All posts by hephaist0s

Mucho Denarium

March 15, 2017 hephaist0s

It’s easy to forget that when Mike Caldwell first started making his brass 1 BTC Casascius coins, they were meant to be a fun, affordable way for people to handle, store and share bitcoin — now, of course, a denomination of “1 BTC” is intimidating, and Casascius coins themselves have long since become collector’s items.

In 2015, Denarium, based in Finland, wanted to get back to those roots, and to that end they created a series of affordable brass coins, each of which contains a private key sealed behind a hologram just like the original Casascius coins. The denominations they chose, though, were 1/100 BTC, 1/10 BTC, and a “custom” option which has no denomination and may be loaded with however much or little you want. They are available either pre-loaded with the specified amounts, or in an empty, buyer-funded form.

These are a thoughtfully designed and packaged way to share modest amounts of bitcoin. The firstbits of each address is visible through a window in the hologram, and detailed address and public key information is printed on the inside of the packaging. The address QR code is even stickered to the back of each coin’s capsule.

Denarium brass physical bitcoins, reverse.

The Denarium packaging contains detailed information about each individual coin.

It’s fine that these are not flashy coins, but even as brass coins go they seem to tend toward the low end in terms of production values: fairly dull and a little rough, with some blemishes. The price, though, is hard to beat.

For just a little more Denarium also introduced a gold-plated series of the same coins, and those really shine. They are still affordable, but they are much more impressive to the eye and more satisfying as a collectible or gift.

Denarium gold-plated brass physical bitcoins, obverse.

Denarium unplated and plated brass custom coin, for comparison.

Denarium gold-plated custom-denomination piece.

Denarium gold-plated 1/10 BTC piece, featuring scary horse.

It’s always exciting to see new creators come into the physical cryptocoin field, and Denarium has since expanded their coin offerings into more premium items. We look forward to their future ideas, as well.

Thoughtful packaging, meant to reach a mass audience.

Standard disclaimer: It’s always, to some degree, a bad idea to let anyone else have access to a private key which controls any of your bitcoin wallets; in a sense, it goes counter to the bitcoin system itself. Once someone else has handled the key which controls your funds, you have to trust both that they exercised adequate security procedures while handling your key, and that they have not save copies of your key to exploit at some point in the unforeseen future. While some (such as Mike Caldwell of Casascius) have established trusted reputations, newer operators can only prove their trustworthiness over time.

Items & Objects, Physical Crypto

Kialara Signature Series

March 31, 2016 hephaist0s

Max Mellenbruch’s bitcoin cold storage art objects have all demonstrated exquisite quality and striking imagination, and his new Signature Series expands enthusiastically on both of those traits.

The first generation Kialara bitcoin cold storage wallet was like a fever dream combining a coin, a bar, a vault and a tiny machine into a package that was a delight to behold and a pleasure to handle. The second generation, the Kialara Labyrinth, built a delicate but confounding game into the heart of the coin, in the process creating an item that would be at home in the treasure room of a Tsar. Both kept their private keys locked deep inside under multiple layers of tamper-resistant engineering.

The Kialara Signature Series is more in the cold storage DIY school, in that they contain no pre-generated keys. This puts control of the wallet wholly in the hands of the user, as you may generate your own keys with whatever security precautions seem appropriate to you, then seal them inside yourself.

"Currents" by Julia Tourianski and "Excavatorelevator" by Ricky Allman. — “Currents” by Julia Tourianski and “Excavatorelevator” by Ricky Allman.

The new offerings are also a departure in their style. While the designs of Mellenbruch’s previous wallets sprung wholly from his own mind, this time around he brought some friends — there are two different versions in the Signature Series so far, and each one features the artwork of a different artist.

Mellenbruch approached two artists he admired and asked them if they’d each create an original work interpreting Bitcoin in their own way. The results were then reproduced in limited editions of 500 on museum quality archival card stock, sealed behind tempered glass and framed by mirror-polished stainless steel.

The results are stunning. For one thing, these are by far the shiniest things I own. I can’t even figure out how to photograph them, since the frames just reflect the world around them as if they’re powering up a stealth field, or bending light around them like small rectangular singularities.

They are also heavy as heck. I don’t want to give away Mellenbruch’s secrets, but he obviously knows that quality is supposed to have a certain weight. Although these are made of steel, glass, and silver, upon first handling they seem startlingly dense, as if you’re handling an exotic element like gold or mercury.

