The Kodak KashMiner was a

Bitcoin Bitcoin ( abbreviation: BTC; sign: ₿) is a decentralized digital currency that can be transferred on the peer-to-peer bitcoin network. Bitcoin transactions are verified by network nodes through cryptography and recorded in a public distr ...

mining computer that was displayed at

Kodak The Eastman Kodak Company (referred to simply as Kodak ) is an American public company that produces various products related to its historic basis in analogue photography. The company is headquartered in Rochester, New York, and is incorpor ...

's booth at the

Consumer Electronics Show CES (; formerly an initialism for Consumer Electronics Show) is an annual trade show organized by the Consumer Technology Association (CTA). Held in January at the Las Vegas Convention Center in Winchester, Nevada, United States, the event typi ...

in January 2018. It was promoted by Spotlite USA, who had previously licensed the Kodak name for Kodak-branded

LED A light-emitting diode (LED) is a semiconductor Electronics, device that Light#Light sources, emits light when Electric current, current flows through it. Electrons in the semiconductor recombine with electron holes, releasing energy i ...

lighting. The initiative was not endorsed by Eastman Kodak. The plan was that for an up-front fee of around $3,400, customers could rent a KashMiner — apparently a rebranded

Bitmain Bitmain Technologies Ltd., is a privately owned company headquartered in Beijing, China, that designs application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) chips for bitcoin mining. History It was founded by Micree Zhan and Jihan Wu in 2013. Prior to ...

AntMiner S9 — for two years, and keep a cut of any Bitcoins generated. The devices would be housed at Kodak's offices in

Rochester, New York Rochester () is a City (New York), city in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York, the county seat, seat of Monroe County, New York, Monroe County, and the fourth-most populous in the state after New York City, Buffalo, New York, Buffalo, ...

, and use surplus power from Kodak's in-house power plant. The scheme was widely criticized, and branded a "scam." The brochure handed out at the show promised $375 per month payout every month for two years — a payout that would have been impossible with the ever-rising Bitcoin hash rate. A Kodak representative at CES said that the stated rates were "preliminary." The "Kodak" branding was present on the miner at CES on Tuesday 9 January, but by Thursday 11 January the "Kodak" label had been removed and replaced with "Spotlite Digital Assets" branding. BBC News "Tech Tent" declared the Kodak KashMiner and the (unrelated)

KODAKCoin KodakCoin (stylized KODAKCoin) was a photographer-oriented blockchain cryptocurrency that was planned for payments for licensing photographs; however, the project has failed and been shut down. The cryptocurrency was being developed under a br ...

plan "Worst Idea" of CES 2018. In July 2018, Spotlite USA CEO Halston Mikail said that the U.S.

Securities and Exchange Commission The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government, created in the aftermath of the Wall Street Crash of 1929. The primary purpose of the SEC is to enforce the law against market ...

had put an end to the scheme. Kodak stated that the KashMiner had never been a Kodak-licensed product, and no miners had been installed at their headquarters. The "Kodak HashPower" website had never been finished, with

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placeholder text still present on the "Terms and Conditions" and "Privacy Policy" pages in July.

References

External links

* kodakhashpower.com, {{Bitcoin Kodak Bitcoin