#this geeky little world of my own has actual people invested in it

[heartbreaknow]

😍😭💡

Thank you very much for the asks, anon! I appreciate you muchly! 

I actually already answered the first two (favorite fic trope, and fic that left me inconsolable) over here. As for the last one…um.

 💡 Tell me a headcanon (and who you wish would write it)?

The thing is, I…I kind of did it wrong. I accidentally wrote an entire blow-by-blow of the scenario I want. Which isn’t really what I was supposed to do at all. But now that I’ve written it I guess I’m gonna post it? Lol. So here’s one bit of Starker headcanon that I am wildly obsessed with:

Caught In The Act

I want to see Peter and Tony in a secret relationship where they’re desperately in love, but Tony is also a complete wreck because he is fucking his eighteen-year-old mentee, and it is the best, hottest, neediest sex of his life, and he can’t seem to stop, and oh my god he is a sick, awful person. And Peter is just taking every single thing Tony gives him, and trying to give as much back as he can, and trying not to think about the fact that when Mr Stark ends this, he is going to break. And they’re not really talking about things the way they should, because they’re both convinced they are inappropriately invested in this thing, in each other. And they’re still in that frantic, perpetually horny stage where they can’t keep their hands off each other, and whenever they’re alone together, level-headed decision-making goes out the window and they end up fucking in some random places.  

Which is how they end up getting caught in the act by almost all of the Avengers.

I don’t know the specifics of how it would happen. The tropey version that’s easy (if maybe a little unbelievable) is that the Avengers throw Tony a surprise party, and they forget to tell Peter about it. So Peter and Tony think they’re alone in the Tower, and that everyone is away doing various Avengers things.

So yeah, maybe they start frantically making out in the elevator on the way up to the Tower, because they just can’t wait. And Peter is so busy trying not to come immediately, like he usually does, that his senses don’t pick up the presence of a bunch of people in the Tower’s main room.

Bonus points if they are actually fucking by the time the elevator doors ding open and reveal them there: Peter’s head thrown back, mouth gaping open, riding out the tail-end of his first orgasm, his naked legs wrapped tight around Tony’s waist—and Tony standing clothed between Peter’s pale thighs, pinning him to the wall, his dress pants pulled down just enough to free his cock so he can pound into Peter like they both need.  

And there stand like six or eight of the Avengers (with noise-makers and party hats, if we really want to milk the horrifying absurdity of the situation), utterly speechless, in various states of shock, confusion, and dawning horror.

Extra, extra bonus points if Peter sees the others first, and gasps, “Oh god, M-Mr Stark,” to try to alert him that they’re not alone—so now not only do the Avengers know Tony is fucking his teenage protegee, they know Tony is fucking his teenage protegee who still calls him by an honorific.

But the crucial part that I’m really here for, is how Peter and Tony react. Because after several long beats of horrified silence, Tony just crumples. As soon as Peter unwinds his legs from around Tony’s waist and stands—a bit shakily—on his own, it’s like Tony withers. Like someone takes the spine right out of him. 

As far as Tony’s concerned, he has no defense. Whatever they’re all thinking, whatever they think should be done with him, he deserves all of it and worse. At first he’s standing in front of Peter, shielding him. But one of the others tells him to step away from Peter, as though he’s a threat to Peter, and he hesitates but he does it, because maybe he is a threat to Peter. He honestly has no idea anymore.

Peter still doesn’t quite understand exactly how fucked up Tony is over what they’ve been doing together, and thus doesn’t have the context to properly understand Tony’s reaction. So for Peter it feels kind of like abandonment—the way Tony withdraws so completely, even while he’s right there. And Peter is just standing there in nothing but a geeky t-shirt, holding the rest of his clothes in front of him, still shaky from the orgasm he had literally a minute ago. Vulnerable as hell.

Then the questions start.

And not all of the Avengers are taking it badly, but a couple of them are. And Tony’s not defending himself at all. 

Peter watches Mr Stark give these flat, horrible, wrong answers to the painful, awful questions the others keep leveling at him…and outrage begins to flare inside Peter, strong and fierce.

And okay, this entire thing is way too long already so I’ll try to truncate things a bit, but basically, Peter tries to interject, but it isn’t working. Everyone is really shaken up and reeling, and Tony’s complete refusal to defend himself isn’t making things any better. And it doesn’t take long before things get heated enough that one of the others gets in Tony’s face—angry and accusatory. (Let’s be real, it’s probably Steve. I don’t hate Steve, and it could totally be someone else, but let’s just say it’s Steve for now.) And there’s a moment of crisis where Steve reaches for Tony, probably not to hit him, but who knows for sure. And Tony, thinking he’s going to be hit, just waits for it.

But then suddenly, Peter is between them, and he pushes Steve back—not violently, but a little harder than he means to. Hard enough that Steve lands on his ass a couple of paces away. And Peter just stands there, squarely in front of Tony, like an animal defending its mate. Peter’s not even sure if Mr Stark feels for him half of what he feels for Mr Stark, but that doesn’t matter right now. What matters is the hollow, defeated, hopeless look on Mr Stark’s face, which Peter has to do something about, because he can’t bear the sight of it. So Peter stands there in front of Tony, like, Nope, we’re not doing this, I won’t let you keep doing this. And he’s either in his underwear or still naked from the waist down, but he isn’t even thinking about that. It doesn’t matter right now.

And Tony’s like, “Kid—” all croaky and awful, and tries to usher Peter back. But Peter won’t budge. He looks straight into the group of Avengers, and basically tells them as plainly as possible that he loves Tony, absolutely and without any doubt. And if they have questions, he’ll willingly answer them in a bit.

Then Peter turns to Tony, and touches him tenderly even though Peter himself is shaking. And for the first time with people around, Mr Stark touches Peter back, just a little—equally gentle and even shakier than Peter. And then, silently, Peter draws Tony back into the elevator.

After a second, Tony says, haltingly, “I don’t—where do you want to go, Pete?” And Peter says, “With you?” like it’s the simplest thing in the world, but also the least certain. So Tony tells FRIDAY to take them up to his quarters.

Gently, Peter holds Tony by the arms, front to front, and leans into him.

And for just a second as the doors close, Peter looks back at everyone in the main room. He doesn’t look angry or even challenging, but he does look determined, and strong in a way that none of them can quite define when they think about it afterwards.

END SCENE

All the details of this scene are as-yet very poorly thought out. A lot of it would probably change if I were to actually write it (and obviously a lot of elements would change if someone else did). This is just the general gist. As for who I’d want to write this scenario, or a version of this scenario with the details retooled—I’m sure it’s a surprise to no one that my first answer is Ride To Church Anon. I mean, who am I kidding, there are already elements here that are clearly inspired by both Covet and Revelations.

That said, “caught in the act” is, IMO, a massively under-used trope in this fandom, and I would love to see just about anyone’s take on this basic concept.

[templeofulchtar]

On Connecting with Starscream

So, true story:

The first time I tried to perform a ritual for Ghost Season, I had no idea what I was doing. None. Which makes sense, since I may have been the first person ever to attempt such a thing. I set up an altar on my apartment balcony using various things that felt “Starscreamian” to me, and when the night of August 22 arrived, I nervously cast my circle. I invited Starscream to enter into the circle, and… waited.

And waited.

For what, you might ask? Well, I have always had a sense of what his presence ‘feels’ like. It’s a little hard to describe, but I’ve made an attempt in the section below, titled Sensing Starscream’s Presence. I’ve included comments from a couple of other people who work with him so you can compare your experiences to ours and, perhaps, have some idea of what to expect.

In any case, I was getting nothing. Not a tingle, not a flicker, not a mental image; nothing. I began to feel ridiculous. Why was I sitting here in the dark waiting for a cartoon robot to speak to me? I’m pretty sure that’s not something normal people do. Not that I’ve ever aspired to be normal, but… well. It wasn’t working. I packed up and went to bed, feeling embarrassed and ashamed. As I burrowed under the covers, though, a car roared past outside with an old AC/DC song blasting out the windows:

You told me to come, but I was already there.

For those who know that song, yes, I do realize that’s a slight misquote. But that’s how I heard the lyrics in that moment, and their message couldn’t have been clearer:

I am always with you. You don’t have to summon me.

For this message to have been delivered in a voice that’s always reminded me of Starscream’s made it seem incredibly personal and real. And yes, it’s wrapped up a double entendre. If you work with Starscream, you’ll likely discover his ribald sense of humor for yourself.

Why am I telling you this?

Because if you turned to this post wondering how to establish a connection with Starscream, this might be your answer. If you love him, he’s probably already with you. If you feel drawn to Starscream, admire him and would love a deeper connection, there's an excellent chance that he'd be open to working with you as well. If you've been having dreams about him or finding that he, or things you associate with him are ‘coincidentally’ popping up in your life, he may be reaching out to you.

If you’re still not sure, though, you can try this exercise:

Connection Excercise

Open your journal to a fresh page and give some thought to the questions below. You don’t have to answer all of them. Pick the ones that resonate, and write down whatever comes up:

★ Does Starscream provoke strong emotions in you (positive or negative)?

★ Does he show up in your dreams?

★ Do you daydream about him?

★ Are you inspired to create works that feature him, such as fanfic, fanart, cosplay, and so on?

★ Are there certain songs that remind you of Starscream?

★ Do you have favorite quotes by or about Starscream?

★ Do you, at times, catch yourself ‘talking’ to him in your inner dialogue?

★ Do you ever wish you could talk to him?

★ Do you identify with Starscream and see yourself in him? In what way(s)?

★ Have you taken on new interests because of him? (Example: jets.)

★ Do you imagine yourself as Starscream in some way, either physically (eg. Having null-rays, ability to fly), or in terms of your personality or life situation?

★ If you were part of the TF Universe, would you want to know him personally and be part of his life in some way?

★ Has he inspired your life in some way?

★ Have you changed how you dress (say, by wearing more red) because of him?

Those are just a few examples of the ways Starscream could be showing up in your life. You might think of others. If you do, note those down as well. Now, you might be thinking these are simply examples of fannish obsession. You may even have found some of the questions embarrassing. That’s very natural. These questions touch on some very intimate, sensitive aspects of being a fan, and there’s good reason for that.

These questions are embarrassing because they bring up feelings of vulnerability. When we love something, we open ourselves to being hurt. The mockery that’s so often aimed at fans is motivated by people’s desire not to feel vulnerable themselves. They try make themselves feel safe by ridiculing others, but in doing so, they cut themselves off from the source of their own magick.

Yes, you read that right. Your magick, and your spiritual connection to Starscream, flows from that intimate space within. It’s that vulnerable, awkward, geeky place where you innocently, unabashedly adore a character and are totally obsessed with them. Treasure that place. It’s your inner temple. Guard it with care, because it’s where your magick resides.

But, you might be asking, are the ‘symptoms’ on this list actually signs of a spiritual connection? I’m going to say yes. I believe they are, and if you’re open to the possibility of deepening that connection, you can begin to make it a two-way street. Starscream is many things, but ‘shy’ is not one of them. He will show up if you make space for him, and the place where he’ll meet you is within the heart of your magick; your inner temple.

Sensing Starscream’s Presence

So what can you expect? What does Starscream’s presence feel like? It’s hard to give a definite answer, since everyone is different. Your experience will be your own, and in many ways incomparable to anyone else’s. In case it helps, though, I’ve included commentaries by three different people who work with Starscream, including yours truly, to give you an idea of what you might experience...

Starshadow writes:

I think I first became aware of [Starscream] as such while I was in high school. I was initially drawn to his character on the animated show, and at first that was all he was. But I quickly became intensely invested in his story, especially when I started to follow him in other media (comics, etc) as well. He became more to me, and began to transcend the stories and art presented. He literally seemed to take on a life of his own. I started to feel (and sometimes see) him in my dreams encouraging me and telling me to be strong.

His presence is distinctly strong. It sometimes borders on aggressive, but it is not threatening to me. I think he just has a particularly powerful presence. It's very fiery and passionate, which makes it distinct from other entities I sense which are more calm and protective. I will often "see" in my mind's eye his red eyes and wings as well when I feel he is near.

Occasionally [he communicates through] dreams, but much more often I will "hear" his "voice" in my mind, often giving advice and emotional input. As I mentioned before, he has from time to time actually yelled (screamed? ;)) at me, but only at times when I really needed it. Sometimes his colors will show up in combination and songs I associate with him will be played out of nowhere when he is taking a more subtle approach.

[My sense of his presence has] waned at times. For a while it seems like he is just hovering on the fringes, but he never completely goes away. His means of communication hasn't changed much though.

He has made me braver than I probably would have been. He is still working on my self-confidence, though. He's been back again recently encouraging me with that. He has also definitely influenced my creativity and aspirations. He has helped me be driven enough to pursue my desires for so long and explore creative work beyond the "traditional female" expectations.

He [also] does sometimes seem to share aspects with other entities I've communed with, like my [wolf guides]. He will almost seem to "combine" with them, or share their energy, and sometimes they with him. I haven't quite figured out why this happens or for what purpose yet, but I am very curious!

Dark Star of Chaos writes:

It’s no exaggeration to say I spent my whole life looking for Starscream. If you want to get technical I first “met” him as a kid watching Transformers Armada, but though he became my favorite character, that was all he was to me then: A character. I loved him, but what I really wanted at that time was an imaginary friend. Not a real one; an imaginary one. The catch was, I didn’t want to invent one. That, in my mind, was not how it worked. The imaginary friends in cartoons all interacted with their humans as though they were real, and that was what I wanted. I didn’t see how a thing invented from my own head could ever take on that kind of life.

When I was older - after Starscream had slipped off my radar - I came across a book called “The Fire Within”, about an aspiring author and his clay dragon Muse. That book, and those which followed, completely redefined what I was after. I wanted to be a part of this world of dragons and shamans, where words held magic and transdimensional aliens “commingled” (merged consciousnesses) with Earth creatures. And I wanted a Muse of my own; always just a thought away, and always ready with some flash of inspiration to offer.

Looking back on it, I don’t think it’s any coincidence that Starscream reappeared in my life within a few months of that series ending. Our reintroduction came via the original cartoon, and after only a few episodes - specifically, by the end of “Fire in the Sky” - I had already decided I had to write about him. I couldn’t say exactly when I began to perceive him as an entity separate from his cartoon portrayal, but when the idea was suggested to me, it didn’t sound strange or crazy. It sounded right.