Locked inside the heart of each one is a medallion containing one pure ounce of .999 pure silver, naturally, with a square indentation in which the user may inset their private key. It’s elegance incarnate.

Each Kialara Signature comes assembled, with everything you need for disassembling and placing your own private key in the medallion: a Torx screwdriver, a set of 3 holograms and both a microfiber cloth and an alcohol wipe for preparing the surface. A clear plastic stand is also provided for standing your Kialara up on your desk, shelf or altar.

Both works of art are lush and vibrant with color and motion, but they represent two very different approaches to Bitcoin-as-art.

Ricky Allman’s Excavatorelevator 1 uses architectural imagery, walls and panels and planes of color rising up out of a more fluid geology. If it’s a building, it’s a living one that’s unfolding right in front of us, or maybe assembling itself, floating against a starry night sky. A mining metaphor? The soul of the blockchain?

Julia Tourianski’s Current harbors a chaotic surge of multicolored animal-shapes on a raft in a dark sea. Are they sailing, or starving? Is this an image of hope for the future, or scene of collapse, or a frozen moment in time that could be both? Tourianski has said elsewhere that each animal represents a different part of the Bitcoin ecosystem. If so, what is the platypus?! (Answer: “unexpected.”)

It’s up to the viewer to make their own connections with these works, and that’s half the fun. The more you look, the more you’ll see.

And that’s a lot like Bitcoin itself.

Items & Objects

Silver Wallets rides again

February 8, 2016 hephaist0s

The people behind Silver Wallets haven’t been idle, and are now on their third major design. Their original Silver Wallets design was a very polished, high-quality inaugural offering, but the new one is even more impressive.

With a beautiful proof finish, this is a lovely ounce of silver to start with, but on top of that they’ve added gold plating on the “B” and around the rim. The result is striking.

As with the previous designs, this is a kit for making your own physical bitcoin collectible. The shallow half-inch square recess on the back allows you space to place your own private key, and the coin comes with 3 holograms for sealing it in place — either backups if you make a mistake, or replacements in case you choose to redeem the coin at some point and then re-assemble it. No one has control over the key but you, so it’s as secure as the precautions you take.

It comes with 3 holograms and an optional slab-style case.

The coin comes in its own round plastic case, but an optional slab-style case is also provided, which would be handy for displaying the public address along with the coin.

These are beautiful pieces, and we look forward to seeing more in the series.

Items & Objects

Ledger HW.1

February 5, 2016 hephaist0s

The Ledger HW.1 is a Bitcoin wallet that tackles the problem of a hardware wallet from a smartcard persective, with no moving parts and no screen. That makes it tiny, simple, light — and inexpensive.

The chip which holds your private key is embedded right in the plastic, and the tiny USB device itself arrives embedded in a credit-card-sized piece of plastic. Pop it out of the card, bend back the flap and snap it in place and your Ledger HW.1 is ready for setup.

Setup is as simple as pointing Chrome (or Chromium) to my.ledgerwallet.com and following the instructions. You’ll receive your 24-word master seed to write down in the provided booklet, with which you can reconstitute your wallet later should your HW.1 ever become lost or damaged.

"Clip" means "bend around to back and clip into place, " NOT "clip off." Don't make my mistake! — “Clip” means “bend around to back and clip into place, ” NOT “clip off.” Don’t make my mistake!

Once you’re set up, my.ledgerwallet.com can then be your wallet, too. Just plug in your Ledger HW.1 and open the website and you’ll be met with a nicely laid out, easy to use and relatively full-featured Bitcoin wallet interface.

But how can you confirm transactions securely if the Ledger has no buttons at all? If all your keystrokes and actions pass through the computer first, then is this really a secure hardware wallet?

The Ledger solution is as simple as their overall design. Each Ledger is shipped with a unique security card with a key printed on one side: a full set of upper and lowercase letters, plus the numbers 0-9, all randomly matched with their ciphertext equivalents. It’s essentially a one time pad, a cryptographic solution that’s as old-school and reliable as they come. In order to confirm a transaction, you’ll need both the Ledger HW.1 to be plugged in as well as having your security card handy to translate whatever the onscreen prompts provide you with.

The Ledger wallet Security Card: so simple, so key. — The Ledger Wallet Security Card: so simple, so key. No, you may not see my key!

Or you can use the security card to pair your HW.1 with your Android smartphone using the Ledger app, and use that as a two-factor authenticator instead.

If the web wallet isn’t to your liking, the HW.1 also works well with Electrum. It also works with Mycelium on Android, if your phone supports USB On-The-Go.

