The Monero Moon (Issue 54)
The Monero Moon is a curated weekly newsletter covering all the latest news within Monero (XMR).
Table of Contents:
Development, Releases, and Technology
Monero is scheduled to undergo a network upgrade (hard-fork) in 2 days time, on the 13th of August 2022, at block 2,688,888. The software you must implement to ensure compatibility with the network upgrade has now been released (v0.18 Flourine Fermi) and can be downloaded from the official Monero website www.GetMonero.org.
dEBRUYNE_1 informed the community that CLI & GUI v0.18.1.0 'Fluorine Fermi' have been tagged and you may now start your deterministic build process. Check out this post for more information.
If you use a mobile wallet or other third party software make sure your apps are up to date. Please reach out to members of the Monero community on r/Monero or other social media platforms if you have any questions.
The network upgrade will include a variety of new features such as:
Ring-size increase from 11 to 16 to increase privacy
Viewtags to reduce wallet-sync times by up to 40%
Bulletproofs+ to reduce transaction sizes by ~7%, and improve verification performance by ~7%.
A complete list of upgrades and improvements will soon be released along with the new software. If you want to learn more about Monero’s upcoming network upgrade, please check out this post on the official Monero website.
Still wondering what exactly a network upgrade (hardfork) is, and what it means for Monero? Check out the Tweet thread below providing a brief discussion regarding hardforks, and a history Monero’s network upgrades.
The original XMR countdown clock from xmr.noctism.com will help you welcome in the network upgrade!
Monero Observer reported that the Farcaster Project has released Farcaster Node v0.3.0. Farcaster is a project aimed at bringing Atomic Swaps to Monero. Check out this post for more information.
Monerujo, an android wallet for Monero that includes Ledger hardware wallet support, pre-released v3.0.0 in preparation for the network upgrade. Check out this post for more information!
Cake Wallet released v4.4.5 for both iOS and Android in preparation for the network upgrade. Make sure you update your app as soon as possible! More information can be found here or in the tweet below.
Longtime Monero contributor moneromooo-monero submitted a pull request to remove Cake Wallet from the GetMonero.org website. moneromooo explained:
“This is a principled removal, on the grounds that the Cake wallet people
are squatting the monero.com domain to push a version of Cake wallet
they call the "monero.com" wallet.”
Vik, the founder of Cake Wallet, soon replied to inform the community they would put a banner on the Monero.com website to ensure there was no confusion with the official Monero website. Vik also said Cake Labs would be willing to sell the domain to the Monero project at cost price. Read more about the issue here!
busyboredom released AcceptXMR v0.11.0. AcceptXMR is a Monero payment gateway library. Check out AcceptXMR here.
v1docq47 provided an update to their work translating Monero documentation. You can check out their report here!
Monero Observer have put out a new Dev Report to provide a big picture view of Monero development activity throughout the past week. If you’re interested in the nitty gritty, check it out here.
MineXMR, Monero’s largest mining pool, is shutting down tomorrow, August the 12th (just before the network upgrade), and referring users to use P2Pool. If you mine Monero with the MineXMR, then you will need to reconfigure your miners before August 12th. It is recommended you switch to P2Pool, a decentralised Monero mining pool to ensure ongoing network security. Make sure you’re running Monerod v0.18.0.0 and P2Pool v2.2.1 to be ready for August 13th network upgrade.
Monero’s mining pools already appear more decentralized with P2Pool growing (up to 6% from 4% last week) in preparation for MineXMR shutting down.
General News
MAGIC Grants recently ran a special election for the MAGIC Monero Fund to fill a vacant committee seat. monerobull has been selected to join the MAGIC Monero Fund committee and will serve the remainer of a 1-year term ending in January 2023. In case you didn’t know, MAGIC Grants is a public charity that provides undergraduate scholarships for students interested in Monero and cryptocurrencies, and supports various critical cryptocurrency public payment infrastructure. Learn more about them here.
