What's going on: IOTA is the hottest cryptocurrency right now and conquered fourth place in terms of market capitalization on coinmarketcap.com. But why is it mooning and what's so special about it?
IOTA is a third generation crypto, basically the next evolutionary step after Bitcoin and Ethereum. It's an open-source distributed ledger (like Bitcoin or Ethereum), but does not use a blockchain. Instead the technological backbone is a quantum-proof protocol called Tangle, that enables features, that most of the other cryptos have yet to deliver, like: zero fees, infinite scalability, fast transactions and secure data transfer.
It's run by a Linux Foundation-like non-profit called IOTA Foundation based in Berlin, that is dedicated to developing the technology and maintaining it license-free for everyone interested in using it. IOTA is focused on serving as the backbone of the Internet-of-Things (IoT), which means that one day connected devices of all sorts (from coffee machines to self driving cars) should be able to automatically transfer, buy and sell diverse datasets while creating access to data that often sits unused, while maintaining high security.
IOTA is pre-mined and doesn't need dedicated miners to issue new coins or validate transactions and therefore doesn't need as much energy as for example Bitcoin mining. But it also uses a proof of work-concept that is comparable to Hashcash to prevent spamming the network. Unlike cryptos that use a blockchain, where miners try to beat each other in adding new blocks, IOTA's Tangle fuses “miners” and “users”. That means that the block rewards paid to miners will eventually mostly consist of users’ transaction fees, which adds up to a zero-sum game.
Why should I care: IOTA is one of the most interesting cryptos out there, with a genius concept behind it. It's technology is still making baby steps, so the main reason behind it's mooning are some big collaborations with really big companies. Recently the foundation behing it opened a data marketplace with Deutsche Telekom, Fujitsu, Microsoft and Samsung. Plus they are a founding member of the IOT Alliance, that also includes companies like Bosch, Consensys, USbank and Cisco.
So if you are looking for a crypto with strong ties to established big players and a really interesting real world application, then IOTA is the one to definitely keep an eye on.
Source: iotasupport.com, thenextweb.com
GIF: giphy.com
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