Creating a “Token-Based Economy” Through Faster Download Speeds?
Following TRON’s acquisition in 2018, the peer-to-peer file sharing company BitTorrent is now taking a further step towards blockchain and cryptocurrencies by integrating its own native cryptocurrency, BitTorrent (BTT), into its widely-used file sharing software.
According to the BTT whitepaper, the new digital token will be a TRON TRC-10 token, meaning it will run on the TRON main net alongside TRON’s native asset, TRX, similar to how Ethereum has numerous digital assets running on its protocol as ERC-20 tokens.
“BitTorrent is introducing a TRON TRC-10 cryptographic token called BitTorrent (BTT) to act as a general-purpose mechanism for transacting in computing resources shared between BitTorrent clients and any other participating service requesters and service providers.
BTT will be the unit which denominates transactions for the provision of different services in the BTT-enabled BitTorrent ecosystem.” – BTT Whitepaper
BitTorrent has been a leading provider of P2P downloadable file sharing clients. Another widely used client is uTorrent, which was bought by BitTorrent Inc. in 2006.
However, something is only valuable if it has demand. Some interesting features are being developed to encourage adoption, one of which is called BitTorrent Speed, giving users the option to earn and trade the BTT token for faster download speeds…
“A new BitTorrent feature called BitTorrent Speed, designed to enable peers to offer each other cryptographic-token-based incentives to continue to seed files after the initial download has completed.
BitTorrent Speed is a feature that will be integrated into future BitTorrent and μTorrent clients and will enable users to advertise their bids within a swarm and trade BTT in exchange for continued prioritized access to seeds. The intended result is that peers will choose to seed for longer, leading to better swarm longevity and faster download speeds for all swarm participants.
Peers will act as both Service Requesters and Service Providers. A peer offering BTT in exchange for other users’ local resources is a service requester and a peer offering such services in exchange for BTT is a service provider.” – BTT Whitepaper, Page 9
The TRON Empire Keeps Growing!
TRON boasts faster transactions and greater capacity than Ethereum. With the number of new applications slowly but surely growing, rival EOS still leads in network activity at the moment. With BTC being 5th and ETH 6th according to Blocktivity, competition will only push each project to perform better if they are to last for the long haul.
TRX receives similar bad press to what XRP, Bitcoin Cash, and Verge receive, whether or not you agree with leader Justin Sun’s approach to leading the TRON Foundation they are making themselves known.
Despite the controversy around TRON, BitTorrent and uTorrent serve millions of users who seek to share files or download the latest movies and games. Marrying digital assets with popular platforms shows us how easily our personal lives can be impacted by cryptocurrencies and can only benefit the cryptocurrency sector overall.
Monero “ACCIDENTLY” Accepted on Fortnite!
Speaking of games and ending on a more comical note, one of the most widely downloaded and played computer games in the gaming industry, Fortnite, developed by Epic Games, accidently supported privacy-driven cryptocurrency Monero (XMR) as a payment option.
Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/Monero/comments/abjfo6/the_official_fortnite_merch_store_is_accepting/
According to tweets by Tim Sweeney of Epic Games, the Fortnite merchandise store added the support of Monero after a miscommunication with a partner!
Source: https://twitter.com/timsweeneyepic?lang=en
No harm was done, and the mistake was quickly patched. This could be a taste of things to come; in the early years of Bitcoin’s existence, gamers and gambling Websites would also use BTC frequently!
This is not investment advice; please always do thorough research and only invest what you are willing to lose, especially in times of uncertainty.