How I Got Over $11,000 in Free Bitcoin

This story is about how I managed to get free Bitcoin online, and while I can’t claim there was no effort involved, I can say it didn’t cost me any money.

A lot of people in the cryptospace are looking to increase their Bitcoin holdings. The proliferation of scams that seem to offer quick and guaranteed profits from minimal investments are a testament to this. Individuals have messaged me on social media offering ways to make easy money fast. I’ve also seen dozens of posts from people promising amazing returns in exchange for sending them small investments. While these are scams (real investment opportunities never guarantee profits and no one is just giving crypto away for free), they continue to exist for a reason. People are looking for ways to get Bitcoin with little to no effort or upfront costs.

Over the past two years, I have managed to get over $11,000 in free bitcoin and tokens. How did I do it? Several different ways.

Bitcoin Faucets

My first free Bitcoin came from faucets. I got a tiny amount, approximately 0.001 BTC (for a discussion of how faucets work see this article). However, I really can’t recommend faucets as a way of getting free Bitcoin since the amounts they give out are so small. However, they are a fun way to learn about crypto and test out sending and receiving from a wallet for the first time. Indeed, my first Bitcoin transactions were faucets payouts. Yet, I didn’t keep doing them for very long. I quickly moved on to more lucrative activities.

Surveys and Odd Jobs Online

I got more Bitcoin from doing surveys and small jobs online. There was, of course, some effort involved. The small jobs were time consuming and boring. They consisted of things like checking the URLs of businesses and making sure information was correct on directory websites. After doing these jobs for a few weeks, I quickly focussed my energy on the surveys, which are less boring and slightly more profitable.

Of course, surveys are also time consuming. They can take anywhere from 4–20 minutes to complete. Sometimes it is hard to find ones you qualify for. In addition, each survey pays out a different amount of BTC depending on the pool of respondents being targeted. For example, a survey about chocolate or beer is pretty open, usually wanting males or females of a certain age who consumed beer or chocolate in the past year. These surveys typically pay only around 25–150 bits each. Other surveys are more specialized, wanting participants who suffer from a particular health condition or who have a specific type of job (e.g. manager with decision-making authority over IT purchases). These more targeted surveys can pay anywhere from 500–15000 bits.

Naturally, surveys want respondents to be honest but I admit to answering questions in ways to make sure I qualified for the most surveys possible. After trying a few of them, it is easy to pick up on tricks for answering questions in a way that makes you seem eligible, no matter what demographic they are looking for. I worked on surveys this way for a couple months and although the earnings were modest, they were real and totalled about 0.015 BTC.

Crypto Airdrops

Most of the free Bitcoin I got came from airdrops. An airdrop is typically part of a marketing campaign for crypto and blockchain startups. A company will give out small amounts of free coin or tokens in exchange for following their social media accounts. Airdrops generate buzz for an ICO (for a detailed discussion of airdrops see this article). I participated in hundreds and hundreds of airdrops and received hundreds of different tokens. The majority of them will be worthless, either because the project fails or the amount given out is so small it is not worth the gas to send them to an exchange.

However, I’ve been lucky to participate in a few airdrops that turned out to be profitable. For example, in one drop I got over 2200 Oyster Pearl tokens, which reached a high of over $7,000. When that happened I sold about half of the tokens for BTC. More recently, I got an airdrop of HYDRO, which was worth approximately $3,000 when I sold half of what I was holding. I’ve also received multiple drops of tokens that ended up being worth a few hundred dollars. Other drops maxed out at between $10–150. I slowly got more BTC by selling these tokens at the right time. So far, I have made approximately $6,500 in total from airdrops.

To profit from airdrops, it is important to be patient and take advantage when there is an increase in value. It also takes some time to learn about the different (and sometimes obscure) exchanges where they can be sold.

Bounty Campaigns

While looking for the airdrops, I kept seeing references to bounty campaigns. Eventually, I looked into what exactly these were. It turns out they are also part of marketing campaigns. Airdrops are one of the first phases of a startup’s marketing plan. Bounties are another way of generating buzz and interest in a project. Essentially, a bounty campaign involves doing tasks in exchange for tokens. The amount of tokens given out for bounty tasks is usually higher than airdrops. However, bounties are more time consuming and can be a challenge to find. I think the best way to find good ones is to use one of several bounty aggregating platforms. These platforms organize campaigns and keep track of social media activity. They also distribute the tokens.

