With the recent news of the Chamber of Digital Commerce urging the Bitcoin industry to submit comments on New York’s proposed BitLicense regulations, they are holding a press conference today at Coin Congress here in San Francisco. That being said, we’ll be live blogging the entire press conference from start to finish along with some photos as well. Also, check PocketFullOfApps on Twitter for all the up to date news. Read the rest of this article ->

The newly formed Chamber of Digital Commerce finds the New York Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) proposed BitLicense rules and regulations to be severely debilitating to the digital currency industry. Despite Ben Lawsky’s claims that these proposed regulations are intended to be guardrails to “protect consumers and root out illegal activity — without stifling beneficial innovation” these rules could potential crush the Bitcoin industry in New York and stifle jobs, investment, and innovation. The Digital Chamber agrees that we need guardrails in these areas, but these proposed regulations are onerous and in many cases simply misplaced, potentially seriously injuring legitimate applications of this valuable emerging area.

“One egregious aspect is that the NYDFS is only giving 45 days to comment, which is severely inadequate to proposed regulations of this scope” said Perianne Boring, President of the Digital Chamber.

The Digital Chamber is calling on the Bitcoin community to submit comments to the NYDFS. Instructions on how to submit comments can be found on the NYDFS website. Earlier this week the digital currency and digital asset communities came together to form the industry’s first trade association, the Chamber of Digital Commerce. Opening its doors this week in the nation’s capital and officially announced at the National Bitcoin Conference in Chicago, the “Digital Chamber” will promote among lawmakers, regulators, policy makers and the public the industry’s goals and its potential to innovate global finance for the benefit of society. Read the rest of this article ->

ZipZap, one of the most well known cash transaction networks, has announced their European expansion, offering 34 countries across Europe opportunities to use cash to purchase Bitcoin and other digital currencies. The company has developed strategic partnerships across Europe to provide free sign up, free wallet and free deposits. So, starting today European consumers can purchase digital currencies and pay bills for their relatives or friends in other countries. Following a recent partnership with PayZone in the UK, ZipZap is now accepting both cash and bank transfers from networks such as iDeal, MisterCash, SOFORT, SEPA, GiroPay and many more payment options across Europe.

“ZipZap has a commitment to simplify and democratize payments worldwide,” said Simon Nahnybida, SVP business development for ZipZap. “We are now enabling more consumers with the power to easily, safely and securely buy digital currencies at affordable prices using multiple payment options”.

“The benefit to consumers is that they will get the best prices while conveniently paying with their preferred method of payment,” added Nahnybida.”

In other news, ZipZap recently announced their expansion in Latin America, providing true global payment solutions for Bitcoin and Digital Currencies. Consumers can register online, select the amount they wish to buy and the payment option (cash, bank to bank transfer, or wire transfer). Upon receipt of payment, ZipZap will process the order with one of their exchange partners that offer the best price. At the time of this writing, one Bitcoin is currently hovering around the low $600 area. Read the rest of this article ->

IdentityMind Global, a provider of risk management and payment solutions, have recently announced the international expansion of their Anti-Money Laundering (AML) solution for Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, including their low-cost IGNITE program for Bitcoin startup companies. With the newly awarded European Union Safe Harbor certification, the AML solution can receive and store user information, expanding IdentityMind Global services throughout the 28 nations in the EU, as well as any other European nation that has adopted EU standards

“We are proud to extend our industry-leading Bitcoin Compliance solution to… Read the rest of this article ->

Well folks, the first day of Casual Connect is officially in the bag and so far the conference has gotten off to the great start. In addition to Coin Congress which starts tomorrow, Indie Prize and Casual Connect have teamed for indie developers to show off their latest and greatest game for iOS, Mac, PC, Android, or Linux. For a good portion of the first day we spent our time browsing around the Indie Prize area, getting demos from different developers, and chatting with attendees. While we don’t have the exact numbers, according to the official website there are over 90 game development teams from 20+ different countries from around the world. Due to the limited time that was available and the judging process we weren’t able to play every singe game there, however, we were able to still play a good amount of the games. Kicking things off we met up with the folks from The Tap Lab who were demoing Big Foot Hunter which is set to land on iOS sometime here soon. From there, a Canada based development studio by the name of Phantom Compass gave us a a quick demo of Rollers of the Realm. At the core of the game it combines classic arcade pinball with the character-driven adventure aspect of fantasy role-playing games to give a really unique gameplay experience.

Moving forward, Rocket 5 Studios, another Canadian game development studio, brought their upcoming iOS title dubbed The Phantom P.I. Mission Apparition. If all goes according as planned, we are told that The Phantom P.I. Mission Apparition will be live on the App Store as soon as this Thursday for $3.99. While mingling just outside of Indie Prize and checking out all the different vendors, we just so happened to stumble upon Pig Eat Ball from a local Indiana resident, Nathan Fouts. Simply put, Pig Eat Ball is a game about flying space pigs that eat tennis balls. Players are tasked with having to eat a certain amount of tennis balls to complete a level while avoiding asteroids. You’ll have to be careful though — bumping into the player’s or AI’s pigs will cause your pig to slow down. Whoever is the first one to reach the required number of tennis balls wins the game.

Even though we’d like to take the time to talk about each individual game that we saw today, it would take too long. So with that said, if you click the following link, there’s a full list a long with information on the lectures for day one. Read the rest of this article ->