New Cosmos Hub Software Goes Live to Improve Blockchain Interoperability

There has been a great deal of build up concerning Cosmos release. The platform is a blockchain system that works to enhance blockchain interoperability. This week, the software went live and of course, along with all of its capabilities.

The Cosmos ecosystem is already gearing up for a series of proof-of-stake (PoS) blockchains. At this point, the platform cannot be used to swap tokens between blockchains. Nor are they able to connect to Cosmos Hub using existing blockchain networks. For these capabilities, validators will need to vote to activate the Inter-Blockchain Communication protocol.

Cosmos was made possible by three years of planning, development, and the raising of over $16 million through an ICO in 2017. The for-profit entity behind the technology for Cosmos Network has released developer-focused products. Zaki Manian, in a discussion with CoinDesk, stated:

“We want to take the blockchain development cycle from the idea to implementation down from years to months. This is how we’re trying to transform the blockchain space.”

In February 2018, Cosmos Software Development Kit launched and since, it has been used by several major crypto companies, Binance exchange being one of them.

Further, Tendermint Core, which is the blockchain network that underlies Cosmos Hub, is a resource that Manin envisions will “fundamentally remove barriers to innovation” and enable companies to “compose an entirely new system of finance.”

He continued, users will be able to develop “[o]ut of all these building blocks an entire . . . open system of finance that operates to scale and can be composed of individual, specialized chains that do different things.”

Of course, the technology requires sets of operators who have, according to Manin, “skin in the game.” The validators are selected by the system and then participate in the process of project finalization. Manin stated:

“In proof-of-stake, the costs and rewards are internal. So we had to come up with a variety of very sophisticated system of distribution rewards, of distributing the speculator taxation system, of pushing people for malicious behavior, of pushing people for going offline.”

This entire process must be internal to the system, which is why proof-of-stake is a significant “engineering feat over proof-of-work.”

It’ll be interesting to see how Cosmos develops and what it comes out with over time. This particular project seems like one that may certainly be able to provide some use for various platforms and many people.