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Smart contracts -
A Smart Contract is a type of computer program that usually underpins the transfer of digital
assets from one party to another. The “terms” of the agreement between the two parties is
stored on the blockchain, and therefore can be easily tracked but once set, cannot be
altered. This means that both parties must be in agreement to the terms of the Smart
Contracts, just as traditional contracts. Smart Contract framework can also be used to assist
negotiations digitally and verify any terms already set.
Similar to traditional contracts, a Smart Contract is a digital agreement between two parties.
However, due to the “Smart” aspect, the specific terms to facilitate the contract, are stored
on a blockchain, and hence, do not require the presence of a third party to intervene.
Smart contracts have significant advantages both practically and legally. Due to their direct
and unambiguous nature, there are huge financial savings on legal fees. There is also an
increased level of security and savings on time.
There have been various uses of Smart contracts, for example, in banking and insurance,
where assets are transferred after certain pre-set terms have been met. The most popular
Smart Contract platform is via the Ethereum blockchain. Smart Contracts are also present
within the EOS and TRON’ blockchains. Whilst the Bitcoin blockchain does support Smart
Contracts, is it much less popular due to the limited nature compared to Ethereum-based
contracts.
Smart Contracts
1. Ethereum (ETH):
Ethereum is a global, open-source platform for decentralized applications. On Ethereum, you
can write code that controls digital value, runs exactly as programmed, and is accessible
anywhere in the world. Vitalik Buterin is the creator of Ethereum.
2. Cardano (ADA):
Cardano is a decentralized public blockchain and cryptocurrency project and is fully open
source. Cardano is developing a smart contract platform that seeks to deliver more
advanced features than any protocol previously developed. It is the first blockchain platform
to evolve out of a scientific philosophy and a research-first driven approach. The
development team consists of a large global collective of expert engineers and researchers.
3. Polkadot (DOT):
Polkadot development is on track to deliver the most robust platform for security, scalability,
and innovation. Currently, Polkadot is in the Governance and Removing Sudo phase of
launch.
Polkadot Features:
True interoperability – Polkadot enables cross-blockchain transfers of any type of data or
asset, not just tokens. Connecting to Polkadot gives you the ability to interoperate with a
wide variety of blockchains in the Polkadot network.
Economic & transactional scalability – Polkadot provides unprecedented economic
scalability by enabling a common set of validators to secure multiple blockchains. Polkadot
provides transactional scalability by spreading transactions across multiple parallel
blockchains.
Easy blockchain innovation – Create a custom blockchain in minutes using the Substrate
framework. Connect your chain to Polkadot and get interoperability and security from day
one. This ease of development helps Polkadot’s network grow.
Forkless and future-proof – Polkadot can upgrade without hard forks to integrate new
features or fix bugs. This capability enables Polkadot to easily adapt to changes and
upgrade itself as better technologies become available.
Security for everyone – Polkadot’s novel data availability and validity scheme allows chains
to interact with each other in a meaningful way. Chains remain independent in their
governance, but united in their security.
User-driven network governance – Polkadot has a sophisticated governance system
where all stakeholders have a voice. Upgrades to the network are coordinated on-chain and
enacted autonomously, ensuring that Polkadot’s development reflects the values of the
community and avoids stagnation.
4. Algorand (ALGO):
Algorand removes the technical barriers that for years undermined mainstream blockchain
adoption: decentralization, scale, and security. Now you can build on a stable platform you
trust.
5. Internet Computer (ICP):
The Internet Computer is a seamless shared universe for reimagined software that’s secure
and unstoppable, that can power a new generation of enterprise systems and internet
services. It’s created by independent data centers running the ICP protocol.
The ICP utility token (formerly known as “DFN”) is the primary mechanism that allows the
broader internet community to participate in the governance of the Internet Computer
network. ICP can also be dissolved and converted into cycles, which are then used to run
websites and applications as well as power computations on the Internet Computer via
canisters.
The project was founded in October 2016 by Dominic Williams, and attracted notable
interest from the crypto community. DFINITY raised a total of $121 million from contributors
such as Andreessen Horowitz, Polychain Capital, SV Angel, Aspect Ventures, Electric
Capital, ZeroEx, Scalar Capital, and Multicoin Capital, and several notable early Ethereum
supporters.
6. Stellar (XLM):
Stellar is a multi-currency payment backend that tens of thousands of people use every day.
It’s decentralized, open-source, and developer-friendly, so anyone can issue assets, settle
payments, and trade. Stellar is a blockchain, but it works more like cash—Stellar is much
faster and cheaper than bitcoin, for example. And it uses far less electricity.
The lumen, often abbreviated XLM, is the protocol token of the Stellar network. One hundred
billion lumens were created the instant Stellar went live, as part of the protocol’s design.
These tokens play a unique role in the network’s operation.
