Simple descriptions of cryptocurrency names / projects. Restricted to proper-nouns.
Edits & additions welcome via pull request
A decentralized exchange for ERC20 tokens built on Ethereum which aims to solve some of the issues with other decentralized exchanges with their SWAP protocol.
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A blockchain & coin with a focus on business applications, that is the successor to NXT. It has a number of "child-chains" and coins in an attempt to solve scalability issues, the first of which is called "Ignis".
An Ethereum based project to improve interchange between ERC20-ish coins (smart tokens), via an intermediary token (BNT).
A full node Bitcoin implementation written in Javascript.
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A network for developing decentralized apps, blockchain agnostic, considered “tier 2” infrastructure.
A company that funds work on Bitcoin Core and a number of other initiatives including Lightning Network and Hyperledger. Their own products include Liquid sidechain and Blockstream Satellite.
A project to enable access to the Bitcoin core network without requiring an Internet connection.
A major coin exchange based in South Korea.
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Original, flagship, crypto currency.
Forked from Bitcoin August 1st 2017, for complex reasons including political and opinions on scaling. Critically, it doesn't include SegWit and opted for a flat increase in block size.
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Fork of Bitcoin and split of the Bitcoin blockchain in an attempt to further decentralize the blockchain by reducing the effectiveness of specialized hardware (ASICs).
A Bitcoin fork that allows for miners to vote on the controversial topic of block size, rather than utilizing SegWit.
An alternive blockchain protocol, designed to increase throughput and reduce latency with supposedly few downsides. A variant of this approach is used in Waves Network.
A major exchange, once hacked, possibly with some curious links to Tether. Based in Taiwan.
A cryptocurrency exchange based in Italy with a focus on Nano. Hacked in February 2018 for 17 million Nano (~ $170 million).
A Payment processor which allows merchants to accept Bitcoin and receive local currency. They also sponsor some of Bitcoin core’s development and have worked to spread Bitcoin's adoption generally. High transaction fees on the bitcoin network have not helped their business.
A major exchange, based in South Korea.
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A delegated proof-of-stake blockchain & coin with integrated exchange, which also allows for user-issued coins to be created and managed with smart contracts. Based upon Graphene.
A major exchange, based in the US.
First proof of stake blockchain, forked from Bitcoin.
The Ethereum proof-of-stake implementation
Proof of stake, smart contract blockchain + ADA coin, built in Haskell by IOHK.
A Javascript library that allows for mining of Monero in web pages.
Open source wallet software, now deprecated as the company focusses on enterprise offerings.
A term for alt coins (often fungible in nature) that are designed to be linked to real world assets - i.e. ownership of a specific coin entitles you to ownership of a real-world thing, such as a car, property or share certificate.
Bitcoin wallet software developed by BitPay.
Distributed ledger (not blockchain) platform designed to be a private network between financial institutions, built by R3.
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A protocol and set of tools that power a number of privacy focussed coins including Monero. It includes CryptoNight, an application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) resistant hash function.
"decentralized, Autonomous Organisation" - a smart contract built on Ethereum designed to act like a Venture Capitalist (handing out money to projects) that was hacked, causing the Ethereum Classic fork (i.e. undoing the hack).
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Blockchain & coin run on a two tier node system (master / mining) with additional functionality such as instant & private payments. Originally forked from Bitcoin.
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Created as a parody of Bitcoin, with which it shares the same early code base with a few tweaked parameters (e.g. a 1 minute block time, utilization of Scrypt rather than SHA-256). Much scandal.
Popular, open source wallet software written in Python.
Fork of Bitshares/Graphene looking to be an Ethereum competitor, built in Web Assembly by Block.one.
An interface specification for standardizing Ethereum tokens. By implementing the given methods and properties, it allows the tokens to work with other things such as exchanges and wallets predictably.
An interface specification for standardizing non-fungible Ethereum tokens. Allows for predicable behavior and interaction. First popular implementation was by Cryptokitties.
An early Ethereum based decentralized exchange that allows the trade of ERC20 tokens.
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Blockchain and coin with Turing complete scripting abilities via the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM).
Hard fork of Ethereum blockchain pre-DAO attack.
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A network of Bitcoin nodes optimised for the fast communication of block information for miners. It allows for improved efficiency across the system (fewer orphans, reduced wasted hash power).
A network designed for fast block transfer - see Falcon Network above.
Blockchain based decentralized file storage using IPFS (which they created). The coin (FIL) is earned by serving files.
Major exchange which powers Coinbase, based in the US
Exchange run by the Winklevoss twins (of Facebook fame) based in the US.
An Ethereum client implementation written in Go-lang.
An Ethereum ERC20 coin used to pay for computation on machines.
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Proof of stake based blockchain + coin which distributes additional coins for proof of research / computation.
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Corporate sponsored set of blockchain / cryptocurrency related tools with a goal of advancing cross-industry collaboration.
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Coin + Tangle (comparable to a blockchain) designed for the internet of things. Uses proof of work. To send a transaction, a node needs to verify two existing ones.
Major exchange based in the US, selected as the "trustee" for MtGox which allows claimants to claim lost funds from them.
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Layer 2 solution for Bitcoin payments using off-chain channels between users designed to solve scalability issues. The Ethereum implementation of this is called Raiden.
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Blockchain + coin focussed on developer tools and application development, where each application (built using node.js) runs it's own side chain. Runs on delegated proof-of-stake.
