[2017-12-06] CryptoKitties Creates Massive Backlog on the Ethereum Network

[davey76]

The new decentralized game CryptoKitties launched last week, with the purpose of the game to collect, bred, and trade electronic cats. Due to the game’s unbelievable popularity, the Ethereum network has been seeing record rates of transaction backlog. Cat-Based Trading Game CryptoKitties launched at the end of last month as one of the first games based on a decentralized blockchain.

More: http://bitcoinist.com/cryptokitties-creates-massive-backlog-on-the-ethereum-network/

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[Iranus]

I'm pretty sure that ETH has an adjusting block size, so it'll clear out after a little while.

Regardless, it shows that transaction backlog and significant fees aren't confined to BTC.  It's a problem that needs to be solved by crypto in general, just not by BTC, and the solution to BTC backlog isn't to jump on the next crypto that comes along.
I doubt that this kind of game will take off after it's past its gimmick phase.  Just a temporary distraction for ETH users.

[hatshepsut93]

For the last year or so all altcoiners were claiming that their coin is scalable, that BTC is a dinosaur and has value only because of network effect, but CryptoKitties showed us that it's just a marketing stunt and there's no crypto that can handle any practical use cases on main chain - and this is not a matter of better code, capacity is limited by hardware of network participants, who are just your regular home users with very limited resources. In this light it makes sense that Bitcoin is the most expensive, because it is the most stable, well-tested, secured by enormous hashpower and has the most experienced developers.

[patt0]

I have mixed feelings every time I hear about this application. At first this looks like great news for ethereum, because an application was finally created that is getting adopted all over the world. I know we already had etherdelta, but that was an exchange, so it's still tied to the speculative financial market. CryptoKitties is just a game, that is also tied to speculation, since it's objective is to create and collect rare kitties, but it is still a game.
This just proves the point that ethereum dapps, have a real use case application, and we will probably see more collectible games coming up, or other types of applications that could benefit from a decentralized network.

The problem is, that this small game also showed us, how fragile ethereum still is when it comes to scalability. How can we expect global adoption of ethereum, and a large number of successful dapps running on the network, if we can't even handle one. I know these issues affect most crypto, including bitcoin, but lets not forget that BTC is now more tied to gold and to being an asset, so even being at max capacity, it can still handle things for now. Ethereum, on the other hand, really needs to solve this issues fast, otherwise it wont be able to handle dapps or even ICO funding.

[kabrero]

Just an app and eth sucks about the transactions. How could i pay my coffee via eth?

[Lukas Tarantas]

Today I read in the news that the first cat was bought for 115,000 dollars. World has gone mad. How can people pay such money for the pixels on the screen?

[Cubanlinx81]

This just proves that Ethereum is a king with clothes. If a trivial app like this can cause so much trouble, how can it be taken seriously. I really do believe that Cardano will eventually wear the crown; and rightfully so. Cardano looks to have all of its work peer reviewed before implementing it into code.