the market cap of the protocol always grows faster than the combined value of the applications built on top, since the success of the application layer drives further speculation at the protocol layer.+One kind of application that is particularly intriguing is decentralized autononous organisations (DAOs, this includes entities as large as, or even larger than nation-states 🇦🇺🇺🇸🇮🇳🇬🇧🇨🇳🇧🇷🇷🇺🇯🇵, social networks, multinational public companies, etc.). Note that having complete autonomy is probably not a good idea, since code may not be able to handle new issues that arise, so human intervention should probably always be an option, but preferably in the hands of a small, non-profit entity or some decentralized solution (perhaps similar to the Aragon Network). By analogy, you wouldn't want a nuclear power plant to be completely automated with no possible means of human intervention. As a precaution, you'd want several safeguards including, for example, an off button 😉. As explained in this Ethereum Wiki here, the first DAO, known as The DAO, resulted in many funds being stolen, and Ethereum hard forking into Ethereum and Ethereum Classic. + +The following list is sourced from [Coin Market Cap tokens (you can sort by market cap)](https://coinmarketcap.com/tokens/) and State of the Dapps, both of which lists many more, as well as elsewhere, e.g. Gitter research room chats. (There are 854 dapps on State of the Dapps as of Dec 1 2017; then [909 on Jan 1 2018] (https://web.archive.org/web/20180101114436/https://www.stateofthedapps.com/). 😯 You can search by tags.) Other examples are also presented e.g. on day 4 of [Devcon 3](http://www.ryanyosua.me/devcon-3-talks/), as well as outlined in the Ethereum whitepaper in the introduction and applications section. Note also that while most of the dapps in the following list run on the Ethereum platform, some examples do not, and where they don't run on Ethereum, it is generally noted as what they do run on. This is not a big deal, as any dapp could theoretically run on another blockchain, (or indirectly via inter-blockchains like Cosmos or Polkadot) provided that the host blockchain has the required features. Also note that the below list is not an endorsement, and is not exhaustive or necessarily well-maintained. At worst, it's included because it was briefly looked into and it seemed like a good idea, while more time may have been spent doing due diligence on some ideas and can therefore have a better idea of its usefulness. Dapps that have been implemented, or are under development, or have been publicly conceptualised, includes: +* a stable coin, e.g. [Dai](https://makerdao.com/whitepaper/DaiDec17WP.pdf) +* smart contracts for the legally enforceable and/or liquid transfer of assets, plus related services e.g. [Mattereum](https://mattereum.com/) and [Sweetbridge](https://sweetbridge.com), e.g. settlement, accounting, risk management, resource sharing, and Optimization & Liquid Talent. Also, asset-based lending: secure loans with holding of assets e.g cryptocurrenices (locking them up) in exchange for cash (fiat currencies), such as Sweetbridge and [SALT](https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/salt/); +* [Veritaseum](http://veritas.veritaseum.com/), which "enables software-driven P2P capital markets without brokerages, banks and traditional exchanges". +* [invoice financing with Populous](https://populous.co/) +* decentralized exchanges to buy and sell cryptos and fiat, e.g. localethereum; for cryptos only there is Decentrex, Omega One and NVO, where the latter two have not been launched as of November 30. +* non-decentralized exchanges such as [Coinbase](https://www.coinbase.com/) (US), [BTCmarkets](https://btcmarkets.net/) (Australia), while more are below, or ones that only exchange cryptocurrencies like Poloniex; +* other exchanges like [OmiseGo](https://omisego.network/). "OmiseGO is a public Ethereum-based financial technology for use in mainstream digital wallets, that enables real-time, peer-to-peer value exchange and payment services agnostically across jurisdictions and organizational silos, and across both fiat money and decentralized currencies. Designed to enable financial inclusion and disrupt existing institutions, access will be made available to everyone via the OmiseGO network and digital wallet