<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?><feed xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" ><generator uri="https://jekyllrb.com/" version="3.9.0">Jekyll</generator><link href="http://dev.gloebit.com/feed.xml" rel="self" type="application/atom+xml" /><link href="http://dev.gloebit.com/" rel="alternate" type="text/html" /><updated>2020-08-10T06:07:14+00:00</updated><id>http://dev.gloebit.com/feed.xml</id><title type="html">Gloebit Developer Site</title><subtitle>Information on utilizing and integrating Gloebit's services as a developer or merchant plus our FinTech blog</subtitle><entry><title type="html">Upgrade Your OpenSim Viewer</title><link href="http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/Upgrade-Viewer/" rel="alternate" type="text/html" title="Upgrade Your OpenSim Viewer" /><published>2018-02-14T00:00:00+00:00</published><updated>2018-02-14T00:00:00+00:00</updated><id>http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/Upgrade-Viewer</id><content type="html" xml:base="http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/Upgrade-Viewer/">&lt;p&gt;Alchemy and Firestorm have released an update which will drastically improve your commerce experience!  It’s time to upgrade your viewer and enjoy the new features.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/images/upgrade-viewer.png&quot; alt=&quot;Golden Ticket&quot; title=&quot;Buy a ticket to an event in OpenSim&quot; /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;!--end_excerpt--&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We weren’t happy with some of the limitations placed on us (and the experience we could provide to our users) from some legacy viewer code, so we designed and implemented a &lt;a href=&quot;https://medium.com/@colosi/multi-currency-support-coming-to-opensim-viewers-cd20e75f7990&quot;&gt;viewer patch&lt;/a&gt; to change what was possible.  The goal was to simplify configuration of the Gloebit Money Module for grids, and to improve commerce in OpenSim.  Two of the most popular viewers have now released versions which included that patch, so we’re alerting our users that they should upgrade and our partners running grids that they should ask their users to upgrade.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;viewers-with-the-patch&quot;&gt;Viewers with the patch&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;The versions of the following viewers include this patch, so upgrading to or beyond these versions will ensure you get an optimal commerce experience.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https://alchemyviewer.org/alchemy-release-50741341.html&quot;&gt;Alechemy v5.0.7.41341&lt;/a&gt; released on November 14th, 2017&lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.firestormviewer.org/firestorm-update-5-0-11-53634/&quot;&gt;Firestorm v5.0.11.53634&lt;/a&gt; released on January 26th, 2018&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;improvements-for-users&quot;&gt;Improvements for users&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;seeing-the-correct-currency-symbol&quot;&gt;Seeing the correct currency symbol&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;You will now see the correct currency symbol for the region you are on.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Traditionally, the currency symbol was set once when you first log into a grid.  This meant that as you moved to a region or grid with a different currency active, the symbol would be wrong, which could be confusing.  Now, the currency symbol updates on a hypergrid teleport and on region crossings and teleports.  When you are in a Gloebit enabled region, you should always see G$ as the currency symbol.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;purchasing-land&quot;&gt;Purchasing Land&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;You’ll be able to purchase land on more grids.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Enabling land sales used to require configuring a special server with special scripts which talked to the viewer separately from the region.  Many grids struggle to configure this properly, and therefore never enable land sales.  With this patch, Gloebit enabled regions can process land sales directly with the viewer, so if a grid wants to sell land, they will, and you’ll be able to buy it using gloebits.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Land sales never worked for hypergrid travelers, and required a user to create a local account on the grid to purchase land.  Not any more.  Hypergrid travelers can now purchase land for sale on Gloebit enabled regions.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;/blog/images/hg-traveler-owned-land.png&quot; alt=&quot;Land owned by a hypergrid visitor&quot; title=&quot;A hypergrid visitor from Zetaworlds purchased land on Mobius Grid&quot; /&gt;
Here, you can see that a foreign hypergrid vistor from Zetaworlds purchased land on Mobius Grid and is listed as the owner of the parcel.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;the-buy-currency-flow&quot;&gt;The buy-currency flow&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;You will recieve helpful messaging from the commerce service for the region you are on when you click the buy-currency button and when you try to buy an object without enough funds and enter the insufficient funds flow.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Much like with land sales, enabling this buy-currency and insufficient-funds flows required some complex configuration from grid owners.  These settings were grid wide and didn’t update when hypergrid teleporting or traveling to regions with other commerce services enabled.  For users, this meant unhelpful and inaccurate messaging at best.  Now, these can be handled directly by the regions moeny module.  When in any Gloebit enabled region, you’ll receive helpful messaging from Gloebit so that you can complete your purchase.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;For security purposes, we don’t sell currency directly in the viewer, but if you click on the buy-currency button, you’ll receive the link to purchase currency from our website.  Additionally, when you attempt to transact on a Gloebit enabled region, if you have not yet authorized, we’ll be able to present you with link to authorize and link your Gloebit account, and if you have authorized, but have insufficient funds for the transaction, we’ll be able to present you with the link to purchase more gloebits so you can complete your transaction.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;improvements-for-grid-and-region-owners&quot;&gt;Improvements for Grid and Region owners&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;configuring-the-currency-symbol&quot;&gt;Configuring the currency symbol&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;This is no longer necessary for Gloebit enabled regions.  You can still set it to determine the grid wide currency when on regions which are not Gloebit enabled, but when on Gloebit enabled regions, the currency will always be G$ without you having to do any configuration.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;The currency was a grid wide setting, which was problematic for grids with multiple commerce systems.  It also didn’t update on hypergrid teleports.  It will now update to the proper grid wide currency symbol or the region specific currency symbol.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;configuring-the-economy-helper-uri&quot;&gt;Configuring the economy helper-uri&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;This is no longer necessary.  