Monero Talk recently interviewed Luke Parker aka kayabaNerve on developing the Monero integrated SeraiDEX, and many other different things. You can check out part one of the interview here, and part two here!
Monero talk also published Monerotopia Episode #77. It features a chat with Vik about Cake Wallet’s new Cake Pay service, and Monero Core Team member Artic Mine. Check out the show here!
Crypto for the Homeless, a non-profit that uses XMR and other cryptocurrencies to assist volunteers delivering supplies and food to homeless, recently delivered 500+ meals over the past few months. Check out this post for more information!
The /XMR/ Monero General Info-Dump is an interesting and somewhat overwhelming, yet impressive collection of Monero information and resources. It reportedly comes from the XMR 4chan community so please keep that in mind if you decide to check it out as some items may be offensive to some people.
The U.S. Treasury sanctioned Ethereum mixer Tornado Cash for its alleged role in money laundering operations, and blacklisted all of its addresses. While not exactly Monero news, this could have future implications for the Monero project.
Comically, a Tornado Cash user proceeded to carry out a ‘dusting attack’ against well known or celebrity Ethereum wallets such as Jimmy Fallon and Shaq following the sanction announcement.
Monero’s blockchain does not allow one to observe the sender, receiver, or amount of a transaction, so ‘dusting attacks’ are not possible on the Monero network. Check out this post from dEBRUYNE_1 for more information regarding ‘dusting attacks’.
Stablecoins such as USDC also blacklisted the sanctioned Ethereum addresses. In addition to this, it was reported that Infura and Alchemy are now also blocking Tornado Cash. This is not an issue for Monero due to the nature of it’s highly private transactions. Monero miners are unable to discriminate against or favor any transaction because they cannot tell who has made the transaction.
Following on from this, GitHub accounts associated with Tornado Cash were kicked off the service. In case you were wondering, Monero developers have long been aware of a GitHub ban being a potential issue, and have already taken precautionary measures in order mitigate any such issues that may occur. Check out this short comment from a Monero Core Team member for more information.
Jerry Brito, the Executive director of DC-based crypto think tank Coin Center, highlighted how this was the sanctioning of a tool that is neutral in character. This is perhaps the first time there has been a crack down on privacy preserving service of such scale, and may impact future decisions from regulators in regards to how they approach Monero.
Kurt Opsahl, Deputy Executive Director and General Counsel of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the leading nonprofit defending digital privacy, free speech, and innovation, provided chimed in on the discussion highlighting how publishing code on its own is protected speech, even if used unlawfully.
Events
A Monero Research Lab (MRL) meeting will take place on Wednesday August 17th at 1700 UTC. You can find links to and more information regarding the meeting here thanks to the Monero Observer. The MRL meeting will take place in the #monero-research-lab channel on IRC if you want to lurk in real time.
By all reports last Tuesday’s NYC Monero Meetup was a huge success! Check out some of the photos below.
Exchanges and Merchants
Cake Wallet and Monero.com released Cake Pay, their biggest update ever! Cake Pay allows Cake Wallet and Monero.com app users to instantly purchase gift cards with XMR. To help ensure privacy only an email is needed, you can buy arbitrary amounts, and you can also save 1-3% on all supported merchants! Check out this post for more information. Below is a video from Techlore demonstrating the service. In addition to this, Cake Pay’s privacy policy and terms of service have been improved to reflect information they don't collect or share after some people expressed concern on Twitter.
Binance announced they will support Monero’s network upgrade! Check out the tweet below for more information.
In light of this, ___GameChanger reported that Binance have once again disabled XMR withdrawals. Other Binance users also claimed they are unable to withdraw their Monero from Binance. If you need XMR withdrawn to your wallet today, you may be better using a different exchange service. As the old saying goes, “not your keys, not your coins”.
Fixed Float have also disabled crypto to XMR trades. It is rumored that Fixed Float may receive their XMR liquidity from Binance, which is why trades to Monero are not currently possible. Despite this, you can still trade XMR to any other crypto.
