The viral CryptoKitties ethereum app has sparked growing congestion on the network, a state of affairs that has spurred one startup to briefly postpone its planned initial coin offering (ICO).
The token sale for SophiaTX was originally planned to start on Dec. 5. SophiaTX, according to its website, is developing a blockchain platform for business-to-business use cases.
Yet the activity around CryptoKitties – an ethereum-based app that uses tokens to represent digital cats that can be traded, exchanged or bred to create more e-pets – has effectively clogged up the blockchain. And while some are calling it a “killer app” for ethereum, the resulting interest is resulting in potentially longer wait times for would-be transactors, including those trying to participate in token sales that accept ethers, the cryptocurrency of the ethereum network.
As a result, the SophiaTX team announced today, they will hold the ICO’s start until this Thursday, Dec. 7.
“We have decided to delay the [token generation event] start by 48 hours because a very large number of participants will use ETH during and it would be a major disappointment if their attempted contributions wouldn’t be processed timely and that would result in a significant backlog of transactions with very long waiting times,” they said in a statement.
It remains to be seen whether the interest around CryptoKitties will lead to similar decisions. Statistics from ETHGasStation.info, a network data provider, suggests that the network congestion has eased somewhat compared to yesterday,
Cats waiting in line image via Shutterstock
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https://www.coindesk.com/ethereums-cryptokitties-blockchain-deluge-sparks-ico-delay/