You can still set it, but when on Gloebit enabled regions, our money module will tell the viewer to talk directly to our money module.  If you haven’t set this or you’ve set it wrong, Gloebit enabled regions will still work.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;This uri presented many problems for grid owners.  It was a grid wide setting, which didn’t work for grids with multiple commerce systems.  It didn’t update on a hypergrid teleport.  And, even if this was set propertly, viewers only update this field when the user actively forces an update, so you can’t guarantee uniform user experiences if you’ve ever had to modify this after creation of your grid.  Now, you don’t have to worry about any of this.  Buy-land, buy-currency, and insufficient-funds events will go directly to the Gloebit money module when on a Gloebit enabled region.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;configuring-your-xml-rpc-server-landtoolphp-file-and-currencyphp-file&quot;&gt;Configuring your XML-RPC server, landtool.php file and currency.php file&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;You no longer have to do any of this.  The Gloebit Money Module handles everything for you.  Land sales and the buy-currency and insufficient-funds flows just work.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Now that the Gloebit Money Module can override the economy helper-uri, we have the viewer send the calls that used to go to this server and these scripts, instead directly to the region the user is on.  The GMM can handle these directly, with no additional configuration work and can provide a much better user experience.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;removing-our-authorization-instant-message-at-the-start-of-a-session&quot;&gt;Removing our authorization instant message at the start of a session&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;This is actually coming soon, but it is enabled by these viewer updates.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Gloebit sends an IM to a user the first time we see them each session if they haven’t yet authorized and linked this avatar on this app to a Gloebit account.  This was the only place we could reliably supply this message.  Most of our partners are fine with this, but some felt that it was obtrusive.  Until now, we’ve been unwilling to provide a configuration setting to remove it because without it, a user who wants to purchase on a Gloebit enabled region might not be able to figure out how to authorize and get access to their gloebits.  Now that we can reliable control the insufficient-funds flow, we can guarantee that we can deliver this message at the time when a user attempts a transaction.  In a future version of the Gloebit Money Module, we intend to provide a new configuration setting for the which will allow our partner to disable the session start instant message.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;upgrade-your-viewer&quot;&gt;Upgrade your viewer&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;So, if you haven’t already, we hope that after reading this, you’ll now upgrade your viewer to one with the new patch.  If you run a Gloebit enabled grid, we hope you’ll tell your users to upgrade their viewers.  If you are building a new grid, or running one without Gloebit, we hope that you’ll agree that we make commerce pretty simple, and that the &lt;a href=&quot;/opensim/configuration-instructions/&quot;&gt;Gloebit Money Module&lt;/a&gt; is worth a try.  Your customers will love it.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Enjoy, help us spread the message, and go shop!&lt;br /&gt;
– Team Gloebit&lt;/p&gt;</content><author><name>Christopher M. Colosi</name><uri>https://www.linkedin.com/in/christophercolosi</uri></author><category term="OpenSim" /><category term="Digital Currency" /><category term="FinTech" /><category term="Viewer" /><category term="Firestorm" /><category term="Alchemy" /><category term="Patch" /><summary type="html">Alchemy and Firestorm have released an update which will drastically improve your commerce experience! It’s time to upgrade your viewer and enjoy the new features.</summary></entry><entry><title type="html">Sell Parcel Access Passes in OpenSim</title><link href="http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/Land-Pass-Sales/" rel="alternate" type="text/html" title="Sell Parcel Access Passes in OpenSim" /><published>2017-08-23T00:00:00+00:00</published><updated>2017-08-23T00:00:00+00:00</updated><id>http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/Land-Pass-Sales</id><content type="html" xml:base="http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/Land-Pass-Sales/">&lt;p&gt;Now, you can sell tickets to an event in OpenSim via the buit-in parcel access interface!&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/images/golden_ticket.jpg&quot; alt=&quot;Golden Ticket&quot; title=&quot;Buy a ticket to an event in OpenSim&quot; /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;!--end_excerpt--&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Give it a try and tell us what you think. This could be a great way to fund the amazing creativity in OpenSim.  It’s an easy way to charge entrance to a music event or a festival without having to manually modify the parcel access list or write or buy a complex scripted access management system. Maybe we can try this for the next OpenSim Community Conference.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;how-it-works&quot;&gt;How it works&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Select “About Land” for one of your parcels and open the “Access” tab.  Deselect “Allow Public Access” and check the box next to “Sell passes to”. Then set the “Price” and “Hours of access”. That’s it!&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;/blog/images/OpenSimLandAccessGUI.png&quot; alt=&quot;OpenSim Land Acess GUI&quot; title=&quot;Select Sell passes to from the land access gui and set the price and hours&quot; /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;When a user approaches a parcel with these settings, they will see a payment boundary which blocks their entrance. If they right click on the parcel and select the “Buy Pass” option, they’ll be presented with a message asking if they’d like to pay for access. If they choose “okay”, the owner of the land will be paid the price that was set and they’ll be granted access for the amount of hours the owner specified. The buyer will appear in the “Allowed Residents” list for the parcel with their remaining pass time in minutes displayed after their avatar name. Once their time remaining reaches zero, they are removed from this list.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;some-details-for-various-opensim-versions&quot;&gt;Some details for various OpenSim versions&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;In 0.8.x versions of OpenSim, users will not be automatically expelled when their pass expires. If their pass is expired, once they leave, they will not be allowed back in without purchasing a new pass. Users can also buy additional passes while a pass is active and the time will be added to their existing pass. The “Hours of access” set will also be truncated to an integer, so if you want finer control than full hours, consider upgrading to the 0.9.0.0-release of OpenSim just packaged about a week ago.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;In 0.9.x versions of OpenSim, users will be automatically expelled when their pass expires. The core developers implemented auto-expulsion somewhere in 0.9.0-dev. They also prevented a user from purchasing more time until their active pass is close to expiring. We’d love to hear your feedback on this implementation so that we can summarize it and pass it along to the OpenSim core team.