Starscream’s energy has always been subtle for me. I’ve never had much luck “feeling” his presence, though I’ve come to trust that he’s there. I only have to talk to him to get proof of that, because he always replies. Sometimes there are words, but more often it’s emotions and concepts, and it can take a while for me to figure out what he means. He also appears in my dreams rather frequently, and we’ve had more than one “face-to-face” meeting that way.

His influence on my life, on the other hand, has been anything but subtle. In addition to inspiring me creatively, he helped me overcome embarrassment about sex, played a role in my moving from a small desert town to a big city, and most recently, he’s come down on me about my abysmal self-care habits. He can be pushy sometimes, but it’s never harsh, and I always end up happier for having listened to him.

In short, Starscream is the friend and Muse I’d been searching for all those years, and I’m endlessly grateful for his presence in my life. After all, how many people get to make dreams of magick a reality?

Grayseeker writes:

I first became aware of Starscream’s presence when I got a call from work asking me to come in, even though it was my night off. The idea of going in made me sick, but I felt I had to. It wasn’t just that I was afraid of getting fired; I also had a strong impulse to obey authority figures. I didn’t know how to say no. But on that particular night, a voice spoke inside my mind:

You don't have to do anything you don't want to.

It was a voice I recognized, and the words were accompanied by what I can only describe as a ‘feeling image’ of myself as a sovereign being with full authority over my own life. I didn’t have to do anything I didn’t want to, and I didn’t go in to work that night. I told my supervisor I’d had some drinks (untrue, but effective) and after that, they stopped calling me on my nights off. Maybe they sensed that something in me had changed. It had.

I believe Starscream has always been with me, but that incident, over three decades ago, is the moment I became consciously aware of his presence. My sense of him has remained pretty consistent over time. I still ‘hear’ him as a voice inside my head. Usually it’s just a few words, but they’re always imbued with a sense of meaning that goes beyond the words themselves. I also get physical sensations, such as warmth or tingling, emotional communication (which is hard to describe!), dreams and synchronicities, usually involving numbers, colors, and/or song lyrics.

To me, Starscream’s presence feels warm, welcoming, comforting, affectionate, and… amused. His communications with me are typically laced with a certain wry humor, and the observations he makes are often phrased in sardonic, even sarcastic terms, though they’re somehow never hurtful. I always feel the warmth behind them, and they make me feel loved. I always feel like he’s on my side, even when he’s pointing out ways that I could improve.

On very rare occasions, he will get serious. That’s when I know to pay extra attention, because it usually means there’s some danger to me, or that I’m venturing into territory that isn’t healthy. I’ve learned (the hard way!) that he’s always right. He’s immensely wise, and I’ve learned to listen when he says ‘no.’ He doesn’t say it often, and he always has a good reason.

Starscream has influenced my life in countless ways. He’s my creative Muse, and has been the impetus for my desire to write. He’s also my main guide, my teacher and spiritual awakener. I think of him as more a friend, and more than family. I love, trust and respect him, and feel that I receive the same in return. I hope these words will find their way to someone who is starting on the same path, or a similar one. If I can offer any reassurance or inspiration, perhaps it’s just to say trust you heart. I’m glad I trusted mine.

I know he’s sad because he couldn’t blow up the Earth, but kinda want to hug him anyway...

A Few Last Thoughts

You might be wondering how to make sense of all this. In particular, you may wonder how to distinguish what’s real from what’s a product of your imagination. And what am I trying to say, anyway? Am I, in fact, suggesting that Starscream is real?

Why yes, I am. Now before you decide that I'm nuts and walk away, let me explain what I mean. I am not necessarily implying that Starscream is a physical entity. I'm not saying that if you were to hop into a really fast spaceship and fly far enough and in the right direction, you would arrive at a metallic world named Cybertron, populated by living robots who are able to transform into various types of vehicles and other machines, and that among those Cybertronian entities you would find an individual named Starscream.

Of course, I'm not ruling that out, either. Our universe is too vast and strange to rule out much of anything. But what I am saying, based on several decades of personal experience, is that there is a real, non-physical entity named Starscream, with whom it's possible to communicate and have real interactions.

Can I prove this? Nope! There is no tangible, objective phenomenon I could point to as "proof" of his existence, but for me, that's beside the point. I feel Starscream as a constant presence in my life. He is my guide, teacher, healer and dearest friend, and his impact on my life has been very real indeed. I hope that the personal examples given above will provide a starting point for you to begin having your own experiences, if you desire them, and that your relationship with Starscream will be as rewarding as mine has always been.

Blessed be, Grayseeker

[ghinanotlinetti]

23 lessons I learnt (and am still learning) at 23-years-old

On Thursday January 30th 2020, I turned 23-years-old. I’ve never been one to want to do something extravagant for my birthday, it’d be too much pressure for a single day. I do, however, like to reflect on my year and have a mental check-up on myself to see how things are going. It just so happens that my birthday is in the month of January, the first month of the year, so I keep all my new years reflections for my birthday. I find that I tend to press refresh on January because there tends to be a lot of clutter that I couldn’t clean out from December. This year was no exception; I was working all the way until December at my corporate job, then I left the country to visit my parents for the winter holidays so I had no time to pick up the pieces from that job and my life in the big city of Jakarta. I couldn’t extend my contract when I came back so had to let go of that job, which was both scary and a relief. Life after grad is very unexpected, I don’t think they prepare us enough to deal with the highs and lows. The week of my birthday was also the same the world received tragic news about the death of Kobe Bryant and his daughter Gianna Bryant. I’m not a basketball lover but I did know Kobe Bryant as this dorky geeky guy who was a huge Potterhead, he loved Game of Thrones and The Alchemist and was not ashamed of this side of him at all. I also started feeling ill, then I got the flu and am still recovering from a cough that’s making my diaphragm and back ache so much. On the other hand, I did get to spend this birthday week with my older sister who shares the same birthday as me. We haven’t celebrated our birthday together in years, it’s nice to be together again. In the spirit of me turning 23 this year, I thought I’d share some teachings and advice I’ve picked up along the way. Hopefully it can be applicable to all, especially if you’re just entering life after uni, so here we go!

1. You’ll never make it if you don’t face it.

So you might be familiar with the phrase “fake it till you make it” which might work for some people, but in the long run it might not be a realistic approach. Of course we all have dreams and want to achieve them, however not everyone is willing to work for their dream. If you’re one of those people like me who have no problem is working hard towards their goals, then you might struggle with the next thing I want to bring up which is: patience.

2. Be patient, be patient, be patient.

I was not that willing to wait for my dreams to come true as I was when it came to working for it. I definitely love working on my writing and the hustle felt rewarding to me, however I was impatient which is quite odd because I’m also young and have years ahead of me. Maybe it’s a millenial thing to be daunted by the what if’s but it’s so valid; what if I don’t make it until I’m 40 something, settled for stability and never took a chance on my passion? I find peace in accepting that I don’t have to know these things because I trust in the universe and I believe God always has a reason.

3. Believe in yourself, over and over and over again.

As someone who struggled with low self-esteem I thought all my insecurities would vanish the moment I felt confident. Instead it’s a whole process that can’t be done overnight. It takes weeks, months, years but if you’ve been able to believe in yourself before you can certainly do it again.

4. It’s okay to not have it all figured out.

Because everyone else around you doesn’t have it all figured out!

5. Generosity can get you far in life.

Helping others is the best way to network and form meaningful relationships at the same time! It’s not worth it to be alone in your hustle, because at some point you’ll need people for a plethora of reasons.

6. Collaboration > Competition

Realistically, you can only really be an expert in a few things, maybe one or two things and that’s completely okay. Because what this means is that there’s opportunities to collaborate and create with others great things.

7. Be kind to yourself.

In order to be kind to others one mustn’t ever forget to be kind to one’s self. Simple.

8. Lead with faith, not fear.

There have been so many times when I’ve done something out of fear and thought it was necessary, but then I felt so anxious I didn’t know what to do about it. I realise now that leading with faith makes me have less panic attacks; it’s not that I’m not scared at all but more so that I’m just calmer because I’ve accepted that I don’t need to have an existential crisis every time I make a decision. So, I’d go with faith.

9. Reclaim your narrative, and stay grounded.

There’s so many labels and stereotypes that I’ve have to deal with and never asked for simple because of who I am. It’s a lot of judgement from all sorts of people and communities (and I thought I was promised one day of judgement?), so I simply refuse to be defeated. I’ll rise above and reclaim my story which demands to be heard.

10. Everyone has talent and is smart, but not everyone is authentic, kind, reliable, etc.

I thought that in order to stand out I had to have a loud, big, and bold persona, which worked fine with other people but that just wasn’t me. On the flip side, I found that most people, be it employers or friends, would value qualities such as authenticity and reliability more than what you could bring to the table.

11. Become the things you want to become and you’ll stop desperately wanting it.

So for a really long time, I’ve always wanted to be a writer and I thought I’d have to wait for that to happen. But then I’ve always been writing, therefore I already am a writer. I think this can be applied to most passion projects and everyone deserves to take a chance on their passion project no matter how absurd or crazy it might be.

12. Just try whatever it is (an interview, application, class, etc.) and at the very least you’ll have one foot in the door.

I’ve got quite an active imagination; I tend to think a hundred steps ahead, mind-wandering in places I probably shouldn’t, so sometimes I won’t do things if I can’t commit 100%. Overthinking has become tiring for me and I want to make more choices out of faith. Most often than not there’s really no harm in trying, so just give it a go.

13. Don’t suffer in silence.

I suffer in silence in the past way too much. As a result I’ve distanced myself from really good friends of mine without any clear explanation. Can’t do that again because I value my friends and they deserve better.

14. Create the art that you would want to consume.

Be your own target audience. Most people don’t actually know what they want until it’s there in the market, so you’d be waiting a long time by asking other people what they want. Just start now.

15. Rest should never be compromised.

Often when I feel like giving up, I don’t actually mean it. Sure it’s frustrating but I don’t want to quit. I just need to rest. Please rest, and make sure to get the best quality of rest.

16. It’s okay to grow out of things and people too.

In the past I’d be needy for closure, but then it became tiring. Sometimes not getting an answer is the same as getting an answer. Let go.

17. When people show you who they are, believe them.

Yes, I think everyone has made excuses for their buddies, and I’m over it honestly. This one for me isn’t about my present circle of close friends, they’re lovely and I’m really lucky to have them. It’s more for people in my past, and it’s out-of-the-blue when it happens. I hate when it happens but then I can’t just pretend it never happened.

18. You matter, block out all the noise and have a moment to listen to your own voice.

If I ever feel lost or out of touch, I know it’s time to put just a little bit of distance from myself and the world for a little while. When I get to this point I’m usually investigating around my emotions, not investing myself in them, just observing patterns and signs and then find out what it means.

19. Unlearning and healing takes time, just make progress no matter how big or small.

So I’m in my twenties and I thought by this age I’d have everything figured out. Turns out I was very wrong. The amount of unlearning and relearning I had to do and am still doing... wow. But as long as it’s not a regression and a motion forwards, even if it’s just baby steps, it’s so worth it.

20. Life is just as much of a journey backwards as it is forwards.

As someone who’s always been spiritual, this is something that I find comfort in especially in times when I feel like I don’t know where I’m going. I’m a third-cultured kid, I’ve never had a home home for so long, and that’s fine. Nothing is a given, not even tomorrow. Life is about eventually returning to the Creator; it doesn’t matter how far you’ve come, what matters is what you make of this crazy beautiful dunya.

21. Close some of those tabs once in a while, it’ll be fine!

Ties into the next one which is:

22. Relax.

I’ve been dealing with anxiety for so long, my mind is somehow on panic mode by default, even when I’m meant to be off duty. Still trying to find that balance which works for me, between work, family, friends, mental health, leisure.

23. You’re not as special as you think you are, but on the bright side it means that you’re not alone! No more pity parties for one!

No more feeling sorry for myself because it’s disgusting! There’s so much out there to explore and discover for me, and that’s worth getting excited over. Here’s to more adventures, travelling, self-discovery, friendships, love, and everything in between!

[inpaperclad]

Dungeons In Dragons - Season 2, Session 18: “Law & Disorder”

The party stands tense as the idea of a former ally being a murderer seems too terrible to bear. In their desperation, they tell Juno all they know of Ichthyarbourus Fel: his Wild Magic and knowledge of necromantic spells, his quest of vengeance, and his unknown whereabouts. Despite Juno's proud reputation as “The Mage Hunter,” she concedes the chase for Fel to our heroes, and they plan for a trip to Corona, capital of the Xiao Empire. Juno resolves to find Alicia Van Osternburg in Orzanthinople's capital of Cerwind, to question her involvement and warn her of impending danger.

Shortly afterwards, Ignis and Evelyn encounter a strange Half-Elven prisoner being taken in for sentencing by Huntmistress Elsa, proprietor of the Preparation hunting lodge. The prisoner introduces herself as Nymeria, and stands accused of freeing the caged prey animals within the lodge, as well as the theft of two Tads and a Mahogany Bow. Ignis promises to defend Nymeria in court before she is hurried along.

Preparing to leave, the party splits once more to finalize their plans:

Ignis revisits Lightbearer Mun to delivers the evidence on Torinn's case. Lightbearer agrees to investigate the evidence for any missing details. Ignis then rushes to District Bahamut, defending Nymeria against Huntmistress Elsa's accusations before Judgement Xelios. He successfully frees Nymeria with a community service charge, where the two help rebuild the broken cages. Finally, he travels to Kord's Tide-Breaker Temple, speaking with Umbrasyl about his upcoming travels. They spar briefly to test their worthiness - Ignis of his folk hero status and Umbrasyl of her induction as Master - a battle which ends in a tie.

Evelyn stays in the Dove Tower after Ignis finishes his delivery, and speaks with Lightbearer Mun regarding Liberatus' true identity as a Drow. Evelyn shares the etching of the locket held in the corpse's hand, as well as her experiences in the tomb. Lightbearer Mun declares it best this remain a secret for now, as too much of humanity's history has been built on the legend. Nevertheless, she shares her pride in Evelyn on being a true seeker of knowledge, and mentions one other who likely knows the truth.

If and Vera head out to research Tads and find suitable cages for them. Finding a ramshackle pet store, the owner is found to be a member of the Wristblades. If reveals their  affiliation, and they purchase a stolen Terrarium Chest featuring grassland and a deep pond. If returns to Matheson Bed & Breakfast, where the twin Tads and Noelani are happily introduced to their new home.