framework."; +* exchange platforms like [Binance](https://www.binance.com/aboutUs.html); +* asset exchanges like [WAX](https://wax.io/). +* the Brave browser (which the author uses) which uses the Basic Attention Token, which provides a better solution for users, publishers and advertisers; +* [MaidSafe](https://maidsafe.net/), which has another browser that actually runs on the [Omni](http://www.omnilayer.org/) layer that runs on Bitcoin, not Ethereum. It is also claiming to be: "The World's First Autonomous Data Network". [Currently you have to receive an invite which requires roughly an hour of interaction on their Discourse forum/site.](https://web.archive.org/web/20171230003420/https://invite.maidsafe.net/) +* [ZeroNet](https://zeronet.io/), another decentralized internet network that runs on Bitcoin cryptography and the [BitTorrent network](http://www.bittorrent.com/). [It on Ubuntu 17.10](http://127.0.0.1:43110/Talk.ZeroNetwork.bit/?Topic:1514631579_13fVMZu2wTNAykEvkYHYfGmTBMSFxz9gFG/It+would+be+good+if+you+could+link+to+a+comment). You can make [your own site](http://127.0.0.1:43110/1zz1z8YPFQizJshGkgHq7GVtBSPCyQM5W/), although [you may have issues with following a tutorial](http://127.0.0.1:43110/Blog.ZeroNetwork.bit/?Post:99:ZeroChat+tutorial#comment_1_13fVMZu2wTNAykEvkYHYfGmTBMSFxz9gFG). Note that this link won't work unless you are running ZeroNet.sh) by clicking the download button on the homepage (then as detailed concisely below the button) extracting it and running (in bash) `./ZeroNet.sh` while `cd`ed to the extracted folder that ZeroNet.sh is located in. +* storage, e.g. Swarm and a distributed hypermedia protocol, IPFS [website](https://ipfs.io/), [doc](https://github.com/ipfs/ipfs); +* communication protocols, e.g. Whisper (also see here for code), which allows dapps (you don't need to capitalize this since it is an abbreviation of decentralized applications) to communicate with each other; +* multi-chain networks/tools like [Polkadot](https://polkadot.io/) and [BTCRelay](http://btcrelay.org/) +* Ethereum Name Service (names like jamesray.eth map to an address); +* mesh networking e.g. implemented here and as voted for here on Twitter (which also has other ideas posted in the comments); +* social networks e.g. Akasha (news here), +* Status: "A Mobile Ethereum OS: Browse, chat and make payments securely on the decentralized web."; +* decentralized search engines, e.g. Weipoint (a news post is here); +* reputation and ratings network e.g. as used by [Etheal](https://etheal.com/), which is described below (CTRL+F); +* identity (e.g. as provided by uPort, as well as [in-blockchain proposal](https://www.ethnews.com/erc725-a-self-sovereign-identity-standard-for-ethereum and [Shyft](https://www.shyft.network/)); +* decentralized electricity trading and other decentralized energy economic applications, which would allow renewable energy to be more economical and accelerate the transition to a clean, renewable energy and safe climate future. + +
+
+Examples of local electricity trading include: Grid+, LO3/Transactive Grid, Power Ledger, Nexergy, Local Volts and Divvi. Grid+ uses Ethereum and they have open source code. Power Ledger has closed source code and runs on the Ethereum Enterprise Alliance, rather than the public Ethereum blockchain. They had a token sale in early October. Both Power Ledger and Grid+ also detail more unique applications in their pipeline, such as renewable energy asset generation (Power Ledger) and Grid+'s in-home computer, an "intelligent agent" that pays for a customers electricity in real-time, using stable tokens, stores cryptocurrency like the hardware wallet functions of Ledger and Trezor; providing Casper proof-of-stake signing, and provide an Ethereum API for IoT ([pp. 26 and 34-36, white paper](https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bz90riPGRHquNDVXVE81RmppaUk/view)). Transactive Grid uses Ethereum and it has been rolled out in Brooklyn with a microgrid, however LO3 hasn't released any code or details for its Transactive Grid application. The others are still all under development (as of August 2017), and they have been scant on the details of how they would implement their application, at the least not releasing their code. Divvi say on its website that they will use the blockchain. Local Volts and Nexergy do not.