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;This will not work for a group-owned parcel in any version of OpenSim. Payment to groups has not yet been impmented as OpenSim has yet to define a standard for who should receive funds paid to a group.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;new-gmm-dlls&quot;&gt;New GMM DLLs&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We’ve released new DLLs for the OpenSim Gloebit Money Module which can be found on our &lt;a href=&quot;/opensim/downloads&quot;&gt;downloads page&lt;/a&gt;. If you’d like to try out land pass sales, then you’ll need this latest DLL.  Simply replace your current DLL with the new one and restart your sim.  If you’re not yet a part of the Gloebit ecosystem, what are you waiting for?  Follow our &lt;a href=&quot;opensim/configuration-instructions/&quot;&gt;simple instructions&lt;/a&gt; to enable Gloebit in your world.&lt;/p&gt;</content><author><name>Christopher M. Colosi</name><uri>https://www.linkedin.com/in/christophercolosi</uri></author><category term="OpenSim" /><category term="Digital Currency" /><category term="FinTech" /><category term="LandPass" /><category term="tickets" /><summary type="html">Now, you can sell tickets to an event in OpenSim via the buit-in parcel access interface!</summary></entry><entry><title type="html">Gloebit Stats - February 2017</title><link href="http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/February-Data/" rel="alternate" type="text/html" title="Gloebit Stats - February 2017" /><published>2017-03-04T00:00:00+00:00</published><updated>2017-03-04T00:00:00+00:00</updated><id>http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/February-Data</id><content type="html" xml:base="http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/February-Data/">&lt;p&gt;We’ve pulled some data since the beginning of the year.  Things really started taking off in February!&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/images/data/2017-02-Total-App-Users.png&quot; alt=&quot;Chart of Gloebit App Users&quot; title=&quot;Gloebit App Users increasing from 0 in June 2016 to 361 in early March 2017 with an inflection point in late January 2017&quot; /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;!--end_excerpt--&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We’ll get back to what an “App User” is shortly, but look at that change in slope!  While we’ve been running and testing for a good long while, it wasn’t until late January, as we announced some core merchant features, that commerce focused spaces began enabling Gloebit.  This post provides the first snapshot of growth we’ve seen since.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;gloebit-accounts&quot;&gt;Gloebit Accounts&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;/blog/images/data/2017-02-Total-Gloebit-Accounts.png&quot; alt=&quot;Chart of Gloebit Accounts&quot; title=&quot;Total Gloebit Accounts rising from 285 on January 1st 2017 to 327 on February 1st to 409 on March 1st&quot; /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We started the year with 285 accounts on our system.  We averaged roughly 1 signup per day in January.  In February, we averaged over 3 signups per day, a 3x increase in our account growth rate.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;active-gloebit-users&quot;&gt;Active Gloebit Users&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;This chart displays the unique Gloebit accounts which either logged in or spent gloebits each day.  We’ll likely refine the definition of active user as we build more metrics to include users who authorized an app, had their balance requested by an app, or purchased gloebits.  If we had this other data, this active users chart would certainly show higher numbers.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;/blog/images/data/2017-02-Active-Users.png&quot; alt=&quot;Chart of Active Gloebit Users&quot; title=&quot;Active Gloebit users rising from about 3.5 per day in January 2017 to nearly 20 per day in February&quot; /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Until the ZanGrid launch, in January, we were seeing about 2 active Gloebit users per day (3.5 with the final days of January factored in).  February saw an average of 20 active Gloebit users per day.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;app-users&quot;&gt;App Users&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;An app user represents a unique account on a Gloebit app.  In the case of OpenSim, an app user is basically an avatar and an app is generally a grid which has enabled the Gloebit Money Module. We create an app user when a user comes to our website to authorize an app with their Gloebit account.  If a single avatar on an open grid such as OSGrid authorizes two separate apps on that grid, this would show up as 2 app users because while it is the same account on the grid, it is 2 different apps on Gloebit.  Similarly, if a user teleports to three different hypergrid enabled grids and authorizes on all of them, this will show up as 3 separate app users in our system because they are both different accounts in OpenSim (yes, when you hg teleport to a grid, that grid creates a local account for you) and different apps in Gloebit.  Over time, we expect our number of app users to grow faster than our number of accounts.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;/blog/images/data/2017-02-New-App-Users.png&quot; alt=&quot;Chart of new Gloebit App Users&quot; title=&quot;New Gloebit app users rising from about 1 per day in January 2017 to nearly 5 per day in February&quot; /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We saw an average of ~1.5 new app users per day in January, and less that 1 a day if you exclude the final few days of the month after ZanGrid launched.  We assume that our best day, 25 new app users on January 30th, was the day that ZanGrid launched.  February saw about a 5x increase to nearly 5 new app users per day.  While we haven’t yet charted apps, it is worth noting that there were 3 commercially active apps in January, and by the end of February, there were 9.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;/blog/images/data/2017-02-Total-App-Users-Since-Jan-1.png&quot; alt=&quot;Chart of Total Gloebit App Users&quot; title=&quot;Total Gloebit app users rising from 147 on January 1st 2017 to 208 on February 1st to 338 on March 1st&quot; /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;It might seem odd that there are less total app users than there are total gloebit accounts.  This is because we didn’t launch our app user system until last year.  Any test accounts from before that date will not have any app users.  A better comparison would be to look at signups since the launch of our app user system, which there have been about 280, and even some of these have been test accounts which are linked to zero app users.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;transactions&quot;&gt;Transactions&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We care about our users, but we know that our users care about money. We’re here to make it easier to transact.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;/blog/images/data/2017-02-Gloebits-Spent.png&quot; alt=&quot;Chart of gloebits spent per day in 2017 through March 1st&quot; title=&quot;Gloebits spent rising from ~800 per day in January 2017 to over 2700 per day in February 2017&quot; /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Spending prior to the ZanGrid launch and the follow-on of other commerce focused OpenSim spaces was sporadic.  