Orchid AMA Summary with Decentralized Club ✔️
Dear, Community,
Welcome to the recap of our AMA with Orchid Protocol.
Our vibrant and enthusiastic community had a lot of questions to ask. To those who want to know quickly what Orchid Protocol is about, we are sure this recap is gonna help you. So without further ado, continue reading 😉
✔️Introduction with Orchid :👉
BILLY:
Q1. Can you please introduce yourself and also tell us a bit about Orchid ? @dereksilva
Derek Silva:
Of course! Thanks so much for having us here todayi.
I have been in the blockchain industry for three years now! I started off as a community member after hearing more about Ethereum from some very smart people at Fireside Conference like Anthony DiIorio, the founder of Decentral and Jaxx wallet, and Ethan Buchman, a co-founder of Tendermint and Cosmos.
I went home, started resarching ICOs, got into ETHLend, and then heard about Bloom. A few months later I became the Head of Community Relations for Bloom Protocol, and the rest is history. 🙂
As for Orchid, it’s a decentralized VPN marketplace where anyone will be able to sell excess bandwidth to the network. People who want to do so stake OXT in order to advertise their Orchid node on the network, and users stake OXT in their account so they show bandwidth sellers they have enough to pay for the service.
Right now the only providers are official partners like LiquidVPN, Boleh and a few others who have lots of experience handling the technical and legal issues around being a VPN provider. Once the node software is a bit more mature though, we’ll be opening up the documentation so that anyone in the world with a desktop or laptop computer can sell bandwidth and earn OXT. 😄
We have VPN clients for iOS, Android and macOS now with Windows available soon. The performance is great and everything is open source, even the node software.
Visit https://orchid.com/download if you’d like to try the service
I’m ready for the next question 🙂
BILLY:
That’s a really good introduction. Hehe. Thanks man
Q2. What are some of the key features of Orchid ? @dereksilva
Derek Silva:
Great question.
Key features and benefits of Orchid include we produce open source software (clients and server), no personal information is collected or shared, no credit card or debit card data collected, there is no in-app analytics (that’s very rare) embedded in the app, we’re collecting the best VPN providers all under one roof so that you don’t have to choose between them, there is no subscription fee (it’s pay-as-you go), plus we should eventually have thousands of individuals selling their excess bandwidth which means you’ll be able to select any number of nodes. There is also the ability to set up multi-hop circuits to guarantee the middle node can’t even see the source or destination, offering even better security and privacy than any traditional VPN can provide.
BILLY:
Since anonymity is a paramount feature, can we pay in crypto fully ?in any tokens we want?
Derek Silva:
Yes, everything runs on OXT. Bandwidth sellers stake OXT, VPN users pay in OXT. We have a really nifty smart contract with its own scaling solution we call nanopayments. If you have heard of Sablier, it works in a similar way where OXT is streamed from your account to the bandwidth seller you’re connected to if you’re using the service. You’re paying on a byte-by-byte basis so it’s super affordable if you only need it in some situations. We don’t want your personal information. 🙂
BILLY:
That’s super
Q3. Can you elaborate a bit on how Orchid has brought a new solution or enhancement(when compared to an existing solution in the market) to the table ?
Derek Silva:
I touched on this earlier but I will try to summarize a few key points in comparison with traditional VPN providers:
- Orchid allows you to set up multiple hops in a circuit, similar to Tor, and pay for each hop using a different wallet. So if you set up 3 hops, each funded with different wallets, not only does the middle hop have no idea where the traffic is coming from or going, but each hop has its own wallet funding it. This is something a whistleblower or dissident should be very interested in for protecting their privacy.
- Orchid collects zero personal information. Email, password, payment information, etc. We want none of it, we don’t ask for it. 🙂 🔒
- Nanopayments, which I imagine we can discuss in more detail, is a great scaling solution.
BILLY:
In short all features are disruptive!
Q4. Finally, what does Orchid plans to achieve by the end of this year?
Derek Silva:
The biggest thing we’re working on right now is the Windows client. Besides that our CEO, Dr. Steven Waterhouse, has also said we’re exploring how OXT could live on other layer 1 blockchains. A lot of them are very immature, but several have launched their mainnets recently and they are very interesting. I think you’ll see a world where OXT can live on Ethereum and other blockchains soon, just like USDT settles transactions on both Ethereum and Bitcoin blockchains.
BILLY:
Windows client will be epic. Millions of people can try it out instantly and maybe love what it does ❤️
Derek Silva:
We certainly hope so! 😄
BILLY:
So, now we move on to our Twitter round. I will post all 5 best questions from Twitter and you answer one by one okay?
Derek Silva:
We also need to add in-app purchases to Android and Windows. I don’t know for sure if that will come this quarter though.
BILLY:
Twitter Questions coming
🐧Community ask Questions by Twitter ✔️
BILLY:
Twitter Question no 1 (ThoaTra)
Username : @TraThoa
here are many VPNs and Messaging Apps that are available and work fine in the current market, why is the decentralized VPN platform better than centralized ? What are the extra benefits of decentralized apps rather than centralized ?
Derek Silva:
Hmm, not much more I think I can add here. I guess I would re-emphasize that this is a decentralized marketplace where users pay sellers directly. Orchid is not taking any fees at this time, and once the server software is more stable anyone will be able to participate in the network as a bandwidth seller. It’s a way to wrestle control from large companies and earn an income if you have capable hardware.
