This is the second chance for mass adoption.

Openbazaar looks great. we will reach out to the developers to understand their vision and development status.

Oh, man, you want 3000 BTC without a working software!!!! We even don't know who you are!

Any chance for the Gems team to partner up with the decentralised market place Openbazaar which is going live early 2015?

Using Openbazaar through Gems would be a pretty neat idea, i think it brings even more users. Since the app already accepts Bitcoin and maybe make it possible to spend Gems in Openbazaar aswell? Is this feature something to consider for the Gems team?

i just want to send in 1 btc for some gems... why does it need to be so complicated...

Any chance for the Gems team to partner up with the decentralised market place Openbazaar which is going live early 2015?

Using Openbazaar through Gems would be a pretty neat idea, i think it brings even more users. Since the app already accepts Bitcoin and maybe make it possible to spend Gems in Openbazaar aswell? Is this feature something to consider for the Gems team?

More invites going out today. Tweet @ us #requestinvite for a better chance!

The messages services of Gems is based on a distributed instant messaging server which is completely asynchronous to achieve massive scale. This service is implemented on SignalR and OWIN - an open-source stack for running realtime signaling over WebSockets.

Note that every user can chose to be totally anonymous and to have all of his text messages client-client encrypted.

In the future we are thinking about adding public key cryptography. Encrypting messages from a user, to someone else using the recipients public key, that way its tied to the GEM asset and nobody can spy on it.

We also considered integration with other (or additional) blockchains better suited to the capabilities Gems core product requires (maidsafe, Storj, ethereum etc) but the problem is none of them are functional right now. Like we said in the past, we believe that everything that can be decentralized, will be decentralized  - Blockchain technology is the future.

How Are Messages Encrypted

Instant messages in Gems arrive in two flavors - standard and secret. Standard messages are the default type and provide a standard level of security. Secret messages are meant for highly confidential conversations and provide an extreme level of security and privacy. App users can switch between these two flavors for every chat conversation. Making a conversation secret is very easy, and only requires tapping on the "lock" icon inside the app.

Instant messages are encrypted on two levels. The first level of encryption is relevant for both standard and secret messages. For both types, all communications between the Gems mobile app and the Gems instant messaging cloud server are encrypted - this is also referred to as client-server encryption. Communications between the two is performed over SSL in a secure tunnel (HTTPS) with 256-bit keys. This prevents third-parties from listening in. This also prevents man-in-the-middle attacks and makes sure the Gems app only communicates with the real server and not anyone impersonating it.

The second level of encryption is only relevant for secret messages. On top of the client-server encryption, secret messages also have client-client encryption. Every Gems app generates a unique random pair of 4096-bit public/private keys upon installation. The public key is propagated within the network, but the private key never leaves the device. The public/private pair is unique to a device. If the user transfers his Gems account to a new device, a new pair is created. The key pair is also expired and refreshed periodically to enhance security.

When user A sends a secret message to user B, it's encrypted using RSA 4096 with user B's public key. Once the message arrives to user B's device, it's decrypted with B's private key. Decryption can only take place on user B's device because only this device has access to the correct private key.

The benefit of client-client encryption is that it provides a zero trust environment. The encrypted message cannot even be decrypted by the Gems server infrastructure. This means that even if the Gems servers have been compromised and hacked into, secret messages are still 100% private and can only be decrypted by their rightful recipient.

The drawback of secret messages is that they cannot appear in push notifications. Since push notifications are encrypted by Apple's/Google's infrastructure, they don't conform to zero trust policy. When a secret message is sent from user A to user B, the push notification user B receives contains the text "You've received a secret message from A" instead of showing the actual content of the message.

Any chance for the Gems team to partner up with the decentralised market place Openbazaar which is going live early 2015?

Using Openbazaar through Gems would be a pretty neat idea, i think it brings even more users. Since the app already accepts Bitcoin and maybe make it possible to spend Gems in Openbazaar aswell? Is this feature something to consider for the Gems team?

Epicenter Bitcoin interview with Gems is live https://plus.google.com/u/1/events/c3divjphjj5v0tkf33q6c23l3ak

edit*
You can watch a replay here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_n56kcI7jg

Peeled disappeared and now this guy is posting it seems for GEMS. Please no more sockpuppets.

Airdrop will start when there is a level playing field for iOS and Android users.
(Thank you for the community feedback regarding this issue)

The value of a social network is tied directly to the number of active users. The key concept behind Gems is that the network is owned by its users, so its value should be divided fairly between them according to their contribution. How does this work?

This model is implemented using the daily airdrop. A percentage of all available gems—30,000,000, or 30%—are reserved for distribution in daily airdrops. Every day, ~27,400 gems are taken from the reserve and distributed directly to users according to a public and fair algorithm. The gems are “dropped” into the users’ wallets, hence the term “airdrop.”

The goal of the airdrop is to reward users based on their contribution to the success of the network. Since we measure network value by the number of active users, the algorithm is designed to reward users who introduce other active users.

I don't think it's possible, but i might be wrong

Please answer the following questions. Thanks
1] Can I buy GEMS at Koinify on 1st December? Can i buy any amount of GEMS like 100, 1000?
2] Is it possible for me to use the GEMS APP [iOS ver] on my Xperia [Android phone]? i know that its possible for some iOS apps to be used on an Android phone and vice versa.