Vera diverts after buying the Terrarium, and wanders Avandra's Asylum of the Adrift. Within she finds Oophelia doing target practice with a siege crossbow as large as her. They briefly discuss their travels and Oophelia wishes Vera safe travels.

Nymeria joins the rest of the party at the inn, sharing a meal and her tale. Hailing from somewhere inside the Endless Forest, she was born among the Sky Elves but raised as an orphan. Her rotting bark armor was part of an order she once belonged to, now degenerated since she has departed from them. Now she seeks adventure, fortune, and her mother, whom she only knew for a week.

During this talk, Nymeria reveals her Druidic talents and speaks with the Tads, discovering them to be utterly stupid. Ignis inspects his Charcoal Knuckles, which have begun to weaken somehow with no viable way to repair them. If's Mahogany Bow comes into question, as it matches the description of the stolen weapon during the trial. If continues to hide their theft from the party.

The group passes through Pinnacle's customs once again, and are surprised to find Oophelia working as their inspector, large siege crossbow now firmly secured to her back. Oophelia identifies If's bow as a stolen item, and takes Vera aside to speak of the party's alignment. Satisfied with Vera's replies, she allows them to sneak the bow out of the city. During this, Evelyn clings tightly to their Bookbag of Holding, realizing she has inadvertently carried stolen goods as well.

After half a day's travel to reach the crossroads, the party stops at a campsite with other travelers. Evelyn and If quietly debate the morality of their stolen goods, especially Evelyn who is very uncomfortable with the contraband 10 pounds of Suude. If offers to sell the product to a distributor, while Evelyn considers dumping it out or turning it in. Meanwhile, Ignis, Nymeria, and Vera prepare a vegetarian feast with Fusaka, and meet a friendly mercenary named Billy. He offers to travel with the group, and while Ignis accepts, Vera seems wary of his extrovertism. Through the night, some activity is heard in the forest bordering the camp.

Billy is missing when the party wakes, so his traveling group go offroad to search for him. The party discusses whether they should follow or continue to Corona. Heroism wins, and they enter the dense patch of trees until they are well within the grove. Vera spots a number of traps ahead, while If pulls a Crossbones bandanna from the Coat of Things, just as a familiar wagon tumbles down the hill towards them. Just as they escape the wagon's path and investigate the wreckage, firey arrows rain down upon the party, igniting a stash of black powder. If is injured from the explosion, and the party rushes to their aid. Ignis uses Step of the Wind to investigate the source of the flaming projectiles, but is ambushed by Billy and another assailant, while the remaining Crossbones close in on the rest of the party aiding If...

@percival-de-rolo as Vera Stoutwillow, Halfling Cleric and Wayfarer of Avandra @kremdelakreme as If Liakiir, Rougish Elven beauty and Palm of the Wristblades @softbutchhiccup as Ignis Wildfire, Human Monk Disciple of the Bronzeheart Monestary in Draconia @dantealicheery as Evelyn Martell, Human Paladin and Sister Enlightened of Ioun @inpaperclad as The Dungeon Master and introducing @arointhestreets-aceinthesheets as Nymeria, Half-Elven Druid and former Spriggan of the Sky Elves

Shoutouts as always to: @lionsquartz’s Mikael Roemont, Human Warlock and Knightmage of the Battlemagus Max’s Ichthyarbourus Fel, Half-Elven Wild Magic Sorcerer from Eispanta @frillylittlecakes for her continuing fan support :D

[techouspeaks]

Toon VS Toon: The Dragon Prince VS She-Ra and the Princesses of Power 2018

Both shows have a lot of promising diversity but which one does it better? 

Alright, so you’re probably wondering why I compare these two shows together? A side from being both hosted on Netflix and showing a lot of diverse characters and story elements, along with taking place in a magical universe where war is raging on and the fate of good solely relies on our heroes saving the day. There’s not too much they have in common.

Well the thing is that’s what I’m going to discuss, how they handle diversity and which one does it better.

Now if you hadn’t read my She-Ra review, I basically think the show is okay. The concept and how the characters are drawn are nicely done and I like Adora, Mermista and Bow. Some of the concepts are very interesting. I just feel it lacks a little bit, especially in animation and character development. I feel like the story and character development is way rushed including the relationships between the characters including our leading female lead Adora and her rival villain Catra. 

The Dragon Prince I recently started watching and it didn’t take me too long to get invested. I liked the settings, the animation is gorgeous and the characters are very likable, despite the dufus wimpy lead that even Hiccup from How to Train Your Dragon would call a dork. I kinda think that Callum was meant to be a copy of Hiccup a little bit. 

The one thing these two shows do have in common is diversity as I said. The characters are all diverse. You have lesbians or hints of lesbian relationship, you have people of different cultures and different skin tones all in this world and it’s not a huge thing, but which one does it better? Which show handles the diversity much better and respectfully.

Let’s look at She-Ra. We have a lot of female leads that have different body shapes and skin tones and all that. There’s even a hint that during a dance with Adora and Catra that there might be some closer feelings. However, this is barely hinted at. There’s no real actual gay relationships as of now. It could be because the series has yet to have a season 2 and Dragon Prince has two seasons already, but still it lacks a bit.

As stated before Bow and Sea Hawk are kinda gay stereotypes. They’re obviously not gay because Sea Hawk does flirt with Mermista and has this huge infatuation with her and Glimmer kinda has a thing for Bow so it’s undecided if Bow is actually gay or not, but it’s obvious they’re stereotypes. At least Sea Hawk is and Bow is sorta that but not as bad. He’s very competent as a character and besides liking pretty things and the whole “Best Friend Squad”, he does act like a natural person would, but yeah his overall is still pretty much a dated stereotype of “Let’s put this kind of character in it because social justice is in right now!” 

All the other characters I’ve said before in my review just feel like well archetypes. You have the lack of emotion, bored tough chick whom I do like and is my favorite character but lets face it, she’s an archetype. I’m not going to deny that even if I do like her. The sweet sensitive type, the geeky nerd that is totally into tech more than people so much so she’s extremely socially awkward. Aside from Glimmer, Adora, maybe Catra and sometimes Bow, most just feel like archetypes and with how the characters are design and how this show tries to be in your face with “We have diverse bodies and we have diverse this and that!”, it comes across almost deceitful with it’s premise. Especially any male character remotely masculine is one of the bad guys and that’s a bad thing. Feminism isn’t about hating or showing masculinity as a bad thing but something as equal to it or just as needed and that the role of masculine and feminine can be reversed around.

The Dragon Prince has it’s stereotypes too. Like I said, Callum is pretty much your wimpy hero that wants to find his place in the world. However, most of the characters are pretty much realistic. What I enjoy about this series is that it does show diversity but in the right way. Not only because there’s more diverse characters ranging from not only on the main list such as sexuality, breaking gender roles and races but also in other factors such as a character that is deaf and mute, a character that is blind and even at one point, Rayla was experiencing what it’s like to lose a limb, which that happens to people too. However, it’s how these characters are represented that makes this show stand out nicely.

All the diversity is treated naturally, like it’s been there for years and everyone accepts that people no matter what they are or who they are can do anything. They don’t feel like they’re just put there for the sake of pleasing the audience with “Hey we got this type of character in it! So you have to like the show!”. The characters just fit in the role. The king just happens to be black, the general just happens to be deaf, the pirate just happens to be blind, the queens are lesbian, which I don’t understand how they have a kid together in a world where technology isn’t established. I guess maybe some sort of  magic, maybe one of them is transgender but okay! It’s just well natural. It’s treated like a normal thing. 

The only bias thing here is just magic folk, more specifically the elves and creatures that are connected to magic vs humans.

Most of the characters in the Dragon Prince feel real, like they are people you will meet, including the villain somewhat. 

In fact, when you really think about it, the Dragon Prince does feel like an old 90s - early 00s show, because a lot of shows like Captain Planet, Avatar the Last Air Bender, Storm Hawks, among other kids action shows that did have diversity. The thing is we weren’t so into social justice stuff back then that maybe people just don’t realize it now. We had diversity in kids shows back then, with the exception of an open gay character, but I guess people just aren’t paying attention. 

What I say about this show being close to say Avatar or early shows is a good thing. It makes it feel less dated. Like you could watch this show years from now and not go “On this was from the mid to late 10s”. In fact, characters don’t even rely on slogans like some of the characters will say in She-Ra or talk like again “Best Friend Squad”. Okay, that’s not really a huge slogan but you get what you mean. 

Sometimes the Dragon Prince will get preachy like how Ezran will say all that is right about humans when Rayla does her human impression, but over all, it’s not in your face about the diversity. 

The only thing people may complain about is the lack of “diverse bodies” aka having a fat or “curvy” characters in it. I think there is only one character that I would say is on the chubby side and that’s one of the kings that Viren meets at the meeting, which I say, you’re talking about a show where most of the characters including the queens fight and know how to fight. Even if a fat or somewhat chubby or curvy character fights, they ‘re gonna lose most of that because that’s how your body burns calories. There’s a reason why if you want to lose pounds you exercise. It’s science and this show at least has some science to it’s lore! Well except, again I dunno how two queens make a baby but again, maybe one of them is trans and with no kind of surgery for that kind of thing, they still have all the male parts. Hey it’s still showing a lesbian relationship. The man becomes a woman so...that’s something! It’s showing a trans and lesbian relationship. Or maybe the girl is actually adopted, I dunno. It’s still treated as a normal thing and at least we actually do see the queens kiss so there’s something!

Another thing that kinda makes She-Ra 2018 a bit dated is the use of colors and animation. It uses the same kind of flash animation and colors that a lot of shows like Steven Universe and other cartoon network  and Disney channel shows tend to use. Not much of the animation makes it stand out or different from shows that use the same kind of style and pallets. That and there’s times where it’s clear the animation isn’t so good. The characters may not move as fluently as they need to move and some scenes look a bit incomplete.

Guys I know it’s hard to do animation but if a small team of animators making a youtube show, the Hazbin Hotel, can clean up on their animation and even without the clean up is still good, there’s no excuse. She-Ra’s animation crew work at Dreamworks, the same studio behind the How to Train Your Dragon series and Voltron! Shoot, the Dragon Prince isn’t even owned by a huge company and it still does better!

The Dragon Prince is set in a more mythological time period and the animation fits well into it. The use of lighting and colors as well as shading makes it feel like genuine. It still looks similar to shows say like Storm Hawks or other 3D action shows but it still has it’s own look and it’s a breath of fresh air to see a show have such beautiful colors and designs. The colors are can be light and pretty with shading to make it easier on your eyes as well as dark in grim when the scenes need to fit that tone.

So obviously, the Dragon Prince does win over She-Ra. If you disagree or think I’m a bit bias, okay. I grew up with wonderful animation such as Disney and Nickelodeon shows. I can’t help but like quality animated shows!

I also like to point out, though this isn’t a comparison, but since this is sort of my review of the show, I must say I really do like how smart the characters including the side characters are in the Dragon Prince. Most of the time in a story like this, the people will blindly follow the evil adviser, not realizing he did it, only to go against the villain at the end when the truth is found out. Here, that’s not the case. Even his own children start feeling odd about their father and most of the soldiers don’t like him nor want to do what he says. Many of the characters suspect Viren’s nature and even the kings and queens while at first want to go with Viren’s plan to group up for war, it’s only until the child queen (I sadly forgot her name) decides, even after the heartbreaking tale of how her parents died, feels that it’s pointless forcing her people to fight in a war where they are more likely to be killed, that the other royals follow beside her and go against the war. It’s done realistic. No one is just a plain idiot! People have their own thoughts and the series never fails to show how each individual feels.

In this day and age, we know that leaders are gonna have many followers and many enemies or people that don’t agree with them even under their reign. This makes sense and I like how this show handles that. Such a simple thing like that is what makes this show a breath of fresh air and why She-Ra doesn’t remotely hold a candle to it.

I may do a review of the show, a proper one and give it my full rating. So far, you I think highly of this show and as for She-Ra, I will continue to watch it as time goes on and when season 2 finally comes out, I’ll check it out. Maybe the later seasons will fix the problems I have or stay the same. It’s not a bad series but I’m gonna act like I don’t have problems with it. I’m not gonna pretend to like something more when the series that is obviously superior does better than it.

I will say this. How you relate to each one depends on you. Maybe you do find yourself relating to She-Ra’s characters and situations. If that’s true, more power to you. You may even say I’m wrong with how I explain things. I honestly, don’t care since most of the time I don’t read notes anyway but I’m not gonna tell you what to like or dislike. These are personal opinions. Nothing more, nothing less.

So that concludes that the Dragon Prince is the winner of Toon VS Toon Battle. Highly do recommend you check both series out as much as I think less of She-Ra, it’s good for at least one viewing so you can draw your own conclusions. Naturally, I highly recommend the Dragon Prince especially if you’re hugely into animated fantasy adventure series like Avatar the Last Air Bender, maybe Adventure Time, Storm Hawks and Legend of Korra.

I’m Tech! Seeya in the next review!

[bobbynolanios88]

The Best Books & Resources to Read on Blockchain

The Best Books & Resources to Read on Blockchain

Are you itching to understand blockchain better? Do you feel like you really need to get to grips with all the content out there, but just don’t know where to get started?

Well, this article is for you. Bookmark it, follow the links and bask in the warm fuzzy feeling that is reserved for those who invest time and effort into learning a new subject.

When I say time and effort, I mean about 200 hours of reading, and an equal number of hours to discuss with friends who are also interested in learning more. You won’t become an expert by the end of it, but you will know enough to understand what the hell all the hype is all about, and be able to understand most of what is discussed on the internet.

If you are active on Linkedin, and you start sharing some of your knowledge after you are through with all the reading, don’t be surprised if you start getting ten requests a day from ‘ICO Advisors’ and other self proclaimed experts.

First, I have bad news for you though.

Despite the thousands on Linkedin and Twitter claiming to be ‘experts’ in the field, there is no such thing as an expert. Not yet anyway. Vitalik Buterin, one of the founders of Ethereum, might come close to being an expert, but even he openly admits to needing a variety of views from various people to make complete sense of the stunning amount and speed of innovation in the space. Also, let’s not forget, that guy is a boy genius, and if he takes time to understand all that needs to be understood, mortals like you and me can afford to take our time!

