• Innovators,  Ripple,  Technology

    Backing Centigrade, Ripple Tries to Save Mother Earth

    Fintech company bets on blockchain for carbon offsets

    In the wake of Ripple’s historic David-versus-Goliath near-total victory over the SEC in July, those who follow the company are excused if they missed its announcement about its investment in Centigrade. But this move, seeking to establish an open data platform serving the market for global carbon offsets, sets a goal even more ambitious and improbable than prevailing against a government agency with infinite resource: Saving the planet. According to Centigrade, the new platform “will provide developers of carbon and nature credits with a low-barrier, intuitive way to bring their projects to market, providing full data transparency and traceability for the entire lifecycle of credits.” Carbon markets allow organizations to…

  • Innovators,  Politics

    Sam Bankman-Fried Political Donations Were Hardly ‘Bi-Partisan’

    Dems got 99.5% of disgraced dough, but GOP got plenty from other FTXers

    One of the weird little elements to the Sam Bankman-Fried debacle —and there are so many, and we journalists are quite grateful for them — has been the determined way the media has tried to make his political donations appear bi-partisan. “The FTX scandal is prompting lawmakers from both parties,” wrote Politico, “to symbolically give up campaign contributions from the crypto exchange’s top executives, underscoring the firm’s political toxicity in the aftermath of its collapse.” “[Sam] Bankman-Fried, 30, and his younger brother Gabriel donated lavishly to members of both political parties,” the New York Post noted. In fact, SBF was the seventh largest donor of the entire 2022 cycle, according…

  • Innovators,  People

    Blockchain Intelligence Group Fights Fraud in Earthquake Relief

    Crypto watchdog ensures that donor money reaches legit charities

    The scale of the disaster in the wake of last week’s earthquake is almost impossible to describe. For 33,000 souls to vanish from the earth in the space of a few minutes can only be conceptualized by picturing it as metaphor—“it’s like eleven 9-11s” or “it’s like the disappearance of everybody at a Yankees playoff game.” In other words, there are no words. In the modern world, where there’s a disaster, there’s money. Generous citizens from around the globe have stepped up to donate to crisis relief, especially needed since the quake affected parts of the globe already traumatized by war and terrorism. It’s been inspiring to watch—one anonymous donor…

  • Innovators,  People,  Technology

    Injective Protocol

    Modern Consensus talked to Eric Chen, CEO of Injective Labs

    An introduction Eric Chen is CEO and co-founder of Injective Labs, a core contributor behind the Injective decentralized exchange. Injective Protocol decentralized exchange protocol (DEX) backed by big names like Binance and Mark Cuban. The protocol is designed to be permissionless, fully decentralized, and fast with low gas fees. It runs on a governance proposal procedure, community members are a pivotal part in all of Injective’s decisions. “Injective is purely community driven. Governance dictates everything.” What is Injective Protocol? “It’s pretty similar to the overall model of Uniswap. Which is basically all the protocol upgrades and contract upgrades are dictated by the community, a governance vote is required for major…