CryptoMorpheus_ shared a post titled “Adoption Metrics, Monthly Edition”. This post focuses on the adoption seen in various markets that accept Monero. Check it out here.
Monero Talk interviewed Viktor Vecsei from IVPN. IVPN is a VPN service that can be purchased with XMR. Doug and Viktor discuss the work of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, governments utilizing spyware against civilians, the benefits of VPNs, and many other things. Check it out below.
Want to buy a Monero themed puzzle? Check out this post of a 500 Piece Monero Jigsaw Puzzle available from E Money Merch.
Damocles-Rising claims they will soon launch a service that will allow you to buy print-at-home shipping labels from well-known carriers using XMR. Check out this post for more information.
Belle Delphine, an internet celebrity, pornographic actress, model, and YouTuber, with a Twitter following of 1.9 million and Instagram following of 3.3 million, fell victim to scammers offering to “make all your fantasies come true” for $100,000 worth of Monero. Check out this Twitter post for more information.
Community Crowdfunding
A CCS proposal to fund the next 18 issues of The Monero Moon newsletter is currently open and it would be great if you could comment on it here. Thanks!
Several crowdfunding proposals are awaiting community feedback before they can start accepting funds through the Community Crowdfunding System (CCS). For now they are just proposals, but if they receive some positive feedback from the community they will be moved to a “Funding Required” stage so that they can accept Monero donations through the CCS.
CCS Projects requiring funding or have been recently funded:
Trading & Speculation
XMR/ETH monthly chart. Monero is currently retesting a historical support level against Ethereum, and holding on by a whisker. A bounce back up from this level would be bullish.
Performance
Total Monero in Circulation — 18,159,563 XMR
Monero Total Marketcap — $3,003,147,956
Coinmarketcap Ranking — #29 (last week #28)
XMR/USD Price — $165 USD
XMR/BTC Price — 0.006733 BTC
LocalMonero.co Peer to Peer Street Price — $189 USD
Average Transaction Fee — 0.00012 XMR ($0.019)
Monero Network Hashrate —2.576 Ghash/s
Monero Mining Pools Hashrate Distribution —
Entertainment
Donate
If you like the newsletter and want more of this content, then shout me a round of beers by donating some spare Monero you didn’t lose during your boating accident.
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Support Monero
Want to help contribute to the Monero Project? Developers, marketers, event coordinators, translators, Instagram personalities, meme creators, public speakers — whatever your skills may be, it is extremely likely there is something you can do to assist. I urge you to reach out to the Monero community on Reddit, IRC, GitHub, Twitter, or Telegram. The official Monero website is GetMonero.org.
Past Issues
Issue 53 / Issue 52 / Issue 51 / Issue 50 / Issue 49 / Issue 48 / Issue 47 / Issue 46 / Issue 45 / Issue 44 / Issue 43 / Issue 42 / Issue 41 / Issue 40 / Issue 39 / Issue 38 / Issue 37 / Issue 36 / Issue 35 / Issue 34 / Issue 33 / Issue 32 / Issue 31 / Issue 30 / Issue 29 / Issue 28 / Issue 27 / Issue 26 / Issue 25 / Issue 24 / Issue 23 / Issue 22 / Issue 21 / Issue 20 / Issue 19 / Issue 18 / Issue 17 / Issue 16 / Issue 15 / Issue 14 / Issue 13 / Issue 12 / Issue 11 / Issue 10 / Issue 9 / Issue 8 / Issue 7 / Issue 6 / Issue 5 / Issue 4 / Issue 3 / Issue 2 / Issue 1
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DISCLAIMER: This publication contains opinion for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice. Information may contain errors and omissions. Use solely at your own risk. The author of this publication and/or the authors of articles linked to from this site may have financial investments that may bias their opinions, including ownership of Monero currency. Always do your own research, form your own opinions, and never take risks with money or trust third parties with out verifying their credibility.
