Arionum the PHP Cryptocurrency
Cryptocurrency, blockchain, altcoin, hashrate, nonce, shares. These are all words to which, up until recently I was clueless. Over my year-end break from work I had one of those lazy, boring nights with nothing better to do than scroll through my news feed and play games on my phone. Somehow or another I ended up reading a few articles on Bitcoin and the crazy run it had made during December. So, with nothing better to do I decided to give trading a shot. Within minutes I had a coinbase account and Binance account ready to trade, I was hooked.
Over the next few weeks I traded here and there and started to read more and more about the 1000s of altcoins coming to market, many with good ideas, and many others that screamed scam. That's when I stumbled across an interesting project on a Cryptocurrency forum, a PHP based Cryptocurrency only minable by CPUs called Arionum. So what makes Arionum a good project? Let's take a look.
---PHP built from the ground up---
So what is PHP and why does it matter that Arionum is built from the ground up in PHP? To be honest when I first read about the project I had no idea what PHP was or who used it so, I did a little research.
It turns out it's a pretty widely used scripting language that has been around for quite some time (23 years). PHP is used very frequently in web development and is used by some of the biggest players in the game. Facebook, Yahoo, and Wikipedia all use PHP for server-side scripting.
What this means for Arionum is that there is already a huge community of developers that would be able to quickly jump in to the project and have a good understanding of the backbones of the platform.
---CPU Optimized Mining---
The savvy developers with Arionum have worked hard to build a mining algorithm that discourages the use of GPUs by making them no more effective than a CPU. So who cares?
Everyone should care! The idea of putting some spare computer equipment to work mining Bitcoin seems like a great way to make an extra buck and get in on the action. That is until you crank up a Miner on your old faithful Dell Inspiron and realize that if you left it running for a year you would make $1.50 in Bitcoin.
This is because Bitcoin and many other Cryptocurrencies have be inundated with powerful and not to mention expensive GPUs and ASIC miners, making it impossible for Joe Bob and his Compaq Presario to do anything worthwhile. This leads to a few very large players controlling the vast majority of the network. This is bad for the idea of a decentralized currency and bad for building interest in the coin.
Since Arionum is optimized for CPU mining anyone can jump in the game and quickly start up a Miner and pull in a few ARO coins with a spare computer. Not only does this help with the centralization problem but, it's also an incredibly easy way to build interest in the platform. That is truly the dream of a decentralized currency, where everyone can use the coin and is also part of the process to validate transactions and create the coin.
---The Team---
This is the real reason I've kept following this project. If you scroll through any Crypto forum it's pretty easy to find a coin promising you riches with some outlandish idea and a non-existent developer team. That hasn't been the experience I've seen with this team. Take a quick scroll through their Discord channel and you'll see the constant work being done by the devs and the awesome community that already exists.
What has really caught my attention is that the devs have been very hesitant to jump into an exchange, stating several times that they want to find the right exchange and really focus on the development of the platform first. Also, there was no premine for this coin. What that means is, the devs didn't mine 1.5 million ARO coins in hopes of dumping them all as soon as the coin gets listed. They are completely funded through donations and the small fee from the official mining pool. This to me shows a belief in the platform for the long haul. This team doesn't smell of the pump and dump schemes that happen far to often.
---How to Get Involved---
If you've read this far then you might be having the same feelings about this project that I do. I encourage you, don't take my word for it, do your own research, read their white paper, read their forum, checkout the official mining pool. I think you'll really like the project and the ideas they have. I've provided some links below to their announcement post, their website, and the official mining pool below. Take a look, and have fun!
Website: https://www.arionum.com
ANN post: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2710248.0
Official Mining Pool: http://www.aropool.com