Bitshares Blockchain Bunker
Amanda sat down for an interview with Jonathan Baha'i who recently deployed a BitShares witness node in a nuclear-proof bunker located in Nova Scotia in Canada. The bunker, which Baha'i now owns, was originally built as a data center and nuclear-proof emergency bunker capable of housing up to 350 people during an emergency.
Baha'i speaks of the possibility of an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) rendering our electronic devices useless. An EMP can occur both naturally from the solar radiation or from man-made events such as the deployment of a nuclear weapon. In deploying his node in his bunker, Baha'i hopes that the BitShares blockchain will survive any such catastrophic event.
After some conversation regarding BitShares, its infrastructure and how he got involved, Baha'i makes a surprise announcement regarding an initiative called Blockchain Bunker which aims to utilize the infrastructure at his bunker alongside sidechain technology to help ensure that other blockchains would continue to exist and remain operable in the event of an EMP or other global catastrophe.
The Corporate Interests of Blockstream
If you've recently visited NodeCounter.com, a website which tracks the distribution of nodes running each of the various Bitcoin codebases, you've probably seen a message detailing the effect that private company Blockstream continues to have on Bitcoin development.
Because the Bitcoin network and its users have never paid Bitcoin developers, the door has been left open for private company Blockstream to come in and finance Bitcoin development, guiding it in such a way that suits its financial aspirations and neglects the wishes of Bitcoin's user base.
This situation has seriously compromised Bitcoin's ability to act as the peer-to-peer digital cash system it was intended to be as outlined in Satoshi's original whitepaper and has left the door open for other cryptocurrencies to emerge with better systems of governance and development funding through various forms of blockchain payouts that ensure the blockchain is working for its users and not subject to excessive oversight by private corporate interests like Blockstream.