The Ledger HW.1 also works with Electrum.

The Ledger HW.1 even works with Mycelium, in case you're on the go. — The Ledger HW.1 even works with Mycelium, in case you’re on the go.

There are several players in the Bitcoin hardware wallet field these days, but Ledger distinguishes themselves in two ways: variety and price.

The HW.1 is a tiny, featherweight device and it is the least expensive iteration, but it is just one of several configurations offered by Ledger. The Ledger Nano is a more traditional USB stick with a folding metal sheath, and even comes in a version in which the Nano is embedded in a wearable rubber wristband. The Ledger Unplugged is a whole different creature, being a contactless wallet meant to work with mobile wallets such as Mycelium. We haven’t had a chance to test either of these yet, and we’re pretty sure there are even more designs in the works.

At 15 Euros (less than $20), the price of the HW.1 is hard to beat. That’s a small fraction of the cost of the competitors. Sure, it’s not as impressive to hold in your hand as something with a screen, but that’s not what you’re buying here.

The HW.1 is simultaneously a fantastic entry-level hardware wallet because of the low price, and a great solution for companies who might want to deploy large numbers of them to their employees while keeping costs manageable.

Items & Objects

KeepKey

January 5, 2016 hephaist0s

It’s nice when things feel as substantial and important as their function. Any reputable hardware wallet is a great idea for keeping bitcoin secure, but despite their utility some can feel insubstantial in your hand, almost cheap.

The KeepKey, though, looks and feels like something that would be at home on a CEO’s desk. The 2001-esque black obelisk is mystifyingly simple: one button, one microUSB port, and two sides. The metal backing is cool and reassuring to the touch, while the glossy black front hides a 3.12″ OLED which remains invisible until woken.

The soft glow of quality and simplicity starts as soon you open the box. The KeepKey comes with only a handsome braided black microUSB cable, a heavy, layered card for writing down your 12-word seed, a thick leathery sleeve for protecting the card and a set of instructions with only three steps on them.

Those steps are simply:
1. In Chrome, navigate to keepkeywallet.com and install the KeepKey Wallet Chrome Extension.
2. In Chrome, navigate to keepkeyproxy.com and install the KeepKey Proxy Chome App.
3. Click the KeepKey Wallet icon in the upper right corner of Chrome to begin initialization.

Out of the box; screen protector still affixed.

Just one logo.

The user is then led through the process of setting up the KeepKey, which is as simple as writing down their 12-word seed and choosing a PIN. (The PIN is protected from keyloggers via the smart PIN matrix, which scrambles the order of the numbers on the device’s screen and displays only a blank PIN grid on the computer itself.)

For those who’ve used the Trezor, the experience and interface is very similar, and that’s no accident. The KeepKey hardware and software is a fork of the Trezor ‘s, which is open source. That’s all good, since it’s what the folks at Satoshilabs intended all along –that their work would inspire other hardware wallets. It’s also good because one can hope that the diligence and obsessive concern for security that Satoshilabs displayed when developing the Trezor carries over to the KeepKey.

Refer to the number positions when entering the pin onscreen.

A screen that’s large enough to read bitcoin addresses easily is a nice differentiator for the KeepKey, and limiting the controls to one button makes the operation dead simple.

This is about as effortless as Bitcoin can be, and one really only needs the most rudimentary understanding of Bitcoin to use it. Send bitcoin from your KeepKey, receive bitcoin to your KeepKey, and as long as you keep your backup seed safe, you’re fine. There’s no complicated software or blockchain downloading to wrangle.

The KeepKey Bitcoin hardware wallet in action. — The KeepKey Bitcoin hardware wallet.

While the KeepKey site explains that the KeepKey also supports Litecoin, Namecoin, Dogecoin, Dash and Testnet coins, since the Chrome extension only offers Bitcoin that seems academic for now.

KeepKey does also work very well with MultiBit HD, and Electrum has support of a sort, but as of 2.5.2 that support is not built-in and requires the installation of additional Python pieces that will be more than most people want to dig into. The Chrome plugin is so simple and fast, though, that there’s little reason to wander beyond it.

Another differentiator from the Trezor, however, is the price, which at $239 is more than twice the price of a Trezor for very similar functionality – and the Trezor itself is sometimes criticized for its price, since competitors such as Ledger offer their own entry-level smartcard-based hardware wallet solution (the HW.1) for less than $20.

