Enigmatic travels of Shytoshi Kusama: message from El Salvador
Shytoshi Kusama’s latest location update places him in El Salvador, a country that has embraced Bitcoin as a national means of exchange and does not allow any altcoins.
Shytoshi Kusama, the pseudonymous lead developer of the Shiba Inu team, has been intriguing the SHIB Army with his cryptic travels. His geolocation status on the Twitter/X social media platform has seen a series of updates over the past two weeks, with locations ranging from Singapore and Dubai to Hong Kong.
El Salvador’s currency is Bitcoin
El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele, adopted Bitcoin as a national currency in 2021 and created a state BTC wallet for use by the local population. With Bitcoin maximalist Max Keiser as an advisor on the BTC strategy, altcoins are banned from use in El Salvador. This move to a Bitcoin-centric economy has positioned El Salvador as a unique player in the global crypto landscape.
El Salvador made history in June 2021 by becoming the first country in the world to adopt Bitcoin as legal tender. This move was spearheaded by the country’s president, Nayib Bukele, who saw Bitcoin as a means to promote “financial inclusion”, investment, and economic development.
The Bitcoin Law, as it is known, was passed by the country’s congress with a majority vote of 62 out of 84 deputies. Under this law, Bitcoin is used as legal tender alongside the US dollar, and the exchange rate between the two is set by the market. Salvadorans can pay their taxes in Bitcoin, and every economic agent is required to accept the cryptocurrency as payment unless they lack the necessary technology.
To facilitate the use of Bitcoin, the government created a digital wallet called Chivo and gave every citizen the equivalent of $30 in Bitcoin. However, the introduction of the currency faced some challenges. Hundreds of Chivo accounts were hacked, leading to the theft of money and the account owner’s identity. This incident may have deterred many Salvadorans from using Bitcoin.
Deciphering message for SHIB Army
The Shiba Inu community has been left puzzled by Kusama’s frequent location updates, speculating on what this could mean for the future of SHIB. Some members of the SHIB Army believe that Kusama is trying to convey a message about SHIB, while others speculate that the SHIB lead developer is working on Shibarium, hence these frequent travels.
When Kusama was spotted in Dubai earlier this year, some assumed that he might be preparing to participate in Token2049, a major crypto-related event that takes place annually in Dubai and Singapore. However, the answer to this riddle may be simpler than it appears. It’s possible that Shytoshi Kusama is not traveling at all but is merely changing his location tag manually to demonstrate the global reach of the SHIB ecosystem.
Future of SHIB ecosystem
If Kusama’s location field continues to see new countries, it will likely prove that the SHIB ecosystem is set to expand its influence worldwide. This could signal exciting developments for SHIB and its community. As the world becomes more interconnected through the use of cryptocurrencies, the SHIB ecosystem could play a significant role in this global financial revolution.
While the true meaning behind Shytoshi Kusama’s cryptic travels remains a mystery, it has undoubtedly sparked intrigue and speculation within the SHIB Army. Whether it’s a coded message about the future of SHIB or a demonstration of the global reach of the SHIB ecosystem, Kusama’s journey serves as a testament to the dynamic and exciting world of cryptocurrencies.
Blockchain network on Ethereum
Shibarium is an upcoming layer-2 (L2) blockchain network built on Ethereum for Shiba Inu. It is designed to transform Shiba Inu, a memecoin, into a complete ecosystem. The project was proposed by Ryoshi, the anonymous creator of Shiba Inu, in a now-deleted blog post in May .
Shibarium aims to address the scalability and cost issues that have plagued Ethereum, making it more suitable for a wider range of use cases, including NFTs, metaverse, DeFi, and gaming. It uses Bone ShibaSwap (BONE) as its primary gas token, which is the governance token of the Shiba Inu ecosystem. Shibarium will also feature a simple and effective SHIB burning mechanism, which will reduce the supply of SHIB over time and increase its value.
The advantages of using Shibarium include higher transaction speeds, lower fees, increased token utility, and seamless decentralized application (DApp) development. Despite Ethereum’s upgrade to a proof-of-stake (PoS) blockchain through the Merge, the Ethereum blockchain still struggled with scalability, despite its robust security layer. Shibarium is also a PoS project, which will help Shiba Inu to scale while keeping it hooked to the Ethereum blockchain.
Shibarium is expected to stabilize the value of SHIB and transform Shiba Inu into a value-added project with long-term prospects. It will increase throughput, enabling the project to handle significant growth. Shibarium is expected to boost the transaction speed considerably. The introduction of the Shibarium layer-2 solution is likely to make gas fees negligible.
The Shibarium ecosystem will be comprehensive, comprising several projects, including SHIB metaverse, ShibaSwap DEX, and blockchain games. The number of Shibarium accounts surpassed 25,800 in the first month after the mainnet launch. The number of addresses surpassed 1 million roughly in the same period.
The Shibarium portal is aimed at reorganizing Shiba Inu as a multi-project and a stable ecosystem. Shibarium developers haven’t yet released a launch date for the project. An alpha preview of SHIB metaverse, a part of the project, however, was on display at SXSW 2023 . The release was originally planned for February 2023 but was delayed because the developers were keen on launching an error-free version after thorough testing through various phases.
Despite these challenges, El Salvador’s adoption of Bitcoin has attracted attention worldwide. It has sparked debates about the potential of cryptocurrencies and their role in the global financial system. However, the adoption of Bitcoin in El Salvador has been described as an opaque experiment with several different objectives: financial inclusion, revenue for the public treasury, and building the reputation of the president3.
As of now, only a small percentage of remittances have been transferred using digital wallets that use cryptocurrencies. Despite this, El Salvador’s move to adopt Bitcoin has undoubtedly had a significant impact on the global discourse around cryptocurrencies.
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