Tether alone now owns more US government debt than major countries like Germany, the UAE, and Australia — and they’re not only profiting from it, but driving blockchain adoption in the process.
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You know those boring businesses you hear about every now and then that absolutely print money?
E.g. Hunt Brothers Pizza — the gas station pizza business that makes $540M a year.
Yeah, well — stablecoins are kinda like that.
The leading stablecoin, Tether, just reported its earnings and have reeled in $5.2 billion of profit so far this year.
(How? By taking a small percentage of the money invested into their coin, and re-investing it to eek out a profit — big bank energy).
Here’s why this is important, and likely to grow:
The US government generates cash by selling IOU’s (typically to other countries) with set interest rates — and to these other countries, it’s a solid deal, cause the US is seen in the same light as the Lannisters (from Game of Thrones):
They always pay their debts.
Problem is…
There’s only so much US debt that other nation states can/are willing to buy — and the US is forever hungry for fresh cash.
Stablecoins are the perfect instrument for extending demand for US debt — they increase the reach of the US dollar by allowing users anywhere/everywhere to buy US dollars, instead of their (often less reliable) local currencies.
And this ain’t some hairbrained theory!
It’s already happening in real-time. Tether alone now owns more US government debt than major countries like Germany, the United Arab Emirates, and Australia.
(Quickly driving blockchain adoption in the process).
Senator Cynthia Lummis (aka the ‘Bitcoin Senator’) formally introduced a bill to the U.S. Senate on Wednesday seeking to establish a national Bitcoin reserve, which will have both short and long-term benefits.
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Let’s cap things off this week with some news which may impact the crypto world in both the short term, and the long term.
Senator Cynthia Lummis (aka the ‘Bitcoin Senator’) formally introduced a bill to the U.S. Senate on Wednesday seeking to establish a national Bitcoin reserve.
She first announced the bill at Bitcoin 2024 in Nashville last weekend but it wasn’t officially introduced until Wednesday.
Here’s why this is exciting in the short term:
Two words: market sentiment.
While there’s still a long way to go for the bill to actually be approved and implemented, the mere introduction of the bill should have some sort of positive impact on investor confidence around Bitcoin.
(And as we know, BTC goes up >> everything goes up 🚀)
And in the long term:
If passed (which would be monumental for BTC), it would surely lead to wider acceptance of crypto in general, and bring us closer to a world where crypto is just another part of the mainstream financial system.
(Not sure that’s what every crypto degen wants, but it’s bound to happen).
Chances are, it would also spur a flurry of other countries also establishing BTC reserves, putting a whole lot more buy pressure on the market.
Whatever timeframe you look at this, it’s huge news.
Now we just need the bill to be reviewed, debated, voting on in both the House and the Senate, and signed in by the President.
The Volumetric Media Interoperability EG seeks to build understanding around volumetric media and draft a charter for a “Volumetric Media Interoperability” Domain Working Group. Opportunities for more immersive services are increasing as volume capturing and rendering devices become more readily available. As a result, more technologies are being developed to address the requirements for compressing, storing, and delivering volumetric media. Multiple SDOs (e.g. 5G-MAG, 3GPP, MPEG, VFA, SVTA, DVB, SBTVD, etc.) have established isolated focus or study groups to solve issues affecting volumetric media services. Because of the wide-spread interest and isolated initiatives, the volumetric media ecosystem is becoming fragmented.
Education and training in the Metaverse are becoming essential for all organizations, whether for internal skill development or external educational offerings. By compiling information from diverse sources, this register will serve to inform stakeholders about the current landscape of Metaverse education and potentially streamline their approaches by collating best practices, challenges, and emerging trends. It is important to note that “education and training in the Metaverse” would refer to both teaching within and about the Metaverse.
After a month-long hiatus, I find myself back in the familiar yet ever-evolving landscape of technology. My time away was a precious opportunity to disconnect, recharge, and spend time with family and close relatives. To my surprise, I spent less time on LinkedIn during my vacation. It’s in these quiet interludes that are needed and we get renewed. And talking about renewals, I am humbled and honored to share with you that I was renewed for a Microsoft MVP (Most Valuable Professional) year. This is my 6th year in the program, and it has been a great ride. I have met and connected with so many people, that I would not have met without being an MVP. All those people spark and ignite inspiration and there is a massive amount of knowledge, insights and experiences shared! I changed a category a bit this time again, as it has been the era of AI (Artificial Intelligence), I received dual-category MVP award for Microsoft 365 (Microsoft Teams) and AI Platform (Azure AI Services). Check out my MVP profile!
As I reacquaint myself with the bustling world of exciting tech, I am particularly focused to the advancements in Microsoft’s Cloud. The pace of innovation never stops, and it’s clear that Microsoft Copilot, Teams, and Azure AI have not stood still during July. In this post, I’ll be highlighting some selected features in Copilot and Teams (& Mesh) that have caught my attention – I will write about Azure AI later. From intelligent aid to collaborative breakthroughs, these tools are reshaping the way we work and interact.