This is a short little guide to get you started on your own learning journey. If you follow through on the resources listed, and actually take time to read, discuss and share, I assure you that you will end up knowing more than most people out there.

When I first started reading up about bitcoin, everyone recommended reading the Bitcoin white paper. If, like me, you don’t have a background in cryptography and computer science, very little in that document will make sense to you. So don’t start there.

Again, make no mistake, getting through every document in this list will only give you a basic understanding of what the technology is and how it works. In other words, and forgive me for being repetitive, you will by no means become an ‘expert’, but you will be able to comprehend and understand the vast majority of projects, discussions and articles on blockchain.

Blockchain Revolution — The first thing I did when my infatuation with blockchain began was to read this brilliant book by the Tapscotts. This book is a neat little synopsis about how blockchain can radically transform a number of industries — from payments and banking to accounting and supply chain. I highly recommend starting with this book since it will give you the all important ‘why’ and therefore help you envision the enormous possibilities of blockchain.

Mastering Bitcoin — Next, pick up a copy of Mastering Bitcoin by the amazingly knowledgeable, eloquent and humorous Andreas Antonopoulos. This book is meant for developers and non-developers, and though he provides plenty of code snippets, you don’t have to follow the code. Andreas breaks some very complex topics down so anyone can understand them. This book will give you a very tightly knit picture of the bitcoin ecosystem, how it works and why things function the way that they do. Terms like proof of work, hashing algorithms and mining will make a lot more sense to you after this book.

Bitcoin & Cryptocurrency Technologies — This is a technical book (PDF) from Princeton University. It is very thorough and explains most concepts you will encounter in the blockchain world in a manner that is fairly challenging for those who have not studied computer science before. Nevertheless, putting yourself through this book will give you enough knowledge to understand a whole array of technical discussions on blockchain.

Once you are done with these, you will have a fairly basic understanding of the ‘why’ and the ‘how’ of blockchain. Good work! This sets you up for more advanced study into the better known networks out there.

Distributed Ledger Technology Systems; A Conceptual Framework — Before you start digging into whitepapers of some of the better known blockchain projects, it is well worth your time to read this excellent document by the Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance. I got a lot from reading this document because it lays out various conflicting terms (which are used rather loosely in the blockchain world) and discusses them in detail. Michel Rauchs, one of the lead authors of this report, is active on Twitter and is very helpful, so do reach out to him and follow him!

White papers — Given there are more than 1600 projects out there, it is impossible to read everything. Also, you might not be as geeky or want to devote as much time as I did, so choose a few and read them. Here are a few that I recommend:

Ripple whitepaper plus the associated documents on how Ripple seeks to supplant the existing system for international transfers

Ethereum white paper, so you can understand what Vitalik saw as the drawback of the Bitcoin network, and his vision for a system that could also incorporate applications that run in a decentralized manner

Bitcoin white paper

The three above have been written with a fairly technical audience in mind. Don’t worry if you don’t understand everything. You will definitely have more questions than answers, but it is a good way to start linking your newly found technical knowledge to real world applications.

Next up, time to get some more thoughts from Andreas.

The Internet of Money — Volume 1 and 2 — are a great way to wrap your head around a lot of the buzzwords that you will have encountered in your reading so far — decentralisation, permissionless, applications on top of bitcoin, trustless layer etc. These books are a collection of Andreas’ talks in different parts of the world, and they will definitely help you tie a number of thoughts together.

Alright, now you are ready to be taken seriously in any conversation related to blockchain. Good work!

At this point, your brain will start to ponder the inevitable question “Why do we need so many networks and blockchains”?

By this point, you will know and understand enough to start exploring different industries that could make use of blockchain. While payments and banking are an obvious choice, there are loads of industries and situations which could make use of blockchain technology.

One document which helped give me tremendous perspective about the philosophy behind anonymous communication protocols was Crypto Anarchy and Virtual Communities by Timothy May. I live in India, and if you have been here, you will know that it is one of the most corrupt countries in the world. Some of Timothy May’s thoughts really resonated with me because he proposes radical ways to counter the robbery being committed by governments in developing countries. The website nakomotoinstitute.org also has plenty of articles and papers which lay down the building blocks of digital cash, anonymous protocols and even smart contracts.

Source link http://bit.ly/2CoZaGk

[orribuontheinternet]

Depression and Drawing.

When I was a young lass (I want to say around 7-8 years old), I saw my biological father drawing something while he sat on the porch. The details are fuzzy, but I do remember it being an equine of some sort. He was working in ink. Watching him was so fascinating that I decided that I too wanted to be an artist. To be able to imagine something and put it to paper was a foreign concept to me, one that I was excited about. Oddly enough, my first ever drawing was of an intangible concept: an emotion. I forgot why little me was so knee-deep in sadness at the time, but I remember doodling a self-portrait of a sad, crying baby Olive while holding back my tears. Underneath (or around, I can't recall) was a caption that kind of stated the obvious: "Olivia is sad." When I think about that moment, I wonder if that was a form of foreshadowing since I suffer from...well, Major Depression. But we'll get back to that later. I think this drawing was spawned from a conflict with my siblings, but I can't rightly recall. I do, however, remember that someone tore the picture to pieces. Then came the waterworks.

I want to pause for a second and let you know that I'm going to try not to throw a pity party. I'm not going to whine and stuff this note with melodramatic hyperbole. If you can stomach an emotional artist digging deep into her head and making her introspection tangible, I encourage you to keep reading. If not, I respect your decision to stop.

To segue on to a brighter note, I started drawing in elementary school. I remember the exhilarating feeling of finishing my work. My proudest moment, aside from a (not) Sonic-themed powerpoint, was a storybook I made in fifth grade. It was a flip book of some sort, and very colorful. I think it had something to do with James and the Giant Peach considering it was a book report. But that was an impression I left. Olive, the artist. This carried on into middle school, where I first discovered anime thanks to an art teacher who had the magic VCR/TV cart we 90s kids remember fondly. He showed us Princess Mononoke, one of Hayao Miyazaki's well-renowned works. It was um...horrifying. The film scared the everloving shit out of me, but I was intrigued by it. There was something really cool about the way the people looked, far different from the Ms. Frizzles and Rugrats I came to know. It captivated me, and when I got over the stomach-churning blood and guts the movie presented, I strove to attain that cool aesthetic. I was always doodling during my classes and lunchtime and recess. People came to know me as that kid that draws. Some of them flocked to me and asked me to doodle something for them. It was annoying in hindsight, but at the time it brought me immense pride. People were interested in something I was doing! This development boosted my motivation; I drew picture after picture, happily sharing it with anyone who was interested. It was invigorating! Then high school happened, and I realized I wasn't as amazing as I initially thought I was. In 2006 I was accepted into the prestigious Philadelphia Highschool of Creative and Performing Arts (henceforth shortened to "CAPA," as to avoid the apparent mouthful of syllables). I attended with a major in visual arts, which I took alongside my core classes, i.e., math, science, and English. The first few months were humbling, to say the least. I took ceramics, graphic art, and observational drawing. During this year, I also discovered the magic (to a 15-year-old anyway) of Naruto. That was my biggest obsession since the Dragonball Z/Rurouni Kenshin/Outlaw Star/Big O/etcetera days. Where I used to make "Dark Sonic" characters and the like,  I made a step towards creating a world of my own. Thus, after a painful defeat in an original character tournament, I decided it was time to start harnessing my writing and narrative skills, as well as my drawing skills. And so I strove to improve, even with those dents in my pride. It became something I was proud of, almost an obsession. I wanted to share it with the rest of the world, so I went for it.

(The first piece I’ve shared with the internet via deviantART.)

This is where my real artistic journey began. When I started, I had no idea of how mentally, physically, and emotionally tolling this would be. Half the time I've made things way more difficult than they've needed to be: sleepless nights, crouching over a desk, risky investments that granted little to no return and thus resulted in me digging myself into a deeper hole of debt, periods of psychological agony–I've experienced a great deal since I started creating these...things. In my naivety, I envisioned making money off of my creativity, having fun, meeting fans around the world, and hitting up cons like those really cool people I follow on the internet. I started comparing myself to more celebrated, experienced artists, to the point where I'd cry out of eye and earshot and wonder why I can't be as good as them. Why can't I be as skilled, or successful, I'd ask myself. This is when I should have realized that the Depression I suffer from has a voice. It'd tell me that I'd never amount to anything, let alone reach that level of expertise and fame. It was painfully merciless and cruel, and I was its punching bag. I'd start wondering what the point was and why I should even try to engage in this creative expression. Then, something tragic happened:

I realized I was falling out of love with it.

I didn't feel the same exhilaration I'd get when I finished something as simple as a little scribble. I didn't feel the warm burst of energy that I felt when I'd make a breakthrough.  I desperately scrambled for something–anything–that would rekindle my love for creating again. Then, after some introspection, I decided that I wanted to try for animation. It had always fascinated me during my time in grade school, so I did some research and even wrote a thesis about animation and why it inspired me. To an extent, the passion I have for the arts did come back a little, but it was just a spark. When I started college, I was reluctantly proud of myself. I started dreaming big again, thinking about how amazing it would be if I could create my own animated series and bring my narratives to life. And so, the dreams of being able to support myself and my family returned to the forefront of my mind, again. While I hopped and skipped through my first year at uni, I built a lot of friendships I never thought I'd have after a painful summer season. I thought back to how I tried and failed to start an art team and decided to go for it again. And thus, after planning gatherings and messing around with my friends, Exploding Fairies was born!

(Old Exploding Fairies logo.)

The Depression and my wounded confidence, however, wouldn't allow for anything to go past casual hangouts and being a nuisance to my teammates. Everything boiled down to three things:

1) I was unwilling to relinquish control of any of the facets of the alliance and our stories. To me, the story we worked on was my baby, and only I would have a say in whatever developments occurred. 2) I lacked the leadership and communication skills to collaborate with my partners effectively. 3) Considering the nature of my requests, I SHOULD have been paying my partners as an incentive. I lacked the money to compensate them for their time and talent adequately. I could very well be painting myself in a horrible light considering how terribly influential my depression is to my self-esteem. 

(The image above is by @cucoo.)

(Concept drawings of Dan’s actual identity.)

However, exposure and companionship don't necessarily pay the bills. Besides, I was still a "nobody on the internet!" I may as well have kicked sand in their faces. At least, that's what the disease told me. I grew bitter towards the world when Homestuck and a traumatizing anime gained the admiration of my friends. I became green with envy, wondering why my work didn't win such affection. That summer, I went into overdrive. I started an original character tournament of my own and gained a considerable following. I even found love again! 

After a busy three months, I jumped into my second year of college. This is when I finally collapsed under the weight of my mental ailments. Week after week, I stressed almost hyperbolically to the point where a single mistake could mean the end of the world to me. I officially started as an animation student (the first year was mostly core studies with elective and liberal arts on the side), and I wanted to bring my A-game to the forefront. I was going to wow everyone with my knowledge of technology while I navigated through the hills and valleys of my second year. I got to take a course in digital 2D animation, the media I've had my eyes on since I started my college career. Everything just hinged on whether I could manage my workload (I took 18 credits). Apart from the building stress, financial troubles, and impaired health, everything seemed fine. That notion, however, was shattered when I lost my progress on a 2D animation assignment. It was all over. All of that hard work that I put in (without saving, no less) was destroyed by a corrupted file. I didn't have a backup file ready for such an occasion. Admittedly, it was my fault for letting my guard down. I should have known better as a geeky artist!  To me, there was no way I could ever recover from that. I was an idiot and a crappy artist anyway! I was a failure! I was nothing! All of the horrible thoughts that my sickness cataloged was thrust into my conscious mind, impairing my ability to reason. Devastated and afraid, I called my crush and opened up about what happened. The pressure finally cracked me, and she had to talk me down from attempting suicide.

The turn of events affected everything, from my focus to my ability to complete my assignments. My crush advised me on what steps I should take while moving forward. I was hospitalized to prevent any harm I could bring to myself. I really DID want to escape from the unbearable pain my sick mind caused me. Eventually, I had to contact the dean of students and was referred to an affiliated therapist. After conversing with him and the dean, we all decided that it'd be best if I were committed to an outpatient program to start on the road to recovery. Fast forward to 2012 or 2013, when I completely lost faith in myself as an artist, and thus, my love for art. I didn't think it'd happen, but I hit what I conceived as rock bottom. I swore off drawing. It didn't bring me joy anymore, and why continue dabbling in something that I'd never be good at?

Unfortunately, the resulting slump turned out to be thicker than I'd imagine and I entered a state of deep depression. I rarely got out of bed, I overate and sometimes didn't eat at all, I never picked up a pencil or opened photoshop, never reached out to the people who I knew and who loved me...I was virtually dead to the world. Some good things happened that, in hindsight, I should have cherished. For starters, my crush became my girlfriend, and we lived together in an apartment in Center City. I was too smothered in the fog to show my appreciation and love for her adequately. She loved me and loved my work, which in turn brought back my passion for creating. If I couldn't financially support myself with my art, the least I could do is bring her joy and feed her imagination. 

(We both love semi-horror and anime, so our roleplays took that direction.)

Sadly, thanks to the disease even something as precious as her happiness wasn't enough. When I look back, I can see the hurt in her eyes, but during the time I had such horrible tunnel vision and was so disappointed about things not working out with my art that I couldn't sense that. Me, a self-proclaimed empath! My desperate greed and envy were my downfall, and I limped my way down the artsy-fartsy road. I'd draw fan art and create fan comics, only to become bitter about either the lack of replies or patrons on Patreon or the perceived disregard for any personal ventures I took. 

I did my first convention at Anime Impulse back in 2015, and after a pretty bad time in the artist alley, I swore off drawing again. I remember nights of staring blankly at the computer screen, smashing Command or Control +Z and ultimately throwing my stylus down, closing photoshop, and crying out of frustration. I remember pulling my hair and sobbing when I faced rejection. It was an incredibly painful time for me. That's not to say I still don't experience that now as I totally do, but something happened this year that strengthened my stride.

I posted something on Tumblr earlier this year about my frustration when it comes to creating art. It was specifically about how I get stuck in the "polishing" phase of building a webcomic page, but when I look back, I can actually attribute it to art in general. I became a "perfectionist." Nothing was impressive enough to finish or release, and I'd wind up with more works in progress than finished ones. My morale just kept dipping lower and lower, and finally, when picking up a webcomic project that I started more than a year ago, I vented my frustrations. To this, my crush, who became my fiancé some four years ago, replied with this:

"You polish because you’re not confident with your work because you're in an evolution phase. Fear holds you back. So you go back and edit. And edit. And edit. So stop the cycle. Kill the fear by not letting it have time to take hold."