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Earl you alt-coin to Bitcoin (from which it was forked), uses Scrypt instead of SHA3 and has a 2.5 min (rather than Bitcoin's 10 min) block time.
Blockchain + coin enabling a decentralized file store and code execution, allowing for a decentralized web.
Now rebranded Omni Layer, it was originally a fork of Bitcoin designed to offer additional functionality.
A web browser based on Chromium which includes an Ethereum client (Geth) and allows users to interact with Ethereum based DApps.
Dogecoin exchange, now bankrupt.
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Privacy focussed blockchain + coin based on CryptoNote (it was one of the first CryptoNote based cryptocurrencies), runs on proof-of-work. Formerly BitMonero. Because of it's privacy it has attracted a lot of illicit use.
The original, now defunct, Bitcoin exchange, hacked multiple times. Was based in Japan.
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Blockchain and coin (originally set up to use the Bitcoin blockchain) that is used to manage ownership of .bit domain names and could in principle be used to manage other naming/ownership systems.
Formerly Raiblocks, Nano offers instant, free transactions via a "lattice" structure, rather than a typical blockchain, where each transfer requires a "send" and a "receive" transaction.
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Blockchain and coin that runs on proof-of-importance and unusually is a mixture of open and closed source software. It powers the private Mijin network which aims to improve banking processes in Japan.
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Formerly Antshares, NEO is a blockchain supporting smart contracts and is often compared to Ethereum. Strong ties to Chinese organisations and possibly government.
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Proof-of-stake blockchain, designed to be a platform upon which applications & financial services could be built. Includes an integrated exchange, upon which user-created tokens can be traded.
A project built partially on Ethereum (as well as it's own blockchain) that plans to use Plasma for scalability. The focus is on bringing a variety of financial services to Asian markets. The OMG token is an ERC-20 token.
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Protocol built on-top of the Bitcoin blockchain to enable user-created coins and other more advanced functionality. Compares itself to the "HTTP" of Bitcoin's "TCP/IP". Formerly MasterCoin, source code forked from Bitcoin.
A lightweight Ethereum client implementation written in Rust, available via your browser once installed.
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Fork of the Bitcoin code base, implements a hybrid proof-of-stake/proof-of-work blockchain, allows for 1% inflation.
A proposed improvement to Ethereum that helps to improve scalability via the use of side-chains which are periodically validated against the main blockchain.
A project created by an Ethereum Founder (Gavin Wood) to link different blockchains together, allowing them to communicate and validating their state. Currently some code forms part of the Parity code base.
US based exchange.
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An early fork of Bitcoin with an adapted proof-of-work function that involves searching for new prime numbers (i.e. doing something actually useful). Also has a reduced (1 minute rather than 10) block time.
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Hybrid Bitcoin and Ethereum based blockchain (thus supporting EVM based smart contracts) which runs on proof-of-stake and is based in China and Singapore.
A lightning-network implementation for Ethereum. It helps to improve scalability by collating many smaller transactions, the net results of which can be periodically written to the main chain.
Focussed on tipping for social networks (first and foremost Reddit). Code forked from Litecoin, thus runs on proof-of-stake.
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Payments & settlement network uses a select handful of validators verify transactions via consensus rather than a blockchain. Multiple tokens can represent things such as fiat or a commodity. Aimed at bank to bank transactions.
An improvement to the Bitcoin protocol (and has been implemented in other protocols such as Litecoin) which involves separating the signature (Witness) data from the transactions allowing for improved security and reduced blocksize.
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Tokens as a service: built on top of Ethereum to allows others to easily create their own ERC-20 tokens (called "Branded Tokens"), plus tools to manage them. Has it's own ERC-20 token (OST) as an intermediary.
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A programming language that can be used to write smart contracts that run on the Ethereum blockchain.
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A blockchain originally forked from Ripple (by one of Ripple's founders, Jed McCaleb), with fast (2-5 second) transaction times, settled via the Stellar Consensus Protocol. It has a distributed exchange baked in and has tokens representing different assets, such Dollars, Euros and it's own currency called Lumens.
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A token issued with the Omni Layer protocol (thus using the Bitcoin blockchain) that is pegged to the dollar (i.e. 1 tether is always worth 1 dollar), designed to make exchange between currencies easier. Linked to Bitfinex in the Panama papers leak.
A blockchain and smart contract platform (which runs the Michelson programming language) often compared to Ethereum. It has a structured protocol improvement process, is due for release in February 2018 and raised a $238m at ICO, a record at the time.
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A fork of Ethereum adjusted to have a deflationary monetary system (similar to Bitcoin), based in China.
A fork of Bitcoin adapted to run on the TOR network to increase the level of anonymity (thus ensuring IP addresses of incoming transactions can't be traced).
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A blockchain platform running proof of stake, using Waves-NG (derived directly from Bitcoin-NG) with an integrated decentralized exchange. Any user can easily create their own tokens through the wallet software and basic smart contracts are under development.
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Implementation of the Zerocash protocol.
Implementation of the Zerocoin protocol.
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A decentralised exchange for ERC20 tokens, built on the Ethereum blockchain.
Cryptoregister was created out of a desire to understand how the various cryptocurrency projects that exist fit together and a frustration with the hype or fear/uncertainy/doubt that’s so often spread about any given project which makes it hard to interpret what these things actually are.
Inspired in part by AWS in plain english, and it aspires to be written like it might be said.