Nothing. The week of 4/20 was upon us and there had been no significant changes. The price had essentially stayed around 450 satoshis with only small dips into the high 300s and crests in the low 500s, all easily explained by dueling scalpbots. Unimpressed, I turned to reddit and BitcoinTalk to see if there were still rumors of a 4/20 pump. And then I saw the post. A group calling themselves the CannabisCoin Cooperative had posted an announcement of their intention to "rehabilitate the CannabisCoin blockchain! " and linked back to a Wordpress blog they had set up. There was a brief description of their organization and intentions as well as a link to their Slack where they organize their efforts. They were also careful to mention that they in no way represent the creators of CANN. Curious. The only other item was the mention of a coming "Road Map to Recovery" to be released on, you guessed it...4/20. Curiouser and curiouser.
My cynical side informed me that this was clearly a shameless attempt to drive prices up in anticipation of their "Road Map" and that I was now witnessing the start of the p&d. Another part of me was wondering about the contents of that Slack. So I joined. At first it seemed empty, the last response over an hour old, but after poking around a bit I noticed a chat happening on the general channel about the need for more hashing power in order to get the network running smoothly. Apparently all but one of the mining pools have dried up and they were trying to construct their own. Over the next couple of days I watched a few people trickle in, some curious and others hoping to sharpen burgeoning blockchain skills on this unusual project. I also noticed a distinct lack of a price increase.
If this was a pump and dump...it wasn't working out well. Volume spiked a few times during this period but the price stayed within its normal range. Right up until the day of the Road Map to Recovery release. At ,yup, 4:20pm (est) the blog displayed the Road Map and when I checked the price of CANN it was...down. I wasn't sure what to make of this until I noticed the price was fixed at exactly 420 satoshis. And it stayed that way with nearly half a million CANN forming the great 420 sell wall. It also appeared that someone was actively managing the price and selling down any attempts to raise it. I could find no coordination of this manipulation on the CannabisCoin Cooperative Slack but their members definitely noticed it. When I woke up the next morning I noticed that the price has risen back to it's usual 450 range with no sign of the 420 wall. Curiouser and Curiouser and Curiouser.
I have no idea what to make of all this but I do know that they are still working on restoring the blockchain, now believing a missing CLI and a non-working daemon are to blame for the wonky nature of the blockchain. There is talk of reviving the Android wallet to make it easier for patrons to use the currency as intended as well as discussions of third party applications built on top of the CANN chain. I suppose only time will reveal if this "cooperative" can restore this abandoned blockchain to any use but I have to admit that I am now fascinated by the mere effort. I will be watching this one unfold. I've included a link below to the Cooperative's Wordpress page in case anyone is curious to see for themselves.