Her words of encouragement and insight changed my perspective in ways I've never expected. It was almost like it triggered an epiphany or a breakthrough in my mind! I was reminded of her love and faith in me! With that came a ray of hope, that I could try again, and this time, throw my fear-induced caution to the wind! While my depression still has a voice and beats me down from time to time, I realize that it's just scared. I realized that when Brittany and I sat down and played through Celeste together. I related it to my sadness and anxiety surrounding art, and now I'm slowly getting back on my feet. I can't displace the blame and "use" my mental ailments as a scapegoat. I can't come up with excuses to give up on what I do. There is SOMETHING in creating visual media that breathes life into me.

(I started learning to let go.)

Looking towards the future, I hope I can look back on even these trying times and remind myself of where I was and how stronger I've become because of it. I'm still struggling with comparing myself to others and crashing into creative and motivational blocks, but someday I'll rise above it all. Besides, I should be doing it for me, right? The external validation should just be the topping on a sweet sundae.

That's why I keep drawing, in spite of the voice's apprehension. We're going to get through this together, I promise.

[shoriignis-blog]

HEADCANONS

tagged by: honestly no one i just found this & wanted to do it. tagging: also no one. if you want to do this. do it && tag me. 

fave/least faves;

music genre: bakugou is really into angry emo/rock music. but also classical. his least favorite is probably country. 

movie genre: acTION. he also enjoys crime dramas, &&& just straight dramas. he likes sci-fi/geeky movies as well. his least favorite movies are suspense/thrillers because he can never get invested in them. 

tv shows: since i can’t really point to a specific tv show, i think i’ll just do examples? he would like serious crime shows, like law & order sort of deal, he lowkey would like cartoons like teen titans. he hates sitcoms. 

movies: again, i’ll just give vague examples. since different world && all that. movies like fight club, kingsmen, star wars, predator, the dark knight trilogy are all ones he would like.  &&& he’d hate movies like “hush” or “split.” 

artists (singers & painters etc): bands like three days grace, fallout boy, red jumpsuit apparatus are things he’d be into. but in the classical sphere he really likes yiruma, this playlist probably saved his life, && he would have a lowkey crush on lindsey stirling. 

youtuber (optional if they don’t watch youtube): i don’t think bakugou would be invested enough in youtube to have people he was really a fan of or really disliked. but other than music he would like montages of people getting injured doing dumb shit. 

singles/tracks/album’s: again, this playlist he loves.

foods: bakugou fucking loves spicy food. but whenever he eats it he has to be extra careful not to blow anything up since he sweats so much. he doesn’t like junk food.

drinks: honestly he drinks a lot of Gatorade type sports drinks, water, &&& things like that. he’s really not a fan of sodas - or anything carbonated. 

personality stuff;

the archetypes (quiz): 39% athlete, 33% advocate, 28% rebel. 

game of thrones/a song of ice and fire house/rank type: i imagine his family would be on the noble side, but rather than having inherited it through generations they’ve earned it through knighthoods. katsuki would definitely be far more interested in being an active knight than the lord of some castle. 

living stuff;

where do they live - explain on why they live there - or we’re the forcibly thrown there? What does it look like, how many rooms - any curtains? etc etc: he lives with his family, in an apartment building ( even though they could afford a bigger place - his mother insists on not having more than they need ) there are three bedrooms, a kitchen, a living room & four little closets. they don’t have any curtains - but bakugou’s mother has pinned up a sheet over her window because no @ the sun. 

do they have neighbours (you don’t have to go supper deep into it but you can if you want - heck don’t listen to me it’s your fucking character.): lmao you mean “deku” 

we have the standard vices (drink/drugs/smokes); what do they eat - are they vegetarian, vegan - lactose/gluten intolerent: katsuki wouldn’t touch alcohol, drugs or cigarettes honestly. he really values his body. like he knows he has to be in the best shape possible to be the best hero. so his diet also follows that - he doesn’t eat anything genuinely unhealthy. 

do they exercise? how often? how dedicated are they to it: bakugou works out a lot. not only just in school - which is mandatory, but also on his own time. he runs a few miles every sunday, he does cardio in his room, he has a punching bag in his family’s storage unit that he visits on sundays as well & spends at least three hours kickboxing with it. decidedly not using his quirk. 

cleaning routine. do they clean? do they clean once a month, does someone clean for them? can they clean - like have they been taught the standards of cleaning or are they a germaphobe: bakugou cleans a lot actually. his room at least. you might expect it to be a little torn apart - but it’s actually pretty organized. having his space neat gives him a nice feeling that helps him calm down. 

accessory stuff;

do they have a phone? if so what colour is it in? Does it have a case - what kind? do they have a ring tone or is it always on vibrate/silent? What is the ringtone (default, some david guetta song etc: yes he has a phone. it’s black. his case is black, but with a orange gradient. it’s almost always on vibrate though because his mom is almost constantly messaging him about whatever nonsense. he doesn’t have a song for a ringtone - just the default one. 

what does their key chain look like - do they lock their front/back/side door? how many keys do they have? do they have charms or old pet name tags: his keychain is basic as hell. it’s literally just a silver ring with 5 keys. one to his house, one to his bike lock ( not that he rides his bike all that often tbh ), one that unlocks his families storage unit, one that unlocks his dads office & one that opens this little vault he has in his room that holds his Most Precious Things. 

do they paint their nails? which ones (ie their toe nails or finger nails)? what colour(s): matte holo, nail art, one colour, top coat & base coat, only top coat, ONLY base coat: he doesn’t paint his own nails no, but honestly i don’t think he’d be against having someone else paint his nails. 

way too close for comfort stuff;

what do they smell like - do they shower often? do they LOAD the perfume/cologne on? if so what does it smell like - or is it a bunch of smells from birthday/christmas presents: bakugou smells like nitroglycerin. literally. because he sweats it. like he tries really hard to cover it because no one wants to smell like a chemical so he ends up smelling pretty “clean” because he uses all kinds of odorless soaps & such to cover it. bakugou has to shower really often ( like two times a day - minimum ) because otherwise he becomes a legit safety hazard. because of, as discussed, he sweats nitroglycerin. 

what kind of laundry detergent do they use? i am stealing a headcanon from this fanfiction && saying that he has to use a custom detergent to avoid blowing up washing machines with his clothes. 

do they ‘five-finger discount’ everything (steal shit), or is it just the ‘small’ stuff: bakugou literally wouldn’t shoplift anything. ever. 

family stuff;

how did their family upbringing affect them? were they orphans? were they spoiled? I have a lot of headcanons on this so i’ll direct you to my headcanon tag. 

do they even like their family? headcanon tag. 

friends stuff;

are they a friend hoarder? do they have 1-5 really good ones; or 1,200 fb friends: bakugou has, if he’s telling you himself one friend. in reality he’s probably got five people he likes well enough to actually want to be around them. but he’s really such an idiot when it comes to friends tbh. 

what do they look for in a friend? a listener or a talker: i think it’s more just that he needs friends who can deal with his dramatic monologues without taking them too seriously, but don’t expect him to do much in way of conversation otherwise. 

relationship stuff;

what do they look for in a relationship? boy isn’t looking for a relationship right now. he’s focused on becoming a pro hero. but if he were to get into a relationship it’d have to be with someone who respected that his hero dreams are his first priority & someone who understood him well enough that they could deal with his personality without trying to change it. other things too, but those are the big ones. 

how old were they when they had their first kiss, what happened? katsuki was seven-years-old & a girl pretty much jumped out up out of nowhere during recess smacked her lips against his && ran away. he was so shocked he kinda just stood there for a while. he never told anyone about it. 

how many relationships have they had? why didn’t they last? lmao he’s never been in a relationship in his life. 

are they straight, bi, gay? something else? he’s bisexual. but hasn’t really had the time/energy/interest in sitting down & doing any soul searching. he just knows that girls can be really fucking hot but so can guys. 

are they poly? or mono? bakugou would have to be monogamous. he’s way too fucking possessive to share. however i can see him being okay with a closed relationship with two other people? as long as they were all together exclusively. 

pet stuff;

do they have a pet? are they allergic to any animal? do they LOVE cats or hate them with a fiery passion - or are they just fucking cats: he doesn’t have a pet, because his dad #cannot with animals. but he’s not allergic to any of them & he fucking LOVES cats but he won’t admit it if asked. 

are they dressed up super cute? katsuki wouldn’t dress any pet up tbh. 

do they WANT a pet really badly but *insert relationship here* is allergic, hates animals etc? baku would like to get a cat but as said above, his dad just can’t with them. 

social media stuff;

do they have…  if so what is there… AND (since it applies to all of them) what’s their avatar? if they don’t have these in their world what would they be if your character could have them. 

facebook [user name], [## friend count], [any family members on the sidebar], [their about] : bakugou katsuki. 403 friends. his header image is an old family photo. his profile picture is him flipping of the camera & his about says, “if you don’t know who the fuck I am, why are you here?”

instagram [user name], [## following], [## followers], [## posts]: explosioncrowned. avatar is of him in a beanie. he’s following five hundred blogs, but has four hundred thousand followers because so many people love his posts tbh of which he has 2k of. he’s had his instragram for a little under a month & absolutely brags about his follower count. 

skype [user name], [## contacts], [description]: his skype username is just bakuplosion, he’s got 2 ( two ) contacts && no description. he exclusively uses skype to talk to his dad when he travels for work &&& his mom when she goes with him. 

tumblr [url], [## followers], [## following], [## mutuals], [## posts], fancy theme they made, fancy theme someone else made, OR tumblr default: honestly i don’t think baku would have a tumblr. he doesn’t care enough to maintain one. 

twitter [user name], [## followers], [## following], [## mutuals], [## posts]: explosioncrowned is his username again & once again he’s got a pretty significant following with 350k. he follows about 50 other people, 46 of which are mutuals. the other four are his #favorite celebrities.  

snapchat [user name], [## contacts], [## stories]: again, I don’t think he’d have a snapchat. it’s just not his thing. 

youtube [user name], [## subscribers], [## subscriptions], [## videos] - extra; are they a vlogger, gamer, musician, cover artist etc. he has a youtube account that’s literally just linked to his email. he only uses it for music && to watch montages of people failing at things. 

pinterest [user name], [## boards], [## following], [## followers]: while bakugou wouldn’t have his own pinterest - I have a pinterest for him so check it out. 

deviantart [uses name], [## watching ], [## watchers], [## submissions], [## favourites] - extra; do they sort anything?: yeah he definitely doesn’t have one of these. baku baby sucks at art. 

[prosperopedia]

Investing in Bitcoin

Sometime during 2010, I heard a lot of buzz in my work office, where there were lots of developers and other technical types, about a shiny new digital currency experiment that the most geeky of geeks in the office were referring to as Bitcoin. It seemed gimmicky to me at the time, besides being complicated, so I chose to ignore it despite feeling some temptation to investigate it and maybe buy some just to see what happened. At the time I when heard first about Bitcoin, the fledgling currency was up for grabs for as little as five to ten cents each.

My previous experience with investing in something I knew little to nothing about happened a decade before I ever heard about Bitcoin, in 1999 to be exact. Following the optimism of one of my co-workers, I had opened an eTrade account, purchased $1,000 worth (which was a lot for me as a college student intern, entry level programmer) of a company called JDS Uniphase, and went to work the next day eager to share my excitement about being a co-investor with my work buddy. When I told him the news, he responded that he had sold his stock in JDS Uniphase, and that it was in the process of tanking.

“Well, that would have been helpful to have known yesterday.”

Within the year that followed, I finally closed my eTrade account after having locked in a complete erasing of my $1,000 investment, plus some extra thrown in for eTrade administrative fees. The whole experience made me pretty gun-shy about investing, especially in things that were complicated or that required knowledge that I couldn’t easily obtain.

Just over a month ago someone told me they had a friend who had just cashed out some of his Bitcoin stash, which amounted to half a billion dollars. He’d purchased it nine years ago when the price was at about 10 cents each. After hearing about this Bitcoin success story, I mentioned to my wife that I’d thought of buying a thousand dollars worth of the cryptocurrency when I first was told about it in 2009. We calculated how much I’d missed out on because I decided against it: a whopping $72 million!

Oh well. We’ve had a good life over the past ten years without winning that lottery.

This and other interactions with Bitcoin have given me a lot more education about Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. I’ll share with you what I’ve learned.

How Currencies Have Traditionally Worked

What we know today as currency (or more commonly money) has been a part of economic interactions for almost 3,000 years. In 1100 BC, the ancient Chinese developed the most primitive currency as a successor to bartering when they started using small bronze replicas of actual goods. In 600BC, the first recognized official currency was created by King Alyattes of Lydia (modern day Turkey) to facilitate trading in the Mediterranean area of the world.

The invention and advancement of currency has allowed economies to behave more efficiently. Currency creates a store of value and acts as a nest for holding the ability to pay for things.

Traditionally, currencies have been comprised of precious metals such as gold, silver, bronze, or copper. In its early history, the United States was on the gold standard, meaning that America’s currency was tied to and got its value from the gold supply. During the Great Depression, Franklin D. Roosevelt decided to stimulate the economy by pouring more money into it, so he unofficially cut the link between the value of currency and its gold equivalent in 1933. Richard Nixon officially severed the ties between US dollars and the value of gold in 1971.

Since 1971, the US dollar is now a fiat currency, not tied to any physical commodity. Instead, the dollar gets its value from the US government’s declaration of the currency for use as legal tender, which has some control over how many dollars are in circulation.

In the current world, there are no currencies that use the gold standard, which means that all of the currencies used throughout the world are somewhat volatile. For instance, the country of Venezuela has responded to its economic difficulties and deficits by printing money particularly irresponsibly, which has led to hyperinflation, which has further crippled the country by making severely depreciating its own currency. Most Venezuelans, those who have not fled the country, live in poverty now.

With a little bit of extra corruption in a government and some bad choices regarding monetary policy, any country could see something similar happen to its economy and currency.

What is a Cryptocurrency?

Cryptocurrency, similar to old fashioned physical currency, can be used to purchase physical goods and can be transferred from one owner to another electronically. Beyond that, there are mostly differences between cryptocurrency and physical currency.

Here are the major differences between cryptocurrency and traditional currency.

