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S.F. Gets Its First Bitcoin ATM At FiDi Cafe

Jay Barmann — Mon, 15 Sep 2014 13:04:00 GMT

Workshop Cafe (180 Montgomery Street) just became the first place in the city to have a BTM or Bitcoin Teller Machine on premises. The machine actually allows owners of bitcoin to convert the electronic currency to cash, and Workshop Cafe and the company BitAccess had an unveiling event on Friday. Bitcoin Magazine (yes, it exists) says, "The launch of this BTM is a big deal for San Francisco but also for Bitcoin as a whole."

In addition to exchanging Bitcoin for cash, you can also purchase Bitcoin with dollars of your own using the machine.

There's a transaction limit of 1 BTC, which is currently worth $476 USD, but repeated use can change this limit.

Here's how it works.

Upon first approach, the large and beautiful screen displays the current USD/BTC price along with some language options (English and French, at the moment). The very next screen is a disclaimer that the BTM is still a product that is in development which the user must accept before moving on...
Phone number verification with code [gets] sent via SMS ... New users begin with a transaction limit of 1BTC, or the current equivalent amount in USD, and the BTM comes equipped with additional verification options to raise that limit, including facial photography in combination with a photo ID scan. Frequent users will see a decrease in their transaction limit over time, if additional verification is not supplied.

Way to go, nerds! Too bad that @SFHiddenBitcoin seems to have tapered off.

[Bitcoin Magazine]

Previously: @SFHiddenBitcoin Is @HiddenCash For Nerds

We Predict Dead Drops Are Going To Be Really Huge With The Dork Set

Jay Barmann — Thu, 19 Sep 2013 15:50:47 GMT

Have you heard about dead drops? Neither had we. Basically it's this "underground" thing where someone sticks a USB flash drive in some concrete sticking out of a building somewhere, and you can bring your laptop there and plug into it and share files completely offline. Think of it like an anonymous, pre-internet internet, if such things as flash drives existed back then.

This all began three years ago in New York with artist Aram Bartholl installing five of these dead drops around the city. He followed that up with a DVD dead drop that was commissioned by the Museum of the Moving image.

It's all anonymous and, ostensibly, safe, and dead drops are meant for people just to share their "favorite" stuff.

According to the map here, there are currently two dead drops in San Francisco: One at Noisebridge at 2169 Mission Street (between 17th and 18th) with 300 GB; another at Instructables at 82 2nd Street (4 GB). Then there are a couple more down on the peninsula, in San Mateo, Redwood City, and some in San Jose.

See the how-to for installing your own below. We look forward to this catching on, and are frankly surprised that it hasn't. But then again, I guess sharing things from your phone is a whole lot easier.

Also, a video in which Bartholl talks about the "future of offline filesharing" in 2012.

Video: Silicon Valley Nerds Rap Badly About Venture Funding

Jay Barmann — Tue, 14 May 2013 15:25:37 GMT

We're not sure if this counts as funny, but we suppose it's funny to those involved the way similar efforts by a college fraternity to make a viral video are funny to those on the same campus. Behold this new rap video, meant as a way of attracting investors, in which some members of 500 Startups join forces to make a tone-deaf, fairly awkward ditty in which they brag about raising VC funds, closing their rounds, and "making products." (Note: It's a 'parody' of Macklemore's 'Thrift Shop,' titled 'Thrifty Startup.')

Startups featured include letsfea.st (a source for online cooking classes), sverve.com (a female social-media-marketing thing), SeMeAntoja (a Mexican restaurant network, in Mexico), and Geekatoo (a local geek computer-repair network). And much like Macklemore, none of them have any flow, or any obvious talent for this, and it's a little painful to listen to.

But something tells this might work for them, anyway.

[Valleywag]
[TechCrunch]

'Start-Ups: Silicon Valley' Premieres Tonight on Bravo

Jay Barmann — Mon, 05 Nov 2012 10:15:09 GMT

With the tagline "Geeks are definitely the new rock stars" [gag], new Silicon Valley-based reality show Start-Ups premieres on Bravo tonight. As we've mentioned before, the executive producer of this possible atrocity is Randi Zuckerberg, Zuck's sister who quit Facebook last year in order to launch her own media company. And this show, ladies and gentlemen, is her first big effort.

We'll try to reserve judgment until we can actually watch this thing, but that is going to be very hard, especially after having watched this preview twice. Two, count 'em two, of these so-called "geeks" have British accents, and they all seem pretty insufferable. They speak in clichés, like "I have a work-hard, play-hard mentality...," they throw toga parties, and they are the reason no one can afford an apartment right now.

Anyway, just for you, Andrew Dalton is going to live-blog this premiere tonight on Twitter (@sfist with the hashtag #startupssfist), because it's clearly a major local television event worthy of everything we can throw at it.

Previously: Meet The People Who Will Be Run Out Of Town Due To 'Start-Ups: Silicon Valley'

'Still Living The Dream,' Says NASA Dreamboat Bobak Ferdowsi

Brock Keeling — Tue, 07 Aug 2012 12:20:47 GMT

On Monday, Mars rover Curiosity landed with aplomb... as did the mohawk-sporting rover lead, Bobak Ferdowsi, who crash-landed into the hearts of countless geekphiles. Ferdowsi recently spoke with Shira Lazar of What's Trending, explaining that he's "still living the dream" regarding yesterday's very tense, yet successful, landing of Curiosity.