The extra polish and design touches might be worth the difference to many, however, and that might be just the demographic the KeepKey is after — people who will settle for nothing less than the Cadillac of bitcoin hardware wallets.

Items & Objects, Physical Crypto

Into the Labyrinth

June 25, 2015 hephaist0s

The original Kialara bitcoin cold wallet was an elegant chimaera, a coin-like construct enclosing a private key, itself encased in a bar, made of plastic, glass, aluminum and steel. Lions, dragons and gears cavorted on its face, and seemed like the sort of compact sculptural object that might be dreamed up by a sentient machine.

The tiny machine theme evolves in the second offering from Max Mellenbruch, the Kialara Labyrinth. It doesn’t just look as if the parts might move, they actually do, since the Labyrinth really is a labyrinth, the circular paths carved right into the surface of the coin and five tiny spheres tumble through the rings — silver spheres on the first 700 coins, and ceramic spheres on the remainder of the 2500-coin run.

A fiendish labyrinth protects your bitcoin.

It’s just as beautiful and well-constructed as the original, with the added bonus of having a game built in. A very difficult game.

The goal is to get the 5 tiny spheres from the outermost ring to the innermost. The first time I tried it, I promptly concluded that this was impossible and abandoned all hope.

Then Mellenbruch announced a contest for the best time solving the puzzle and I thought, heck, I’ll give it another shot.

My best times seemed to be approaching infinity. The first time I solved it took more than 10 minutes, an agonizing, maddening eternity in which the tiny balls danced and flew in all directions like quicksilver in an earthquake. I couldn’t figure out any strategy of any use and despair set in again.

Eventually, though, you start to learn. Gentle, swishing loops, working with the labyrinth’s circles instead of fighting them, letting the spheres drop gently down to the next level instead of trying to force them along with my mind.

I shudder to think how long I spent in that labyrinth before I got a time under three minutes, then two, and finally managed a run completed at just 1:16. That felt good.

I tried to beat that, but never came close again. Fortunately, that time was good enough to win the contest. Yup! Here’s my video to prove it; apologies for the blurriness, but I was single-mindedly focused on the puzzle at the time.

My prize was the low-numbered Labyrinth #003, plus an original Kialara as well, which is a pretty great prize package.

Both of Mellenbruch’s designs are lovely works of collectible Bitcoin art, but they’re also as close to tamper-proof as a physical wallet can be without encryption, due to the elaborate and meticulous construction which includes details like countersunk screws glued in with red goop. It’s even harder to imagine counterfeits, since the sheer amount of work necessary to recreate one of these would be formidable.

They make for very elegant vaults, and the face denomination of .1 BTC doesn’t prevent you from saving more at that address. Still, I’d love to see an undenominated variation that the user could fund however they wanted.

But wherever Mellenbruch’s artistic instincts take him next, I wouldn’t be surprised if it exceeds our expectations yet again.

Anatomy of a Labyrinth, courtesy www.maxfield.me/blog/

Items & Objects

Embracing entropy

March 24, 2015 hephaist0s

Three green flashes means there isn’t enough entropy detected. Do you have a device which can tell you that?

The Mycelium Entropy device can. But no worries, if there isn’t enough entropy, just unplug it for a few seconds and try again. Or move away from strong magnetic fields. This is my new favorite error message on anything anywhere.

The name is hard to beat, too. When you think about how much trouble the Genesis device was in “Wrath of Khan”, then how much more devastating must the Entropy device be?

The Mycelium Entropy with case & instructions.

The Mycelium Entropy is a tiny bitcoin paper wallet generator meant to be as simple, secure, and portable as possible. The size of a small thumb drive, it may be plugged directly into a USB-equipped printer in order to generate random, one-time paper wallets whose information isn’t saved anywhere other than the piece of paper which is printed out: the keys are not saved on the device, they’re not saved on the printer, and as long as the printer isn’t connected to a computer or the Internet, then they can’t be saved there, either.

It’s also dead easy to use. There is no software interface or driver download, just plug it into the printer and then print the wallet. This is possible because when you plug in the Entropy, it generates the new wallet in the form of a jpg, which is what the printer sees — a flash drive with a picture on it, which just happens to be a public address/private key pair.

This also means that you can print it from a USB port on a computer, too — just open the drive and print the jpg — but of course this is a bad idea since you’re negating some of the security precautions by doing so, and exposing your device to whatever nastiness is on your computer.

If you want another wallet, either unplug the Entropy device and then re-insert it, or just press the button on the end, the only control on the device. Presto, new key pair!

