Interview to Anton Rosenberg about TON and the new cryptocurrency Gram
Open Gram Italia
Without mining and decentralization
- Can you tell us about the new technology of Pavel Durov in simple words?
- So far, only advertising materials are known about the technologies that the TON platform wants to create. But they are also in Russian: both the commercial and the translation of white paper for investors (in the context of crypto currency, white paper is an open-access document in which the creators of the project explain their goals and objectives, and justify why it will be successful.) - RT ). Unfortunately, it's not so easy to tell even about what the already existing crypto-currencies like bitcoin are. Those who have already figured it out will be easier.
Pavel Durov promises to create his own crypto currency, but with fast and convenient translation capabilities. The price of speed will be incomplete decentralization. The processing will be handled by dedicated nodes belonging to either Telegram or to large investors. (Noda is a node in a blocking system, in fact it is a separate computer that processes transactions.In decentralized crypto-currencies, like bitcoin, anybody with a computer and a special software installed on it can become a node.With a node, that is part of the network, a person helps to process transactions, receiving for this a reward in the form of the same crypto currency .This is the process of mining.- RT. )
It will not be able to crawl, inflation will be put into the system (depreciation of "grams" on users' wallets) at the level of about 2% per annum, the issued ("pre-printed") funds will be distributed among owners of large nodes to compensate their costs.
But about the possibility and ease of input and output of "grams", that is, their purchase and sale for fiat (real) money, as well as generally legality of this in the future, so far nothing is known. A number of other, ancillary services were also announced, so that it could be said about the platform, but they will be less interesting to ordinary users.
- Did you know about the plans to create a crypto currency for a messenger when you worked at Telegram? Was this discussed?
- No, while I was working for Telegram, until April 2017, there were no plans related to ICO (Initial Coin Offering, or the primary location of tokens, the release of the project of tokens, that is, the crypto currency, which in the future will be able to pay for the services of this site . -RT ), blocking, crypto-currencies. No one even discussed them. If I learned about some plans in the process of work, I would not publish it, it's unethical.
So I'm sure the idea arose in Pavel Durov in the summer and autumn, when the courses of the crypto-currencies rushed up, and the ICO topic became very popular.
- What do you think about this?
- It so happened that I accidentally found a video with the advertisement of TON and was the first to tell about the plans of ICO . Basically, there I wrote the main thing that I thought and thought about the project. Since then I managed to talk with dozens of investors, to study the original white paper, but basically nothing has changed. It is necessary to divide the stage of the ICO and everything that will (or will not) later.
"Telegram depends on the authorities of the EU and the US"
- How can such a system work in Russia, if at the legislative level there is still no understanding of the regulation of these processes?
- Previously, Pavel Durov complied with the laws of the Russian Federation, then we saw a court with the FSB in October, after which he began to look for lawyers to study the legal status of the messenger. In summer Durov flew to negotiate with the Indonesian authorities, and now Telegram is blocked in Iran due to refusal to block one of the channels on their territory. If all this is not worth something more, then Paul just in each case decides that it is more profitable here and now, that is, the laws are not very worried.
Then everything will depend on what laws in Russia will have time to take and how significant the popularity of the new crypto currency will be for users. Approximately this is the case with existing crypto-currencies, such as bitcoin or "ether" (Ethereum crypto currency, created by Russian- born Vitalik Buterin -RT ).
But, unlike them, Telegram is easier to block - it is not decentralized and almost completely depends on the App Store and Google Play. And, of course, even more - from the authorities of the EU and the US, since there are major data centers.
- Is it likely that the transfers will be made in the usual currency?
- To collect a lot of money for the ICO, you have to promise a lot. Pavel Durov needs to create a new crypto currency, and a fundamentally new one. While no one was able to achieve simultaneously all of the declared characteristics.
Unfortunately, the decentralization of crypto currency is poorly combined with the speed of transaction confirmation and performance, that is, the number of transactions that can be processed per unit of time.
In advertising, TON promise to revolutionize all parameters at once, but no technical documentation has been published so far.
If all this can be done and implemented (and at the same time to keep within the legal framework), then Telegram will have services for transferring fiat money through conversion to "grams" and back, but third-party developers can create them.
- In your opinion, Pavel Durov will look for investors himself?
- Pavel Durov is friends with a number of Russian oligarchs, but he does not like investors, because in the classical schemes, when investing money in the project, people expect some kind of control, at least of observation, want transparency and reports, plans and budget. And Telegram does not have anything.
Strictly speaking, therefore ICO is almost the only way to attract money for the project, as it does not imply any responsibility, except for the promise to issue tokens.
As far as I know, several intermediaries are helping to collect money for ICO Paul, each of whom is looking for investors and convinces them to invest.
- Can you guess who will become an investor?
- I suppose that several people can be such intermediaries, and investors, most likely, are, first of all, large investment funds, which can allocate a small percentage of funds for high-risk investments. However, intermediaries also come to large private investors, offering to make money through them.
On the other hand, since there is still no official information about the ICO, and there is interest, many investors, medium and even large investment funds, write to me in search of contacts.
Among them there are private investment funds, as well as people engaged in crypto-currencies and have made money on this recently.
