Telegram plans multi-billion dollar ICO for chat cryptocurrency
news.ycombinator.com
I don't understand: Wouldn't Apple just remove their app from the app once they touch payments? Someone will be bitten by compliance, and if Telegram is able to circumvent that then the bucket stops with Apple.
This is what has stopped me from doing payment in my apps until now - you never know when some apple or google employee decides to smash you in the face with the ban hammer.
I suspect that once you get big enough, Apple is reluctant to touch you. Remember, Uber broken Apple's app rules, and were not banned, merely threatened[1]. If Apple removes the app, then who will people blame? The app or Apple? I suspect Telegram might be betting on that.
[1] https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/news/2017/04/24/ubers-ka...
Telegram still concedes to Apple.
You cant join Telegram chats marked as NSFW on iOS devices.
I don't really understand the Apple policy on payments.
How come, for example, they don't demand their cut from Monzo person to person transfers?
Isn’t Apple only seeking a cut of sales of digital goods? You can sell physical merchandise like a real book, but you can’t sell an ebook without cutting them in.
I thought surely you can buy ebooks on the Kindle app for iOS. But a quick search and you are right - nope, you cannot buy books on the Kindle app for iOS. The option just isn't there.
I am a happy user of Telegram but I don't think re-inventing ethereum with a small team of developers is a great idea. But then again, using existing tech gives you fewer opportunities for cash grabs...
Strange decision indeed, they could use one of the existing technologies like Ripple or Stellar.
Integrating cryptocurrency within an easy to use chat environment has added value. Gitlab and Github have chatops, irc had chatops for ages, there were bots for twitter... chatops for payment solutions/providers/oracles is just automation. 'Ok Google, please pay HN 1 Gbyte for the inspiration.'
See for a good example how Byteball is doing this in their Android client, encrypted chat inside their wallet, chat with bots and oracles and chat with other people to send 'MBytes' to their wallet or using e-mail with a 'claim' link. I paid my lunch that way to colleagues (who are now stuck with MBytes to play with). https://medium.com/byteball/sending-cryptocurrency-to-email-...
Kik has their own crypto called Kin
A lot lot lot of crypto projects use Telegram for their official chat lines.
I fail to see why this is valuable in any way. Why would this raise even a million, let alone half a billion?
Telegram has added in client payments a while ago. Their app/bot platform is crazily amazing. Plus a lot of the most popular bots also send out cash to users, which right now works with a rather complicated third party Bitcoin bot, but then could be done internally.
Blockchain, VR, Bitcoin, AI are the buzzwords that bring you $$$. Businesses will throw money at you just for using AI/ML, blockchain, even if these use cases can be solved with a few if/else or fuzzy logic or distributed NoSQL database.
What is preventing every app/service to launch their own crypto currency? It looks like in these times it is in their own interest to launch their own crypto currency than adopting an existing one as they stand to make billions. In that scenario do we say bitcoin and their ilk is failing or succeeding?
This is what I'm afraid of. Just as nearly every mobile game has switched to in-game currencies, other apps will develop their own (crypto)currencies. The benefits to the app owners are numerous, and users always get screwed.
1. The app owners control the denominations in which the currency can be purchased, and they can structure prices to maximize the average user's unused balance.
2. Once the proprietary currency has been purchased, transactions using that currency need not go through the confirmation dialogs required for cash purchases. That removes a chance for users to reconsider and back out.
3. Because of (2), apps can inject dialogs with 'offers' to buy things at points in the workflow where the user expects some other dialog. Users who aren't paying close attention will end up wasting their currency on accidental purchases.
4. The only "real money" transaction is the purchase of the currency, so any protections that consumers might have had with cash purchases in their jurisdiction may not apply when the proprietary currency is used.
5. On top of the usual bank/credit/debit fees, you can expect app currencies with a cash out capability to include additional fees from the app developer.
> What is preventing every app/service to launch their own crypto currency?
Yeah, they will. Cryptocurrency in 2018 is the machine learning of 2017.
Startups will get asked "what is your blockchain strategy" instead of "what is your machine learning strategy".
And that is the problem with cryptocurrencies, everyone and anyone can produce on.
> Nothing is preventing them.
Fear of the SEC is likely preventing plenty of them.
Does WeChat have its own cryptocurrency or do its users just transfer fiat (ie yuan) into it?
As far as I understand Wechat pay is more or less PayPal. So no crypto anything.
With their volume of transactions: no. As another comment said, they act as PayPal (same goes for Ali Express)
Source news.ycombinator.com