You can also print of a 2-of-3 split key wallet simply by pressing the button immediately after inserting the device into the printer.

If you want to get complicated and enter the configuration mode, a host of other possibilities open up. Hierarchic deterministic wallets? Yup, it will generate a BIP-39 12-word seed phrase instead. Other cryptocurrencies, such as litecoin? Sure!

It’s a solid little device, as well, with a metal shell and good build quality. It’s great when first-of-their kind devices are also built to last.

Why yes, you certainly may send bitcoin to this address!

The Entropy device began as an Indiegogo project in 2014, and while its completion took longer than planned it seems to have been worth the wait. Created by the people behind the excellent Mycelium bitcoin wallet, the Entropy shows the same innovation and attention to detail as their wallet. The wallet has been my favorite smartphone wallet for a while now, full-featured and easy to use while also including forward-thinking gems like a decentralized exchange which lets you contact other bitcoin users in your geographic area to arrange direct purchases and sales.

Clearly the Entropy device only moves in one direction: the future.

Items & Objects, Physical Crypto

Shiny

March 3, 2015 hephaist0s

The Argentina-based bhCoins have come out with their first series of DIY coins. Although they contain no precious metals, they are available in mirror and antique finishes in both gold and silver.

I opted for the shiny gold and shiny silver, and they look fantastic. They have a nice weight to them, and a compact size at 28mm in diameter.

Each coin kit comes with 3 holograms for securing the key in the square hollow on the reverse of the coin, and also a hologram-sealed envelope containing a set of address/key pairs, the keys being printed at the right size to fold and place in the hollow on the coin. For added security, one could always generate and print their own keys.

Let's face it: DIY is fun. — Let’s face it: DIY is fun.

BHCoins DIY coins in silvery and golden, shiny and slanty.

I am really fond of the bhCoins designs. They’re simple and elegant, but unique at the same time, not quite like anything else out there. These have a funky “B” all askew and slanted, sliding right off the surface of the coin, and the mirror finish is top-notch.

And they’re a bit on the obscure side, which is always exciting for a collector. For the curious, there is more information here.

Items & Objects, Physical Crypto

Ten thousand bits

January 13, 2015 hephaist0s

After the success of their Dogecoin design, Crypto Imperator is back with another solid-feeling, zinc-plated coin, this time with less Comic Sans and more good old bitcoin.

It’s a 10,000 bit… coin. There’s been a shift to move to bits as the common unit of bitcoin, the thinking being that once we make the shift we won’t have to adapt again. In case your conversion skills are rusty, there are 100 satoshis in a bit. From the other end, 10,000 bits equals .01 bitcoin.

The argument for shifting to smaller units is that if bitcoin reaches a high rate of exchange and stays there, using them will be psychologically cumbersome to people. We’re not used to calculating out to three or four decimal places in our transactions, but we’re quite used to thinking with more digits on the other side of the decimal point.

Regardless of its small/enormous denomination, the Crypto Imperator 10,000 bit piece is a handsome coin, even if it lacks the precious metal that some other coins boast. It’s smooth, professional finish and nice heft give it a professional air, and it has a strong simple design on the front of a breaking chain.

The hologram on the back features the delightful rockets-and-moons of the Dogecoin piece, which was well worth revisiting.

10,000 bit piece reverse, angled for more hologram glory.

Items & Objects, Physical Crypto

BitCentimental

December 15, 2014 hephaist0s

There have been a number of one-tenth BTC pieces, but one of the first was the bhCoin “10 bitCent” brass piece in late 2013. I’ve had some series two bhCoins for a while, but only just recently tracked down one of the series one brass coins. It delights me.

The series two coins which came out a few months later are also great, nickel-plated to create a fine silvery shine, though mine did get gently scuffed during the no-doubt-tumultuous journey from Argentina.

Neither series has an especially bold design, but that’s part of their charm. They’re clean, straightforward coins produced by enthusiasts in very limited numbers, only about 100 of each run.

A series one bhCoin 10-bitcent brass piece.

There are pictures of an opened bhCoin series one here.

The folks at bhCoin have since moved on to create a 2-factor coin, and we look forward to their next project.

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All posts by hephaist0s

Mucho Denarium

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Kialara Signature Series

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Silver Wallets rides again

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Ledger HW.1

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KeepKey

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Into the Labyrinth

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Embracing entropy

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Shiny

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Ten thousand bits

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BitCentimental

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