+* electricity tokenization: e.g. SolarCoin, EnergyCoin, although both are altcoins rather than Ethereum tokens;
+* governance of any organisation, e.g. Democracy.Earth; and also governance of DAOs, e.g. Aragon;
+* decentralized search engines like [BitClave](https://www.bitclave.com/en/), [Weipoint](https://www.weipoint.com/) and [Epocum](https://www.stateofthedapps.com/dapps/epocum);
+* wallets like MyEtherWallet or hardware wallets Trezor or Ledger;
+* blockchain explorers like [Etherscan](https://etherscan.io/);
+* a gateway to decentralized services such as [Infura](https://infura.io/);
+* visit dapps in your browser with [Metamask](https://metamask.io/);
+* decentralized media;
+* asset titles (such as land titles). Read more on that here: "Having so far built the software and tested it with a couple dozen land title registrations, Bitfury and the Georgian National Agency of Public Registry have now signed a new memorandum of understanding to expand the service to purchases and sales of land titles, registration of new land titles, demolition of property, mortgages and rentals, as well as notary services". Nottar.io also provides notary services. A similar, more specific application is for academic certificates with [Smart Diploma](https://www.stateofthedapps.com/dapps/smart-diploma);
+* Debit card 💳 transactions 🤝 (done on several exchanges 💱, e.g. Coinjar Swipe (but it accepts BTC only), Coinbase, while others which I've mentioned elsewhere in this article have plans to do this e.g. [OmiseGO](https://www.omise.co/go);
+* co-ownership of real assets e.g. the [Swarm Fund](https://www.swarm.fund/how-swarm-works/index.html)
+* crowdsales, e.g. an Initial Coin Offering (ICO) as compared with an Intial Public Offering (IPO), or for tokens with Ethereum: an Initial Token Offering (ITO). Note that this is not so much a business model in itself, per se, rather it is more of a fundraising method (which has also led to scams, e.g. here);
+* crowd development (but not as part of the blockchain, e.g. here), e.g. for infrastructure and other public assets;
+* think of public companies being remodelled into communities with tokens instead of shares, governance using a platform like Democracy.Earth (which can be tailored to have voting anywhere between one vote one person like direct democracy, or conventionally more hierarchical like a board of directors and token-holders instead of or in addition to—and probably eventually superceding—shareholders);
+* dividend payouts and secure email-based transactions with [Dividend](https://www.dividend.cloud/). For sending ETH via email there is also [You've Got ETH](https://www.stateofthedapps.com/dapps/you-ve-got-eth);
+* prediction 🔮 🦉 markets like GNOSIS, Augur and [WINGS DAO](https://www.stateofthedapps.com/dapps/wings-dao);
+* [Built-in price discovery and a liquidity mechanism for tokens with Bancor](https://www.bancor.network/);
+* labour/recruitment/freelance markets like Chronobank and [Ethlance](https://ethlance.com/);
+* permissioned distributed ledgers like [Hydrachain](http://www.brainbot.com/projects#hydrachain);
+* trust-based models like the [Trustlines Network](http://trustlines.network/)
+* Secure distributed computing, e.g. Golem. Ethereum needs to be faster e.g. with EWASM and parallelizability.
+* accountability, e.g. for non-profits (e.g. "how do I know how badly you need a donation unless I can see your net liabilities, net assets, and balance sheet, and how you plan to use the funds?") and aid (also see here)
+* Self Learning, Autonomous, Decentralized Artificial Intelligence (this could be used for many things such as self-driving cars, robots, or anything else that is owned by a contract; bots; and art);
+* decentralised financial services like [WeTrust](https://www.wetrust.io);
+* futures-like dapps such as [TimeBank](https://www.stateofthedapps.com/dapps/timebank) and [hodlethereum](https://hodlethereum.com/);
+* sharing car refueling stations with [Share&Charge](https://www.stateofthedapps.com/dapps/share-charge);
+* health, e.g. [Etheal](https://etheal.com/), a healthcare service comparison site with a content platform, trust and review / reputation system; an anonymous marketing platform for surveys, ads and communication research where users are paid by pharmaceutical companies; and a platform for building health apps;
+* examples of contracts are [here](https://solidity.readthedocs.io/en/develop/solidity-by-example.html) and [here](https://viper.readthedocs.io/en/latest/viper-by-example.html), e.g. voting, auctions (open or blind), safe remote purchases, micropayment channels, crowdfunding and company stock. Many more can be found on Github, which may be referenced from the whitepaper and the website of a dapp.
