After receiving a handful of requests through Twitter this morning, and also getting poked by my buddy ThisWeeksCoin, I think it’s time we take a look at SilkCoin. Apparently , this coin is generating quite some buzz, so lets take a look.
First of all, SilkCoin has absolutely nothing to do with Silk Road. The SilkCoin developers want this to be crystal clear to everyone, as Silk refers to the fabric you can find in clothing, nothing more and nothing less.
SilkCoin is a bit of an odd coin, as it is a Scrypt Proof-of-Work/Proof-of=Stake hybrid, but not like you’d come to expect. There will not be one, but two distribution stages, which means SilkCoin will go PoW/POS – PoS – PoW/PoS and then full-time PoS. Unique, but I like it!
The first distribution stage will last a week (10,000 blocks) , followed by a full month of PoS. After that, we will see a new PoW/PoS stage similar to the first one, and then the final PoS stage. Minimum stake age is only 12 hours, at a fixed rate of 2% per year.
What is most impressive to me, is the fact that the SilkCoin client has a lot of built-in tools and features! A block explorer, statistics, coin control, QR code capabilities, reserve balance and pools/services updates are all within your grasp.
This might actually be one of the most complete clients I have ever seen, especially impressive for a cryptocurrency that only launched 3 days ago! A lot of work has been put into the development of this coin and client, and it certainly sets the bar for coins to come.
It also has an animated camel, which certainly tickled by funny bone. It’s a small thing, but I like it anyway.
During the Proof-of-Work phases, a total of 100,000,000 SC will be mined. With a 2% stake annually, there is no set hard supply cap for SilkCoin. This is not unusual, and shouldn’t be any reason for concern really.
SilkCoin blocks are generated every minute, and reward miners with 50,000 SC. These block rewards will not decrease, and will remain the same for the second PoW/PoS phase as well. Difficulty will re-target after every block.
Several exchanges have already listed SilkCoin/Bitcoin trading pairs. ShareXCoin, CryptoAltEx and Bittrex are all supporting SilkCoin, with more exchanges to come over the following days and weeks, no doubt.
Make sure to check out the SilkCoin website , as well as the SilkCoin thread on BitcoinTalk!
SilkCoin donations are welcome to : BEscjsaNqDcBK8MMwkH3AX4c7nFKDQWCqx
Launch went very well. The mixed POW / POS should allow for a more even distribution and the devs look very active. Wallet is the best I’ve seen, liked the camel as well 🙂
I like the idea of the mixed POW/POS as well. Seems like a fair way to test if a coin will take off, then allow everyone to join in. Should get big support soon