Since then, we’ve averaged over 3,000 gloebits spent per day.  Transactions moving 100,000 gloebits were processed by our system between January 28th and February 28th.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;looking-forward-through-2017&quot;&gt;Looking Forward Through 2017&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Our users are on pace to transact over 1 million gloebits this year.  That’s just incredible.  That’s if we saw no growth the rest of the year.  But we expect to see a lot more growth.  We receive inquiries from new OpenSim grids daily, and we know that adoption by more grids translates into more Gloebit accounts, more app users, more active users, and most importantly, more transactions.  Much of the growth in February was from only a few active apps on our system.  At the start of march, there are about 10 which appear reasonably active, and many more which are in the process of enabling Gloebit.  March will almost certainly be a bigger month than February.  We’ll look forward to updating you again at the end of March.&lt;/p&gt;</content><author><name>Christopher M. Colosi</name><uri>https://www.linkedin.com/in/christophercolosi</uri></author><category term="OpenSim" /><category term="Digital Currency" /><category term="FinTech" /><category term="data" /><category term="stats" /><summary type="html">We’ve pulled some data since the beginning of the year. Things really started taking off in February!</summary></entry><entry><title type="html">We’ve Enabled Gloebit Sales</title><link href="http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/Gloebit-Sales-Enabled/" rel="alternate" type="text/html" title="We've Enabled Gloebit Sales" /><published>2017-02-10T00:00:00+00:00</published><updated>2017-02-10T00:00:00+00:00</updated><id>http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/Gloebit-Sales-Enabled</id><content type="html" xml:base="http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/Gloebit-Sales-Enabled/">&lt;p&gt;Merchants can now request permission to sell gloebits for USD.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;http://dev.gloebit.com/images/seller-flow-images/seller-flow-sell-order-partially-executed.jpg&quot; alt=&quot;Signs in Zangrid explaining how to use Gloebit&quot; title=&quot;Gloebit sell order partially executed 800 of 1000 gloebits for $3.20 USD&quot; /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;!--end_excerpt--&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;requesting-permission-to-sell-gloebits&quot;&gt;Requesting permission to sell gloebits&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;A user with a verified email address and the proper payment credentials on file can request permission to sell gloebits.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Learn more about &lt;a href=&quot;/opensim/seller-flow/#request-seller-perms&quot;&gt;requesting seller permissions&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;selling-gloebits&quot;&gt;Selling gloebits&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Once a user has been approved and granted permission to sell gloebits, they will see a “Sell Gloebits” button on their dashboard which will take them to a page where they can sell gloebits and track previously placed sell orders.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Learn more about &lt;a href=&quot;/opensim/seller-flow/#selling-gloebits&quot;&gt;placing a gloebit sell order&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;/images/seller-flow-images/seller-flow-sell-gloebits-button.jpg&quot; alt=&quot;Sell gloebits button on dashboard&quot; title=&quot;Sell gloebits button visible on dashboard for approved users&quot; /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</content><author><name>Christopher M. Colosi</name><uri>https://www.linkedin.com/in/christophercolosi</uri></author><category term="OpenSim" /><category term="Digital Currency" /><category term="FinTech" /><category term="launch" /><category term="sales" /><summary type="html">Merchants can now request permission to sell gloebits for USD.</summary></entry><entry><title type="html">ZanGrid Enables Gloebit In HyperShopping Regions</title><link href="http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/ZanGrid-Enables-Gloebit/" rel="alternate" type="text/html" title="ZanGrid Enables Gloebit In HyperShopping Regions" /><published>2017-02-03T00:00:00+00:00</published><updated>2017-02-03T00:00:00+00:00</updated><id>http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/ZanGrid-Enables-Gloebit</id><content type="html" xml:base="http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/ZanGrid-Enables-Gloebit/">&lt;p&gt;These are the first Gloebit enabled VR regions strictly focusing on commerce.  It’s a beautiful outdoor mall build.  Check it out.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/images/HyperShopping-Gloebit-signs.jpg&quot; alt=&quot;Signs in Zangrid explaining how to use Gloebit&quot; title=&quot;ZanGrid Gloebit Signs&quot; /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;!--end_excerpt--&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;immediate-success&quot;&gt;Immediate Success&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We consider HyperShopping an immediate success.  They only enabled Gloebit earlier this week and we’ve alredy seen over 30 new Gloebit account signups, and about 70 active users who have purchased nearly 200 virtual items.  Sales are rolling in for the merchants of HyperShopping.  We can’t wait for the weekend spike!&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;shop-at-hypershopping&quot;&gt;Shop at HyperShopping&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We hope all OpenSim users Give it a try.  &lt;a href=&quot;https://www.gloebit.com/signup/&quot;&gt;Sign up&lt;/a&gt; for a Gloebit account, &lt;a href=&quot;https://www.gloebit.com/purchase/&quot;&gt;buy some gloebits&lt;/a&gt; and then head over &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.zangrid.ch/&quot;&gt;ZanGrid&lt;/a&gt;’s HyperShopping regions using their hypergrid teleport url - hg.zangrid.ch:8002:HyperShopping.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;enable-gloebit-on-your-grid&quot;&gt;Enable Gloebit On Your Grid&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://zetamex.com/&quot;&gt;Zetamex&lt;/a&gt; handled the configuration for ZanGrid and is prepared to do so for their other customers.  They made a wonderful &lt;a href=&quot;http://blog.zetamex.com/posts/2017/01/a-new-era-for-hypergrid-shoppers/&quot;&gt;blog announcement&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;blockquote&gt;
