Before the financial collapse and the resurgence of bartering, another kind of trade made the news. In 2006, a Canadian man named Kyle MacDonald garnered international attention after he successfully bartered a single red paperclip all the way until he obtained a house. The barter took almost a full year and 14 trades. He traded his red paperclip for a pen that looks like a fish. The fish pen traded for a handmade door knob which was then traded for a camp stove. The camp stove was traded for a 100-watt generator which was then traded for an empty keg and an illuminated Budweiser beer sign. Those items were traded for a snowmobile; the snowmobile was traded all the way up for an afternoon with rock star Alice cooper, a KISS snow globe and then a paid role in a Corbin Bernsen movie. Finally, the town of Kipling, Canada offered MacDonald a farmhouse for the movie role.
When film and television writers went on strike from November 5, 2007 to February 12, 2008, Kal was playing Dr. Lawrence Kutner on the television show, House M.D. The writer's strike meant that production on the show came to a halt until a resolution was achieved. During the strike, Kal campaigned for Obama, serving on the campaign's arts policy committee. After the election, Kal took a job as the associate director in the White House Office of Public Engagement. In order to take the job at the White House, Kal's character of Dr. Lawrence Kutner was killed off in the show.
James Howells isn't the only person who has made headlines for losing a bitcoin key. He's also not the only person who wants to pursue a creative solution for finding it. Master hypnotist, James Miller from North Carolina, was featured in the Wall Street Journal for offering to help people recall their forgotten bitcoin passwords through hypnosis. Miller used to charge 1 bitcoin plus 5 percent of the recovered amount. However, he recently reduced is compensation to half a bitcoin plus 5 percent of the recovered amount.
The word Kal probably wants to use is "currency." Governments across the globe are scrambling to figure out how to "govern" cryptocurrencies. In April of 2018, Japan declared bitcoin to be legal tender. In June of 2018, the U.S. government made federal workers declare cryptocurrency holdings. Switzerland has also declared bitcoin to be legal tender.
Before filming in San Francisco, production reached out to the Fort Funston Shiba Inu Walk Facebook group and asked if some of the shiba inu members would like to participate in the show. To get the perfect framing for the scene, production purchased the two chairs Kal and Jackson are sitting in about 20 minutes before the shoot took place.