those people who are seeking a distraction from their everyday life, especially after two months of enforced cohabitation with their spouses.
The app which is run by a team of 20 women, is free for female subscribers. It has five million subscribers worldwide – mostly in France.
And now, as both the crisis and the general election enter their third month, panic is beginning to set in about the startling digital gap between the two parties, amplified by the recent Trump campaign announcement of both a new app experience and the start of a $10 million digital push against Joe Biden.
President Trump’s campaign manager has called what he’s built a “juggernaut” and is likening his digital infrastructure to a Death Star. In reality, what he’s built is a trap.
Bitcoin has flippened USD on Square’s Cash App, sort of.
As reported in the publicly traded fintech company’s first-quarter earnings Wednesday, Cash App brought in $222 million on all its other fiat-powered services in Q1. Meanwhile, revenue from bitcoin was $306 million, the first quarter in which bitcoin revenue surpassed all other revenue on the app.
“In the first quarter, Cash App gross profit grew 115% year over year,” the shareholder letter reported.
Gross profit on Cash App, however, remains to be found primarily outside of crypto. Of Square’s $222 million in non-bitcoin revenue, $178 million of that was profit. The Cash App saw one of its best quarters yet for new users in the first quarter of 2020, across its many different services.
Bitcoin profit through Square’s Cash App was $7 million in the first quarter of 2020. It earned $8 million in bitcoin profit through the whole of 2019.
Still, on the revenue side, the year-over-year growth in bitcoin sales was steep.
In a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, the company noted:
“Bitcoin revenue for the three months ended March 31, 2020 increased by $240.6 million or 367%, compared to the three months ended March 31, 2019. The increase was due to growth in the number of active bitcoin customers, as well as growth in customer demand.”
Total revenue from bitcoin in the first quarter was $306 million, versus $65 million in the first quarter of 2019. Square earned $178 million in bitcoin revenue through the prior quarter, the last of 2019.
Total revenue for Square this quarter was $1.38 billion, roughly 43% over what it earned in the first quarter of last year. Square had $535 million in gross profit for the quarter, but a $105 million net loss.
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.
