EU Budget Amendments Call For Millions in Blockchain Funding
As many as four blockchain-related amendments, funding various initiatives, could find their way into the European Union's 2018 budget.
Public documents have revealed that several blockchain-related amendments may be present in the European Union's 2018 budget. These include a proposal to use blockchain as a payments rail for an EU-wide free Wi-Fi access project, "WiFi4EU", as well as funding proposals for two working groups dedicated to the tech. The aim, according to the amendments, is to test "the feasibility and demonstrate the usefulness of using blockchain technology in the interaction between the EU Institutions and the citizens." The budget document reads:
"As a starting point, the project will aim at underpinning the voucher scheme of the Wifi4EU project with blockchain technology, allowing for transparent and traceable payment of EU funds to the private companies, which install the Wifi4EU infrastructure. It will also provide the citizens with the tools to examine the transactions registered in the ledger. It will rely on Open Source software and seek collaboration with Member States for providing blockchain services (also known as Govchains)."
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Ethereum's Byzantium Hard Fork Postponed For Further Testing
The Ethereum hard fork for the Byzantium upgrade has been postponed and should now take place during block number 437,000,000, or about October 17 given current block production metrics. The delay follows a suggestion made by the Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin, who noted that this was not "an emergency situation". The suggestion was made, in part, to nudge miners into adopting the hard fork successfully. Since the difficulty increase intended to incentivize miners to swap onto a different chain has not become too high, blocks would still be mineable throughout October, allowing miners to profit from mining on both chains, a situation that Ethereum developers want to avoid.
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Cryptocurrency Job Openings Double in Last 6 Months
A recent report from AngelList, the online job postings in cryptocurrency related fields have increased exponentially as companies seek new talents to help fill needs of the growing marketplace. The report indicates that in the first half of 2017, more money was invested in cryptocurrency startups than all of 2016 combined. The increasing number of startups has also coincided with an increasing number of job postings within the AngelList platform. The report said:
“As cryptocurrency companies are growing, raising larger amounts of money at higher valuations, so are their hiring needs for finding top talent. The number of job listings on AngelList by cryptocurrency companies have nearly doubled in the last six months.”
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