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ryan cooper
ryan cooper

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Solana & Cell-Phones & Bears (Oh my)

"The Solana Mobile Stack shows a new path forward on Solana that is open source, secure, optimized for web3, and easy to use."
~Anatoly Yakovenko, co-founder of Solana

TLDR: I'm not getting rid of my iPhone, iPad, & I <3 Steve Jobs tattoo yet, but the Solana Mobile Stack (SMS) and ethOS have me excited for the potential of a true web3 mobile shift and the prospect of being early to the development of new tech.

This could be big.

  • Ethereum has released their new mobile operating system, ethOs
  • Solana Labs (SOL, not SZA) recently announced the release of their upcoming phone, Saga as well as the Solana Mobile Stack (SMS).
  • Polygon recently announced a collab with startup Nothing on their upcoming Nothing (1) phone

In a world where 68% of website visits come from mobile devices, mobile has the potential to be monumental in terms of crypto adoption. That's the thesis of these crypto giants as they invest in building web3 for mobile devices.

Solana (Saga & SMS)

Solana Labs announced the Solana Mobile Stack recently, which is an open source mobile stack designed for devs to build mobile dApps and other functionality for the phones. Github linked here.
They are also releasing the Saga phone in early 2023 (with pre-orders available now). The specs are as follows:

"6.67 OLED display, 12 GB RAM, 512 GB storage, and the latest flagship Snapdragon® 8+ Gen 1 Mobile Platform, the security features of which will enable the Solana Mobile Stack’s Seed Vault. With the addition of a Secure Element built into the device, the Seed Vault keeps private keys, seed phrases and secrets separated from the application layer yet still capable of interacting with apps running on the device or in a mobile browser."

Per the Bankless podcast, Solana's co-founders primarily intend for Saga and SMS to serve as a starting point to push for developers and phone giants to focus more on mobile first web3 applications, but they'll grant themselves bonus points if the actual Saga phone gains traction on its own.

Saga Phone

Ethereum (ethOS)

The next play comes from Ethereum, with their ethOS. ethOS (in addition to being impossible to Google because of collisions with the word 'ethos') is a community led mobile operating system for Ethereum. It is currently available for the Pixel 3 and Pixel 5a. Github linked here and whitepaper linked here.
ethOS demo

Polygon (Nothing (1))

Few details are available so far for this project, other than Polygon's plans to build in easy access to dapps games, and their planned Polygon ID feature.

Nothing (1) Phone

Why this matters to me as a dev

As a developer, all this innovation has me hype. New tech means devs with their ears to the ground can be early adopters and become experts of potentially game-changing technology.

Let me know your thoughts & how I can improve my writing in the comments!

"Developers have been blocked for too long from creating truly decentralized mobile apps because the existing gatekeeper model just doesn't work anymore," said Anatoly Yakovenko, co-founder of Solana.

Sources:

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