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Polkadot Developer Robert Habermeier Wins Prestigious Thiel Fellowship

Polkadot developer robert habermeier wins prestigious thiel fellowship

Polkadot Developer Robert Habermeier Wins Prestigious Thiel Fellowship


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Polkadot developer Robert Habermeier has become the latest cryptocurrency developer to win a prestigious fellowship from the Thiel Foundation, which was founded by PayPal co-founder and bitcoin bull Peter Thiel.

Every year, the Thiel Foundation 20 to 25 entrepreneurs under the age of 23 and awards them $100,000 over a two-year period. The foundation encourages its fellows to drop out of school and pursue their passion, providing guidance and support along the way. Allyson Dias, director of the Thiel Fellowship, said, “College isn’t for everyone, and it certainly isn’t for everyone fresh out of high school. Young people learn best by doing things in the real world.”

This year, out of the 20 selected, four are working with blockchain — Aparna Krishnan, Axel Ericsson, Daniel Ternyak, and Robert Habermeier. A notable former recipient in the blockchain industry is Vitalik Buterin, co-creator of Ethereum. The companies built under the foundation’s tutelage are reportedly worth $3 billion — a value which excludes the most valuable of them all, Ethereum, with a market cap of about $50 billion, as of June 22.

Dias believes Habermeier is essential for the future of cryptocurrencies, and so is the project he’s a part of — Polkadot, a Parity project. The team is developing a heterogenous multi-chain technology which hopes to solve issues currently plaguing blockchains, such as security, scalability, and interoperability. This network will unite the several tokens, smart contracts — or any application, — allowing for a free-flowing communication between other blockchains.

Parity Substrate seems to be the foundation for the Polkadot project. Habermeier explained in a video the framework can be used to write any sort of blockchain, due to Parity’s earned experience working with different clients. This framework promises to help users to build new blockchains easier and more intuitively.

The Executive Chairman of the Thiel Fellowship, Jack Abraham, said, “The environment for entrepreneurs is the best it’s ever been. This year’s class proves that there’s still a hunger for individuals seeking unconventional approaches.”

Krishnan is the CEO and co-founder of Mechanism Labs, an open source research lab — allegedly the first in the world. His project is using crypto economics to address several issues with blockchains, namely alternative consensus and incentive design.

Ericsson comes from Stockholm, Sweden, and he’s the founder of Vest. The company is working on a software meant for Ethereum and similar blockchains which will allow users to earn interest on their cryptocurrencies.

Finally, Ternyak is representing MyCrypto, where he operates as the CTO. His company is reportedly bringing accessibility to blockchains in an effort to increase adoption of a decentralized society.

Featured image from Flickr/Heisenberg Media

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Polkadot developer robert habermeier wins prestigious thiel fellowship

Published at Sun, 24 Jun 2018 19:55:41 +0000

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Dashing Forward – BANKEX Develops World’s First Working Plasma-like Protocol Bringing Vitalik Buterin’s Idea to Life

The BANKEX technical team has recently announced they have developed the world’s first private blockchain that supports the Plasma Protocol for public audit which will allow users to transfer different assets directly to each other leaving intermediaries behind and solving one of the most pressing problems of the current crypto world – high gas consumption. The Plasma-like protocol open source code is already available here.

[Note: This is a sponsored article.]


Inspired by the Plasma project’s working draft written by Vitalik Buterin and Joseph Poon, the BANKEX team has successfully completed the development of the first working version of the protocol after successfully developing its demo during a 36-hour hackathon. The protocol can sufficiently reduce the load of the main Ethereum blockchain by redirecting transactions into a subsidiary blockchain, thus creating faster and cheaper transactions.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JbjIe_PbrM4?feature=oembed&w=500&h=281]

Low transaction speed is not the only problem Ethereum users are currently facing. In order to keep track of the transaction history, users are forced to retain copies of the entire blockchain with full transaction history and calculations. As the blockchain grows, the amount of available space needed is causing a lot of grief for its users.

Tackling these problems, BANKEX has released a Proof-of-Concept in the form of a Plasma-like protocol, a solution that is compatible with the Ethereum blockchain. BANKEX strongly believes that the Plasma protocol is “a prominent upgrade of the Ethereum blockchain”, calling it “bitcoin in Ethereum”  Find out more information about BANKEX’s solution here.

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BANKEX has developed a server-side solution comprised of an operator and a smart contract that facilitates the return of input funds which have not been included by the operator into the Plasma-blocks and also allows UTXO withdrawal from the Plasma sidechain to the main network. The functionality of the BANKEX solution also includes proof of double spend and proof of ownership that prevents duplicate transactions.

As more transactions demand decentralization, openness, and higher processing speeds, the BANKEX breakthrough is a long overdue evolution that everyone has been waiting for.

What do you think of BANKEX’s new protocol? Will it speed up and reduce the cost of transactions on the Ethereum blockchain? Let us know in the comments below.


Images courtesy of BANKEX

The post Dashing Forward – BANKEX Develops World’s First Working Plasma-like Protocol Bringing Vitalik Buterin’s Idea to Life appeared first on Bitcoinist.com.