What do lumens do?
Anyone that wants to hold or move money on Stellar must also hold lumens. Per the
protocol, every account must set aside a small increment of lumens for each type of asset it
holds. Similarly, an account must reserve lumens for each open offer against its assets. The
total holdback for a typical account is low—a few XLM.
Stellar also imposes a very small fee for each transaction, and that fee can only be paid in
lumens. The median fee on the network right now is 0.00001 XLM—about a millionth of a US
dollar.
Why does the network require lumens?
Spam deterrence – Lumen reserve requirements and transaction fees are there to minimize
ledger spam. They make it unprofitable to, say, spin up thousands of fake accounts or
attempt millions of pointless transactions. You often hear that Stellar helps money move like
email, but spam is one part of the analogy we don’t want to live up to.
Liquidity – Stellar was built for cross-currency payments: you can send USD and your friend
will receive MEX, with the USD<>MEX exchange happening automatically through the
Stellar order books. Sometimes this exchange requires an intermediate asset—also called a
bridge asset—to get the best price. XLM’s role in Stellar’s markets is similar to USD’s role in
traditional forex markets. Especially for thinly-traded currencies, XLM provides liquidity.
7. Cosmos (ATOM):
Cosmos is a blockchain ecosystem where thousands of dApps interoperate to create the
foundation for a new token economy. Cosmos is a decentralized network of independent
parallel blockchains, each powered by BFT consensus algorithms like Tendermint
consensus.
8. VeChain (VET):
VeChain is an enterprise-focused blockchain ecosystem that aims to enhance supply chain
management by connecting blockchain technology with the real world through ‘a
comprehensive governance structure, a robust economic model, and advanced IoT
integration’. VeChain enables manufacturers to assign products with unique identifiers on
the platform, thereby allowing participants to track the movement and provenance of
products in a supply chain.
9. Ethereum Classic (ETC):
A continuation of the original Ethereum blockchain – the classic version preserving
untampered history prior to the July 2016 DAO hack.
10. TRON (TRX):
TRON is one of the largest blockchain-based operating systems. It offers high-scalability,
high-availability, high-throughput, and the lowest cost support for all decentralized
applications in the TRON ecosystem. With the advantage of the DPoS consensus algorithm,
TRON brings unlimited possibilities to the TRON ecosystem via achieving high throughput
by improving TPS to the highest among the mainstream public chains. TRON provides an
innovative, pluggable smart contract platform to improve
compatibility with Ethereum smart contracts. TRON further expends the usage scenarios
with its highly modularized development framework, empowers the customized
development. In the era of the Great Voyage, the TRON ecosystem will start the era of
cross-chain with its brand new cross-chain protocol TICP, one chain can communicate with
any other chain which implements TICP.
In July 2018, TRON acquired BitTorrent Inc., an internet technology company based in San
Francisco. The distributed technologies designed by BitTorrent can scale efficiently, keep
intelligence at the edge, and keep creators and consumers in control of their content and
data. More than 170 million people use BitTorrent products every month. The BitTorrent
protocol delivers 40% of the world’s Internet traffic every day.
On January 17–18, 2019, niTROn Summit 2019 hosted by TRON ended successfully at the
Yerba Buena Art Center in San Francisco, USA. NBA superstar Kobe Bryant was invited as
a special guest at the summit to talk with Justin and share his vision on entrepreneurship.
niTROn 2019 was a successful summit which gathered the most influential network
resources in the blockchain industry.
Kobe Bryant, CEO and President of Kobe Inc and NBA legend, will be attending #TRON’s
first international conference in San Francisco as a Special Guest
On October 9, 2019, Justin Sun was invited to attend Samsung Developer Conference; On
October 30, TRON established partnership with Samsung; In May 2020, TRON was listed on
Samsung Galaxy Store.
On October 22, 2019, TRON wallet was added to both web and mobile versions of Opera
browser. Following the cooperation, the 350 million Opera users can receive and transfer
TRX directly in Opera.
On February 14, 2020, the decentralized social platform Steemit entered into a strategic
partnership with TRON, marking its integration with the TRON ecosystem.
As of December 15, 2020 (HKT), statistics from TRONSCAN show that the number of
TRC20-USDT in circulation reached 6.5 billion. The number of TRON users by MainNet
accounts exceeded 17 million, which is 7 times that of EOS. As of December 15, 2020
(HKT), the daily number of new accounts on TRON had grown dozens of times higher from
3,000 to 80,000-100,000, projecting an annual growth rate of four to five fold. The block
height on TRON exceeded 25 million, and the total number of transactions on TRON
exceeded 1.39 billion. The block height of TRON DappChain exceeded 12.5 million, with a
total of over 25.6 million transactions and a daily circulation of over 5 million TRX. The
TRON ecosystem recorded a total of 1,064 DApps.
