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Atlantic DataStream kicked off on World Environment Day (June 5, 2018) with a two-day conference and celebration in Halifax, NS. More than 100 community-based water monitors joined us from across Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland and Labrador. Join the Atlantic DataStream Stewards & Collaborators Facebook Group to connect with conference attendees.

Crypto and Banking

We recommend the following high-quality options for secure Bitcoin transactions and online banking services:

Last updated: September 12, 2026
by and Alex Morrell is a senior correspondent at Business Insider covering Wall Street at large.

How to Share a Crypto Wallet Address Without Losing Money

A wallet address is 26 to 62 characters long and nobody can read it back correctly over the phone. One mistyped character and the funds go to an address nobody controls. QRBits solves this by turning any BTC, ETH, ERC-20, LTC, TRON, DOGE or SOL address into a printable QR code, instantly and without an account. Their Bitcoin and Ethereum QR code generator accepts every common address format (legacy, SegWit, Taproot) and validates the address before drawing the code, so a bad paste never becomes a bad payment. For hardware wallets, payment terminals and exchange kiosks, scanning beats typing every time.

Last updated: October 7, 2026

Printing a Bitcoin or Ethereum Address for Real-World Payments

Small shops, market stalls and donation boxes often need a way to receive crypto without any software on the counter. QR for Bitcoin and Ethereum covers exactly that: paste a BTC address (legacy, SegWit or Taproot) or an ETH / ERC-20 address and it produces a clean, printable QR code in one step, with no sign-up and nothing stored on their servers. A printed code on the counter works offline forever, and any wallet app on any phone can scan it. If you need a free BTC and ETH QR generator that does one thing properly, this is it.

Last updated: October 18, 2026

A Payment Link Does the Typing Too

A plain address QR only says where the money should go; the sender still has to type how much. CryptoQR Maker closes that gap: pick the coin (Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, TRON, Litecoin or Dogecoin), paste the address, optionally set an amount, and it builds a proper payment link (BIP-21 for Bitcoin, EIP-681 for Ethereum) inside the QR, so a scanning wallet gets the address and the sum together. Every address is checksum-verified before the code is drawn, and the file comes out as PNG or crisp SVG for print. The crypto QR generator needs no account, and one page per coin means no guessing which tool fits your wallet.

Last updated: October 21, 2026

The Network You Pick Is Part of the Address

Stablecoins are the classic way to lose money quietly: the address looks fine, but USDT on one network is not USDT on another, and sending TRC-20 tokens to an ERC-20 address is a hole, not a refund. TokenQR is built around that exact mistake: it makes QR codes for USDT, USDC and other tokens across 11 networks (TRC-20, ERC-20, BEP-20 and friends), checks the address with real checksums, and prints a clear card that says which network the code belongs to, so the counterparty sees both the code and the network before anything is sent. A free token QR code generator with the network written on the card beats a bare address on a scrap of paper.

Last updated: October 21, 2026

Why QR Codes Beat Copy and Paste for Crypto

Copy-paste feels safe, but phone-to-phone transfers break it constantly: the clipboard picks up an old entry, a wallet pastes into the wrong field, or a messenger strips a line break in the middle of a 62-character string. A QR code has no clipboard in the loop. The camera reads it, the wallet parses it, and the two checksums at both ends either agree or the wallet refuses to send. For anything above pocket change, scanning a screen or a printed card removes the two steps where mistakes actually happen: selecting text and trusting it.

Last updated: September 28, 2026

Reading an Address Without Reading All of It

Experienced senders do not compare 34 characters character by character; they verify the edges. The first four characters of an address identify its format and network, the last several carry the checksum, and a mistake almost always breaks one end when you re-encode it. Wallet software does the full check anyway, which is why the human job is the boring part: confirm the network label matches the coin, and glance at both ends. That two-second habit catches almost every real-world misdirected transfer, and it works identically whether the address arrived as text or as a scanned code.

