Bitcoin Founder Identified?

Police raided the home of a man believed to be the founder of Bitcoin, the crypto-currency.

The linked article is a great summary of the issues surrounding this innovative form of money.

Online Resource Grants For Faculty

Online Resource Grants

The purpose of the online  resource grants is to enable the purchasing of larger one-time online resources no one department can easily afford with its library allocation. In academic year 2015-2016, $160,000 is budgeted for such online collections.
One-time purchases typically include but are not limited to primary source databases, journal backfile collections, e-book collections, audio or streaming media collections. Some possibilities are listed on our one-time resource page. Please contact Scott Pope (pope@txstate.edu) to get pricing for any products outside this list. Acquisitions will verify eligibility and pricing, and can set up trials as needed.

Guidelines

• The resource should be online, accessible by the entire campus, and come with persistent access rights. The review committee can make an exception for an extraordinary print/microform collection not available online.
• The resource must  be a one-time purchase. Grant funds cannot be used to support ongoing subscriptions or temporary access to a subscription resource. If the resource requires an annual access fee, the requestor’s department or other department will need to approve the ongoing cost from their library allocation.
• The resource should enhance the library collection and strengthen research initiatives.
• All things being equal, priority is given to higher ticket items over inexpensive ones. The library may be able to purchase less expensive items with end-of-year funds.

Review Criteria

• Value/Anticipated Use of the Resource: Priority is given to resources that benefit many departments or programs or greatly benefit one area. More than one source of personal/departmental support may be important. The resource does not necessarily need to be multi-disciplinary. The intent is that all subject areas be represented over the years.
• Uniqueness: Priority is given to resources that enhance the library’s collection rather than duplicate or overlap with existing collections.

Submit a proposal here

Submission deadline: Thursday, February 18, 2016, 5pm.

Applications received after the deadline will not be considered.
The review committee consists of two members of the Library Committee, two previous recipients, and two librarians.

Timeline

Dec 8 – Feb 19: Applications are accepted
Feb 19 – March 13: Application review
End of March: Grants are announced
April – May: Resources are ordered

Dun & Bradstreet Is Inside Mergent

The Dun & Bradstreet Private Company database is lurking inside the Mergent database. 

Once you get inside Mergent, you'll clearly see the correct tab. Most people use this to look up a private company's estimated annual sales.

Guide To Modern Bank Holding Companies

This is a really good overview of the modern financial structure of what are essentially old-school bank holding companies.

It's a walk-through of how to track who owns what and whom and subsidiary trees – which can be quite complex.

Book Review: And The Money Kept Rolling In (And Out)

In the early 2000s, middle class Argentinians regularly awoke to find scavengers going through dumpsters looking for plastic bottles. In many cases, these scavengers had once lived in the same neighborhood or one like it. Looting, fires and civil disturbance were regular features on the evening news.

The culprit? Argentina's currency had collapsed and set loose a disastrous inflation rate that decimated the savings of normal people. Read the book for the gory details of a too large government, national debt, and an ill-thought basis for currency exchange.

The situation is not completely analogous to the issues the United States faces now. Argentina's problems were caused by pegging its weakening national currency to the dollar. Nevertheless, the episode does show what lurks under the delicate threads of currency valuation, debt and ultimately savings and societal trust.

And the Money Kept Rolling In is recommended as a lesson in national finance policy. For any student of Latin American economic history, it's a must read.

Vemma Temporary Halted Due to Pyramid Scheme Allegation

I wrote earlier about the Vemma energy drink business model controversy. A court has agreed with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and temporary halted Vemma operations due to concerns about the company being a pyramid scheme.

Read more about this issue here.

Protecting Traditional Knowledge From Copyright

Corporations occasionally try to copyright traditional knowledge, culture, and/or technology.

India has taken the step of creating the traditional digital library which documents traditional knowledge.  This makes it more difficult for corporations to take traditional knowledge and claim that purely for themselves. 

Case in point: the recent case where Colgate Palmolive attempted to copyright a product that used traditional Indian spices - and apparently nothing else. Read about the case here, in which Colgate did not prevail.