A better look at Ergo
Here at Crypto Caverns, we’re researching a variety of coins as we look toward expansion. And as we research, we’ll be keeping you in the loop on some standouts, and telling you a bit about them.
Next up is Ergo. Introduced in 2019, Ergo (ERG) is a project that boasts a programmable blockchain with an energy-efficient and stable mining protocol.
Ergo’s mission is to develop all the necessary tools for a decentralized finance ecosystem. Ergo is a partner of Cardano and Emurgo, and a member of the Blockchain Privacy, Security & Adoption Alliance.
The Ergo mainnet was launched in July of 2019 by Alexander Chepurnoy, a blockchain veteran whose first big project was the NXT platform, and Dimitry Meshkov, who has a PhD in physics and over a decade of software development experience.
Chepurnoy and Meshkov both worked in research at IOHK, an engineering and research company that builds blockchains and cryptocurrencies that was also instrumental in creating the cryptocurrency Cardano.
“Ergo allows people to synchronize with the network by downloading less than a megabyte of data, reducing the process from potentially weeks to minutes and enabling it to take place on mobile devices — all with the same security as current third-party solutions,” Chepurnoy said in a statement clarifying what ergo is all about at the time of launch.
Ergo is a programmable blockchain like Ethereum, which means it provides a platform where developers can create decentralized applications (dApps), with the difference being that unlike Ethereum, Ergo doesn’t have gas fees. This means developers can more accurately predict the cost of creating dApps on Ergo.
Like Bitcoin, Ergo uses a proof-of-work model for mining new coins and validating transactions. Ergo is built from the ground up and not a code fork from another project.
According to Ergo’s website, “Ergo was created for regular people, proof of work allows a truly fair start and the highest degree of decentralization. It’s also widely studied, has very high-security guarantees and is friendly to light clients.”
Ergo is the first blockchain to adopt the smart contract language in the same eUTxO (extended UTXO) model as Cardano, which in turn enables proof of work compatibility. Ergo’s Multi-Stage UTXO model that introduces the concept of UTXO chains and allows chaining together smart contracts of arbitrary complexity.
Here’s some information on Ergo’s tokenomics:
- ERG is a deflationary token, hard-capped at under 100 million ERG.
- It doesn’t have a long tail of emission, and its block rewards steadily decrease following a two-year period.
- When ERG launched on the mainnet, block rewards were set at 75 ERG.
- After eight years, it will go down to zero, at which point the total ERG supply will have a settled number.
- The circulating ERG supply is at 45 million, representing 46% of the total supply.
- The rest of the supply emission will be released over the next six years before proof- of-work consensus rewards drop to zero.
- From there on, Storage Rent and the transaction fees paid by users will provide economic incentives for miners to run their equipment.
ERG is currently listed on gate.io, coinex, bitcoin.com, waves.exchange, swop.fi, biki TradeOgre, HotBit, and KuCoin.
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