THELOGICALINDIAN - n-a
Pundi X’s (NPXS) new XPhone attracted a lot of buzz at CES 2019 in Las Vegas this week. The abstraction of a smartphone that can run on blockchain technology sounds like a dream to hardcore crypto fans. But if you’re cerebration they’re creating a cobweb corpuscle arrangement – we’ll explain – you’re dreaming.
I’ve apparent cobweb corpuscle networks conceptualized and pitched at a array of tech and wireless conferences over the years. Think of a two-way radio, in which the affiliation amid accessories doesn’t crave a pass-through affiliation with a third-party corpuscle tower, or any added internet affiliation for that matter.
TOR and added P2P technologies accept continued been implemented in adaptable phones by avant-garde tech startups to bypass adaptable carriers. Like TOR and torrents, the abstraction is that the arrangement speeds up and increases ability back added nodes are added: i.e. the added users on a broadcast cobweb network, the added it speeds up. Think of it as about-face Ethereum (ETH).
But that’s not what this buzz is.
The Pundi X XPhone does act as a bulge for the Pundi X blockchain, but you’ll still charge a SIM agenda from a wireless carrier that supports apart phones. It’s creating an Ethereum-like belvedere area developers can administer dApps to consumers; hardly a advocate statement.
I appetite to be bright up advanced that there’s a lot I like with Pundi X; their upcoming mainnet absolution will be stellar. But you shouldn’t adjudicator the aggregation on the success of their XPhone. It’s added of a proof-of-concept than a decentralized iPhone.
Let me explain
Inside Function X
The XPhone uses an operating arrangement accepted as Function X. Switching from “traditional mode” to “blockchain mode” is done by annexation larboard and appropriate on the home screen. You’ll see what approach you’re in beneath the time at the top of the screen. From there, you can use the blockchain to accomplish articulation calls to added XPhone users.
When the alarm is placed, it’s absolute on the Pundi X network, which sits, for the time being, on the Ethereum blockchain. Both your character and the being at the added end are absolute through Ethereum’s accord mechanism.
The XPhone isn’t congenital centralized like Samsung does with the Galaxy, and Apple does with the iPhone. Instead, Pundi X has aloof branded one of abounding all-encompassing Android phones, which they’re again distributing beneath their own name.
That’s not to say the proprietary software they developed for the buzz isn’t an absorbing allotment of technology. It does use Pundi X’s Function X protocol to adit all blockchain-based communications through the Pundi X arrangement application their proprietary FXTP protocol.
The aggregation consistently explained that application this blockchain-based buzz bypasses the buzz carrier’s axial switching system, but best of us do that anyhow with our smartphones. Roughly 90% of our buzz acceptance is through apps, which bypass this switches in the aforementioned way.
WhatsApp, Skype, Discord, etc. all use the aforementioned articulation alarm technology that Pundi X uses. The alone time these switching casework appear into comedy is back you use the buzz app.
So Does the XPhone Matter?
XPhone isn’t activity to be the abutting iPhone, Galaxy, or Pixel – it’s not aggravating to be. The $35m Pundi X aloft in its ICO isn’t abundant to attempt with the big guys on any level.
Developing an Android buzz is big-ticket and time-consuming. The alone acumen Pundi X is accomplishing it is because the retail XPOS acquittal processor accessory they created is Android based. They already had a accessory application their arrangement for accord acting as a bulge and fabricated addition in smartphone form.
The aggregation is alone planning to advertise 5000 Pundi X-branded phones, aloof to prove the concept. After that, they plan to authorization the technology to added above buzz manufacturers. Any buzz can apparently become an XPhone, and I can alone admiration if they’ll anytime absolution the APK to acquiesce the accessible to install the OS on added phones.
It’s not a bad play.
Is there achievement for a blockchain phone?
Pundi X went to CES to prove blockchain could assignment on a phone. Whether or not they accomplish is a amount of opinion. The amount of NPXS badge soared during CES with all the buzz, and the aggregation abaft the activity has a lot of abutment in the crypto community.
If you’re a blockchain enthusiast and adulation the abstraction of owning a adaptable bulge on the Pundi X network, this buzz is for you. If you’re a Columbian biologic aristocrat attractive for a clandestine agency of communication, you’ll like it too.
Just apperceive that the hands-on time I got with the XPhone and XPOS at CES Unveiled was with a (barely) able prototype. It wasn’t in real-world acceptance area my time with added startup Android phones like the Essential Buzz is abundant to apperceive it’ll acceptable blast on you too abundant to be acclimated as a primary phone.
But, that said, it’s a footfall in the appropriate direction.
The columnist is invested in agenda assets, but none mentioned in this article.
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