Zippie Monthly Update #10
By: Heikki Vänttinen
Tags: Blockchain, Ethereum

Zippie is getting into Holiday spirit!

With Christmas fast approaching, we decided to create the year-end update with a slightly different format, publishing a joint post that includes progress made by the Zippie team in both November and December. This is because for the last two months, we’ve been working on some very exciting Zippie ecosystem related projects, and we didn’t want to announce them before they were ready to be launched to the whole world. It is that time now that all the pieces are in place, so let’s look at what is new in the world of Zippie, what we’ve been up to in the last two months, and how we’re literally making an impact — already today.

Announcing the Zippie ecosystem accelerator

To move forward in our mission to empower application developers in building mass market friendly distributed applications — and in the process a better, more decentralized world — we are launching an ecosystem accelerator which will support teams building great projects on the Zippie platform. In addition to increased visibility towards investors, projects in the accelerator will have full access to all the functionalities of the Zippie product, such as fast and easy onboarding with the Sign in with Zippie solution, complete Zippie token wallet integration which allows the app to send and receive value in the form of Ethereum tokens, as well as the Zippie ID identity management solution.

All together, with the Zippie ecosystem accelerator we want to enable and empower the creation of the next generation of distributed applications. Apps that take the opportunities that blockchain technology provides and create products and services that serve mass market needs. Our first project in the accelerator is AirImpact, a Zippie powered crowd donation platform, which you can learn more about by reading on, or by visiting www.airimpact.org.

First accelerator participant announced at Slush: AirImpact crowd donation platform

In the beginning days of December the Zippie team headed over to Helsinki, Finland for the Slush startup event. This year’s Slush was especially interesting for teams working in the blockchain space, as blockchain and cryptocurrencies were prominently included as one of the main themes of the conference, all the way to a specifically blockchain focused event — Slush Crypto Evening, sponsored by Zippie and PwC. It was at this sold out event where we helped launch the initial marketing campaign for the first mass market application to run on the Zippie platform: a cross-border, peer-to-peer crowd donation platform, called AirImpact.

Slush is the world’s leading startup event with over 20,000 attendees

AirImpact is a Zippie powered app that lets you donate to charitable causes anywhere in the world with a swipe of your finger, while at the same time being certain that 100% of the value you donated went through to the intended receiver. With donations through the AirImpact donation app, you will be able to support elephant guardians in Tanzania, farmers planting co2 reducing trees and dozens of other causes directly and instantly, using AirImpact’s blockchain-powered solution.

AirImpact’s simple donation user interface

As its first campaign, AirImpact will be utilized in protecting the African elephant population in Tanzania, where elephant guardians work tirelessly to prevent the poachings of this endangered species. To support the campaign, you can join today, and download your very own digital elephant, called Fantti — free of charge. For every new signup to the campaign, the project donates one hour’s salary to an elephant guardian tasked with protecting the African elephant in Tanzania. AirImpact is working on the initiative with PAMS Foundation, one of the foremost nature conservation organizations Africa. You can read more and join the campaign here.

Zippie accelerator and AirImpact in the press

Our announcements didn’t just reach the crypto scene, but also got picked up by mainstream publications in Finland. Zippie accelerator and AirImpact as its first project were published on many of Finland’s leading business and technology publications — a sign that our message of using blockchain to do good is something that resonates not only in the blockchain space, but also among the general public. Some of the publications that ran the story were Kauppalehti and Talouselämä (Finland’s 1. and 2. business magazines) as well as Tivi and Tekniikka & Talous (two of the leading technology publications in Finland). Needless to say we are very happy with the exposure, which should help in drumming up interest towards AirImpact in its first launch market of Finland.

Christmas Airdrop

Don’t think we forgot about our token holders either! If you’re one of the 1160 Zippie community members who signed up for the Christmas Airdrop, this Christmas will be extra rich in gifts — especially ones that come in token form. We’ll be distributing the Airdrop tokens to signed up members on the 28th of December, so keep your eye on your wallet!

Product news

On the product side, our Alpha 6 release is officially out and looking great with the new brand visuals integrated into a whole new, rewritten React based UI. With it, Zippie now not only has a fresh UI that looks and feels awesome, but also a more functional, responsive user experience. Besides the look and feel, the new React based user interface also provides a more customizable UI structure for various future use cases.

A peek at our new and improved UI

With the card, we have been working on enabling Zippie ID recovery. This is made possible by an application called Zippie Secretary, which will use a PIN code paired with the card’s NFC capability to enable easy ID recovery as well as control of paired devices. Currently only accessible to our alpha testers, when rolled out to all users, the Zippie Secretary will be the simplest way to recover your Zippie ID if you for example misplace or break your smartphone — or simply want the same great Zippie experience on multiple devices.

And the improvements don’t end there. The R&D team have also been working hard on the wallet, and as a result of this it can now support any generic ERC20 token. In the Alpha 6 release, these tokens now go to their token-specific subwallets that are accessible from the main wallet UI, creating a clear an intuitive structure and improving the overall user experience of sending, receiving and storing any ERC20 token on the Zippie platform. You can read the full Alpha 6 product update here.

Team news

With the Zippie ecosystem growing, that growth is naturally reflected in the need for more hands on deck to build the decentralized future we’re all envisioning. This time it is our aforementioned partner AirImpact who is looking for skilled builders to realize their vision of an easy to use blockchain based peer-to-peer donation platform. The need is for experienced React developers, so if you are one or know somebody with a corresponding skillset, contact us at hello@zippie.org.

That’s it for now! A couple of busy months in the bag, and new year just around the corner, we would like to wish all of our followers a very merry Christmas, and a happy New Year!

As always, to follow our projects’ development between updates, you can join our community on Telegram, Twitter, Reddit and YouTube.