I'm not sure if this would work but here goes....

Could we launch a Bitshares community owned retail website where ideas and the products come from the community and a percentage of profits are awarded to everyone by burning the equivalent value in BTS for every trade? 

For example, I've been trying to come up with Bitshares branded T-shirts....

Front - It's good to share (with the b logo at the left breast)
Back - Your bits

Let's say this t-shirt was a hit and sold in the Bitshares retail outlet, initially I might source, manufacture and ship the product but eventually, it might be worth having a Bitshares retail co-ordination worker company that handles all of that and benefits from economies of scale etc. The products would have to meet quality standards to qualify.

I'd love to hear your thoughts!

The Invitation - by Oriah Mountain Dreamer

It doesn't interest me
what you do for a living.
I want to know
what you ache for
and if you dare to dream
of meeting your heart's longing.

It doesn't interest me
how old you are.
I want to know
if you will risk
looking like a fool
for love
for your dream
for the adventure of being alive.

It doesnt interest me
what planets are
squaring your moon...
I want to know
if you have touched
the centre of your own sorrow
if you have been opened
by life's betrayals
or have become shrivelled and closed
from fear of further pain.

I want to know
if you can sit with pain
mine or your own
without moving to hide it
or fade it
or fix it.

I want to know
if you can be with joy
mine or your own
if you can dance with wildness
and let the ecstasy fill you
to the tips of your fingers and toes
without cautioning us
to be careful
to be realistic
to remember the limitations
of being human.

It doesn't interest me
if the story you are telling me
is true.
I want to know if you can
disappoint another
to be true to yourself.
If you can bear
the accusation of betrayal
and not betray your own soul.
If you can be faithless
and therefore trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see Beauty
even when it is not pretty
every day.
And if you can source your own life
from its presence.

I want to know
if you can live with failure
yours and mine
and still stand at the edge of the lake
and shout to the silver of the full moon,
"Yes."

It doesn't interest me
to know where you live
or how much money you have.
I want to know if you can get up
after the night of grief and despair
weary and bruised to the bone
and do what needs to be done
to feed the children.


It doesn't interest me
who you know
or how you came to be here.
I want to know if you will stand
in the centre of the fire
with me
and not shrink back.

It doesn't interest me
where or what or with whom
you have studied.
I want to know
what sustains you
from the inside
when all else falls away.

I want to know
if you can be alone
with yourself
and if you truly like
the company you keep
in the empty moments.



Have a great weekend!

What an incredible few months!  Well, I'm off to show my baby daughter the sea for a week or so.  There's a lot happening and I don't want to miss a thing but it's good to unplug from time-to-time!  Good luck evaluating Testnet 2.0.  Try to keep cool heads, especially with each other 

Later!

So there are some great people in this community. I read as much of the forum as possible, the news letters, recommended links and a bunch more but I still don't have a clue what everyone is up to!  I was thinking maybe there are others who feel the same. Assuming we can all get passed the CMX nuke  , we'll need get really mobilised if we're going to build the network up so we can afford the core devs and get the juggernaut rolling.

So please post a short summary in this thread, if you wouldn't mind, about what you're up to. Or recommend someone who's efforts have made a difference to you. The idea is for us all to have a reasonable idea of who our foundational, active members of the Bitshares network are and what they are up to.

This is also a call to all lurkers too. Are you working behind the scenes? Or perhaps you are on the cusp of introducing yourself....well go for it!  We sometimes bark and our bite is always worse, but we'll work it out in the end 

I'll go first.... Ben Mason, working towards integrating BTS into my Vape shop, perhaps launching a UIA.

People have been working furiously and it's about to get even more hectic, so here's a tune that might help you chill.  Certainly does it for me anyway

Bitshares is potentially a 'Flow' network (see https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php/topic,16544.0.html from CLains) and you can't have Flow without beauty.....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vap8QjDdxiY

I realise that different people view the risks, taken by individuals to short bitassets into existence, in different ways.  However, it does not sit well with me that some of our community have lost out in some way due to current market mechanics/bugs.  Especially if they have been helping to test the market mechanics or improve liquidity of our products.  I'd like to propose a fund is set up to encourage those that have been damaged and to perhaps help repair any future damage our innovation and testing causes.  I would donate 1000bts to such a fund.  I only have some vague ideas about how the fund would be cared for or how someone would be able to prove damage and call upon the fund.  I really think this is worth considering though.  I realise that devshares seeks to minimise impact on the production version, nevertheless, things may go differently in the live network from time-to-time.

Disclosure - I cannot access my bts funds at this time due to technical difficulties with the client.  I do not have a good enough understanding of the market mechanics to make any sort of judgement on the veracity of potential claims.

Not sure if it will be of any use but i've been trying to think of ways to describe Bitshares that might help a crypto layman to understand.  My musings led me to cellular biology and this is what I have so far;

Bitshares could be described as a multi-nucleated (digital) cell.....

Delegates are cell nuclei - source of blockchain evolution & replication in addition to acting as a repository for the blockchain
Blockchain is DNA - encoding rules governing the cellular network & acting as a repository of evolving information
Software is cytoplasm - provides the medium and structure in which processes occur & information flows
Internet is vascular/nervous system - enables (packets of digital information) resources to flow across, in & out of the network
Workers are mitochondria - power change within the network whilst ensuring a competitive & efficient use of network resources 
Witnesses represented by RNA - manage configuration & maintenance of the network
Market mechanisms form a digital membrane - manages & monitor the flow of resources throughout the network
Unit/tokens represent cellular resources - special configurations of digital information that enables resource within the network to be managed effectively
Users represent the supply of extra-cellular or consumption of resources - input or remove of resources & providing impetus for the flow 

If this analogy proves useful, we could refine it and produce a graphic representation.  I thought it was quite a nice possibility to market BitShares like some kind of cybernetic, autonomous, semi-biological, intelligent network....

Anyway, would love to hear your thoughts.