Don’t miss these events, where I am speaking during autumn!
Let’s start exploring what’s new!
Microsoft Copilot for Microsoft 365 Catch up Outlook Word Excel Microsoft Teams Custom emojis Turn on and off channel post notifications Microsoft Designer in Teams New Notification options Microsoft Mesh
Microsoft Copilot for Microsoft 365
Catch up
I have been waiting for this one to appear. Catch up helps you get up to speed with the help of Copilot regarding documents and meetings. You can find this when you open Copilot and notice Catch up next to “Try these prompts”.
Catch up is a new tab you can just open and see what kind of updates there are. I don’t see this yet in all tenants where I have access to the Copilot so it is still rolling in.
My personal tenant does not have any other collaborators, so catch up will be less useful in that one. But I hope to see this in my work tenant soon. Looking at picture at Microsoft’s material we can see better what this will be when you see it in your Copilot:
The Catch up feature displays personalized cards offering significant updates and actionable recommendations, allowing you to swiftly grasp important points from materials and recorded sessions that you did not attend or might want to review. Additionally, Copilot assists in meeting preparation by recommending associated documents.
Outlook
The side-panel Copilot in Outlook, can initiate now a new draft reply to an email message – using the information in email messages. For example (note: typos don’t matter 😊 )
It creates a new draft message in Outlook, and lets you continue working on the reply from there.
Word
I think the biggest news here is that Copilot’s context has increased. Now Copilot in Word can summarize documents containing (approx) up to 80 000 words – that is about 160 pages. This depends on the language as well. My guess is that Copilot in Word is now internally using GPT-4o model with 128k token context. As tokens are parts of words, it would target 80k words in document ballpark.
Excel
When users request Copilot to modify table data, it outlines the intended changes and presents a button to execute the alterations, giving users better insight to determine whether to go ahead with the alteration. Users can adjust the changes before applying them at their convenience. For example, I have this (very small) sample dataset:
When I ask Copilot to highlight months where sales are larger than opportunities it shows me what it is going to do. It is great how Copilot will be saving time when working with conditional formatting in Excel.
After hitting Apply, it does the highlighting for me.
Currently Copilot in Excel doesn’t have the capability to add a sum cell (like for example Sum of Sales), but it was announced during July that it will be coming soon. When I just tried it out, it is still summing it the old way: adding a pivot table to a new sheet. Fingers crossed it will appear soon!
Microsoft Teams
Now, let’s get to what’s new in Teams. First, I want to highlight something fun:
Custom emojis
Yes, you can add your own images and gifs to Teams message reactions. You can start adding your custom emojis by selecting the emoji+ icon right before the pen-icon to edit your message.
When the pop-out opens, click the rightmost icon on the bottom row.
This is where you can start adding your own gifs and images by clicking + and then selecting the image (or gif) you want to use as emoji. I already have added Copilot and clippy, but there is room for more. When you have added the image, you get a window to see example uses and you need to enter a unique name to your reaction. The name needs to be lowercase and without spaces.
And as the information box on top says: emojis you add will be visible for everyone in your organization. Your identity is also linked to your emoji. Let’s name this emoji mesh.
After clicking Add emoji you can see mesh emoji in custom emojis.
We can use it normally .
We can also add custom emojis to our selected emojis to react messages.
To edit your favorite emojis, select the smiley + pen icon next to search magnification glass on “Find something fun”.
You can also add custom emojis to your messages. Just open the emoji-button and search for it (or navigate to custom emojis and select the one you want to use).
Quite fun, isn’t it? Adding custom emojis is on by default for all users and admins can delete them.
Right clicks the emoji, to open information who added it and optionally delete it, if you have delete permissions.
Now, if you are an admin or business decision maker worried about people putting all kinds of emojis there are controls available.
Turn the feature on/off for the whole tenant via the Messaging Settings page (on by default).
Set which users can create new emojis via the Messaging Policy groups (on for all users by default).
Set which users can delete emojis via the Messaging Policy groups (off for all users except admins by default).
Read more from custom emojis Microsoft Learn article.
Turn on and off channel post notifications
If you want to follow-up conversation in a conversation thread in channels – or you want to mute it just click the … menu in the message to see the option.
Turning off notifications is especially useful, when you add something to the thread but don’t want to be bothered by it anymore.
Microsoft Designer in Teams
What is quite fun (and also useful!), is that Microsoft Designer is now integrated directly into Teams. You can use it in both chats and channels. With Designer you can generate images without leaving Teams at all.
Just at-mention Designer when writing a message and type in your image prompt.
Designer then creates the image directly to the conversation
Just click the image open, you want to use, and copy or download it.
New Notification options
And as the closing feature, check out new notification settings there are for notification sounds.
It is good to have more control when sounds are played with notifications.