As far as his first reaction to his sudden interweb fame? "Uhhh, you know, I knew something was strange by thte number of text coming through my phone...and hundreds of emails and friend requests," Ferdowsi explains. With regard to his place in history as the Hair Battle Spectacular of NASA, he says, "If my mohawk gets a few more people excited about science and this mission, that's awesome. That's what it's all about."

Ferdowsi goes on to add that, somewhat surprisingly, the NASA team in charge of Curiosity came up with the now-famous hairstyle. In fact, he often changes his coif in order to "bring a little levity to what's otherwise a very serious situation and job."

Also worth pointing out? Bobak has a lovely smile with wonderfully blinding white teeth. Delightful.

'One-Man Star Wars' Guy Returns to San Jose With 'One-Man Lord of the Rings'

Jay Barmann — Mon, 23 Jul 2012 13:05:55 GMT

Canadian performer Charles Ross, who delighted the geeks of geekdome down in Silicon Valley last year with his One-Man Star Wars, returns to San Jose Rep to do his other show, a one-man version of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Like his earlier show, it's all done without costumes, or props, or a set. As Ross himself puts it, "It’s almost like watching an 8-year-old kid playact something they care about greatly."

Ross has been touring with both shows for the last several years, and his condensed, prop-free Star Wars re-enactment actually dates back 12 years. Of the Lord of the Rings saga, which he was granted rights to perform in 2009, Ross says, "I love the fact that it seems to promise if you come from a marginalized background, adventure will find you."

He'll be performing One-Man Lord of the Rings starting tomorrow night and through the weekend, July 24 to 29. Get tickets here.

[CBS]

East Bay Couple Offering $1,000 Reward for Two Lost Toy Bears

Jay Barmann — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 10:55:34 GMT

You might have seen some of their 'Missing' posters around downtown, but an East Bay couple is offering a large reward for a pair of palm-sized stuffed bears purchased in Japan for $10, and which apparently have come to be avatars of sorts in their ongoing and dorky romance. Between online multi-player gaming, jobs in programming, and polyamorous sex play involving fuzzy animal suits*, Chris Ferreira and his girlfriend have found time to create a blog for the bears, and make a bunch of stop-action animated videos of the bears like the one you see above. Thus the loss of the bears is especially crushing.

Chris believes his girlfriend may have dropped the bears (which apparently travel everywhere with them) while rooting through her purse at the Bay Street cinemas in Emeryville. Anyone who may have seen them, or has any information about their whereabouts, are asked to get in touch via the website.

*We're guessing...

Apple May Get Bigamous With Verizon for Both iPhone and iSlate

Jay Barmann — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 09:15:43 GMT

Listen up everyone: In case you hadn't heard the big buzz, the people who brought you the Jesus Phone -- which ended up being pretty cool but still has its drawbacks like everything else on this green earth, and which now has competitors like Google's Nexus One phone -- are now poised to unveil another game-changing device, which has dominated all the talk on the geekier blogs since late last year. It's rumored to be called the iSlate, a name that Apple has trademarked in several ways, and it's a tablet computer with a touch screen that's meant to blow all other netbooks out of the water and change the laptop landscape henceforth. At least that's what excitable bloggers are saying.

The unconfirmed news we're hearing today is that Apple is likely planning to partner with Verizon Wireless' 3G service for both the iPhone and iSlate come summer. We know that Apple's exclusive with AT&T is up early this year, but it's likely they will end up getting double-teamed by both phone services, offering customers the choice.

Geeks Unite at W00tstock Tomorrow Night

Leanne Maxwell — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 12:45:18 GMT

Hurry, tonight's event is sold out, but tickets to tomorrow night's edition of w00tstock at Cafe Du Nord are still available (as of this posting). W00tstock is a special event for geeks of every stripe, celebrating the dawning of the Age of Geekdom.

Television host/special-effects artist Adam Savage (MythBusters), actor/author/blogger Wil Wheaton (Star Trek: The Next Generation, Stand By Me) and music-comedy duo Paul and Storm present a night of songs, readings, comedy, demonstrations, short films, special guests, and "other clever widgets born from and dedicated to the enthusiasms, obsessions, trials and joys of geek pride."

Tomorrow night's special guests are singer/songwriter Molly Lewis and singer/beatboxer/game inventor/all-around creative person Kid Beyond.

Third NASA Employee Charged With Child Porn Possession

Brock Keeling — Fri, 21 Mar 2008 10:51:45 GMT

Christopher Burt Wiltsee, 57, of Morgan Hill pleaded guilty this week to a charge of child pornography possession. This makes him the third ex-NASA employee to get busted fo having kiddie porn on his government-owned computer. According to the Gate:

Wiltsee admitted that while employed at NASA, he used his government computer to download child pornography from the Internet. He admitted to possessing more than 600 images, including ones depicting sadistic and masochistic conduct, as well as pictures involving prepubescent minors.

In February and December, Ernst John Rhode, 63, of Stockton and Mark Charles Zelinsky, 56, of San Bruno were both charged, respectively, were caught with juvie porn on their NASA-owned computers as well. Wow. You'd think people in an industry known for employees with technical savvy would know better. Alas.

Wiltsee on will be handed a sentence on June 4 in San Jose.