What Is Tron? A Complete Guide

What is Tron? We are not talking about the movie with fancy lights and motorcycles. Rather, Tron is a decentralised content-sharing platform that uses blockchain and peer-to-peer (P2P) technology.

You can think of Tron as the ‘Netflix’ but decentralised, allowing everyone and anyone to create and share content, anywhere in the world. It also allows the creator of the content to be compensated for their work. Tronix (TRX), which is the cryptocurrency of the Tron network, serves this exact purpose.

WHAT IS TRON? A BRIEF HISTORY

Tron was launched at the height of 2017’s crypto mania, and it quickly gathered a group of investors and developers who shared the vision of Tron reshaping the Internet. Supporters praise Tron for being the leader to empower artists and content creators into having ownership over the content they create.

It wasn’t all smooth sailing for Tron. Since inception, Tron had criticisms around the originality of its technology. This is because the building blocks of Tron, such as decentralised applications, smart contracts, tokens and proof-of-stake consensus were all pioneered by other projects prior to its launch.

Tron started to gain more mainstream attention in 2018 when it made the strategic acquisition of BitTorrent, the renowned peer-to-peer content sharing platform. This move gave Tron the ability to market its new cryptocurrency, TRX, to millions of existing users.

THE USE OF TRON

Tron is a network that allows and incentivises the creation and sharing of content. As such, it is a network that brings creators and viewers together. However, none of these would be possible but for the circulation of Tron’s native currency, TRX. Viewers use TRX to compensate the content creator for the content they create. This is a remarkable step up from the current media platforms such as Netflix or Stan. It is also very different to social media companies, whose business model is around monetising their user data.

To obtain TRX, the processed initially involved investors trading their Ether tokens for Tron’s TRX tokens. There are two additional benefits of holding TRX tokens apart from the fact that they can be used to pay content creators.

Tron uses a system in which there are a rotating cast of 27 ‘super representatives’. These super representatives are entrusted to validate transactions and maintain the system’s history. These super representatives are chosen every 6 hours and if chosen, they have the ability to collect new TRX generated by the protocol. How the super representatives are chosen is discussed below.

Tron users can stake their TRX to gain ‘Tron Power’. Tron Power is then used to vote for super representatives. Users receive 1 Tron Power for every 1 TRX they choose to lock in an account. As such, TRX holders tend to lock their TRX away in exchange for the rewards. This has the effect of ‘monetary tightening’, which means reducing the number of circulating TRX on the market. This has a positive effect on the price of TRX.

IS TRX SAFE TO INVEST IN?

TRX is a token that has gained lots of popularity since its inception. Some of the popularity is due to the personal brand of Justin Sun, who famously paid over US$4.5 million to secure a lunch with the billionaire investor Warren Buffett. Due to Justin’s influence and arguably some publicity stunts, TRX has been able to stay in the spotlight even during the lows of cryptocurrency.

Compared to mainstream cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ether, TRX is more speculative in nature. Having said that, it does have a significant market capitalisation and a large base of followers, which provides market depth and liquidity. This means that should an investor wish to exit their TRX holdings, this can be done with relative ease.

In summary, TRX is probably something to include in a diversified crypto portfolio, but not something to go all-in on. This, of course, does not apply to people who are looking to purely speculate on the token.

LOOKING TO BUY TRX WITH AUD?

Look no further, Coinstash is one of the few Australian platforms that allows its users to buy TRX with AUD. We have deep liquidity into USD markets, therefore the ability to provide our users with some of the best prices available.