Text The Times.

Text The Times.

870-225-1456

Here’s what everyone is talking about this week:

Recently Gerry Cotten died, a sad event like all of the deaths that have occurred. The thing that makes this a major media event is that he operated Quadriga a Canadian cryptocurrency exchange, a real storage for imaginary money. It was secure as only he had the password. The $250 million stored there is still there, or so everyone assumes as no one has the key to open it and check. The imaginary money will probably be there long after the 115,000 users have also died. The issue of bitcoin and other imaginary currencies has already been discussed thoroughly in the papers and general media but what of the need for passwords. A song ‘Down Home’ by Alabama includes the lyrics ‘When a man’s word and a handshake was all that was needed.’ There were no passwords then and trust was the standard but that approach is so far from the current approaches that it is unrecognizable now. Most people are honest and trustworthy although not all are so some form of security is now needed but does it need to be that secure. It ‘s a shame trust is gone and probably access to the $250 million. Will there eventually be a time when fake news, social media and password are only words in a dictionary and not blights on our society? [ Editor’s Note: I’m not gonna lie here. I consider myself a pretty smart fella, and I still can’t wrap my head around what exactly Bitcoin and all the other “ cryptocurrencies” really are. I sort of get the idea around it, but the specifics of how it actually works or how I make it, use it, spend it, retire to the Bahamas on it, where it goes or what it does just goes over my head. So, I’ve never even heard of “ Quadriga,” so my deepest sympathies to whoever had their share of the $ 250 million in imaginary money in Cotten’s bank or whatever. But seriously, do I just say, “ OK, folks, I’m starting my own money. It’s called SmileyBucks! Invest in my idea and we’ll all be SmileyBuck Millionaires! I have no

idea…]

*** OK, so do you guys have a Monday Wednesday and Friday paper? Sometimes I get my paper on Tuesday or Thursday or even Saturday? Whats up wit dat? [ Editor’s Note: While we do print three times a week, they are technically the Early Week, Mid- Week and Weekend print editions. We publish five days a week ( Monday through Friday) online, with the papers on Tuesday and Thursday being online only. Hope that makes sense]