For example, Chinese investors, as they have large exchanges and miners in their country, and ICO was banned. But, as far as I heard, money is accepted only in the form of classical currencies, primarily in dollars.
- What platform Durov took as a basis? WeChat?
- When creating Telegram as the basis was taken WhatsApp, it was a tough requirement to work faster and more stable on bad connections. But WeChat is, rather, a common example of a platform where payments, games and other services are integrated.
And as a basis for TON, rather, the etherium and other projects based on block-technologies, like distributed file systems, appeared.
Due to the specifics of decentralization, the main ones are the protocol and the reference implementation, and all this is usually laid out in the form of open source codes. So you can see what others have done, repeat and use their solutions.
- How it can be developed further, to what all moves?
- To begin with, you should try to create everything that has already been promised within the ICO and white paper. While in Telegram from this there is nothing, and the terms are stated in four years, and during this time everything can change. I do not think that it makes sense to guess what will happen next.
At least when we worked on VKontakte, Pavel Durov was always outraged by investors who asked for development plans for more than a year. If it was not about building datacenters, of course.
And he said that for a longer period to plan something in such a dynamic industry as IT, there is no sense. In Telegram, too, they did not make far-reaching plans.
"It will be interesting exactly"
- Can Telegram become a competitor of Visa and Mastercard?
- It's not so much about creating an analogue of traditional payment systems, but about creating a new crypto currency. If the claimed can be implemented technically, the next task will be to convince all users of the messenger to start using it. Pavel Durov in 2010 already tried to make his own currency, "rubles VKontakte", but then her popularity did not exceed the level of 1%.
If this task can be solved, the new currency will have to compete with other crypto-currencies, such as bitcoin and "ether."
However, unlike them, Telegram is not decentralized and depends on the authorities, first of all, the EU and the USA. And I think that none of the states will want to see a competitor to their central bank.
By the way, after the publication of the first information on the TON project, Iran has managed to block Telegram, and it is not yet known whether it will be unlocked. And this is the largest audience of the messenger. Visa and Mastercard there, however, still do not work.
To capture a new market, you often need to do something at first small, inconspicuous. And when larger players pay attention, it will be too late. So the Internet has defeated television, so we did "VKontakte" in our time, although there were already Internet giants like "Yandex", Mail.ru, "Rambler".
But here Pavel Durov already attracts a lot of attention to this ICO, although the product will appear only in a few years.
This is the reverse side of the ICO. Therefore, I propose to wait and see what will happen in the end. It will be interesting exactly.
- Does Telegram have the power to create user-friendly interfaces that are intuitively understood by millions of users?
- To create interfaces, not power, but good designers are needed, and the number of users here is not important. But in the case of a block-project, this is not the main thing. The main tasks will be in the development of decentralized protocols, the development and construction of many large nodes (such are the features of the proof-of-stake consensus protocol) and ensuring the security of all this.
The published documents listed the bulk of the Telegram team (more precisely, my former colleagues at Telegraf LLC - we all worked there). Guys fellows, but everyone is completely engaged in the development of the messenger, and time is not enough. So, for example, Paul promised to solve the problem (the limit of one million messages for each user - RT ) until the end of 2017.
To do this, Nikolai Durov had to rewrite the text-index, but the time had elapsed, and the task was never completed.
Therefore, to develop TON, you will have to either redesign developers to C / C ++ (but there are only five of them, and they are already occupied), or to recruit a team for a new project from scratch. But Pavel Durov in this issue over the years is becoming more conservative and takes to work almost exclusively those with whom he worked in VKontakte. It's easy to see even on white paper: only one of the employees listed there did not work in VKontakte, although it was selected based on the results of a contest for the development of a photo editor for VC.
However, this personnel resource is almost completely exhausted, and I myself with great interest are waiting for information about who will really do TON.
- Will there be a demand for the Gram? And will Telegram collect money for ICO?
"It's too early to speak about the demand for" grams ", as it seems to me. As for the ICO, there is no declared hard cap (the maximum amount of funds that will be collected in the process of croweding - RT ). The price of tokens grows exponentially, albeit with a very small basis, so this is done, rather, to create a psychological sense of excitement.
Sell will be as much as they will buy.
But at a closed sale before the ICO, I think, will collect hundreds of millions. So the current ICO market is arranged. Young investors invest money, focusing on names and not particularly interested in even the product itself. They hope to make money by speculating tokens after they enter the exchange. I hope they even look attentively at the term of freezing, some sources say even about 2.5 years. In the end, during this time can pass laws governing the ICO.
- Is it worth it, in your opinion, to invest in the crypto currency?
- Crypto-currencies now refer to high-risk assets with high volatility and uncertain legal status, and the price for most of them is determined primarily by speculative and rush demand. In addition, they are not sold in the exchangers, when buying there is a risk of remaining without money.
So I advise first of all to understand that the crypto-currencies are of themselves, and not to try to invest there all the savings in the hope of getting rich. Only what you are morally ready to lose.
In the end, you can forget or lose the password from your wallet - and then no one can help you.
Those who still want to take risks, but are not ready to become a professional trader, it is worth paying attention to the most popular crypto-currencies. Everything else is either considered as a lottery ticket, or go deep into the question, study forums, follow the news and constantly monitor the price.
Source: https://ria.ru/economy/20180109/1512293952.html
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