Purse.io announced a $1 million seed round and revealed early details on a new project called Tritium. The bitcoin platform, which helps users buy Amazon products at discounts, plans to build Tritium
Purse.io announced a $1 million seed round and revealed early details on a new project called Tritium. The bitcoin platform, which helps users buy Amazon products at discounts, plans to build Tritium as an open-source smart contract platform accessible to regular developers and non-technical users.
Developers have built smart contract platforms before, but none gained traction. BitHalo, which ran on the Blackcoin blockchain, seemed promising at first. The platform had technical flaws, and developers never completed the features it needed. Users didn't embrace it. Other projects since have also struggled to gain mainstream traction.
Purse explained its vision in a blog post: "Purse's mission has always been to build products that are compelling to Joe; enough so that he'd become a Bitcoiner. Our vision for Tritium advances this mission on a larger scale."
The company wants to build something ordinary people would use. Smart contracts execute code automatically when conditions are met, no human override required. They could power a peer-to-peer marketplace, an escrow system, insurance products, or countless other uses.
But Purse seemed to contradict itself in the next breath. The company said: "If mass adoption is to occur (i.e. Bitcoin is truly disruptive), we need to build new products that neither depend on old ones, nor compete with them. Disruptive products simply obviate the status quo."
If Tritium were a decentralized Amazon or eBay, developers would need to build something billions prefer over what they use today. That's disruptive, but the bar is extremely high. An escrow system would be more manageable but less transformative.
Purse already runs a decentralized marketplace in beta. The company could be extending that. Or Tritium might be something else entirely: a platform layer that other developers build on top of.
The company hasn't disclosed details. When Purse releases more information, the actual purpose of Tritium should become clear.
