- Orchid was founded in 2017, on the principle that the internet should be more open and more accessible, to - everyone. In 2017 and 2018, Orchid successfully raised more than $48 million, and those funds immediately went - towards building the Orchid team – now with offices in CA and Berlin – and to creating the technology and - products that will advance our mission. -
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- - Dr. Seven Waterhouse, Orchid co-founder & CEO discusses solutions to combat the global rise of centralized - surveillance states and how decentralization of the global internet architecture could be the key to - preserving democracy, privacy, and individual rights. -
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- As dueling interests move to control the future of the internet, users around the globe are increasingly - turning to VPNs. But what users don't know is that many VPNs fail to provide the security and privacy that - they advertise. -
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- Governments and corporate interests are competing to own the future of the internet, and with it, control - information and personal data. As users, developers, and investors, how can we take back control? -
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- How ISPs, apps, third parties, and websites are raking in the big bucks by tracking your clicks, emails, and - purchases—and what we can do to control our digital identities. -
-- Orchid’s founders bring together deep experience in the open source software community (BASH Shell, GNU Finger), - technology management (RPX IPO), blockchain investment (Bitstamp, Pantera Capital), jailbroken app package - management (Cydia) and security (Wells Fargo’s 1st Online Banking, Ethereum core security team). -
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- “Orchid struck us as one of the first killer apps that we can see getting broad appeal. It also has an important - mission that we think is very timely in the world today.” -
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- — Matt Huang, Former Sequoia partner and Paradigm co-founder (Business Insider, Nov. 2017)
+ The Internet opened up an unlimited world of information. Its creators invited us to bring our curiosity and explore that world freely. As the Internet grew, exploring freely became harder. Web 2.0 business models incentivized companies to watch and track us and sell our data. And in some places, limits were placed on the information we can see. But that is changing. The decentralized Web 3.0 being built on Ethereum is allowing the Internet to be reclaimed by its users. At Orchid we share in this mission. We use Web 3.0 technology to offer users better digital privacy today, so we can realize the promise of the Web 1.0 and explore freely again. Orchid was founded in 2017 to help restore the open and accessible Internet for everyone. Since then, we have grown an incredible team based in San Francisco and Berlin that is releasing the Orchid tokenized VPN in Q4 2019.
+ Orchid’s founders bring together deep experience in the open source software community (BASH Shell, GNU Finger), technology management (RPX IPO), blockchain investment (Pantera Capital), jailbroken app package management (Cydia) and security (Wells Fargo’s 1st Online Banking employee, Ethereum core security team).
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+ Orchid is a Delaware c-corp
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+ Orchid is a Delaware c-corp
+ Let's reclaim the Internet together! We are looking for partnership opportunities with infrastructure + providers and integration partners that want to build with Orchid. Contact us and we'll get back to you + shortly.
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+ contact@orchid.com
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+ @OrchidProtocol
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+ @OrchidOfficial
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+ We've decided to distribute an early version of the Orchid app ahead of our network launch. This pre-release version analyzes network traffic on your phone and does not include VPN service yet (your IP address will not change). We are using the software to test and audit our networking code prior to integrating the token and interfacing with the Orchid Network. Once we launch our network, we can update the Orchid App to provide complete VPN service.
-In its initial form, this app will only be focused on one thing: analyzing and reporting the hosts that the data on your device are connecting to. For now, our app includes the following features:
-It's important to us that this app is both open source and localized to your device, meaning no third parties see your data and nothing leaves your phone. We believe that an Open Source approach embraces the core tenets of decentralization and provides the greatest opportunity to create a network capable of delivering the stability, capacity, and security necessary to provide users with the online experience they desire.
-Follow the directions below to download the Orchid App.
-- Download the Orchid app today for a local traffic flow analysis of your phone's internet connection with no - external servers and no third parties. -
-- As we build towards a decentralized, tokenized marketplace where users can construct their own custom VPN - configurations and privacy services (as described in our whitepaper), the first feature offers under-the-hood introspection into - your internet connection. -
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- - Humans naturally crave space to freely express their agency. No other place on Earth has the potential for - all humans to collaborate and access opportunities than the web that connects us all. -
-- Orchid is building a suite of Open Source tools and cryptographic protocols developed and run by people who - want the internet to extend our natural human freedom, not curtail it. -
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+ Read the whitepaper to see what we’re building. +
+We believe that by eliminating centralization, rewarding network contributors, and harnessing the power of - blockchain, we can preserve an open and accessible internet.