+* [insurance](https://www.stateofthedapps.com/tagged/insurance/);
+
+
+Examples that have been conceptualized, but not implemented (at least as far as the creator of this wiki is aware of) include:
+* reducing transaction costs for existing business models (here is a good read about that). However, to tokenize online centric business models, the network model should change from client-server to peer-to-peer, to avoid a conflict of interest. This is more difficult to achieve since a server is a piece of infrastructure, and transferring to a peer-to-peer model would cause it to be a sunk cost. Additionally, it may be difficult to build a replacement dapp for a successful website, because it is hard to get a network of engaged users to change to using something else (inertia). Centralized web apps (not just mobile apps but websites, and use the word to contrast with dapps) include:
+* * Google (although note [Weipoint](https://www.weipoint.com/) as mentioned previously),
+* * social networks like [Facebook](http://www.trustnodes.com/2018/01/04/zuckerberg-studying-cryptocurrency-implementation-facebook), Twitter, (although note [Akasha](https://akasha.world/) above);
+* * online marketplaces e.g. Amazon, eBay and Alibaba (decentralized alternatives include [Soma for products or services](https://soma.co/), [Canya for services](https://canya.io/) also note this simple implementation and subreddit [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/ethmarket/), as well as more specific or niche marketplaces like [Cryptokitties](https://www.cryptokitties.co/), [Hamster](https://hmstr.io/)). For more info see [here](https://www.forbes.com/sites/rogeraitken/2017/10/24/whats-the-future-of-online-marketplaces-blockchains-technology-impact/#3f6bde2a63a0)
+* making economically viable other business models that have seen low uptake or aren't economically viable without blockchain tech. So-called sharing economy business models (which are more aptly called tasker or rentier capitalism models) like Airbnb, Uber, AirTasker, Fiverr, Upwork, TaskRabbit, and Menulog are particularly ripe for transformation (the term transformation is preferrable to disruption, since it should be a net positive change, while negative effects are manageable or solvable), since no trusted third party for a transaction is needed, such as banks 🏦, credit card 💳 companies or PayPal, just a smart contract; and
+* mortgage brokers;
+* More examples are here—scroll to the examples—they have bold headings and are about two thirds of the way down, or search for "Dank meme trading". Note that the Basic Attention Token has already been mentioned, and the creator of this wiki is skeptical that AI will create truly beautiful art, since no AI can have any feeling. CryptoKitties is an example of meme trading and has taken up [a lot of the transactions on the Ethereum network](https://etherscan.io/address/0x06012c8cf97bead5deae237070f9587f8e7a266d).
+* curation markets, which is part of what [Steemit](https://steemit.com/@jamesray/feed) does (which runs on the STEEM network), and which curators, social networks and wiki authors would all benefit from. More info is [here](https://medium.com/@simondlr/introducing-curation-markets-trade-popularity-of-memes-information-with-code-70bf6fed9881);
+* [P2P Decentralised Autonomous Transportation Network](http://www.flyingcarpet.network/)
+* [Waste collection management](https://twitter.com/JamesCRay01/status/936992945173020672). Other ideas include plus generally thinking of existing business models running on the blockchain, like real estate developers and investment trusts (with which blockchains could be used e.g. for crowdfunding).
+* legally enforceable wills running on the blockchain, as well as being able to appoint an executor in a legally enforceable way on the blockchain.