  &lt;p&gt;“To the rescue comes Gloebit, a new currency specifically designed for the hypergrid. Gloebit offers stability, usability and a level of integration that has not been seen in OpenSim thus far.”&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We’ve had many other grids testing our sytem over the last year and a handful of others, like &lt;a href=&quot;https://mobiusgrid.us/&quot;&gt;Mobius Grid&lt;/a&gt; who’ve pushed us live on their Grid during that time.  We have a couple customers who have enabled Gloebit on their OSGrid regions.  Other solution providers have tested Gloebit as well and can enable it for you, and for those managing their own grids, we’ve done our best to make the integration a simple process you can walk through yourself.  For some more testimonials, check out the latest &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.hypergridbusiness.com/2017/02/gloebit-live-on-zangrid-readies-merchant-payouts/&quot;&gt;article&lt;/a&gt; by Maria Korolov on Hypergrid Business.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Our &lt;a href=&quot;http://dev.gloebit.com/opensim/&quot;&gt;developer website&lt;/a&gt;, which needs a little updating with our latest developments, is also another great resource if you’re interested in enabling the Gloebit Money Module on your OpenSim grid or regions.&lt;/p&gt;</content><author><name>Christopher M. Colosi</name><uri>https://www.linkedin.com/in/christophercolosi</uri></author><category term="OpenSim" /><category term="Digital Currency" /><category term="FinTech" /><category term="launch" /><category term="GMM" /><category term="ZanGrid" /><category term="HyperShopping" /><category term="Zetamex" /><summary type="html">These are the first Gloebit enabled VR regions strictly focusing on commerce. It’s a beautiful outdoor mall build. Check it out.</summary></entry><entry><title type="html">Beta Launch of Gloebit Money Module for OpenSim</title><link href="http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/OpenSim-Beta-Launch/" rel="alternate" type="text/html" title="Beta Launch of Gloebit Money Module for OpenSim" /><published>2016-02-16T00:00:00+00:00</published><updated>2016-02-16T00:00:00+00:00</updated><id>http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/OpenSim-Beta-Launch</id><content type="html" xml:base="http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/OpenSim-Beta-Launch/">&lt;p&gt;Gloebit has developed a drop-in module integrating our currency service with the OpenSimulator virtual world platform.  We are testing this beta on a number of public virtual worlds running on OpenSim.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/images/OpenSim-Gloebit-Money-Module-Addon-Beta.png&quot; alt=&quot;OpenSim Gloebit Money Module Beta&quot; title=&quot;OpenSim Gloebit Money Module Beta&quot; /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;!--end_excerpt--&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;read-our-launch-announcement-on-medium&quot;&gt;Read our launch announcement on Medium.&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Don’t forget to recommend our story on Medium to help us share the news.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;script async=&quot;&quot; src=&quot;https://static.medium.com/embed.js&quot;&gt;&lt;/script&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a class=&quot;m-story&quot; data-collapsed=&quot;true&quot; href=&quot;https://medium.com/@colosi/uniting-virtual-reality-with-one-digital-currency-edb71b312eb5&quot;&gt;Uniting Virtual Reality With One Digital Currency&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;learn-more&quot;&gt;Learn More&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Find out all the details, where you can test our module or how to request beta access for your grid from the &lt;a href=&quot;http://dev.gloebit.com/opensim/&quot;&gt;OpenSim Gloebit Money Module section of our developer site&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;updates&quot;&gt;Updates&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We’ll continue to post updates such as improvements we’ve made, feedback we’ve received and press coverage here, so check back.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;press&quot;&gt;Press&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;Hypergrid Business - &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.hypergridbusiness.com/2016/02/ex-linden-money-man-creates-new-hypergrid-currency/&quot;&gt;Ex-Linden money chief creates new metaverse currency&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;Hypergrid Business - &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.hypergridbusiness.com/2016/02/how-to-use-gloebits/&quot;&gt;How to use gloebits&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;Hypergrid Business on &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.hypergridbusiness.com/2016/02/hosting-firms-grids-split-on-gloebits/&quot;&gt;early reception of GMM beta by OpenSim grids&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;versions-of-opensim&quot;&gt;Versions of OpenSim&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We’ve built our GMM against all of the following OpenSim versions which are being tested:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;0.9.0 Dev&lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;0.8.2&lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;0.8.1&lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;0.8.0&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;p&gt;If you’d like to try out our OpenSim GMM, see our &lt;a href=&quot;http://dev.gloebit.com/opensim/#test&quot;&gt;list of beta test regions&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;updates-to-the-gmm&quot;&gt;Updates to the GMM&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;pgSQL support
    &lt;ul&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;Added on 2016-02-11&lt;/li&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;The initial launch only supported MySQL.  Thanks to a lot of help from Zetamex, we have fixed the integration with pgSQL.&lt;/li&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;Note for anyone else writing code for pgSQL, the npgsql library which OpenSim uses to execute queries from C# will silently fail/freeze on constraint errors.  This is very bad for a sql library and makes debugging a bit of a challenge.&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;/ul&gt;
  &lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;Backport for OpenSim 0.8.0.3
    &lt;ul&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;We had to make some very minor modifications to run with OpenSim 0.8.0.3 which dates back to November of 2014, but we now have a branch of our module with those modifications.&lt;/li&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;This turned out to be a bit of a challenge due to some incompatibilities with older versions of OpenSim and recent versions of Mono.  Huge thanks to the opensim-dev IRC channel, especially Plugh and AliciaRaven, for helping us to discover this.&lt;/li&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;If you’re building an older version of OpenSim, make sure you are using Mono 3.12.1 or earlier.  4.x versions of Mono will not work.  We believe this was &lt;a href=&quot;http://opensimulator.org/viewgit/?a=commit&amp;amp;p=opensim&amp;amp;h=4cbbbefbf63f6cab4241563ebf56c6b0bea30ed3&quot;&gt;fixed by Diva Canto in August of 2015&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;/ul&gt;
  &lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;Per-region Currency Symbol and buy-url updating
    &lt;ul&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;Updated on 2016-04-26&lt;/li&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;We have added the OpenSimExtras parameters “currency” and “currency-base-url” which are delivered when a client makes a features request upon entering a new region.&lt;/li&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;Cider Roxley has added code to make use of these to the Alchemy Dire viewer, though we have not yet tested this
        &lt;ul&gt;
          &lt;li&gt;https://bitbucket.org/alchemyviewer/alchemy-dire/commits/f41da42e55d92eb49b4cc3a535c5056ea5f9c25b&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
      &lt;/li&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;Kalasiddhi Grid informed us of a conflict this feature created with mesh objects rendering (which we fixed on 2016-04-26).