Social Media and Content Creation Bounties

The easiest bounties involve simply liking, retweeting, and sharing content from a project’s social media accounts. However, these also pay the least. The more profitable bounties are “content creation” campaigns, which involve writing articles or creating Youtube videos about a project and posting them online. The content bounties pay the best (often several hundred dollars for a high quality piece) but they are also the most time-consuming. Moreover, they are only feasible for those who have a good knowledge about blockchain technology and strong writing skills.

I first started with social media bounties and earned thousands of tokens this way. However, I soon moved on to writing articles. At that point, I was deep in the cryptospace and had enough knowledge to understand and assess the concept behind many startups. I also had a general interest in writing. I created articles on dozens of different blockchain projects and received 100s of thousands of tokens in exchange. Not all of these tokens became valuable but some did. I would put my earnings from bounties at approximately $5,000.

Nothing is Really Free

As you can see, there are ways of getting free Bitcoin online. However, it should also be clear from my story that nothing is really “free”. Getting Bitcoin from faucets, surveys, selling airdrop and bounty tokens, all take a good chunk of time. The most profitable bounties also require a good amount of knowledge of cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology. So, while I never paid any money to get this Bitcoin, I did put in a lot of time and effort.

Full article on Hacker Noon: https://hackernoon.com/how-i-got-over-11-000-in-free-bitcoin-af21a734f45d

Is Electricity a Limiting Factor to Bitcoin’s Promise?

While critics have pointed out Bitcoin’s energy consumption is bad for the planet, few have asked whether a scarcity of electricity could be a limiting factor to Bitcoin’s promise.
On July 31, 2018 one bitcoin transaction consumed as much power as thirty-one US households per day

Many are excited over the possibility that blockchain technology will radically transform economic and social life. At the same time, many are equally passionate about the problems with the current state of the technology. One particularly urgent issue relates to the voracious energy consumption of blockchain technology. While critics have pointed out this is environmental sustainability, less attention is paid to the question of whether a scarcity of electricity could be a limiting factor to the uptake of cryptocurrencies.

Bitcoin’s Massive Energy Consumption

Bitcoin’s purpose — keeping a transparent, tamper-proof, decentralized ledger — depends on a Proof of Work (PoW) verification step. The cost of PoW in electricity and computing time increases along with the value of what is recorded in the ledger. To give a sense of the scale of Bitcoin’s current energy consumption consider the following. Right now, each Bitcoin transaction consumes enough energy to run a moderately expensive house, and everything in it, for nearly a week. On December 31, 2017, one bitcoin transaction consumed as much power as eleven US households per day. On July 31, 2018, one bitcoin transaction consumed as much power as thirty-one US households per day. Currently, Bitcoin mining energy consumption is equal to the energy consumption of the country of Austria. Moreover, as the difficulty of mining increases, energy consumption will increase. By 2019, Bitcoin mining will consume the same amount of energy as the 20th country in the world in energy consumption.

While many have decried the environmental impact of this energy use, few have considered how electricity could function as a limit factor to Bitcoin’s promise. By design, PoW require an enormous amount of computational and electrical expenditures, including removal of waste heat. Moreover, multiple miners or mining pools must work to solve an algorithm, even if only the first to solve it gets the Bitcoin. This wasted computational power is part of each transaction.

A Limit to Bitcoin’s Promise

Critics have pointed to the environmental unsustainability of Bitcoin. However, fewer have noted how Bitcoin’s security hinges on a convergence of the cost of adding transaction blocks (i.e. mining) with the increasing value of bitcoin. In other words, the energy used in this process will go up as the value of bitcoin rises. If Bitcoin continues to grow in uptake under the current PoW model, it will begin to have a significant impact on the world’s coal and oil supplies. This could cause the cost of a kilowatt to rise globally, and with the increasing cost of energy comes increasing mining costs. At what point will this cycle result in a situation where mining is only feasible for a tiny portion of the ultra wealthy, or perhaps for no one at all?

