With the thousands of projects now in existence it is easy to get jaded by what appears to be yet another copycat project. Ethereum initially caught my interest because it was described as a ‘new decentralised internet’. Golem was another that immediately popped owing to its vision of becoming a “global, open source, decentralised supercomputer”. Those are large scale visions, regardless of how realistic they might be.

In the last 12 months there have been a multitude of projects which are at best theoretically partial upgrades on already existing cryptoassets so that new ideas are often quickly written off because there is already a competitor or because it just feels so similar. It is very easy to get jaded to such an extent that projects from certain regions begin to be lumped together as a collective, an issue that Chinese projects are particularly prone to.

Elastos is one of those projects that I disregarded without a thorough reading because it seemed to be yet another knock off project that offered little new. However, a little additional research reveals there is more to Elastos than meets the eye, although the muddled marketing makes it harder than most to properly grasp.

The sentence that grabbed my attention was that Elastos was aiming to "build a decentralised operating system". I had no idea what it meant, but it's cool.

Explain Like I'm 5

Note: I normally don't do this and I actually wrote this section after completing the rest of the article. I have moved it to the top as I feel many will benefit from it as I have found Elastos to be a particularly difficult project to explain.

Elastos is an operating system, a decentralised internet and a Virtual Machine (VM) tool all wrapped up into one. It has its own operating system to run on devices without one (e.g. IoT devices), it aims to improve security by using the blockchain as an internet protocol rather than TCP/IP and it allows DApps to run across any operating system - including phones - using what is essentially a VM (called Elastos Runtime).

It works to improve security by assigning everything running on Elastos (including devices, digital assets, servers, DApps) their own ID or 'Universal Unique Identifier'. This is checked on startup by the Elastos blockchain and only following validation is an internet connection established. This aids prevent DDoS attacks. Furthermore as all DApps run on Runtime they do not touch the device, Elastos OS or any other DApp - they essentially operate in a vacuum.

There are other projects which aim to do some parts of Elastos but there are none (to my knowledge) that are trying to combine it all as is attempting to do.

What is it?

Let’s break down the whitepaper bit by bit, beginning with the introduction and vision:

Elastos aims to create a new kind of Internet, powered by blockchain technology: This is similar to many of the claims made about Ethereum and others.

This is similar to many of the claims made about Ethereum and others. Elastos wants to make digital assets scarce, identifiable and tradable. Property rights pave the way for wealth creation, and Elastos intends to build a new World Wide Web that respects those rights: Whilst there are other projects sharing this goal, I’m not sure any of the other platforms have made this as high a priority as Elastos have, given this in the opening paragraph of the whitepaper.

Whilst there are other projects sharing this goal, I’m not sure any of the other platforms have made this as high a priority as Elastos have, given this in the opening paragraph of the whitepaper. The goal is to create an Internet that allows users to access articles, movies and games directly, without going through a media player or another platform intermediary: Again, there are other projects aiming to let people do this but it is more DApps aiming to do this, not platforms. It is interesting that they aim to bypass other media players entirely here.

Again, there are other projects aiming to let people do this but it is more DApps aiming to do this, not platforms. It is interesting that they aim to bypass other media players entirely here. Elastos will be a platform for decentralized applications (Dapps) that runs on a peer-to-peer network with no centralized control: Nothing particularly new here.

Nothing particularly new here. People can access these Dapps via their mobile phones, without changing their operating system: This is interesting and the first part of the project which really stands out. One of the main issues with a lot of DApps is the inability to run them on mobile phones at present.

This is interesting and the first part of the project which really stands out. One of the main issues with a lot of DApps is the inability to run them on mobile phones at present. Elastos wants to create a new World Wide Web that is safer and smarter, and that can one day be known as the Internet of Wealth: Continuing the confused marketing theme, burying the vision (actually located at the end of the whitepaper) is an odd move and it is unclear what a smarter WWW might actually resemble.

So do you understand what Elastos’ differentiator is or really what it is trying to do? No, me neither. It seems to be similar to many other projects at this point, although the ability to run on any mobile phone is attractive. Let us continue.

Section 2 opens with the perceived limitations of Ethereum based DApps which include storage/speed (no argument there), bugs (I don’t believe this to be an inherent flaw of Ethereum, just the sloppy work of those who code DApps), cost (whilst simple transactions are cheap, executing smart contracts can be expensive), junk data (all data published is stored forever, making the blockchain increasingly big) and security (Ethereum does not negate conventional attacks via a virus, middlemen etc).

The big issue they raise is that Ethereum (and by extension most competitors, Ethereum is merely the largest) runs smart contracts on the blockchain itself. Elastos claims to run DApps that are enabled by blockchain technology but do not run on the blockchain itself. They instead run on any OS – be it mobile or not. The paper goes on to explain that “Elastos runs applications on Elastos Runtime as opposed to on the already congested blockchain”.