Microsoft Mesh
Microsoft Mesh also got news during July. A few key picks of recent ones:
Event templates updatedPrebuilt event templates (Meadow and Oasis) have gotten updates. They automatically now include screenshare object, so these templates can be used in more scenarios without a need to make any kind of customizations. Customization is still available normally, when you want to add images, videos, etc.
Revisit event links Use past links you’ve received when you created your event, or share the link with others, to rejoin old events. Simply select the link to open the Mesh application and rejoin your past events.
More avatar reactionsNew avatar reactions are coming both on Teams and Mesh events.
Avatar personal boundaryThis one will be useful for a plenty of people. Avatars now have a personal boundary to prevent other people from walking through avatars or standing too close. This helps to increase comfort and safety while in immersive spaces. Avatar personal boundary is available in all Mesh experiences.
Updates to network setup requirements, improved audio qualityMicrosoft Mesh is transitioning to use Microsoft Teams’ backend for spatial audio, promising improved audio quality and simpler network setup requirements for users with Mesh app versions 5.2407+. The rollout, starting now, is expected to complete by late July 2024. No admin action is required before the rollout.
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Published by Vesa Nopanen
Vesa “Vesku” Nopanen, Principal Consultant and Microsoft MVP (M365 and AI Platform) working on Future Work at Sulava.
I work, blog and speak about Future Work : AI, Microsoft 365, Copilot, Microsoft Mesh, Metaverse, and other services & platforms in the cloud connecting digital and physical and people together.
I have about 30 years of experience in IT business on multiple industries, domains, and roles.
View all posts by Vesa Nopanen
The DMV’s new partnership with Avalanche is going to streamline the title & registration transfer process, lowering required physical appointments and bringing 42M Californian drivers onchain in the process.
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Did you know all the dreary, soulless office scenes from Fight Club were based on the director’s experience at the DMV?
How did we learn that?
We didn’t. We just made it up. But you believed it because everyone knows the DMV is a hellscape (with paperwork).
Good news for those of you in California: those visits to the DMV are about to be heavily reduced, thanks to the department’s new partnership with Avalanche.
Here’s an A/B comparison of the old/new experience:
A) The Old Way
You buy a second hand car (nice!)
To transfer the title and registration, you need to visit the DMV or Post Office and provide some or all of the following documents…
Completed Application for Title or Registration (Form REG 343), vehicle’s out-of-state title, vehicle’s out-of-state registration, proof of insurance, valid smog certificate, VES statement…
* Deep inhale of breath *
California Certificate of Title or an Application for Replacement or Transfer of Title (REG 227), signatures of seller(s) lien holder (if any) and buyer(s), and payment for the transfer fee.
B) The New Way
Most of that is logged, verified, and updated on the blockchain, so when you want to transfer a title and registration…
You just fill out a digital transfer form and click a button to sign in the DMV app.
It’s a massive step towards change for Californian drivers; and it will bring 42M new users onchain in one fell swoop.
For the first time ever, the US national debt surpassed $35 trillion — which equates to over $105k for every living person in the country.
That’s the bad news 👆
This is the good news 👇
The US’ accelerating debt could increase the adoption of Bitcoin and well n’ truly solidify it as a safe haven asset.
The less valuable the dollar becomes → the more dollars it takes to buy BTC → BTC’s growing price is (as it always has been) its own advertisement.
Preferably, we never have to get to the point where Bitcoin’s merits are proven to the world thanks to the collapse of the dollar.
What we will say is this:
We’re glad to have a ‘life raft’ available if such an event were to take place — one that cannot be manipulated and subject to the same fate as fiat currencies.
The Fed just announced that they weren’t touching interest rates in the US for now, leaving them unchanged at 5.25%-5.50%, which resulted in a small drop in value for BTC, but the impact was small.
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There ya have it: the Fed just announced that they weren’t touching interest rates in the US for now, leaving them unchanged at 5.25%-5.50%.
(Which means people won’t have more money in their pockets to spend on risky-ish assets like crypto).
The decision to hold interest rates was widely expected by analysts!
What wasn’t widely expected, though, was that the Fed Chair, Jerome Powell, gave little-to-no indication that a September rate cut is happening.
(Something he probably would have done if this decision was teetering on the edge of a ‘yes, we’ll make he cut now’).
As a result, the crypto markets dipped slightly (with BTC ~2% down at the time of writing, compared to before the Fed rate decision announcement).
But here’s the good news:
In the past, when interest rates rose or stayed the same (i.e. anything besides an interest rate cut), the crypto markets dropped significantly.
Less volatility related to the news cycle shows a maturing asset class.
(We love to see it).
And in other good news, earlier this week, Jerome Powell did say, and we quote – “inflation has eased substantially” – which sparked a small uptick in the value of BTC.
Whether they hold rates steady in September, or make their first cut since March 2020, is anyone’s guess at this point.
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This section contains many common flower varieties that can often be found at your local professional florist.
Have you ever wondered what a Gerbera looks like? They can create a beautiful arrangement.
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