Management: cryptocurrencies are managed by a network of computers that use open source code; traditional currencies are managed by the government entities that created them

Value: cryptocurrencies get their value mostly from the interaction of supply and demand; with traditional currencies, the value comes from the perceived confidence of the issuing government, although supply and demand also factor in

Access and Security: cryptocurrencies are kept secure by the network of computers on which it operates, which verifies every transaction, and which allows anyone with access to the internet to participate in trading; cryptocurrencies can be bought and sold using virtual wallets; traditional currencies are secured by banking and government institutions, which hold on to cash reserves

Presence of Physical Money: cryptocurrencies do not have any physical representation, whereas traditional currencies do have physical representation, usually in the form of paper bills or coins

Ubiquity: cryptocurrencies are limited to being used only where merchants have chosen to accept it; traditional currencies are normally limited to being used in the countries where they’re issued, except for the US dollar, which is accepted in many different countries throughout the world because of its prominence

Creation of New Currency: cryptocurrencies can have new units of currency created through a process of mining, which involves validating and timestamping transactions that exist in the blockchain (a distributed ledger); additional units of traditional currency is created by printing paper money or minting new coins

What is Bitcoin?

The most popular of the cryptocurrencies by far is Bitcoin. News headlines in 2017 regularly reported on the meteoric rise of Bitcoin from an obscure, unknown hobby to a legitimate currency that made thousands of holders of the currency into millionaires and that created a $200 billion market.

Bitcoin is the first of now more than 6,000 cryptocurrencies. Bitcoin was invented in 2008 by an anonymous person or group of people using the pseudonym Nakamoto. In the white paper (written in October, 2008, entitled Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System) describing the purpose of the invention of Bitcoin and its mechanism for accomplishing the desired outcome, authored by Nakamoto, the purpose of Bitcoin is stated thus:

A purely peer-to-peer version of electronic cash would allow online payments to be sent directly from one party to another without going through a financial institution.

Bitcoin kicked off its public existence worth essentially nothing from January 2009 until March 2010. In March, 2010, a Bitcoin exchange was launched, with Bitcoin trading at a value of 3/10 of a cent each. By April 2011, Bitcoin had reached parity with the US dollar.

Over the next six years, from April 2013 to December 2017, Bitcoin’s volatility and uncertainty saw it climb to new highs, then topple back down, only to rebound again. Speculation, regulation, and the interaction of a new type of currency with economies and systems that operate very differently and that were being challenged created a roller coaster scenario for Bitcoin investors. On December 17, 2017, Bitcoin reached its all-time high of $19,783.06, only to see a fall to less than half that price in early 2018.

As of the time of this article’s writing, the price of Bitcoin is around $7,300.

Current Bitcoin Price

Bitcoin doesn’t really have a timestamped “price”, because the currency is traded on different exchanges at slightly different prices. However, you can find a close approximate that consists of a weighted average of recent trades in several ways.

One of the easiest ways to find the most recent Bitcoin price is to simply google “Bitcoin price”, and Google will give you the current weighted average price provided by their partner Morningstar, along with an interactive graph that allows you to see the historic price numbers.

There are several other ways to find out the most recent weighted average of Bitcoin trades, including:

BitCoinAverage.com – This web page shows Bitcoin’s historical numbers an includes some tools for using the data, including an API for making use of the pricing data in other environments

BitCoinity.org – The home page of Bitcoinity.org is a simple update of the weighted average of Bitcoin trades. There are links from the home page to access the various markets throughout the world where Bitcoin is being exchanged, a link to extensively detailed data and evaluations of the trading history, and a section for webmasters who want to embed the data on their own websites.

How to Buy and Sell Bitcoin

Unlike what’s required with traditional currencies, which simple require you to have the money in hand if you’re paying with cash, or which can be sent and received through transaction vehicles (banks, credit cards, checks, etc.) with which you are likely familiar, using Bitcoin safely requires becoming somewhat educated on the process of acquiring and spending the cryptocurrency.

The official Bitcoin website has some advice for those who are getting started with the cryptocurrency, including making sure that your wallet is secure and using an offline wallet for Bitcoin savings, understanding that Bitcoin pricing is highly volatile and that transactions can’t be reversed (like a credit card chargeback or stop check), and learning what government tax and regulations could have implications on your transactions.

Buying Bitcoin requires you to have a Bitcoin wallet, which is a software application that acts as a holding place for your Bitcoin money. You can choose from wallets that are specific to mobile Android or iOS devices, for Linux, Mac, or Windows computers, web wallets that are not specific to any device but instead are accessible through a web browser, or you can use a hardware wallet, which is recommended for storing large amounts of Bitcoin.

Finding Your Bitcoin Wallet

As described above, finding a Bitcoin wallet that meets your specific needs, in regards to technical specifications, security, and ease and convenience, depends upon your preferences, experience, and interaction mechanism of choice. Here are some of the most popular Bitcoin wallets:

Bitcoin Wallet

Bitpay

BRD

Electrum

Exodus

Ledger Nano S

MyCelium

Trezor One

Samourai

Wallet Generator

Risks Of Investing in Bitcoin

As discussed in this article, Bitcoin is still an experimental currency, new enough that it is still finding its place in a very diverse and dynamic worldwide economy. Investing in Bitcoin should only be done as much as you’re comfortable, including having spent the required time learning and understanding the limitations of the wallet you’re using to invest and being familiar with the various aspects of how Bitcoin works.

Greg Herlean from Forbes lists his top 10 risks associated with investing in Bitcoin. I’ll include some of the most relevant risks from his list below.

Bitcoin is a young technology

Bitcoin has limited use

Complications related to a heavily technology-based money

Bitcoin is not very well regulated

There is substantial fraud that takes place in the Bitcoin world.

Bitcoin is subject to cyber theft, which is harder for a layman to protect against than other forms of money theft.

The Bitcoin market is volatile and constantly fluctuating, often unpredictably.

Alternatives to Bitcoin

The safest alternatives to Bitcoin involve sticking with other types of investments that you already know well or that are already time-proven, such as mutual funds, stocks, hard money lending, real estate, investing in businesses with which you’re familiar and other more traditional investment vehicles.

If you’re not comfortable with Bitcoin, but would still like to try out cryptocurrency, you could also consider Ethereum. Ethereum is the second-largest cryptocurrency. It’s currently much cheaper than Bitcoin, and may ultimately have a higher upside, although the risks that apply to Bitcoin also apply to Ethereum as well.

Bitcoin as An Investment

As with other investments, understanding that Bitcoin on the riskier side of the investment spectrum compared to traditional investment methods, it’s highly recommended that you invest only as much into Bitcoin as you can comfortably lose should such a misfortune come to pass. Starting out slowly and learning as you go with Bitcoin will help you to hedge against unforeseen issues.

Also, looking at the investment using a long-term perspective versus doing speculation will help you not make knee-jerk decisions that could prove costly.

The post Investing in Bitcoin appeared first on The Handbook for Happiness, and Success, and Prosperity Prosperopedia.

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[ggdbcheapforsale-blog]

Golden Goose Superstar Trainers List Building Success . Your significant To rewards

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The Best Books & Resources to Read on Blockchain

The Best Books & Resources to Read on Blockchain

Are you itching to understand blockchain better? Do you feel like you really need to get to grips with all the content out there, but just don’t know where to get started?

Well, this article is for you. Bookmark it, follow the links and bask in the warm fuzzy feeling that is reserved for those who invest time and effort into learning a new subject.

When I say time and effort, I mean about 200 hours of reading, and an equal number of hours to discuss with friends who are also interested in learning more. You won’t become an expert by the end of it, but you will know enough to understand what the hell all the hype is all about, and be able to understand most of what is discussed on the internet.

If you are active on Linkedin, and you start sharing some of your knowledge after you are through with all the reading, don’t be surprised if you start getting ten requests a day from ‘ICO Advisors’ and other self proclaimed experts.

First, I have bad news for you though.

Despite the thousands on Linkedin and Twitter claiming to be ‘experts’ in the field, there is no such thing as an expert. Not yet anyway. Vitalik Buterin, one of the founders of Ethereum, might come close to being an expert, but even he openly admits to needing a variety of views from various people to make complete sense of the stunning amount and speed of innovation in the space. Also, let’s not forget, that guy is a boy genius, and if he takes time to understand all that needs to be understood, mortals like you and me can afford to take our time!

This is a short little guide to get you started on your own learning journey. If you follow through on the resources listed, and actually take time to read, discuss and share, I assure you that you will end up knowing more than most people out there.

When I first started reading up about bitcoin, everyone recommended reading the Bitcoin white paper. If, like me, you don’t have a background in cryptography and computer science, very little in that document will make sense to you. So don’t start there.

Again, make no mistake, getting through every document in this list will only give you a basic understanding of what the technology is and how it works. In other words, and forgive me for being repetitive, you will by no means become an ‘expert’, but you will be able to comprehend and understand the vast majority of projects, discussions and articles on blockchain.

Blockchain Revolution — The first thing I did when my infatuation with blockchain began was to read this brilliant book by the Tapscotts. This book is a neat little synopsis about how blockchain can radically transform a number of industries — from payments and banking to accounting and supply chain. I highly recommend starting with this book since it will give you the all important ‘why’ and therefore help you envision the enormous possibilities of blockchain.

Mastering Bitcoin — Next, pick up a copy of Mastering Bitcoin by the amazingly knowledgeable, eloquent and humorous Andreas Antonopoulos. This book is meant for developers and non-developers, and though he provides plenty of code snippets, you don’t have to follow the code. Andreas breaks some very complex topics down so anyone can understand them. This book will give you a very tightly knit picture of the bitcoin ecosystem, how it works and why things function the way that they do. Terms like proof of work, hashing algorithms and mining will make a lot more sense to you after this book.

Bitcoin & Cryptocurrency Technologies — This is a technical book (PDF) from Princeton University. It is very thorough and explains most concepts you will encounter in the blockchain world in a manner that is fairly challenging for those who have not studied computer science before. Nevertheless, putting yourself through this book will give you enough knowledge to understand a whole array of technical discussions on blockchain.

Once you are done with these, you will have a fairly basic understanding of the ‘why’ and the ‘how’ of blockchain. Good work! This sets you up for more advanced study into the better known networks out there.

Distributed Ledger Technology Systems; A Conceptual Framework — Before you start digging into whitepapers of some of the better known blockchain projects, it is well worth your time to read this excellent document by the Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance. I got a lot from reading this document because it lays out various conflicting terms (which are used rather loosely in the blockchain world) and discusses them in detail. Michel Rauchs, one of the lead authors of this report, is active on Twitter and is very helpful, so do reach out to him and follow him!

White papers — Given there are more than 1600 projects out there, it is impossible to read everything. Also, you might not be as geeky or want to devote as much time as I did, so choose a few and read them. Here are a few that I recommend:

Ripple whitepaper plus the associated documents on how Ripple seeks to supplant the existing system for international transfers

Ethereum white paper, so you can understand what Vitalik saw as the drawback of the Bitcoin network, and his vision for a system that could also incorporate applications that run in a decentralized manner

Bitcoin white paper

The three above have been written with a fairly technical audience in mind. Don’t worry if you don’t understand everything. You will definitely have more questions than answers, but it is a good way to start linking your newly found technical knowledge to real world applications.

Next up, time to get some more thoughts from Andreas.

The Internet of Money — Volume 1 and 2 — are a great way to wrap your head around a lot of the buzzwords that you will have encountered in your reading so far — decentralisation, permissionless, applications on top of bitcoin, trustless layer etc. These books are a collection of Andreas’ talks in different parts of the world, and they will definitely help you tie a number of thoughts together.

Alright, now you are ready to be taken seriously in any conversation related to blockchain. Good work!

At this point, your brain will start to ponder the inevitable question “Why do we need so many networks and blockchains”?

By this point, you will know and understand enough to start exploring different industries that could make use of blockchain. While payments and banking are an obvious choice, there are loads of industries and situations which could make use of blockchain technology.

One document which helped give me tremendous perspective about the philosophy behind anonymous communication protocols was Crypto Anarchy and Virtual Communities by Timothy May. I live in India, and if you have been here, you will know that it is one of the most corrupt countries in the world. Some of Timothy May’s thoughts really resonated with me because he proposes radical ways to counter the robbery being committed by governments in developing countries. The website nakomotoinstitute.org also has plenty of articles and papers which lay down the building blocks of digital cash, anonymous protocols and even smart contracts.

Source link http://bit.ly/2CoZaGk

[vanessawestwcrtr5]

The Best Books & Resources to Read on Blockchain

The Best Books & Resources to Read on Blockchain

Are you itching to understand blockchain better? Do you feel like you really need to get to grips with all the content out there, but just don’t know where to get started?

Well, this article is for you. Bookmark it, follow the links and bask in the warm fuzzy feeling that is reserved for those who invest time and effort into learning a new subject.

When I say time and effort, I mean about 200 hours of reading, and an equal number of hours to discuss with friends who are also interested in learning more. You won’t become an expert by the end of it, but you will know enough to understand what the hell all the hype is all about, and be able to understand most of what is discussed on the internet.

If you are active on Linkedin, and you start sharing some of your knowledge after you are through with all the reading, don’t be surprised if you start getting ten requests a day from ‘ICO Advisors’ and other self proclaimed experts.

First, I have bad news for you though.

Despite the thousands on Linkedin and Twitter claiming to be ‘experts’ in the field, there is no such thing as an expert. Not yet anyway. Vitalik Buterin, one of the founders of Ethereum, might come close to being an expert, but even he openly admits to needing a variety of views from various people to make complete sense of the stunning amount and speed of innovation in the space. Also, let’s not forget, that guy is a boy genius, and if he takes time to understand all that needs to be understood, mortals like you and me can afford to take our time!

This is a short little guide to get you started on your own learning journey. If you follow through on the resources listed, and actually take time to read, discuss and share, I assure you that you will end up knowing more than most people out there.

When I first started reading up about bitcoin, everyone recommended reading the Bitcoin white paper. If, like me, you don’t have a background in cryptography and computer science, very little in that document will make sense to you. So don’t start there.

Again, make no mistake, getting through every document in this list will only give you a basic understanding of what the technology is and how it works. In other words, and forgive me for being repetitive, you will by no means become an ‘expert’, but you will be able to comprehend and understand the vast majority of projects, discussions and articles on blockchain.

