The mainstream will never adopt decentralized applications driven by blockchain (dApps) if it is difficult to log on. They are forced to manage complex security keys by themselves or rely on a wallet-equipped wallet browser like MetaMask. What users need is to log in to blockchain applications to make it as easy as logging in with Facebook. So that's what Bitski built. The launch today emerges from stealth with an exclusive in TechCrunch on the launch of the beta version for developers of its single sign-on cryptocurrency portfolio platform.
Ten projects, including 7 game developers, are scheduled to pay a fee to integrate Bitski & # 39; s SDK. Then, whenever they need a user's identity or to make a payment, their applications open a Bitski authorization screen, where users can grant permits to access their identification, send money or receive items. Users register only once with Bitski, and then no more private keys or other frictions need to be entered. Using blockchain applications becomes simple enough for beginners. Given the recent fall in prices, the mainstream has been frightened by speculation with cryptocurrencies. But Bitski could unlock the usefulness of the dApps that the blockchain developers have promised but have not delivered.
"One of the great challenges for protocol equipment and product companies in crypto today is the poor UX in dApps, specifically integration, transactions and recovery of login / password", says Donnie Dinch, co-founder and CEO "We interviewed a ton of dApp developers. At the time they used a wallet, there was a great fall of people. Bitski's vision is to solve user integration and user-friendliness of the wallet for developers, so that they can focus on creating unique and useful dapps. "
The skeptical Bitski team raised $ 1.5 million in pre-seed capital from Kindred Ventures, Signia, Founders Fund, Village Global and Steve Jang's Social Capital. They were betting on Dinch, a designer-CEO who had created the concert discovery application WillCall that he sold to Ticketfly, which was eventually purchased by Pandora. After 18 months of changing the name of Ticketfly and reviewing his consumption experience, Dinch left and finally recruited the engineer Julian Tescher to accompany him to found Bitski.
Bitski's co-founder and CEO, Donnie Dinch
After Riff could not reach the scale, the team hung up their social ambitions in late 2017 and "started kicking ideas for dApps." We made fun of one of Venmo, a remittance application … but we found that the obstacle for someone to use one of these products is huge, "recalls Dinch." The incorporation was a breaking factor for anyone who built dApps, even if we did the best Vento crypto. , getting normal people would be extremely difficult, it's already difficult enough for people to install applications from the App Store. " It occurred to Bitski that any developer can jump over the obstacle.
Looking through the crypto industry, companies like Coinbase and Binance with their own host Portfolios that allowed UX without problems were the ones that won. Bitski would bring that same experience to any application. "Our hosted wallet SDK allows developers to place the Bitski wallet in their applications and users on board with standards that Web 2.0 users have come to know and love," explains Dinch.
Imagine that an iOS game wants to reward users with a sword or digital tab. Users would have to set up a completely new wallet, fight with their credentials or use another awkward solution. They would have to own Ethereum to pay the price of the Ethereum "gas" to drive the transaction, and the developer would have to approve the gift manually. With Bitski, users can approve receiving a developer's tokens thereafter, and developers can pay for fuel on behalf of users while activating transactions programmatically.
Magik is an AR content platform that is one of the first developers of Bitski. The founders of Magik tell me: "We are moving forward to reach millions of traditional consumers, and Bitski is the only wallet solution that understands what we need to reach users on that scale." They provide a simple, safe and familiar interface that addresses all the weak points throughout the user's journey. "
Bitski will offer a free level, levels with prices based on the volume of transactions or a monthly rate and a business version. In the future, the company is considering doubling premium developer services to help them build more on the block chain. " Never, never, will we monetize the user's data. "We've never had any intention of looking at it," says Dinch. The startup expects developers to take advantage of the network effects of a cross-application wallet, since once someone configures Bitski to use a product, all future logins just require a few clicks.
[19659011] In August, Coinbase acquired a startup called Distributed Systems that was building a similar cryptographic identity platform called Clear Protocol. A "login with Coinbase" feature might be popular if started, but the company's focus is to spread a ton of blockchain projects. "If the [initiationwith Coinbase] was launched tomorrow, they could not support games or anything with a single token. We are a safe deposit box, they are a bank," says Dinch.
The spectrum of the largest single sign-on player, Facebook, is also looming. In May, he announced the formation of a blockchain team that we suspect might be working on a cryptographic login platform or other ways to make the decentralized world more accessible to moms and pop. Dinch suspects that fears about how Facebook uses the data would discourage developers and users from adopting such a product. However, Bitski's haste to convert its developer platform to beta one year after its formation shows that it is eager to beat the market.
Building a centralized wallet in a decentralized ecosystem carries its own security risks. But Dinch assures me that Bitski is using all its own hardware with airless computers that have been stripped of their Wi-Fi cards, and is taking other secret precautions to prevent someone from snatching their wallets. He believes that cross-application wallets will also offer a future in which users actually own their virtual assets instead of relying on developers' willingness not to push them away or close them. "T The idea that never "Being able to own unique digital assets is crazy for me," says Dinch. "Whether it's a skin on Fortnite or a movie on iTunes that you buy, you do not have the liquidity to resell those things. We think we'll look back in 5 to 10 years and we think it's crazy that nobody has had their digital items. "
While the prices of cryptograms can be very high and applications like Cryptokitties have been cooled down, Dinch is convinced that Blockchain startups will not fade away. " There is a thriving ecosystem of developers that strives to bring the decentralized web to reality, regardless of the price of the token. It's a safe assumption that prices will go down a bit more, but eventually they will increase every time we see actual use cases for many of these tokens, most will die, those that will be successful will be results oriented, building useful products that people want. " Bitski is a big step in that direction.