Bitcoin Sees Rise in Open Source Contributors

Eric Katz

published in Blogs

Jun 05, 2018

Bitcoin’s emergence in the mainstream has more to do with its soaring prices and speculation about its potential than the nuts and bolts that make it function. The open-source code, which depends heavily on user contributions for maintenance and improvements, is vitally important to Bitcoin’s health, but coding has typically been handled by several dozen veterans. The times, however, may be changing. After struggling for years to recruit fresh contributors, 2018 has seen healthy growth in coders and code submissions – 21 were approved in March and April alone.

While there does not appear to be a single root cause for the increase, developers believe that sustained investment in educational programs has paid off in spades. Chaincode Labs, a New York City-based research and development group that explores cryptocurrencies and other peer-to-peer decentralized systems, created a residency program where top bitcoin developers volunteer their time to teach new trainees.

Jimmy Song, an experienced developer, founded the Programming Blockchain Workshop, which has trained 250 people of varying backgrounds in multiple U.S. locations since September 2017. "One of the things that surprised me is what kinds of people take my class. I expected it to be all developers," said Song. But the demographic makeup has been far more diverse than anticipated – a welcome change of pace for the veteran development community. “[This growth] is important because you need a diversity of views…you don't want it to just be a couple of people that do everything," said Song.

Diversity offers an antidote to long-simmering concerns about homogeneity among bitcoin developers. Too many people working the same way on the same projects means a lack of perspective, increased likelihood of bugs, and an ultimate drop in decision-making quality. Residency programs have created valuable face-to-face learning time for people of varying backgrounds, who are in turn contributing new, thoughtful ideas and perspectives. This stands to further decentralize the network and, as novices gain more experience, will alleviate current bottlenecks related to code approval – a rigorous process that only a few dozen people have the requisite experience to perform.

Onboarding new developers to a complex system containing billions of dollars in value remains complicated. Paid positions are still hard to come by, experienced developers remain rare, and the idiosyncratic review process can be intimidating. But this problem is universal to open-source projects, and the influx of new developers stand to turn the tide. Bitcoin’s continued vitality relies on new contributors, and it appears the gap between supply and demand is beginning to close.

Interested in Trading Cryptocurrencies?

Cryptocurrencies are complex, and an investor is often venturing into the unknown when buying and selling. Don’t be one of those investors. Tickeron has resources to help you get started in cryptocurrency investing, from an extensive library filled with definitions and articles, to Artificial Intelligence trained to find patterns and trends in the crypto markets. Learn more about Tickeron’s resources and tools at tickeron.com.

Related Tickers: BTC.X

Sergey Savastiouk

published in Blogs

Mar 07, 2021

4 Tricks Hedge Funds Use to Get Ahead

If the stock market were Major League Baseball, hedge funds and institutional investors would be the pros on championship teams while everyday self-directed investors (SDIs) are the benchwarmers in the minors.It’s how they get ahead, and it’s why 90% of SDIs lose money trying to play (invest and trade) in the major leagues. The 4 tricks we discuss below are rooted in one common theme: they all use Artificial Intelligence and algorithms to generate data and ideas.

John Jacques

published in Blogs

Mar 22, 2018

A.I. Stock Market Predictions: Head & Shoulders

Statistics for the Head-and-Shoulders Bottom Pattern The days where only hedge funds used algorithms to trade stocks are officially over. Now retail investors can use Artificial Intelligence (A.I. Here’s an example of the algorithm in action: Late last year, Tickeron’s A.I.

Sergey Savastiouk

published in Blogs

Jul 10, 2020

3 Stocks to Buy if Coronavirus Second Wave Hits

By analyzing market trends from the first wave, you can predict behavior for the second. Technology stocks have performed at historic levels this year, but the market is severely overbought.To compensate for that, look at performance during Q1 and Q2, the height of global Covid shutdowns.

Edward Flores

published in Blogs

Feb 06, 2021

How to Become the Millionaire Next Door

The Golden Gate Bridge is always a fixture of these walks too, one of man's most beautiful creations. As we were walking, at one point she turned to me and said, "Man, I'll never have a million dollars."" My girlfriend is 27 years old and works as a graphic designer, making about $75,000 a year.

Alla Petriaieva

published in Blogs

Feb 23, 2021

Is Ethereum’s Bomb about to Explode?

Ethereum’s software is set for an update in October.Until it is finished, participants in the Ethereum blockchain must determine how to delay the difficulty bomb – code that necessitates a steadily increasing amount of computer power to mine blocks and unlock rewards – that is already in place.

Sergey Savastiouk

published in Blogs

Aug 07, 2018

When Is the Next Recession Coming?

However, we also know that economists predicted 22 recessions out of 11 that took place since 1945. Are there real recession signs we should watch for?Indeed, the answer is yes, and here are a few very important ones: The first one is almost obvious and known to everyone – it is the Fed.

Abhoy Sarkar

published in Blogs

May 22, 2020

Central banks have been buying $2.4 billion in assets every hour for the past two months

Some $17.8 billion has been poured into bond markets over the past week, the biggest move in more than three months.Around $3.5 billion has been invested into gold, the second largest on record.

Rick Pendergraft

published in Blogs

Feb 07, 2021

Mid-January Short Interest Report Shows 8 Stocks with Good Fundamentals and High Short Interest

Sergey Savastiouk

published in Blogs

Mar 10, 2021

How to Start Trading Penny Stocks

Penny stocks have long been marginalized within the professional investment community, oftentimes being painted with a broad brush of simply being “too risky.” Leonardo DiCaprio’s depiction of the penny stock peddling conman, Jordan Belfort, in the Wolf of Wall Street certainly didn’t help.Here are four reasons to start trading them now. Reason #1: Let’s State the Obvious -- Penny Stocks are Cheap A single share of Apple Inc. costs over $350.

Abhoy Sarkar

published in Blogs

May 08, 2020

US unemployment rate jumps to 14.7%, the highest in series history

The U.S. economy’s employment fell by -20.5 million in April. The coronavirus crisis led to unemployment rate soaring to 14.7% in the U.S, the highest rate in the Bureau of Labor Statistics-tracked series history that goes back to 1948. However, the figures were better compared to several economists'/analysts' forecasts of 22 million job losses and 16% unemployment rate. Another unemployment measure that includes those who have stopped looking for work as well as those holding part-time jobs for economic reasons also touched an all-time high of 22.8%.