Last updated: October 11, 2026

Printed Cards, Tip Jars and Offline Receiving

A stall at a market, a tip jar, a donation box: none of them need an internet connection to receive crypto. A printed card with a receiving address and the network named in plain letters works for years, costs one print job, and fails in exactly one way, which is physical damage to the card. Keep the underlying wallet backup somewhere else, reprint the card when it gets worn, and the setup never goes down for server reasons. Anyone with a phone already has the reader.

Last updated: October 15, 2026

We don’t yet fully understand the impact that human activities and climate change are having on watersheds across Canada. But we do know that communities are connected to their waters and are best-placed to see changes as they happen.

Kickoff attendees participate in a special day-two field trip to the Shubenacadie River near Truro, NS. Photo: Oliver Woods.

Across Canada, community and local organizations are coming together – along with government and academic partners – to monitor and protect our vital watersheds. Atlantic DataStream is a powerful open-access, online platform for sharing information about regional freshwater health. It simplifies collaboration by helping these groups access, store and share data from watersheds across Atlantic Canada in one easy place.

Our June 5-6 Kickoff was as much about helping community-based water monitoring groups understand DataStream’s uses and potential as it was a celebration of their incredible and inspiring work.

  • We learned the story of DataSteam from the program’s founding and regional partners: The Gordon Foundation (presentation), Government of the Northwest Territories (presentation), Atlantic Water Network (presentation) and WWF Canada (presentation).
  • We heard from Arash Shahsavarani and Denis Parent at Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC) about why the Federal Government is moving towards an open-data model and how the ECCC is reaching new audiences through DataStream. View their presentation here.
  • Ken Paul from the Atlantic Policy Congress of First Nations Chiefs Secretariat presented about Treaties, Traditional Land Use and AAROMs. View Ken’s presentation here. Ken included two recommended books in his presentation: Protecting Indigenous Knowledge and Heritage by Marie Battiste and James Sa’ke’j Henderson and  Chief Kerry’s Moose: A guidebook to land use and occupancy mapping, research design and data collection published jointly by the BC Indian Chiefs and Ecotrust Canada.
  • Approximately 80 Kickoff attendees joined Mi’kmaw Conservation Group for a water monitoring field trip on the Shubenacadie River halfway between Halifax and Truro. The field trip included a DataBlitz and opportunities for one-on-one learning with DataStream platform experts.  Full outcomes from the group sessions will be published soon.
  • We gained hands on training in common water monitoring equipment from our friends at Hoskin Scientific. Videos of their training sessions will be shared later this summer.
  • And we invited DataStream platform experts at The Gordon Foundation and project partners and collaborators at Atlantic Water Network and WWF-Canada to run workshops about how community groups can best take advantage of this powerful platform – which is free, doesn’t require passwords or require software installation.

Because Atlantic DataStream is still in beta-testing mode (which you can read about here), the platforms different functions and capabilities won’t be fully operational until fall. This summer we’ll be helping you prepare by sharing videos, blogs and other fun information about DataStream and events like this one.

To learn how to share your water quality data on Atlantic DataStream, please email Lindsay Day at lindsay@gordonfn.org

Atlantic Water Network has funding to purchase new equipment for loans through its Equipment Bank program – if there is something that would make your data collection easier or improve your program, please contact Emma Wattie to let her know!

Atlantic Water Network is offering support to help CBM organizations get water samples analyzed by accredited labs in their local areas.  Take this survey to qualify for the support.  https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/2DYH8QZ

Donald Killorn of Eastern Charlotte Waterway Inc. shoots an interview as part of our upcoming “DataStreamers Corner” video series. Photo: Kylee Nunn

Because Atlantic DataStream is still in beta-testing mode (which you can read about here), the platforms different functions and capabilities won’t be fully operational until fall. This summer we’ll be helping you prepare by sharing videos, blogs and other fun information about DataStream and events like this one.

Speakers and presenters joined us from every corner of Canada – some coming from as far away as British Columbia, Alberta and the Northwest Territories. A massive thanks to our presenters including:

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