Blockchain Revolution — The first thing I did when my infatuation with blockchain began was to read this brilliant book by the Tapscotts. This book is a neat little synopsis about how blockchain can radically transform a number of industries — from payments and banking to accounting and supply chain. I highly recommend starting with this book since it will give you the all important ‘why’ and therefore help you envision the enormous possibilities of blockchain.

Mastering Bitcoin — Next, pick up a copy of Mastering Bitcoin by the amazingly knowledgeable, eloquent and humorous Andreas Antonopoulos. This book is meant for developers and non-developers, and though he provides plenty of code snippets, you don’t have to follow the code. Andreas breaks some very complex topics down so anyone can understand them. This book will give you a very tightly knit picture of the bitcoin ecosystem, how it works and why things function the way that they do. Terms like proof of work, hashing algorithms and mining will make a lot more sense to you after this book.

Bitcoin & Cryptocurrency Technologies — This is a technical book (PDF) from Princeton University. It is very thorough and explains most concepts you will encounter in the blockchain world in a manner that is fairly challenging for those who have not studied computer science before. Nevertheless, putting yourself through this book will give you enough knowledge to understand a whole array of technical discussions on blockchain.

Once you are done with these, you will have a fairly basic understanding of the ‘why’ and the ‘how’ of blockchain. Good work! This sets you up for more advanced study into the better known networks out there.

Distributed Ledger Technology Systems; A Conceptual Framework — Before you start digging into whitepapers of some of the better known blockchain projects, it is well worth your time to read this excellent document by the Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance. I got a lot from reading this document because it lays out various conflicting terms (which are used rather loosely in the blockchain world) and discusses them in detail. Michel Rauchs, one of the lead authors of this report, is active on Twitter and is very helpful, so do reach out to him and follow him!

White papers — Given there are more than 1600 projects out there, it is impossible to read everything. Also, you might not be as geeky or want to devote as much time as I did, so choose a few and read them. Here are a few that I recommend:

Ripple whitepaper plus the associated documents on how Ripple seeks to supplant the existing system for international transfers

Ethereum white paper, so you can understand what Vitalik saw as the drawback of the Bitcoin network, and his vision for a system that could also incorporate applications that run in a decentralized manner

Bitcoin white paper

The three above have been written with a fairly technical audience in mind. Don’t worry if you don’t understand everything. You will definitely have more questions than answers, but it is a good way to start linking your newly found technical knowledge to real world applications.

Next up, time to get some more thoughts from Andreas.

The Internet of Money — Volume 1 and 2 — are a great way to wrap your head around a lot of the buzzwords that you will have encountered in your reading so far — decentralisation, permissionless, applications on top of bitcoin, trustless layer etc. These books are a collection of Andreas’ talks in different parts of the world, and they will definitely help you tie a number of thoughts together.

Alright, now you are ready to be taken seriously in any conversation related to blockchain. Good work!

At this point, your brain will start to ponder the inevitable question “Why do we need so many networks and blockchains”?

By this point, you will know and understand enough to start exploring different industries that could make use of blockchain. While payments and banking are an obvious choice, there are loads of industries and situations which could make use of blockchain technology.

One document which helped give me tremendous perspective about the philosophy behind anonymous communication protocols was Crypto Anarchy and Virtual Communities by Timothy May. I live in India, and if you have been here, you will know that it is one of the most corrupt countries in the world. Some of Timothy May’s thoughts really resonated with me because he proposes radical ways to counter the robbery being committed by governments in developing countries. The website nakomotoinstitute.org also has plenty of articles and papers which lay down the building blocks of digital cash, anonymous protocols and even smart contracts.

Source link http://bit.ly/2CoZaGk

[courtneyvbrooks87]

The Best Books & Resources to Read on Blockchain

The Best Books & Resources to Read on Blockchain

Are you itching to understand blockchain better? Do you feel like you really need to get to grips with all the content out there, but just don’t know where to get started?

Well, this article is for you. Bookmark it, follow the links and bask in the warm fuzzy feeling that is reserved for those who invest time and effort into learning a new subject.

When I say time and effort, I mean about 200 hours of reading, and an equal number of hours to discuss with friends who are also interested in learning more. You won’t become an expert by the end of it, but you will know enough to understand what the hell all the hype is all about, and be able to understand most of what is discussed on the internet.

If you are active on Linkedin, and you start sharing some of your knowledge after you are through with all the reading, don’t be surprised if you start getting ten requests a day from ‘ICO Advisors’ and other self proclaimed experts.

First, I have bad news for you though.

Despite the thousands on Linkedin and Twitter claiming to be ‘experts’ in the field, there is no such thing as an expert. Not yet anyway. Vitalik Buterin, one of the founders of Ethereum, might come close to being an expert, but even he openly admits to needing a variety of views from various people to make complete sense of the stunning amount and speed of innovation in the space. Also, let’s not forget, that guy is a boy genius, and if he takes time to understand all that needs to be understood, mortals like you and me can afford to take our time!

This is a short little guide to get you started on your own learning journey. If you follow through on the resources listed, and actually take time to read, discuss and share, I assure you that you will end up knowing more than most people out there.

When I first started reading up about bitcoin, everyone recommended reading the Bitcoin white paper. If, like me, you don’t have a background in cryptography and computer science, very little in that document will make sense to you. So don’t start there.

Again, make no mistake, getting through every document in this list will only give you a basic understanding of what the technology is and how it works. In other words, and forgive me for being repetitive, you will by no means become an ‘expert’, but you will be able to comprehend and understand the vast majority of projects, discussions and articles on blockchain.

Blockchain Revolution — The first thing I did when my infatuation with blockchain began was to read this brilliant book by the Tapscotts. This book is a neat little synopsis about how blockchain can radically transform a number of industries — from payments and banking to accounting and supply chain. I highly recommend starting with this book since it will give you the all important ‘why’ and therefore help you envision the enormous possibilities of blockchain.

Mastering Bitcoin — Next, pick up a copy of Mastering Bitcoin by the amazingly knowledgeable, eloquent and humorous Andreas Antonopoulos. This book is meant for developers and non-developers, and though he provides plenty of code snippets, you don’t have to follow the code. Andreas breaks some very complex topics down so anyone can understand them. This book will give you a very tightly knit picture of the bitcoin ecosystem, how it works and why things function the way that they do. Terms like proof of work, hashing algorithms and mining will make a lot more sense to you after this book.

Bitcoin & Cryptocurrency Technologies — This is a technical book (PDF) from Princeton University. It is very thorough and explains most concepts you will encounter in the blockchain world in a manner that is fairly challenging for those who have not studied computer science before. Nevertheless, putting yourself through this book will give you enough knowledge to understand a whole array of technical discussions on blockchain.

Once you are done with these, you will have a fairly basic understanding of the ‘why’ and the ‘how’ of blockchain. Good work! This sets you up for more advanced study into the better known networks out there.

Distributed Ledger Technology Systems; A Conceptual Framework — Before you start digging into whitepapers of some of the better known blockchain projects, it is well worth your time to read this excellent document by the Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance. I got a lot from reading this document because it lays out various conflicting terms (which are used rather loosely in the blockchain world) and discusses them in detail. Michel Rauchs, one of the lead authors of this report, is active on Twitter and is very helpful, so do reach out to him and follow him!

White papers — Given there are more than 1600 projects out there, it is impossible to read everything. Also, you might not be as geeky or want to devote as much time as I did, so choose a few and read them. Here are a few that I recommend:

Ripple whitepaper plus the associated documents on how Ripple seeks to supplant the existing system for international transfers

Ethereum white paper, so you can understand what Vitalik saw as the drawback of the Bitcoin network, and his vision for a system that could also incorporate applications that run in a decentralized manner

Bitcoin white paper

The three above have been written with a fairly technical audience in mind. Don’t worry if you don’t understand everything. You will definitely have more questions than answers, but it is a good way to start linking your newly found technical knowledge to real world applications.

Next up, time to get some more thoughts from Andreas.

The Internet of Money — Volume 1 and 2 — are a great way to wrap your head around a lot of the buzzwords that you will have encountered in your reading so far — decentralisation, permissionless, applications on top of bitcoin, trustless layer etc. These books are a collection of Andreas’ talks in different parts of the world, and they will definitely help you tie a number of thoughts together.

Alright, now you are ready to be taken seriously in any conversation related to blockchain. Good work!

At this point, your brain will start to ponder the inevitable question “Why do we need so many networks and blockchains”?

By this point, you will know and understand enough to start exploring different industries that could make use of blockchain. While payments and banking are an obvious choice, there are loads of industries and situations which could make use of blockchain technology.

One document which helped give me tremendous perspective about the philosophy behind anonymous communication protocols was Crypto Anarchy and Virtual Communities by Timothy May. I live in India, and if you have been here, you will know that it is one of the most corrupt countries in the world. Some of Timothy May’s thoughts really resonated with me because he proposes radical ways to counter the robbery being committed by governments in developing countries. The website nakomotoinstitute.org also has plenty of articles and papers which lay down the building blocks of digital cash, anonymous protocols and even smart contracts.

Source link http://bit.ly/2CoZaGk

[adrianjenkins952wblr]

The Best Books & Resources to Read on Blockchain

The Best Books & Resources to Read on Blockchain

Are you itching to understand blockchain better? Do you feel like you really need to get to grips with all the content out there, but just don’t know where to get started?

Well, this article is for you. Bookmark it, follow the links and bask in the warm fuzzy feeling that is reserved for those who invest time and effort into learning a new subject.

When I say time and effort, I mean about 200 hours of reading, and an equal number of hours to discuss with friends who are also interested in learning more. You won’t become an expert by the end of it, but you will know enough to understand what the hell all the hype is all about, and be able to understand most of what is discussed on the internet.

If you are active on Linkedin, and you start sharing some of your knowledge after you are through with all the reading, don’t be surprised if you start getting ten requests a day from ‘ICO Advisors’ and other self proclaimed experts.

First, I have bad news for you though.

Despite the thousands on Linkedin and Twitter claiming to be ‘experts’ in the field, there is no such thing as an expert. Not yet anyway. Vitalik Buterin, one of the founders of Ethereum, might come close to being an expert, but even he openly admits to needing a variety of views from various people to make complete sense of the stunning amount and speed of innovation in the space. Also, let’s not forget, that guy is a boy genius, and if he takes time to understand all that needs to be understood, mortals like you and me can afford to take our time!

This is a short little guide to get you started on your own learning journey. If you follow through on the resources listed, and actually take time to read, discuss and share, I assure you that you will end up knowing more than most people out there.

When I first started reading up about bitcoin, everyone recommended reading the Bitcoin white paper. If, like me, you don’t have a background in cryptography and computer science, very little in that document will make sense to you. So don’t start there.

Again, make no mistake, getting through every document in this list will only give you a basic understanding of what the technology is and how it works. In other words, and forgive me for being repetitive, you will by no means become an ‘expert’, but you will be able to comprehend and understand the vast majority of projects, discussions and articles on blockchain.

Blockchain Revolution — The first thing I did when my infatuation with blockchain began was to read this brilliant book by the Tapscotts. This book is a neat little synopsis about how blockchain can radically transform a number of industries — from payments and banking to accounting and supply chain. I highly recommend starting with this book since it will give you the all important ‘why’ and therefore help you envision the enormous possibilities of blockchain.

Mastering Bitcoin — Next, pick up a copy of Mastering Bitcoin by the amazingly knowledgeable, eloquent and humorous Andreas Antonopoulos. This book is meant for developers and non-developers, and though he provides plenty of code snippets, you don’t have to follow the code. Andreas breaks some very complex topics down so anyone can understand them. This book will give you a very tightly knit picture of the bitcoin ecosystem, how it works and why things function the way that they do. Terms like proof of work, hashing algorithms and mining will make a lot more sense to you after this book.

Bitcoin & Cryptocurrency Technologies — This is a technical book (PDF) from Princeton University. It is very thorough and explains most concepts you will encounter in the blockchain world in a manner that is fairly challenging for those who have not studied computer science before. Nevertheless, putting yourself through this book will give you enough knowledge to understand a whole array of technical discussions on blockchain.

Once you are done with these, you will have a fairly basic understanding of the ‘why’ and the ‘how’ of blockchain. Good work! This sets you up for more advanced study into the better known networks out there.

Distributed Ledger Technology Systems; A Conceptual Framework — Before you start digging into whitepapers of some of the better known blockchain projects, it is well worth your time to read this excellent document by the Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance. I got a lot from reading this document because it lays out various conflicting terms (which are used rather loosely in the blockchain world) and discusses them in detail. Michel Rauchs, one of the lead authors of this report, is active on Twitter and is very helpful, so do reach out to him and follow him!

White papers — Given there are more than 1600 projects out there, it is impossible to read everything. Also, you might not be as geeky or want to devote as much time as I did, so choose a few and read them. Here are a few that I recommend:

Ripple whitepaper plus the associated documents on how Ripple seeks to supplant the existing system for international transfers

Ethereum white paper, so you can understand what Vitalik saw as the drawback of the Bitcoin network, and his vision for a system that could also incorporate applications that run in a decentralized manner

Bitcoin white paper

The three above have been written with a fairly technical audience in mind. Don’t worry if you don’t understand everything. You will definitely have more questions than answers, but it is a good way to start linking your newly found technical knowledge to real world applications.

Next up, time to get some more thoughts from Andreas.

The Internet of Money — Volume 1 and 2 — are a great way to wrap your head around a lot of the buzzwords that you will have encountered in your reading so far — decentralisation, permissionless, applications on top of bitcoin, trustless layer etc. These books are a collection of Andreas’ talks in different parts of the world, and they will definitely help you tie a number of thoughts together.

Alright, now you are ready to be taken seriously in any conversation related to blockchain. Good work!

At this point, your brain will start to ponder the inevitable question “Why do we need so many networks and blockchains”?

By this point, you will know and understand enough to start exploring different industries that could make use of blockchain. While payments and banking are an obvious choice, there are loads of industries and situations which could make use of blockchain technology.

One document which helped give me tremendous perspective about the philosophy behind anonymous communication protocols was Crypto Anarchy and Virtual Communities by Timothy May. I live in India, and if you have been here, you will know that it is one of the most corrupt countries in the world. Some of Timothy May’s thoughts really resonated with me because he proposes radical ways to counter the robbery being committed by governments in developing countries. The website nakomotoinstitute.org also has plenty of articles and papers which lay down the building blocks of digital cash, anonymous protocols and even smart contracts.

