NY Times columnist: North Korea has sold this carpet before

Tom Friedman talks with CNN’s Anderson Cooper about North Korea’s warning over talks with President Donald Trump, claiming “one will be truly bowled over if they actually agree to a verifiable denuclearization plan.”
CNN.com – RSS Channel – World

L.A. Times suspends Beijing bureau chief while it investigates sexual misconduct allegation

The Los Angeles Times suspended Beijing Bureau Chief Jonathan Kaiman on Tuesday and has launched an investigation into an allegation of sexual misconduct.

On Monday, former Beijing-based journalist Felicia Sonmez sent a letter to the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of China detailing “problematic…

L.A. Times – Business

He Scaled El Capitan 177 Times. No. 178 Went Badly

A rock-climbing legend and record holder who has scaled Yosemite’s El Capitan 177 times and wrote a book about his “lifelong obsession” with the climb survived a harrowing plunge on El Capitan’s nose Thursday. Hans Florine, 53, was 2,300 feet above the floor of Yosemite Valley when the wedge…
Newser

Video of Him Vanishing Has Been Watched Millions of Times

Lars Mittank spent the first week of July 2014 with friends at a Bulgarian beach resort. He has spent the nearly four years since as one of YouTube’s greatest mysteries. Kirk Pepi has the story at Mel Magazine . Pepi writes that the 28-year-old’s holiday with his five former classmates from…
Newser

Unruly Passenger Tased 10 Times

An unruly passenger on a flight from Miami to Chicago never made it off the ground before he was Tased 10 times and removed from the plane, police say. According to a police report, 28-year-old Jacob Garcia was initially moved to a different seat on the American Airlines flight after…
Newser

L.A. Times will move to 2300 E. Imperial Highway in El Segundo

The new home of the Los Angeles Times will be at 2300 E. Imperial Highway in El Segundo.

A spokesman for Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, soon to be the newspaper’s new owner, said The Times would relocate to that address permanently sometime before the end of June, when the lease at its longtime headquarters…

L.A. Times – Business

Patrick Soon-Shiong — immigrant, doctor, billionaire, and soon, newspaper owner — starts a new era at the L.A. Times

Biotech billionaire Patrick Soon-Shiong – one of L.A.’s wealthiest residents – is expected to take ownership of the Los Angeles Times this month. It would be his highest-profile venture in a long and lucrative career that began halfway around the world in apartheid South Africa.
L.A. Times – Business

Bitcoin Has Now Forked Almost 70 Times

Forking bitcoin used to be a rarity. Then it became the norm. And then it became a meme, with anyone and everyone forking bitcoin on a weekly basis. There have now been a total of 69 bitcoin forks plus another 18 altcoin forks. Holders of bitcoin, monero, ethereum, and litecoin can claim almost 80 additional coins for free. Whether it’s worth their time to do so, however, is another matter.

Also read: Russian Court Bans Telegram, Founder Pavel Durov Defiant

Fork All the Things

It’s widely known that ever since bitcoin cash launched, the quality and value of subsequent forks has been deteriorating. What’s not so widely known is just how many forks there’s been. The likes of Bitcoin Coral, Bitcoin Sudo, and Bitcoin Star aren’t exactly household names. Nor will they ever be. Like most of the bitcoin forks to be found on Forkdrop.io’s exhaustive list, these coins don’t have exchange listings.

For anyone with a passing interest in forks, and who’s considering claiming some of these coins, Forkdrop.io’s resources include guides to claiming them and sections on passive and active airdrops. For those who aren’t particularly tech-savvy, there are sites that will help you claim your free coins – in return for a cut. Whether these coins are worth claiming, with or without a commission attached, is debatable.

How Much Are Your Forked Coins Worth?

Of the 69 bitcoin forks to date, just 10 are tradable on exchanges. Combined, these have a value of  $ 941, or around 0.12 BTC. Take bitcoin cash out of the question and you’re left with only $ 206 or 0.026 BTC. Unless you’re sitting on a trove of bitcoins, claiming these forked coins simply isn’t worth it. And for those who are blessed with a bountiful supply of BTC, moving them, and risking exposing your private key on a third party site, to claim an additional 2.5% of BTC simply isn’t worth it.

When it comes to altcoins, the returns are every bit as poor. Forkdrop.io lists 18 altcoin forks, although many more have forked by cloning the code and then adding their own twist. Verge, for example, is a fork of dogecoin, but was never made available on a 1:1 basis to doge holders. Forkdrop’s altcoin section lists six ethereum forks, three litecoin forks, and six monero forks plus a couple of others. Only three of these forks are tradable, with a combined value of just $ 20. You don’t even need to punch the numbers in to appreciate that claiming forked altcoins is a pointless exercise, unless they’re automatically distributed by an exchange, sparing holders from having to move a muscle.

Free Coins – But at What Price?

Forking bitcoin is easy. Tools like Forkgen will do all the hard work for you. Using the mantra “Fork it till you make it”, they guide noobs through a simple process which concludes by hitting the blue button marked “Generate New Altcoin”. As the developers of such forks as Bitcoin Minor, Bitcoin King, and Bitcoin Boy are discovering, though, after forking from BTC, the hard work is only just beginning. As Jimmy Song put it:

Bitcoin will continue to be different because unlike centralized coins, it’s market driven, immutable and unseizable. These happen to be the properties of a great store of value and this gives Bitcoin a utility that no other token has.

One coin that isn’t listed on Forkdrop is Bitcoin Private. It was a little different from the rest in that it forked simultaneously from zclassic and bitcoin. BTCP started trading at around $ 80, but has dropped four-fold in under a month. It seems it doesn’t matter what you fork from, how, or why, the fact remains that everything since bitcoin cash has been destined for irrelevance. Forked coins might be fun, but on the evidence so far, they aren’t worth claiming.

Have you bothered to claim any of the forked coins available to you? Let us know in the comments section below.

Images courtesy of Shutterstock, and Forkdrop.io

Need to calculate your bitcoin holdings? Check our tools section.

The post Bitcoin Has Now Forked Almost 70 Times appeared first on Bitcoin News.

Bitcoin News

Could the world come to an end on April 23 — Are Biblical end times finally upon us?

The best line of defense for those who believe the Bible is to be ready and waiting by following Jesus, living our lives right and sticking to our faith.
FOX News

Michael Ferro sells stake in Times parent Tronc to McCormick family for $208.6 million

Michael Ferro, who resigned last month as chairman of Chicago-based newspaper chain Tronc, has struck a deal to sell his entire stake in the company, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission late Friday.

Ferro, who owned more than 25% of Tronc, the parent of the Los Angeles…

L.A. Times – Business