A Potential Solution

The 4NEW blockchain platform aims at addressing cryptocurrency’s sustainability problem. In so doing, it also offers a model for fulfilling Bitcoin’s promise. In effect, 4NEW proposes to tokenize electricity transactions over an “eco-friendly” blockchain powered by powerplants that convert waste into energy. The process of refining waste products into water and organic materials creates energy that can either be sold to national grids or used to operate an onsite mining farm. The mining farms will power the 4NEW blockchain, which is where actors in any industry will be able to transact using the KWATT coin. Powerplants will also be paid for the waste they process and the byproducts of waste processes, such as fertilizer and clean water. These by products can be sold on the market, further ensuring the viability of the blockchain.

Tokenomics

KWATT is currently an ERC20 Ethereum based token. However, when the blockchain is complete the token will be swapped for the KWATT Coin, which will interact with the blockchain. The coins are smart contracts that establish a binding relationship between transacting parties and provide a value for each transaction. The blockchain will provide an immutable and auditable journal of all transactions with all parties to each transaction being able to see the same ledger entry and costs of reconciliation.

Bold Vision and Regulatory Reality

4NEW’s plan is incredibly ambitious. However, the difficulty it presents is how it can be realized in practice. In many counties powerplants are not simply free market enterprises that anyone can build. They are heavily regulated by governments and sometimes owned in part in wholly by governments and state-backed corporations. It is difficult to imagine how 4NEW’s plan would fit into this complex regulatory landscape. Perhaps this is simply a failure of imagination in the face of the need for new social processes and institutions premised on blockchain technology. While the “waste to energy model” might sound radical, it could represent one direction for society to move as the uptake of cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology continues to rise.

https://hackernoon.com/is-electricity-a-limiting-factor-to-bitcoins-promise-86e457cf27ae

"Airdrops are a central feature of the cryptocurrency space. The first time I participated in one I didn’t even fully understand what an airdrop was or the value of the tokens I had received in my wallet. I was brand new to the cryptospace and had read something on a social media site about a company giving out “free ETH”. I followed the link and provided my ETH address. In actuality, they weren’t giving out free ethereum. There were airdropping their token and the amount they were giving away was priced to cost .5 ETH during their upcoming Initial Coin Offering (ICO). I received the tokens in my wallet but it wasn’t until a while later that I fully understood I had received an ERC20 token that could eventually be worth something on a crypto exchange. Since then I have participated in hundreds and hundreds of airdrops and received well over 500 different tokens and coins through these campaigns. The point of this article is to share my experience navigating the world of cryptocurrency airdrops, including how I learned to profit from them and some of the scams I encountered along the way."

Full article: https://hackernoon.com/a-guide-to-navigating-the-world-of-cryptocurrency-airdrops-cef2777427db

I like this piece because the author isn't wearing rose-colored glasses when assessing the potential for blockchain technology to help secure our digital privacy:

"Often when we hear the phrase “data privacy” what is being referred to are the rules set by centralized platforms that determine who has permission to access data and who gets informed when it happens. Yet, this is only the surface of the problem. The deepest threat to our online privacy lies in the nature of the internet itself. The network operates like a massive copy-and-paste machine — copying information from one computer and pasting it to another. For example, when we share vital information like our name, date of birth, address, and social security number, that personal information is passed onto third-parties that require it. This means not only do we have to repeatedly fill out forms every time we interact with a new organization or business, but those entities also make copies and store our information in centralized databases that are easy targets for hackers."

Read the full article on The Start Up: https://medium.com/swlh/immutability-is-a-double-edged-sword-how-blockchain-solves-some-privacy-problems-while-creating-ab5fb6336935

"This story is for all cryptocurrency enthusiasts out there, but in particular it is for new enthusiasts and those still learning the dynamics of the cryptospace. I’m going to explain some of the most common scams, how I was scammed, and how you can avoid a similar fate."