        &lt;ul&gt;
          &lt;li&gt;While researching the issue, we discovered that OpenSim’s SimulatorFeatureModule was not implemented properly.  Melanie_T &lt;a href=&quot;http://opensimulator.org/viewgit/?a=commit&amp;amp;p=opensim&amp;amp;h=995655c445ebc32c8c20d8101259d7f5ccb95477&quot;&gt;patched&lt;/a&gt; the module and we updated our integration.&lt;/li&gt;
          &lt;li&gt;Big thanks to opensim-dev on IRC, Melanie_T, and Kalasiddhi Grid.&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
      &lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;/ul&gt;
  &lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;Grid Fees
    &lt;ul&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;Added on 2016-04-08&lt;/li&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;Implemented support for group creation, classified ad, and asset upload fees&lt;/li&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;Fees are paid to the account which created and owns the application.  No additional configuration of a “Banker Account” is required.&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;/ul&gt;
  &lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;Fixed message spamming of agents in nearby regions
    &lt;ul&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;Added on 2016-04-08&lt;/li&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;We learned a lot more about the IClientAPI and discovered the OnCompleteMovementToRegion event, which we now use to send a balance update and gloebit purchase message to the user upon entering a Gloebit enabled region.&lt;/li&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;Currently, the user will receive a single IM with the purchase url upon entering (logging in, teleporting, or crossing a region boundry) and Gloebit enabled region.  If this is too much messaging for users, we’ll examine ways to reduce it, though we’ve erred on extra information for now.&lt;/li&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;A user should no longer receive a purchase url message from Gloebit when on a non-Gloebit region near a Gloebit enabled region.&lt;/li&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;A user should only receive a single message when entering a Gloebit enabled region.&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;/ul&gt;
  &lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;Fee details in transaction history record for purchaser
    &lt;ul&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;Added on 2016-04-08&lt;/li&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;The buyer/payer will now see the gross amount, fees, and net amount in the details for a transaction from their transaction history on Gloebit.&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;/ul&gt;
  &lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;0G$ object purchase support
    &lt;ul&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;Added on 2016-04-27&lt;/li&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;We missed this one, but thanks to MobiusGrid and Zetamex reporting it, we’ve fixed it.&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;/ul&gt;
  &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;feature-requests&quot;&gt;Feature Requests&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;This is not an exhaustive list, but rather, a short list of items we think a large portion of the community will want to know have been requested.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;Make currency symbol in the viewer consistently update to the G$ symbol upon entering Gloebit enabled regions.
    &lt;ul&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;Added&lt;/li&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;With Cinder’s Roxley’s help, we have added some parameters to the OpenSimExtras sent to a viewer upon entering a region.  Hopefully soon, some viewers will make use of this and update the currency symbol.&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;/ul&gt;
  &lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;Add in support for upload fees, group creation fees, etc.
    &lt;ul&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;Added on 2016-04-08&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;/ul&gt;
  &lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;Make the buy currency button in the viewer work on regions where the GMM is not enabled grid wide.&lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;Update the gloebit balance automatically in the viewer after a user purchases gloebits (currently requires clicking on your balance).
    &lt;ul&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;The GMM delivers the url to Gloebit for us to deliver this alert to.  We are not yet calling it from our server, but we will eventually add this feature.&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;/ul&gt;
  &lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;Make fee details visible to paying Gloebit account in their transaction history as this is required in some countries such as Germany.
    &lt;ul&gt;
      &lt;li&gt;Added on 2016-04-08&lt;/li&gt;
    &lt;/ul&gt;
  &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;reported-bugs&quot;&gt;Reported Bugs&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;FIXED 2016-02-11 - pgSQL issues&lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;FIXED 2016-02-18 - auto-debit scripted objects failing if description is blank&lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;FIXED 2016-04-08 - Gloebit module messaging agents in nearby regions&lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;FIXED 2016-04-26 - Mesh objects not displaying on GMM enabled region&lt;/li&gt;
  &lt;li&gt;FIXED 2016-04-27 - Purchase of object for 0G$ fails&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;</content><author><name>Christopher M. Colosi</name><uri>https://www.linkedin.com/in/christophercolosi</uri></author><category term="OpenSim" /><category term="Digital Currency" /><category term="FinTech" /><category term="launch" /><category term="beta" /><category term="GMM" /><summary type="html">Gloebit has developed a drop-in module integrating our currency service with the OpenSimulator virtual world platform. We are testing this beta on a number of public virtual worlds running on OpenSim.</summary></entry><entry><title type="html">Currency Terminology: Virtual, Digital, Crypto, Bitcoin ???</title><link href="http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/Currency-Terminology/" rel="alternate" type="text/html" title="Currency Terminology: Virtual, Digital, Crypto, Bitcoin ???" /><published>2015-04-14T00:00:00+00:00</published><updated>2015-04-14T00:00:00+00:00</updated><id>http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/Currency-Terminology</id><content type="html" xml:base="http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/Currency-Terminology/">&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;“Virtual currency, digital currency, Crypto-currency, Bitcoin… these are all the same thing, right?”&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;A form of this question comes up in almost every interview, advising session, or conversation around &lt;a href=&quot;https://www.gloebit.com/&quot;&gt;Gloebit&lt;/a&gt; and the field of &lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Financial_technology&quot;&gt;FinTech&lt;/a&gt; (financial technology).  Clearly, the industry lacks consensus on the definitions for existing terminology.  My goal here is to educate where consensus exists and promote some concepts that will help us all better understand each other.