+
+More examples are e.g. [here in a blog post](https://medium.com/@Ethereum_AI/ethereum-introduction-what-exactly-is-it-why-care-how-to-invest-9a627ab04408) and [here on Wikipedia](https://github.com/Ethereum-community/Ethereum-introduction/wiki/Decentralised-apps-(dapps))
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+
+
+Note that due to the lightning-fast pace of development in the Ethereum space with core development and dapps continually being launched, certain parts of this article may be outdated. You can help by keeping it up to date!
+
+
+
+Table of Contents
+=================
+
+ * [Table of Contents](#table-of-contents)
+ * [About Ethereum](#about-ethereum)
+ * [Uses](#uses)
+ * [List of dapps](#list-of-dapps)
+ * [Market analysis](#market-analysis)
+ * [Issues](#issues)
+ * [Scalability](#scalability)
+ * [Proof of work / proof of stake / other proving methods](#proof-of-work--proof-of-stake--other-proving-methods)
+ * [Public permissionless blockchains vs. private permissioned blockchains](#public-permissionless-blockchains-vs-private-permissioned-blockchains)
+ * [No technological artefacts can be a panacea](#no-technological-artefacts-can-be-a-panacea)
+ * [How do you buy and sell Ether, the currency of Ethereum?](#how-do-you-buy-and-sell-ether-the-currency-of-ethereum)
+ * [Table of exchanges](#table-of-exchanges)
+ * [More details about what I've tried (not very necessary to know)](#more-details-about-what-ive-tried-not-very-necessary-to-know)
+ * [Development](#development)
+ * [Concluding remarks](#concluding-remarks)
+ * [Further reading](#further-reading)
+
+# About Ethereum
+Ethereum is a [decentralized](https://medium.com/@VitalikButerin/the-meaning-of-decentralization-a0c92b76a274) blockchain platform for "building unstoppable applications", while Ether is the cryptocurrency used on this platform. Ethereum has been described in several ways, such as (the first and third resources are more general introductions, while the second is a technical introduction, although all are outdated.
+Another introduction is available [here](https://bitsonblocks.net/2016/10/02/a-gentle-introduction-to-ethereum/), but again, it is outdated. Despite being outdated, Ethereum has maintained backwards compatibility thus far up till January 1 2018, so the info is still relevant.):
+| Exchange link (may go to a fees page) | +Fiat to crypto exchange fee buy/sell spread | +
| BTCmarkets | +AUD is the only fiat currency. 0.85% trading fee. Funds available to deposit, withdraw, buy and sell are: AUD, ETH, ETC, BTC and LTC. To deposit AUD, you need to verify your account and then use POLi Payments (available banks are here. My bank is ME Bank, which doesn't support POLi Payments. I applied with BOQ because they do support POLi Payments, they don't invest in fossil fuels [like ME Bank] and they have transaction and savings accounts with no fees [like ME Bank].) | +
| GDAX | +0.25/.3% maker fee low volume, 0% taker fee BTC for USD/EUR/GBP, ETH/LTC for USD/BTC/EUR | +
| Coinjar, has a debit card with accounts for Ether, BTC, XRP and LTC. | +1.00% AUD/BTC (and only AUD/BTC) | +
| Coinbase | +In Aus: 3.99% credit/debit card only (no other transaction method accepted). Other fiat and crypto currencies are available. | +
| CEX | +7% BTC/ETH for USD/EUR/GBP/RUB | +
| ice3x | +1% ZAR/BTC | +
| Luno | +ZAR/BTC fee not easy to find | +
| okcoin | +CNY/USD for BTC/LTC, fee not easy to find | +
| Maicoin | +TN/BTC Fee not shown, claimed none | +
| + | Crypto to crypto exchange fee / buy/sell spread | +
| Poloniex | +0.15/.25% BTC/ETH “maker-taker” (presumably the same as buy-sell) | +
| gdax.com/fees/ | +0.25/.3% maker fee low volume, 0% taker fee ETH/LTC for BTC | +
| Exodus | +~0.4720–.528% BTC/ETH variable. Desktop app. Sometimes currencies are not available for exchange! | +
| NVO | +Decentralised. ICO 05/27/17 02:00 UTC to 06/27/17 02:00 UTC | +