+We believe that by eliminating centralization, rewarding network contributors, and harnessing the power of blockchain, we can preserve an open and accessible internet.
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- Utilizing the power of Ethereum’s ecosystem allows Orchid to operate without a central authority. The app - runs local on your device—not through a server—and no data is ever stored. + Ethereum allows Orchid to operate without a central authority, and the network is completely permissionless.
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- Orchid is 100% open source software, enabling the sharing of ideas, community auditing, debugging, and, of - course, contributions. + Orchid software is Open Source to enable the sharing of ideas, auditing and debugging by the community, and of course, contributions.
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- Orchid clients and network providers transact directly, with no middlemen, creating an open, transparent, - and low cost - marketplace for bandwidth and VPN connectivity. + Clients and network providers transact directly with no middlemen, creating a low-cost marketplace for bandwidth and VPN connectivity.
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The Orchid network enables a decentralized virtual private network (VPN), allowing users to buy bandwidth from a global pool of service providers.
+To do this, Orchid uses an ERC-20 utility token called OXT, a new VPN protocol for token-incentivized bandwidth proxying, and smart-contracts with algorithmic advertising and payment functions. Orchid's users connect to bandwidth sellers using a provider directory, and they pay using probabilistic nanopayments so Ethereum transaction fees on packets are acceptably low.
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+ Users of Orchid run a client similar to a typical VPN client for protocols such as OpenVPN, but which speaks the Orchid protocol. The Orchid network client goes past the basic functionality offered by most VPN clients, with features such as the ability to run traffic through an integrated personal firewall. The Orchid client is accessible via iOS, Android, macOS, Linux, and (soon) Windows.
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+ OXT’s primary and fundamental purpose is to keep track of who has used computing services, who has provided computing services, and whether the average user is fairly compensating the average provider.
+The OXT token provides value in the Orchid network in a number of ways:
+The bandwidth marketplace is peer-to-peer and run in a completely decentralized manner without reliance on any central party. The primary reasons for a native token are:
+Accordingly, in addition to facilitating bandwidth transactions on the Network, the Orchid Token is used to prove a stake within the Orchid network that is intended to demonstrate a commitment for bandwidth providers, as well as to mitigate certain risks.
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+ The Orchid software is designed to use a custom VPN protocol, similar in scope to OpenVPN or WireGuard. The Orchid protocol is designed for high-performance networking and runs on top of WebRTC, a common web standard, widely used to transmit video and audio from inside browsers. Our protocol is intended to allow users to request access to remote network resources and pay for these resources using OXT via a nanopayments system.
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+ Orchid uses a new probabilistic nanopayment system to scale payment throughput.
+This nanopayment system is the foundation of the Orchid peer to peer bandwidth marketplace where clients pay Node operators OXT “tickets” for proxy bandwidth. The system is designed to lower the transaction fees on small payments by amortizing transaction fees across many transactions and even across multiple parties.
+For more information, see our recent article: Introducing Nanopayments
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+ Service providers on Orchid run software similar to a typical VPN daemon for protocols such as OpenVPN, but which speaks the Orchid protocol.
+Orchid nodes maintain registration information in a stake registry and provider directory on Ethereum. The stake registry is optimized for enabling the Orchid app to automatically discover random servers in a decentralized environment, while the provider directory allows Orchid nodes to register metadata such as geolocation or additional services offered.
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+ A provider stakes some number of OXT tokens to create a stake deposit.
+Once tokens have been locked into a stake deposit they can be used immediately for bandwidth provisioning. If the provider wants to withdraw tokens from the staking contract, they have to start an ‘unlocking’ process period, which involves a three month cooldown where their funds cannot be used as a stake deposit or transferred elsewhere by the provider.
+Whatever the amount of value that is exchanged in the Orchid ecosystem, a given seller’s relative stake amount, as a percentage of the total stake, provides them that same percentage of user traffic and dealflow. Assuming typical and honest selling behavior (no users drop them for bad service) this dealflow will translate into a similar portion of the total revenue. The staking decisions of sellers is left to their own choices.
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