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;!--end_excerpt--&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/images/Currency-Terminology-Diagram-with-logos.png&quot; alt=&quot;Digital Currency Terminology Diagram&quot; title=&quot;Currency Terminology Diagram&quot; /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;first-a-little-history-from-my-perspective&quot;&gt;First, a little history from my perspective:&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;at-second-life-we-called-it-virtual-currency&quot;&gt;At Second Life, we called it virtual currency.&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;From 2007 through 2011, I had the pleasure of working on Linden Lab’s Second Life virtual world, eventually running the economy and maintaining the money supply much like the Federal Reserve Chair of the United States.  The product may have been virtual, but the economy was very real.  At over &lt;em&gt;$500 million&lt;/em&gt; in user-to-user transactions per year, it could sit around 185th on the &lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28nominal%29#Lists&quot;&gt;list of countries by GDP&lt;/a&gt; - not far from the economies of some small island nations.  Many residents (what we called the Second Life users) earned a full-time living off of the product in Linden Dollars, the virtual currency of the platform, which could be “cashed out”, or exchanged into USD.  Still, we called it a &lt;em&gt;virtual&lt;/em&gt; currency because it was playfully used only in our world, because it only existed in this digital space of bits, and because we wanted to differentiate it from the currencies of the countries around the world.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;at-gloebit-we-built-a-digital-currency&quot;&gt;At Gloebit, we built a digital currency.&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;In 2012, when I founded Gloebit, I made a very conscious decision to replace the word &lt;em&gt;virtual&lt;/em&gt; with the word &lt;em&gt;digital&lt;/em&gt; and put a stake in the ground about the breadth of its intended usage.  Unlike Linden Dollars, a virtual currency for use on one platform, Second Life, gloebits would be a payment method for use by all companies and products.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;digital-currency-you-mean-that-bitcoin-thing-right&quot;&gt;“Digital currency, you mean that Bitcoin thing, right?”&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;In 2013, Bitcoin took the world, or at least the media, by storm.  It captured enough attention that it entered the general lexicon, but not enough attention for the average person or the media to really understand how it worked.  It is often coupled with the terms virtual, digital and crypto, and occasionally, everything else is referred to as a type of Bitcoin the same way that &lt;a href=&quot;https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facial_tissue&quot;&gt;tissues&lt;/a&gt; might wrongly be referred to as a type of &lt;a href=&quot;https://www.kleenex.com/&quot;&gt;Kleenex&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;fintech-is-changing-fast-and-its-important-to-have-shared-terminology--heres-your-cheat-sheet&quot;&gt;FinTech is changing fast, and it’s important to have shared terminology.  Here’s your cheat sheet.&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;virtual-currency&quot;&gt;Virtual Currency&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;A &lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_currency&quot;&gt;virtual currency&lt;/a&gt; is for use in a single product or on a single platform.  It is managed and controlled by the same company who produces that product or platform.   Have you ever purchased some sort of coin or gem in an app and then spent those gems to purchase something in the app such as extra lives, a character, a hat or new features?  Well then, you’ve used a virtual currency.  A notable platform example is &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html?docId=1001166401&quot;&gt;Amazon Coins&lt;/a&gt;.  There are many popular games with currencies, one of which is &lt;a href=&quot;http://hearthstone.gamepedia.com/Gold&quot;&gt;HearthStone Gold&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Some people restrict the term virtual currency to digital tokens which a user can purchase and/or sell for a government currency such as USD, focusing on the tie in to traditional payment methods.  I am much more liberal with the term and use it for any platform-specific medium of exchange, even those earned within the platform.  For example, any reward system where you earn points instead of a dollar value, such as airline frequent flyer miles, is also a type of virtual currency.  Additionally, any in-game resource such as minerals, lumber or energy which is earned or mined and spent on in-game production is also a very simple virtual currency.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;digital-currency&quot;&gt;Digital Currency&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Here we have a debate.  Some use &lt;a href=&quot;https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_currency&quot;&gt;digital currency&lt;/a&gt; to describe a superset which includes virtual currency.  Others see it as a complementary, but distinct, set.  Even the single Wikipedia page on the subject has both a section which &lt;a href=&quot;https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_currency#Definition&quot;&gt;supports&lt;/a&gt; and one which &lt;a href=&quot;https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_currency#Digital_versus_virtual_currency&quot;&gt;disputes&lt;/a&gt; overlap of the two.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I am of the school of thought which treats digital currency as a distinct set, separated from virtual currency by the breadth of intended use.  Whereas a virtual currency is restricted to use on a single platform, and tightly controlled by that platform, a digital currency is open for use by any platform, and control is outside the scope of a single platform.  A digital currency, by this definition, must supply a service, protocol, or interface for platforms to tie into.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;centralization&quot;&gt;Centralization&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Centralization refers to how the currency is managed.  The digital currency space is bifurcated into centralized and decentralized digital currency.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;centralized-digital-currency&quot;&gt;Centralized Digital Currency&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;In a centralized system, there is a single authority who at a minimum controls the money supply (amount of the currency in circulation), and generally also controls transaction processing, record maintenance, user account creation, balances, and access.  This authority is also responsible for granting platforms and consumers access to the currency.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;All government fiat currencies are centralized.  The Federal Reserve Bank is the central authority controlling the supply of USD.  By their nature, all virtual currencies are also centralized.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;A centralized digital currency is for use across many platforms, but with a single central authority who oversees access to and controls the currency.  &lt;a href=&quot;http://dev.gloebit.com/monetize/#gloebits&quot;&gt;Gloebits&lt;/a&gt; are a centralized digital currency.  &lt;a href=&quot;https://www.gloebit.com&quot;&gt;Gloebit&lt;/a&gt; is the central authority which manages access to &lt;a href=&quot;http://dev.gloebit.com/#monetizing&quot;&gt;gloebits&lt;/a&gt; via a set of &lt;a href=&quot;http://dev.gloebit.com&quot;&gt;web services&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;decentralized-digital-currency&quot;&gt;Decentralized Digital Currency&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;In a decentralized system, there is no single authority that controls the system.  No entity has the power to create currency to grow the money supply.  Generally, some public process (such as one defined by a community of users) manages account creation, access, transaction processing, and records, enabling peer-to-peer transactions.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Crypto-currencies are decentralized.  Precious metals may be considered a form of decentralized currency in the physical world.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;A decentralized digital currency is for use across many platforms, and has no single central authority who oversees the access to or controls the currency.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;crypto-currency&quot;&gt;Crypto-currency&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Let’s delve into the often-misused term.  A &lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptocurrency&quot;&gt;crypto-currency&lt;/a&gt; is a specific flavor of a decentralized digital currency.  Complex cryptography, along with a public record of all previous transactions, or &lt;a href=&quot;https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin#Block_chain&quot;&gt;block-chain&lt;/a&gt;, is used to verify a transaction between users rather than a central authority.  Production of new currency is predefined via an algorithm and is awarded to users (owners of computer nodes) who solve the cryptographic equations required to process the transactions.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Because growth of a standard crypto-currency money supply is finite and many users are doing work to try to attain the next “nugget” of currency produced, production of currency has been likened to the mining of precious metals and these users are often referred to as miners.  Since the money supply is handled in this predefined fashion, rather than adjusted by a central authority according to demand, the value of a unit of a crypto-curreny can be quite volatile, leading to speculation in the market.  The behavior of crypto-currencies and the activity that behavior enables is much more akin to the commodity market than the currency market, and so, it actually may make more sense to refer to these as &lt;em&gt;crypto-commodities&lt;/em&gt;, but let’s not get carried away with yet more terminology.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3 id=&quot;bitcoin-and-altcoins&quot;&gt;Bitcoin and Altcoins&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin&quot;&gt;Bitcoin&lt;/a&gt; is specific instance of crypto-currency and was the first to reach substantial usage.  Since the creation of Bitcoin, many alternative crypto-currencies have popped up, bringing rise to the term “altcoin” which refers to any crypto-currency other than Bitcoin.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/images/Currency-Terminology-Diagram4.png&quot; alt=&quot;Digital Currency Terminology Diagram - alternate&quot; title=&quot;Alternate Currency Terminology Diagram&quot; /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2 id=&quot;cementing-the-foundation&quot;&gt;Cementing the Foundation&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;The organization above is meant to provide a foundation, not a final structure.  The area of alternative currencies is complex and evolving daily.  I’ve attempted to include enough detail and depth that an average interested person can gain some understanding and use clear, accurate terminology.  There will always be exceptions and products which don’t fit neatly within the simple boxes I’ve outlined.  For instance, government fiat currencies like the US Dollar have a centrally managed money supply, but decentralized transaction processing where one person can pay another in cash directly.  Alternatively, credit cards fit much more neatly into the centralized bucket.  Ideally, this post will serve as the reasonably simple base, from which deeper dives into the minutia will start.&lt;/p&gt;</content><author><name>Christopher M. Colosi</name><uri>https://www.linkedin.com/in/christophercolosi</uri></author><category term="Digital Currency" /><category term="Virtual Currency" /><category term="Crypto-currency" /><category term="Bitcoin" /><category term="FinTech" /><summary type="html">“Virtual currency, digital currency, Crypto-currency, Bitcoin… these are all the same thing, right?” A form of this question comes up in almost every interview, advising session, or conversation around Gloebit and the field of FinTech (financial technology). Clearly, the industry lacks consensus on the definitions for existing terminology. My goal here is to educate where consensus exists and promote some concepts that will help us all better understand each other.</summary></entry><entry><title type="html">Welcome to the Gloebit Blog</title><link href="http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/Welcome/" rel="alternate" type="text/html" title="Welcome to the Gloebit Blog" /><published>2015-04-13T00:00:00+00:00</published><updated>2015-04-13T00:00:00+00:00</updated><id>http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/Welcome</id><content type="html" xml:base="http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/Welcome/">&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Welcome.&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Today, &lt;a href=&quot;https://www.gloebit.com/&quot;&gt;Gloebit&lt;/a&gt; is excited to announce the launch of its very own &lt;a href=&quot;http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/&quot;&gt;blog&lt;/a&gt;.  We will be sharing news, thoughts and insights on the Financial Technology(&lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Financial_technology&quot;&gt;FinTech&lt;/a&gt;) space.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;http://dev.gloebit.com/blog/images/FinTech_Blog.png&quot; alt=&quot;Gloebit FinTech Blog&quot; title=&quot;Gloebit FinTech Blog&quot; /&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;!--end_excerpt--&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We’ve been working with digital currencies for years, since well before the entrance of &lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin&quot;&gt;Bitcoin&lt;/a&gt;, and we have many opinions we’ve locked away for too long.  We hope you’ll find our posts worthwhile, and when you have questions or expertise on a subject, will contribute to the dialog via the comments section.  Also, please consider following our authors, and following Gloebit to support us and to receive alerts when we’ve posted new content.&lt;/p&gt;</content><author><name>Christopher M. Colosi</name><uri>https://www.linkedin.com/in/christophercolosi</uri></author><category term="Digital Currency" /><category term="Virtual Currency" /><category term="Crypto-currency" /><category term="Bitcoin" /><category term="FinTech" /><summary type="html">Welcome. Today, Gloebit is excited to announce the launch of its very own blog. We will be sharing news, thoughts and insights on the Financial Technology(FinTech) space.</summary></entry></feed>