Full article: https://hackernoon.com/lessons-i-learned-from-being-scammed-twice-in-the-cryptocurrency-space-43658f4753e8

CyberFM is Levelling the Playing Field for New and Artists

As anyone familiar with the music industry knows, there are royalty payment systems enforced in most countries through government regulation. The reason for this is to ensure that musicians and artists are compensated for the use of their performances. Benefitting from these royalty regimes requires being a member of a recognised rights performance organisation (for example, SOCAN in Canada and SoundExchange in the United States, which collects online broadcast payments through a membership system for multiple performance rights organizations). As a way to offset the costs associated with these payments to artists, large online radio networks that broadcast music have monetized content using subscription systems, membership perks and traditional broadcast advertising.

Cyber-FM challenges this model of online radio in a number of ways. First, Cyber-FM Radio has been a leader for the past 10 years in providing listeners access to music that is not normally available on mainstream radio at no charge. Now, it is working with Mainstream for the Underground (MFTU) to add a new system in which everyone (listeners and artists) are rewarded with tokens for each song they listen to. MFTU uses an open-source online royalty payment model that functions worldwide through a distributed ledger (blockchain) system. To operate globally while also negotiating varying government regulations, the system uses a dual token ecosystem involving the CYFM token and the MFTU token. Both tokens are built on the ETH blockchain, which can be used to create a universal payment system that enables royalties to be collected and paid throughout all countries.

The CYFM token represents a regulatory compliant cryptocurrency for artists that are currently registered locally in their home countries. It will be used for payment to government regulation agencies worldwide. This means is that the CYFM tokens will not be totally decentralized as it will have to conform to regulatory requirement in different countries. The MFTU token is similar to CYFM, but it is architecturally decentralized and as such represents the only truly internationally accepted, transparent, fair, legal and cryptographic performance rights royalty system for independent artists. Any artist can register with MFTU, have their music broadcast on Cyber-FM and receive royalty payments in MFTU tokens regardless of individual membership to the performance rights organization in their home country. Fans and listeners alike can use either token in stores for merchandise, song downloads, and “tipping” directly paid to the artist (this is separate from MFTU artist royalties).

In Conclusion, Cyber-FM has an established record of bringing independent music to listeners and promoting artists through user outreach. Its new plan with Mainstream for the Underground is exciting because it provides a way of protecting artist's rights and payments across the globe while they maintain current copyright registrations locally. At the same, it gives a way for artists who are not officially registered the chance to have their music broadcast on CYBER-FM and be paid royalties through MFTU tokens. This means the ecosystem can effectively function in the current context of government regulation of copyright and royalties, while also helping to usher in a new era of decentralised and global royalty payment processes.

More information:

https://www.cyber-fm.com/
https://www.mftu.net/

#CyberFM #Investment #Cryptocurrency #DistributedLedger #RadioOnline #CYFM

4NEW Promises Environmentally Sustainable Cryptocurrency

The Problem: Cryptocurrency Energy Consumption

There is intense excitement among many over the possibility that blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies will radically transform society. At the same time, there are many who are equally passionate about the problems with the current models. One set of issues relates to energy management and environmental sustainability, in particular the voracious energy consumption of blockchain technology. The 4NEW blockchain platform aims at addressing this problem using KWATT tokens to enable tokenized electricity transaction over a blockchain network.

As of September 30, 2017, one bitcoin transaction consumed as much power as eight US households per day. As of December 31, 2017, one bitcoin transaction consumed as much power as eleven US households per day. As of March 31, 2018, one bitcoin transaction consumed as much power as thirty-one US households per day. Also, as of March 31 2018, Bitcoin mining energy consumption officially surpassed the entire energy consumption of the country of Singapore, which ranks 43rd globally in regards to energy consumption. As the difficulty of mining increases, this energy consumption will increase exponentially. At the current rate of consumption, by 2019 Bitcoin mining will consume the same amount of energy as the 20th country in the world in energy consumption.

Critics have rightly pointed out this is simply unsustainable. The world relies primarily on the production of energy from the burning of coal and oil, so the current model will damage the environment. It also threatens to destabalise the economy. If Bitcoin continues to grow in uptake under the current model, it will begin to have a significant impact on the world’s coal and oil supplies. The more valuable bitcoin becomes, the more energy will be used to mine the coins and the cost of a kilowatt will rise globally. This will go on until energy around the world will cost much more than it does currently. The volatility of the value of cryptocurrencies will be an issue as well since with price spikes, come energy spikes.

