Could the be used to support local communities and build a new model for basic income? Circles thinks it has an answer, starting at a tiny cafe in Berlin. The rise of and the underlying technology of the have given rise to wide-eyed visions. Developers of techno-utopias where, perhaps, rent-seeking companies like AirBnB and Uber and Facebook are replaced by semiautonomous corporations built on peer-to-peer, decentralized cryptographic systems. Operating in parallel to this are legions of currency speculators seeking fortune on the blockchain; there are now some 1,300 cryptocurrencies. Rampant, sometimes unscrupulous investors have ushered in a new currency craze, whereby valuations fluctuate by thousands of dollars, sometimes even in the same afternoon.Read Full Story