Later this year HTC Smartphone maker will release the first version of a Cryptocurrency hardware device embedded into a phone. The significance of this development has been understated.
For the adoption of blockchain technology into our everyday lives the widespread development of DAPPS needs to occur. For the uninformed DAPPS are applications which are built on top of Blockchains. There is no killer DAPP out there nor does there seem to be that any startups are even remotely close to bringing something out in the near term. Cryptokitties although hyped when released is still clunky and isn’t actually that easy to play.
The Pain
To get a Cryptokitty you need to go through the following steps:
- Buy the cryptocurrency Ether from an Exchange
- Download Metamask client and transfer Ether into your Metamask address
- Log into Cryptokitties through their web based platform
- Use Metamask to perform the transaction to obtain the Cat
An average user is not going to be able or be bothered to go through the above steps. The UX is just terrible for all DAPPS with the current process. The people who are playing Cryptokitties are people with experience in cryptocurrencies. You know that when you get a Cat it is non-fungible and unique. However if you aren’t that familiar with crypto would you even care? If you didn’t would you go through all that pain to get a Cat? My guess is probably no.
All the other DAPPS currently on the Ethereum Blockchain basically go through the same process.
The Game Changer
Which brings me to the point on why a hardware wallet embedded into a phone is so important. For a seamless experience to occur we need to do away with the crypto wallet aspect of using a metamask or other such middle layer service. There isn’t much detail on what the HTC wallet will be like but I really hope that they create a phone where you don’t need a bridge to use a DAPP inside a browser.
If it does that then my prediction is that alot of current DAPPs out there will be making mobile version DAPPs on the HTC. And oh yeah I forgot to mention but there are ZERO mobile DAPPS out there! Toshi which was recently rebranded to Coinbase Wallet has DAPPs but they are actually web based. You can use some DAPPs but it’s actually through their inbuilt browser.
There is no DAPP where you can just go to the appstore, download the application you are after and then use it in the same way you use apps like facebook, uber etc.
Meeting the Hype
Price declines across the crypto market has been painful for alot of HODLERs. Top Coins have declined 90%. It’s not enough to believe that the Bitcoin ETF approval will reverse the market bear trend. Development in the technology needs to occur. A Bitcoin ETF will most likely bring a price spike but may not even last that long since it will just bring in more speculators.
Without Mobile DAPPs I just don’t see the leap in mainstream adoption happening. We are still far away from usable DAPPS. There has been lots of discussions and promises of solving Scaling issues in the community already so I wont comment on that. However besides scaling not many are talking about the importance of Mobile. I really hope the HTC Smartphone is going to make a leap and get startups to focus on making mobile user friendly DAPPS. That’s what is going to drive the next bull run. Real users using DAPPS and creating transactions on the blockchain networks. That’s what is going to give real value to cryptocurrencies.
