With Twitter’s recent transformation to “X” and plans to morph into a payments platform under the visionary guidance of CTO Elon Musk, competition is heating up as another crypto aficionado seeks to seize the opportunity first. Web3 wallet Suku, a crypto payment innovation, is initially integrating with Twitter to allow users to send digital currencies and non-fungible tokens (NFTs) with ease.
Last week marked an exciting partnership between Suku and sidechain Polygon which led to the hosting of an open-edition NFT mint, celebrating the launch of Polygon 2.0. Users minted over 50,000 NFTs in just 48-hours by posting a tweet and tagging both parties. Users were then prompted to access the NFT via Suku Wallet or website by logging with their Twitter credentials. A staggering 48,000 users registered for Suku accounts during the mint period.
Yonathan Lapchik, CEO of Suku, elaborated on their company’s agenda of making the crypto onboarding process as simplistic as possible, bypassing the need for the traditional process of connecting a wallet. Focusing on engaging non-crypto users, Suku’s initial phase entails providing every user with an immediate wallet. In a move to catalyse adoption, Suku carries the burden of any gas fees that users would typically incur while receiving or dispatching payments.
Although Twitter is the starting point for Suku, they acknowledge the need to integrate other social media platforms due to the intricacies of creating a decentralized payment system via one centralized application. Furthermore, Lapchik believes that users don’t want to manage a myriad of payment systems for each social media platform they use. They want one that connects seamlessly with all. And Suku aims to serve just that – a noncustodial, user-friendly, and readily accessible platform connecting to users’ entire social graph.
While crypto payments systems have widely existed independently of social media, the trend towards incorporation into social platforms is gathering momentum. Earlier in July, messaging app Telegram announced plans to facilitate crypto transfers between chats.
To draw a clear conclusion, as Suku harnesses Twitter’s user base to democratize access to crypto payments, it also shines light onto the challenges of building a decentralized system via a centralized platform. Meanwhile, the race heats up with Twitter seeking to reinvent itself into a fully-fledged payments application. It seems social media platforms and crypto payments are, undoubtedly, on an exciting collison course.
Source: Coindesk