Source link http://bit.ly/2CoZaGk

[teiraymondmccoy78]

The Best Books & Resources to Read on Blockchain

The Best Books & Resources to Read on Blockchain

Are you itching to understand blockchain better? Do you feel like you really need to get to grips with all the content out there, but just don’t know where to get started?

Well, this article is for you. Bookmark it, follow the links and bask in the warm fuzzy feeling that is reserved for those who invest time and effort into learning a new subject.

When I say time and effort, I mean about 200 hours of reading, and an equal number of hours to discuss with friends who are also interested in learning more. You won’t become an expert by the end of it, but you will know enough to understand what the hell all the hype is all about, and be able to understand most of what is discussed on the internet.

If you are active on Linkedin, and you start sharing some of your knowledge after you are through with all the reading, don’t be surprised if you start getting ten requests a day from ‘ICO Advisors’ and other self proclaimed experts.

First, I have bad news for you though.

Despite the thousands on Linkedin and Twitter claiming to be ‘experts’ in the field, there is no such thing as an expert. Not yet anyway. Vitalik Buterin, one of the founders of Ethereum, might come close to being an expert, but even he openly admits to needing a variety of views from various people to make complete sense of the stunning amount and speed of innovation in the space. Also, let’s not forget, that guy is a boy genius, and if he takes time to understand all that needs to be understood, mortals like you and me can afford to take our time!

This is a short little guide to get you started on your own learning journey. If you follow through on the resources listed, and actually take time to read, discuss and share, I assure you that you will end up knowing more than most people out there.

When I first started reading up about bitcoin, everyone recommended reading the Bitcoin white paper. If, like me, you don’t have a background in cryptography and computer science, very little in that document will make sense to you. So don’t start there.

Again, make no mistake, getting through every document in this list will only give you a basic understanding of what the technology is and how it works. In other words, and forgive me for being repetitive, you will by no means become an ‘expert’, but you will be able to comprehend and understand the vast majority of projects, discussions and articles on blockchain.

Blockchain Revolution — The first thing I did when my infatuation with blockchain began was to read this brilliant book by the Tapscotts. This book is a neat little synopsis about how blockchain can radically transform a number of industries — from payments and banking to accounting and supply chain. I highly recommend starting with this book since it will give you the all important ‘why’ and therefore help you envision the enormous possibilities of blockchain.

Mastering Bitcoin — Next, pick up a copy of Mastering Bitcoin by the amazingly knowledgeable, eloquent and humorous Andreas Antonopoulos. This book is meant for developers and non-developers, and though he provides plenty of code snippets, you don’t have to follow the code. Andreas breaks some very complex topics down so anyone can understand them. This book will give you a very tightly knit picture of the bitcoin ecosystem, how it works and why things function the way that they do. Terms like proof of work, hashing algorithms and mining will make a lot more sense to you after this book.

Bitcoin & Cryptocurrency Technologies — This is a technical book (PDF) from Princeton University. It is very thorough and explains most concepts you will encounter in the blockchain world in a manner that is fairly challenging for those who have not studied computer science before. Nevertheless, putting yourself through this book will give you enough knowledge to understand a whole array of technical discussions on blockchain.

Once you are done with these, you will have a fairly basic understanding of the ‘why’ and the ‘how’ of blockchain. Good work! This sets you up for more advanced study into the better known networks out there.

Distributed Ledger Technology Systems; A Conceptual Framework — Before you start digging into whitepapers of some of the better known blockchain projects, it is well worth your time to read this excellent document by the Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance. I got a lot from reading this document because it lays out various conflicting terms (which are used rather loosely in the blockchain world) and discusses them in detail. Michel Rauchs, one of the lead authors of this report, is active on Twitter and is very helpful, so do reach out to him and follow him!

White papers — Given there are more than 1600 projects out there, it is impossible to read everything. Also, you might not be as geeky or want to devote as much time as I did, so choose a few and read them. Here are a few that I recommend:

Ripple whitepaper plus the associated documents on how Ripple seeks to supplant the existing system for international transfers

Ethereum white paper, so you can understand what Vitalik saw as the drawback of the Bitcoin network, and his vision for a system that could also incorporate applications that run in a decentralized manner

Bitcoin white paper

The three above have been written with a fairly technical audience in mind. Don’t worry if you don’t understand everything. You will definitely have more questions than answers, but it is a good way to start linking your newly found technical knowledge to real world applications.

Next up, time to get some more thoughts from Andreas.

The Internet of Money — Volume 1 and 2 — are a great way to wrap your head around a lot of the buzzwords that you will have encountered in your reading so far — decentralisation, permissionless, applications on top of bitcoin, trustless layer etc. These books are a collection of Andreas’ talks in different parts of the world, and they will definitely help you tie a number of thoughts together.

Alright, now you are ready to be taken seriously in any conversation related to blockchain. Good work!

At this point, your brain will start to ponder the inevitable question “Why do we need so many networks and blockchains”?

By this point, you will know and understand enough to start exploring different industries that could make use of blockchain. While payments and banking are an obvious choice, there are loads of industries and situations which could make use of blockchain technology.

One document which helped give me tremendous perspective about the philosophy behind anonymous communication protocols was Crypto Anarchy and Virtual Communities by Timothy May. I live in India, and if you have been here, you will know that it is one of the most corrupt countries in the world. Some of Timothy May’s thoughts really resonated with me because he proposes radical ways to counter the robbery being committed by governments in developing countries. The website nakomotoinstitute.org also has plenty of articles and papers which lay down the building blocks of digital cash, anonymous protocols and even smart contracts.

Source link http://bit.ly/2CoZaGk

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The Essential Sprudge 2018 Holiday Gift Guide

It’s here! The 2018 holiday season is finally here, and with it, a swarm of gift guides great and cheap, big and small, for you and not even remotely for you at all.

Here at Sprudge holiday gift guides are a long-running tradition, dating back to the internet’s earlier, simpler, arguably less evil times. To kick the Guidesapalooza off this year, we tapped three of our favorite regular contributors: Jenn Chen, Zac Cadwalader, and Anna Brones. We asked them some very simple questions: What moves you? What coffee gifts would you give to a loved one? Does this spark joy?

Read on to find out, and happy holiday-ing from all of us at Sprudge.

Image by Sam Lee.

Handmade Mug and Dripper by Sam Lee

There is something particular about drinking coffee out of a handmade mug, something that helps to turn it from routine into ritual. San Francisco-based artist and ceramicist Sam Lee creates beautiful everyday objects, including those made for making and drinking coffee, and I love her style. Her work is simple yet stunning, like in the V60 dripper, glazed to balance the texture of both the smooth glaze and the rough ceramic. Any morning would be made just a little more beautiful with Lee’s work in it. – Anna Brones

Photo courtesy Umeshiso.

Rainbow Cupping Spoon

Born out of a desire to empower themselves and other marginalized folks in the industry at the cupping table, Umeko Motoyoshi created the Rainbow Spoon project. Their store, Umeshiso, has a wide array of pins, cupping spoons, and stickers for your favorite coffee professional. Sold as a single spoon or a set of six, these rainbow spoons offer a perfect bowl depth for a dip and slurp. The spoons are offered on a sliding scale basis to reflect the store’s inclusive mission. Choose to pay the at-cost fee or a few dollars more to contribute back into the project. – Jenn Chen

Terroir Coffee Chocolate and Coffee Blossom Honey

Coffee gifts don’t always have to be coffee. They can also be chocolate and honey. Coffee chocolate and coffee honey. From Terroir—the sister company of Onyx Coffee Lab—comes two tasty sweets cultivated on actual coffee farms. The cacao comes from one of three origins—Colombia, Uganda, and Guatemala—and each bean-to-bar dark chocolate is made with coffee from the same farm. The honey is from Finca El Apiario in Guatemala, produced by bees who only pollinate coffee blossoms. Not only are these products really tasty (I eat the honey on my morning yogurt daily), they are also providing auxiliary revenue streams for the farmers producing them. It’s a great coffee gift for non-coffee people that brings in additional money to the coffeelands. Win win win. – Zac Cadwalader

Image via Snow Peak.

Field Barista kit from Snow Peak

There’s a clear intersection between outdoor lovers and coffee drinkers, and Japanese lifestyle brand Snow Peak caters to the nature enthusiasts who want to ensure that their coffee game is as strong outside as it is at home. The brand’s Field Barista kit is the ultimate in outdoor coffee brewing setup, including a dripper, grinder, and kettle. You don’t have to opt for the entire set, each piece can be purchased separately. The dripper is cone shaped—which will keep your filters from collapsing—and disassembles to fit in a small bag, and the grinder’s handle easily folds down, which makes packing easier. The weight of the kit makes it geared at the kind adventures that include a base camp, or just a morning coffee brew in the local park, as opposed to journeys where weight is a consideration, but if you’ve got the whole set, you just might start to prefer brewing in your backyard to your kitchen counter. – Anna Brones

Photo courtesy Standart.

Standart Subscription

Creative types will appreciate an annual subscription (four issues) to Standart, a beautiful independent print magazine (and 2017 Sprudgie Award winner) dedicated to the art of coffee. The stories, illustrations, and photographs within its pages cover a wide range of global issues and perspectives. You’ll just as easily read a profile with a barista champion right after a piece exploring tasseography, the art of reading tea and coffee leaves. Content is at the forefront in Standart and there’s something for everyone. The subscription is available globally and comes with a bag of coffee roasted exclusively for subscribers. – Jenn Chen

Courtesy of Agate Publishing

Craft Coffee: A Manual

Getting into coffee can be intimidating. It feels like there is an entire lexicon to memorize just to learn how to make a pour-over. Luckily, there is Craft Coffee: A Manual by Jessica Easto. Easto is “not a coffee person,” as she described to Sprudge in our interview with her earlier this year, and that’s the perspective she brings to the pages of Craft Coffee. With the help of her husband and “coffee person” Andreas Willhoff, Easto covers just about everything you need to know to get started on your coffee journey, including: brewing basics, equipment, processing, and step-by-step guides for making coffee with 10 different brewing devices. It’s all the coffee info, none of the intimidation. – Zac Cadwalader

Image by Lindsey Shea.

Ebb Filter by GDS Cloth Goods

Coffee is a product that centers around origin, but while we focus on where our coffee comes from, we don’t always apply the same principles to our brewing equipment. For the coffee drinker who cares about how things are made and where they’re from, Ebb Filter is the perfect gift. This reusable filter is made from organic cotton grown in Texas, processed and woven into fabric in the Carolinas and sewn into final product the Bay Area by GDS Cloth Goods. The filters come in a variety of sizes to fit all types of brew methods, and are wrapped in biodegradable packaging. – Anna Brones

Courtesy of Melodrip

Melodrip

Buying gadgets for a coffee tinkerer can be a tall order because 1) geeky gear is often prohibitively expensive and 2) what even is that thing and how does it make coffee? For those wanting to gift something brewing-related that won’t break the bank, look no further than the Melodrip. Essentially just a dispersion screen on a stick, the Melodrip allows you to drastically cut down on the amount of agitation in the brewing process, which leads to a cleaner cup of coffee, according to the creators. After a successful Kickstarter campaign (of which I backed with my own actual dollars), the Melodrip is now in full production and available for purchase for a cool $45. – Zac Cadwalader

Photo courtesy IWCA.

Charitable Donation

A thoughtful gift for the coffee lover who doesn’t want any physical products, a charitable donation in their name goes a long way to supporting the communities who create your morning brew. Did you know that over 80% of women newly diagnosed with cervical cancer live in developing countries and that 70% of coffee farm laborers are women? Grounds for Health provides cervical cancer screenings at coffee farms. For a more general contribution to the coffeelands, the International Women’s Coffee Alliance (IWCA) works in 22 countries to empower women at the local community level. And if you’d like to invest in the next generation of farmers, Coffee Kids works with young farmers on business training and seed capital. – Jenn Chen

via It’s A Mod, Mod, Mod, Mod World

Commandante Hand Grinder

I have more hand grinders than I care to mention in polite company, but whenever I go out of town and need a way to pulverize some whole beans, the Commandante manual grinder is always the one I bring with me. Besides being one of the most aesthetically pleasing grinders on the market—just look at all that wood grain!—the German-engineered Commandante is the perfect mix of portable and dependable, making it the ideal suitcase (or day pack) companion. At $250, this isn’t exactly a small gift, but, speaking from opinion here, it’s worth every penny. – Zac Cadwalader

Coffee Isn’t Rocket Science by Sebastien Racineux and Chung-Leng Tran

Have you ever been asked by friends and family how to make better coffee at home? Get them this book. Coffee Isn’t Rocket Science by Sebastien Racineux and Chung-Leng Tran (both co-owners of Hexagone Cafe in Paris) is a well-rounded guide to better understanding and making coffee. For the newly coffee acquainted, it’s a helpful tool for navigating the world of coffee, the kind of book that can always be kept close to the coffee brewing equipment. And for well-versed coffee lovers, it’s a fun resource to include in your coffee library, particular for those moments when you forget some of the basic details of the drink you love. – Anna Brones

Kaffe Box Subscription

Sometimes the best coffee gift is simply just coffee. For those who want to gift coffee but don’t know what is “good,” a subscription is always a solid place to start. As an American who makes primarily filter coffee, I have yet to find a subscription service more up my alley than Norway’s Kaffe Box. Each month, the subscription service works with a different Scandinavian roaster to deliver light-roasted coffee directly to your doorstep. Past roasters include big names like Tim Wendelboe, La Cabra, The Coffee Collective, and Koppi as well as lesser-known micro-roasters like Jacobsen og Svart, Nord, and Talor & Jorgen. To me, this is THE subscription service for lighter-roast filter coffee drinkers. But if you are buying for someone who is an espresso drinker or likes more developed coffees, Trade Coffee is where I would start. – Zac Cadwalader

Via Seal Press.

“So You Want to Talk About Race” by Ijeoma Oluo

A New York Times bestseller and book that transcends any industry lines, “So You Want to Talk About Race” is a must-read for the well-meaning ally. The book isn’t about coffee, yet like any industry built on colonialism and capitalism, race is inextricably tied to coffee. Oluo breaks down key concepts in a straightforward manner and provides the reader with tangible ways to talk about race. This is a great place to start for those who find themselves saying things like, “But what can I do?” and “I don’t know what that means” after listening to the Black Coffee podcast episodes. – Jenn Chen

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