The Daily: Google Founder Is a Crypto Miner, Elon Musk Impressed by Scambots

In today’s edition of Bitcoin in Brief we cover why Google founder Sergey Brin has become a crypto miner, and why Elon Musk is impressed by crypto scambots on Twitter. Additionally covered are a new response from Fcoin regarding recent allegations and a $100 million venture capital fund for blockchain startups in Israel.

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Google Founder Is a Crypto Miner

Sergey Brin, one of the two founders of Google and current president of its parent company Alphabet, took part in a blockchain conference in Morocco a few days ago and revealed that he is a crypto miner. With a net worth of over $50 billion, Brin has no need for an extra income, but he started mining to further his son’s knowledge about the technology and got hooked himself. “A year or two ago my son insisted that we needed to get a gaming PC,” Brin said. “I told him If we get a gaming PC we have to mine cryptocurrency. So we got an ethereum miner on there and we’ve been making a few pennies and dollars since.” He added: “That definitely got me interested and I started to study the technology behind it and found it to be fascinating.”

Elon Musk Impressed by Scambots

The founder of Tesla and Spacex, Elon Musk, knows how to recognize great tech when he sees it. Twitter is infested by scams that automatically reply to messages by high profile accounts with promises of giveaways while mimicking them in every possible way. This phenomena has spread from just crypto influencers to even people such as the original Captain Kirk, William Shatner. Musk has taken note of this and he seems to be very impressed with the scammers. He said: “I want to know who is running the Etherium (sic) scambots! Mad skillz …” The geniuses behind these might want to reach out to Musk to seek work on getting humans to Mars, developing a self-driving car, or even preventing an AI takeover of the Earth. Sounds more challenging than taking money away from fools, no?

I want to know who is running the Etherium scambots! Mad skillz …

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 8, 2018

Fcoin Denies Fake Volume Bots

Speaking of bots, Fcoin, which was previously pilloried for slowing the ethereum network, has came under fire from critics with new accusations of employing bots to drive up its exchange volume. The team denied this to us, saying: “Just like Bitcoin cannot control miners’ activity, FCoin cannot control the mining activity of the community. With that said, FCoin doesn’t encourage bot-trading on the platform. The ‘Trans-Fee Mining’ model is designed in a way that it eliminates such possibilities…FCoin doesn’t hire or own bots to increase the trading volume. As far as fake volume is concerned, FCoin cannot indulge in such practices. It simply doesn’t make any sense to create fake volume and use our own funds to reimburse the 100% transaction fee.”

$100 Million for Blockchain Startups in Israel

Israel might not be the most welcoming of cryptocurrency environments, but its specialized tech and cryptographic talent continues to attract venture capital. Benson Oak, an investment bank which raised over $5 billion for young technology companies such as AVG, has announced it has already secured $25 million in commitments for a new $100 million fund. Benson Oak Ventures is said to be focused on Israeli startups, with an emphasis on blockchain technologies. Managing partner Robert Cohen said: “I believe that there are great entrepreneurs in Israel who are leading the platforms of the future, with creating and disruptive use of blockchain technologies. I moved to Israel six years ago, and with a passion to build companies, I have established Benson Oak Ventures as a new platform to provide financial and operational capital to the best entrepreneurs in Israel and around the world.”

What do you think about today’s news tidbits? Share your thoughts in the comments section below. 

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