Any idea what is causing this movement?  Is it just all the money from eth sloshing around, and some of it finally finding us?  Do people know about the progress we have made?  Is this a response to stealth, azure?  What do you guys think?

Traders are starting to take profits on ETH and now they need a fresh horse to bet on. If the Azure blog post comes out next week it could fuel the fire.

One measure of BTS excitement among traders is that the order book for buys on Poloniex is about x3 what it was 2 days ago.

ETH showing signs of topping out now that it briefly passed 0.03 btc. If ETH corrects now, it will take all the other pump coins with it. BTS has not experience anything like the ETH club pump over the past month; SYS, EXP, FTC, MAID, and even DGB all had nice runs, so I expect they will all contract if ETH leads the way down. At that point, disillusioned pump addicts may finally light the fire for BTS. (Not that I am advocating a pump, but it would be nice for BTS to get some recognition.)

Community Action Request: Content for Azure BaaS blog post. 

Background:
I've been in contact with Marley Gray, Director, BizDev & Strategy - Cloud and Enterprise, Microsoft on the on-boarding process for BitShares to Azure BaaS.  We are a pull request approval from being live. 

Request:
First, please review Mr. Marley's previous blog posts to see how other blockchain offerings are being positioned [1].  Then, please provide ideas on what you feel should be included in his upcoming blog post highlighting BitShares.  I have a skeleton contained within the metadata.json and README.md files within the GitHub repository [2].  If you choose to tweet this information, please mention @ryanRfox

Gratitude:
Thanks to all those that have tested the scripts and provided feedback thus far; please offer more. 

[1] https://azure.microsoft.com/en-gb/blog/author/marleyg/
[2] https://github.com/ryanRfox/azure-quickstart-templates/tree/review/bitshares-ubuntu-vm

Can we give him Emperical's "bitshares product description" post:

https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php/topic,21115.msg274117.html#msg274117

What is BitShares?
BitShares is a decentralized platform that runs on a blockchain like Bitcoin but with MUCH higher performance.
Our core invention is Price Stable SmartCoins which since inception in 2014 have successfully allowed users to hold the value of currencies & commodities on the blockchain. Over the next few years this technology will completely transform the world as you know it and here's why...


Global Payments  (See you later PayPal!)
Stable BitShares SmartCurrencies like BitUSD let you make & receive payments globally for 0.1% which is up to 35x cheaper than leading centralized competitors.

Spread Trading Platform (Short IG Index & CMC!)
Trade popular SmartStocks and SmartIndexes on the BitShares blockchain at a fraction of the cost of leading spread trading platforms and without KYC. BitShares already offers the popular Nasdaq and Shenzen indexes.

Online MarketPlace (Asta la Vista Amazon!)
List & sell products directly & privately on the blockchain & in stable currencies like BitUSD for less than 0.1% in fees.

The Blockchain Economy
Due to volatility & tight margins, merchants have to convert Bitcoin payments directly to fiat. SmartCurrencies like BitUSD let merchants keep more of their proceeds on the blockchain, creating the potential to have entire supply chains & a blockchain economy that is independent of the traditional banking system. 

Crypto Exchange (Arrivederci Coinbase!)
Traditional Bitcoin exchanges have high risks of thefts, seizures and shutdowns. BitShares lets you trade Bitcoin and other popular crypto-currency Smartcoins directly on the BitShares blockchain.

Digital Gold & Silver Vault
Physical gold has high storage costs, is difficult to move internationally and has historically been confiscated. Centralized derivatives like GLD have a high risk of default when there is a run on physical. BitGold & Silver lets you keep some of your portfolio on the blockchain free from those risks.

Subscription Services (Hello NetFlix!)
BitShares has recurring payment functionality which combined with SmartCurrencies bring the $30 Billion Subscription Market to the blockchain.

Transparent Crowdfunding (Nice Knowing you Kickstarter!)
Want to start a company doing anything you want and attract global investors without the red tape and high fees? BitShares lets you list, fund and trade on it's blockchain without the 3% processing fee charged by centralized competitors.

Global Remittance (So long Western Union!)
Due to Bitcoin volatility and slow confirmation times, Bitcoin has struggled to penetrate the $500 billion global remittance market. SmartCurrencies like BitUSD with their low fees and 3 second transaction times change this.

True Private Banking (At least Switzerland will still have watches and chocolate!)
BitShares allows anonymous global transactions and the ability to hold deposits in multiple SmartCurrencies, accessible to anyone, anywhere in the world. Your blockchain funds cannot be seized or scrutinized and are not affected by local or global banking crises.

Social Tipping & The Gift Economy
Social tipping is a new phenomenon which allows users on social media sites like Twitter, Reddit & Facebook to give a tip to content they appreciate and companies like ShareBits.io have already been integrated with the BitShares platform to take advantage of this. 

Online Charity
Currency Smartcoins and $0.01 transaction fees make small online charity donations affordable, transparent and fast.
 
Sports Betting
BitShares prediction markets allow private wagering on sports events that can penetrate a huge global market without restriction while also reducing the average 'vig' of 5-10% to under 1%. BitShares has already offered wagering on 2016 NFL games. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/afp/article-3040540/Global-sports-gambling-worth-3-trillion.html

Global Lottery
Lotteries lose up to 50% on running costs, taxes and other expenses. BitShares RNG provides provably fair draws and with ticket sales directly on the blockchain, total running costs could be less than 1%.

Blockchain Casino
Winner winner Chicken Dinner! Volatility is cited as the number one reason more online casinos don't integrate Bitcoin, Smartcurrencies like BitUSD solve this problem and BitShares could even offer traditional Casino games on the blockchain for a fraction of the cost and penetrate the lucrative $30 billion onine gambling market.

Global Personal Insurance
By reducing traditional fixed costs and using the wisdom of the crowd for claim validation, the inventor of Smartcoins is attempting to revolutionize personal insurance by developing the first blockchain based Mutual Aid Society on the BitShares platform.

The Ethereum pump may be over.  Bitshares has been quiet long enough.

ETH hit an inflection point. I expect to see an extended pullback from here. Bitshares could benefit.

Ethereum price is at the top of the long term trendline. Time to take profits.

The governance structure of BitShares enables rapid responses and efficient coordination that would be very difficult to achieve with any other technology.

That is a beautiful sentence that could spawn across social media and spark big conversations. Google + is fine and all, but please can we add a social media plugin to the bitshares forum so comments like these can be amplified?

There are social media plugins available for Simple Machines Forum:
http://custom.simplemachines.org/mods/index.php?mod=3580
https://docs.oneall.com/plugins/guide/social-login-smf/

We can be heroes just for one day.
https://youtu.be/bsYp9q3QNaQ?t=1m36s

The main reason that BTS price dropped so low is that a bunch of community members lost all their BTS and all of that supply is now floating around out there in the hands of traders who dont really want it, who instead want BTC back.

That is a keen observation, and dead on true.