There are some interesting things in store for the Monero community. One of the things a lot of people are excited about is multisignature support. This feature has been in development for quite some time now, but a major breakthrough was achieved earlier this week. It appears the Monero multisignature implementation is currently being tested as we speak. A merge with the main code is imminent, although no official date has been announced yet.
Monero Multisig Support is Coming Soon
In the world of cryptocurrencies, it is somewhat surprising to see so few currencies benefiting from multisignature technology. Bitcoin has had this feature for as long as most people can remember. In the case of Monero, however, the developers had to start from scratch due to the very different infrastructure they are working with. This explains why this solution has been in development for so long. There is still no official mainnet release date at this time, though, as there is still a lot of work to be done in this regard.
To put things into perspective, some changes have been made to the Github repo for Monero’s multisig development. Until two days ago, they had the “DO NOT MERGE” tag associated with them. That indicated the developers were far from having a working product. All of a sudden, however, this tag was removed, which seems to indicate a lot of progress has been made. Moreover, Moneromoo – the person responsible for the multisig implementation – has asked the community on IRC to test and review this implementation in the near future.
It is important to note that Monero’s multisignature development is a project funded by the community itself. Unlike other cryptocurrencies with major financial backing, the Monero community put together the funds necessary to ensure the longevity of this anonymity-oriented cryptocurrency. These efforts are paying off in spades right now, as 2017 has been a pretty solid year for Monero already. Even more growth is expected to occur in the coming weeks and months.
The main benefits of multisignature technology for Monero are on par with other currencies. More specifically, 2-of-3 multisig can be quite useful to businesses of any kind. Online stores with third-party vendors will benefit from it as well. Keeping money safe for all parties is a big development, to say the least. Whether or not we will see “more” than 2-of-3 multisig for Monero remains unknown, although it is certainly a possibility.
Moreover, the darknet marketplaces have been holding off on accepting Monero until multisignature technology is fully developed. With this project now entering the testing phase, things will surely head in the right direction. It is certainly possible we will see more darknet markets drop Bitcoin support entirely and go all-in on Monero. When the darknet flocked to Bitcoin, we saw the latter’s adoption and price increase dramatically. The same may very well happen to XMR, although it is still too early to speculate.
Altcoin development has certainly shifted into higher gear this year. Most of the currencies in existence have no real purpose, but a few of them will actually stick around for the long run. Litecoin and Ethereum are on that list, for obvious reasons. The introduction of multisignature support for Monero will make it another contender to keep an eye on. The future’s looking bright for all XMR supporters, even though no official timelines have been made public as of yet.