BILLY:
Twitter Question no 2 (Laylo Madellin)
Username : @LayloMadellin
What is the objective of the Whitelist in your protocol? Under what circumstances could it be within a whitelist and in which cases not? Would an unbalanced distribution of nodes be a problem for network performance?
Derek Silva:
I think this is referring the default Curator. As I mentioned earlier, the default Curator and the partners in it were a way to bootstrap network capacity with a group of companies who know how to do this well already. They have been instrumental in helping us improve and stabilize the node software during these early days, and they offer a trusted Curator that anyone can connect to. For those who are a bit more adventerous, you’ll eventually be able to select other Curators that could offer better performance, connect you to servers in a specific country/city, and so on.
BILLY:
Twitter Question no 3 (Rivaille)
Username : @rivaills14
Can you tell us about the degree of decentralization and governance model of this protocol?What incentives will be there for participating in the Governance activities?
Derek Silva:
Orchid continues to be more and more decentralized every day. There isn’t a governance mechanism built into OXT at this time, so I can’t speak to that. The incentives here are better digital privacy and security, and the ability to earn an income by selling excess bandwidth. Orchid’s CEO has also mentioned other potential use cases like offering video streaming or content paywall payments using OXT in the future as well.
BILLY:
Twitter Question no 4 (Ahmer)
Username : @ahmer_khokhar
Q: Kindly elaborate the Probabilistic nanopayments approach and its benefits .
Derek Silva:
It is a complex bit of math that you can read more about here and in the whitepaper. Both of these assets are available in other languages besides English, too.
In a nutshell, it means that while most OXT is streamed from a user’s account to a bandwidth seller off-chain using Orchid’s nanopayment smart contract, every once in a while a larger payment is issued on-chain to a random provider. That helps secure the network, and make sure that everything is eventually settling on-chain.
BILLY:
Twitter Question no 5 (yavuz)
Username : @yavuzarslant
Orchid is developing an open-source decentralized and surveillance-free internet protocol, recently there was the web censorship and hate bill speech, how can orchid help overcome these problems
Derek Silva:
One of the big advantages Orchid provides you is free access to the Internet. Running Orchid encrypts all your traffic and obscures it using WebRTC — that hides what kind of traffic you’re actually sending (e.g. email, websites, video streaming, FTP) and all your DNS requests go over Orchid’s network as well so your ISP can’t see your traffic. If you pair that with the ability to set up multi-hop circuits and private payments, we think that leads to a winning solution for just about any use case.
✍️ Telegram live Questions answered by Orchid ✔
NIco BEN:
Community support is one of the biggest aspects of a project’s success. Most projects have programs that interact with their users. Does you have any special plans to attract and expand the community and improve the user experience?
Derek Silva:
We have a robust Telegram presence already, a growing Reddit community and are looking at Discord next. We have a team of very smart and caring individuals that, whether they’re part of the team or are passionate community members, help each other to make sure everyone has what they need. 🙂 ❤️
Jose:
The main problem with most VPNs I use is internet speed! VPN will reduce internet speed! So, how does Orchid VPN solve the speed problem?
Derek Silva:
We have worked really hard at achieving great performance. The team is often testing speeds, and some of our community members also report on the performance they’re seeing like this one, where Crypto Master got almost 200Mbps download and over 20Mbps upload!
https://t.me/OrchidOfficial/59600
Leo:
How is the tokenomics and distribution plan of OXT? How to ensure that the price of the token does not affect the profits of the nodes?
Derek Silva:
Orchid is very transparent about the OXT distribution schedule, and it can be found at https://orchid.com/oxt.
There is a deep dive about the tokenomics in the whitepaper, which I linked to earlier and can also be found in the footer at https://orchid.com.
Gerry Hoppe:
Where I can buy OXT ? Do you have plans for listing on more exchanges in this quarter?
Derek Silva:
OXT can currently be purchased on Binance, Bitcoin.com, Kraken, CoinList, Gemini, Bittrex Global, OKEx, Coinbase, Coinbase Pro, Upbit, and CoinDCX, amongst other exchanges.
Please note that Orchid has no role in connection with any such purchases and cannot provide support for these transactions.
When choosing partners, we are always looking for those that can help expand Orchid’s reach and awareness so that more people can participate in the network. I think you see reflected at https://orchid.com/partners that we focus on high quality partners.
OM:
had a question about non-USA providers and nodes, asking “Have you guys partnered with any VPN’s that are not in the US, or thinking about partnering with VPN’s outside of the country? I think people want the option to choose their location, as this is a common feature of VPN’s”
Derek Silva:
Yes, we have partners whose presence is based outside the USA and are operating nodes outside the USA.
I’ll pair this with the often asked “when can I choose to select which country I’m connecting to/from?” question. It’s actually really hard to offer geo-selection in a decentralized way because a centralized VPN provider knows exactly where their servers are, whereas Orchid either needs to collect that data from a bandwidth seller or rely on GeoIP lookups, which are notoriously unreliable. It’s something our team thinks about a lot and hopefully we find a really good solution for. An oracle like Chainlink, which we have already deployed two oracles on, is a potential solution.