The Solution: 4NEW’s Blockchain

4NEW’s “eco-friendly” blockchain will be powered by powerplants that convert waste into energy. 4NEW uses what it describes as a “waste to energy model” in which the company is paid for the waste its powerplant processes and the sale of byproducts such as fertilizer, organic materials and clean water. The process of refining various waste products into water and organic materials creates energy and that can be leveraged to either be sold to national grids or applied to operate mining processes at an onsite mining farm. The mining farms will power the 4NEW decentralized ledger, which is where all actors in any industry will be able to transact using the KWATT coin. The idea might sound radical or audacious but this is one direction society could move as uptake of cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology continues.

Token

KWATT Token currently is an ERC20, Ethereum based smart contract. Upon completion of the blockchain development, the token will be swapped to the KWATT Coin that will interact with the blockchain. The coins are smart contracts which establish a binding relationship between transacting parties and provide a value for each transaction. The ledger will provide an immutable and auditable journal of all transactions related to purchase and sale of goods and services on the blockchain. With all parties to each transaction being able to see the same ledger entry, costs of reconciliation.

Website: https://4new.io/

Like this article on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/new-project-promises-environmentally-sustainable-mina-down/

Aenco: Blockchain-Based Healthcare Financial Solutions Platform

What is Aenco?

Aenco is an international blockchain solutions company that has launched a new venture in the health technology sector with the aim to support research, innovation, and health tech entrepreneurialism. Its co-founders state that they want to create a decentralized ecosystem that supports the development and research of medical technology. Their goal is to develop a "one stop shop" for the delivery of institutional financing, prime brokerage, and smart capital solutions for the health technology industry, as well as a research and collaboration hub for healthcare organizations and projects involved in the field of blockchain development.

How Does It Work?

In the whitepaper, Aenco’s core services or “Health Tech Solutions” are categorized into three different pillars: Aenco IB Solutions, Aenco Smartcap Solutions Platform and Aenco Prime Solutions. Aenco IB Solutions will focus on ICO integrity processes, which involve, among other things, providing ICO analytics to health tech start-ups, facilitating community sponsorships, as well as liquidity facilitation. Aenco Smartcap Solutions and Aenco Prime Solutions are used to create a decentralized brokerage platform that supports collateralized digital assets lending and borrowing. They will also cover P2P financing pools that can interface with fiat currency and major digital assets such as cryptocurrencies. Additionally, SmartCap Solutions will include alternative financing options primarily focused on receivables financing, bridge financing and collateralized lending. All three of these platforms comprise the Aenco Healthcare Financial Solutions Platform.

AEN Token

Aenco will be combining its solutions platform and core financing ecosystem with the wider healthcare technology community, through the AEN token as the key ecosystem building block and link across all its service and community deliveries. The token will be integrated as major payment currency and transaction support. It will also use a “proof of stake” basis for account holding and conducting of financial services, including: fiat deposits, domestic and cross-border fund remittances, foreign exchange transactions, trade services, and investment product distribution and asset management.

The Team Behind the Project

Aenco consists of an impressive team with many years of experience working with global investment banks and financial institutions, as well as blockchain development and entrepreneurship. This team has been developing the Aenco platform since 2008, which means that they have already laid much of the groundwork necessary for executing the project and making it appealing to a wide audience.

Conclusion

Aenco has some important strengths. One of the biggest is its ambitious vision. Aenco promises to provide a global health technology solution using blockchain technology to enable organizations to research, innovate, and work with each other in searching for cures for diseases and ways to improve human quality of life. The team has been working together for ten years already, which means that they have experience needed to complete such a project. At the same time, this large scale vision presents some challenges, one of which relates to the global nature of the Aenco ecosystem, which involves interacting and ensuing compliance with the regulations of many different countries. This complex legal and policy landscape makes the idea of a GLOBAL heath tech solution difficult to image.

Website: https://www.aencoin.com/
Whitepaper: https://www.aencoin.com/assets/docs/aenco-whitepaper.pdf
Explainer video:
Please like this article on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/aenco-blockchain-based-healthcare-financial-solutions-mina-down/