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Is the Ripple Network Bitcoin 2.0?

Fastco.exist provides an in-depth look at Ripple, a company that calls itself the “world’s first open payment network,” and may be the next big thing for Bitcoin.

Ripple, a platform that just received funding from Google Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz, Lightspeed Venture Partners, and others, has created both an alternative to Bitcoin and a distributed currency exchange for Bitcoiners (and others) who aren’t comfortable using only Ripple’s currency, known as XRP.

More on the mechanics of Ripple:

The Ripple platform serves two purposes: it’s a distributed open-source payment network, and it’s the home of the newly minted XRP currency. As a payment network, Ripple provides free global payments without chargebacks (minus a $0.0001 per transaction network charge, implemented as a security precaution against hackers), the ability to pay in any currency using a distributed currency exchange, and an open protocol that any developer can use. “The Ripple network is a protocol. It’s like HTTP for money. Users, merchants, anyone can use it for free without a license,” explains OpenCoin co-founder Chris Larsen.

So is it complementary or competitive with Bitcoin?

Ripple isn’t trying to convert all Bitcoin users to dedicated XRP advocates (though that would certainly be nice for OpenCoin). Instead, Larsen sees Ripple as a companion to Bitcoin. “It’s complementary. You can hold your Bitcoin in Ripple. We want to be agnostic to any currency, whether that be a virtual currency, political currencies, or peer to peer currencies,” he says.

Read the full article at Fastco.exist.

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