Ponder is a unique use of blockchain technology and cryptocurrency, letting people introduce each other. The team calls this a platform designed to allow for introductions at scale. This means that everyone is invited to be a matchmaker for their friends as well as strangers, but not just in a romantic sense. Ponder hopes to become the go-to solution for anyone who wants to meet new people in a context that requires high levels of trust, such as recruiting, babysitting, business partners, and roommates. In the beginning, it will focus on romantic matchmaking, with other sectors being added later.
The Upcoming Token Sale
The token sale for Ponder Gold started on Feb. 14 at 6 a.m. PST and will end at 10 p.m. just over a month later on April 20. The Ponder Gold price is $0.20, and there is a hard cap of $18 million. During the first week of the token sale, contributors will receive a 20 percent bonus, and in the second week, that bonus drops slightly to 10 percent. You can contribute via LTC, BTC, ETH, Zcash, Dash, NEO, or a USD wire transfer.
There will be 360 million tokens in total. Twenty-five percent of these will be contributed during the token sale, with a further 40 percent purchased within the application, 30 percent retained by Ponder, and 5 percent for token distribution.
Why Do You Need Ponder Gold?
Anyone who plans on making use of Ponder will want to purchase some tokens during the sale or trade for them at a later date. Owning Ponder Gold becomes a VIP card that improves a user’s match rate. Matchmakers with Gold will get the highest number of active singles, and singles with Gold will get exposed to the best matchmakers.
If you want to participate in a matchmaking sub-group, you will need to hold Ponder Gold, making them important to invest in. You also must hold Ponder Gold to participate in extra matchmaking services, including relationship advice and singles’ events. Once Ponder extends to other sectors, certain areas of the application will only be available to those who hold Ponder Gold.
Those who hold Ponder Gold can also create applications or services, such as a singles event where they charge Gold coins, or they can offer dating advice for a fee in Gold.
Why a New Solution Is Needed for Introductions
Ponder argues that introductions change lives, but those truly impactful introductions are difficult to find and limited without any way to make them at a higher scale. Traditionally, large matchmaking is done centrally with an online service, a matchmaking agency, or a recruitment company. While informal matchmaking tends to be the most effective, it has a limited scale.
The team at Ponder further points out specific flaws of the current online dating industry. The generic algorithms companies use simply won’t work well, and no dating company has been willing to share its data, showing a lack of confidence. There is also a very high rate of signal noise compared to noise, with about seven times as much time spent online compared to actually dating.
The team also points out structural problems with various online dating companies that lead to females receiving excessive messages and often experiencing harassment. Finally, the team points out the lack of trust due to things like no trusted intermediary, the possibility of fake profiles, and false information. This lack of trust makes it take longer to develop trust and a relationship.
How Does Ponder Resolve the Issues?
Ponder takes control of these issues by decentralizing matchmaking in a way that lets anyone play matchmaker and make a profit in the process. It aims to take that informal matchmaking that friends do and scale it to use on the mass market. It adds social capital and human judgment to the process, which improves match rates and saves time.
Why Does Ponder Use Tokens and the Blockchain?
The involvement of the blockchain and tokens in matchmaking is unique, but it makes sense for Ponder. The team feels that matchmakers and those who get matched experience a clear transfer of value, which makes it logical to have the person matched pay the matchmaker a token. The team chose to put the token on the Ethereum blockchain instead of just within the app for flexibility.
The team also incorporates financial rewards and game mechanics to create an incentivized community that boosts growth and aligns all parties. Trust and security come from the blockchain and the ERC-20 smart contract. To hold the Ponder token, users must go through a Civic identity management platform.
Decentralization was chosen because Ponder will collect sensitive personal information to help with matchmaking. The blockchain allows for trust, safety, and accuracy when matching people and transferring value. The Ponder team also hopes that this platform will show people around the world that blockchain technology truly is for the masses.
How Does Basic Matchmaking Work?
The key to Ponder is basic matchmaking, and this is already active with 70,000 registered users. Users rely on the app to view singles, which include strangers and friends. Everyone has a shortlist of the various prospects to choose from, and users make matches based on the profile. To suggest a match, they just drag and drop a photo. Once a user creates a match, the two people matched receive a notification. If they like the other person, both parties give $10 as a fee for success. The matchmaker receives $10, as does Ponder. If the couple marries, the matchmaker gets another $1,000.
What Is Group Matchmaking?
Group matchmaking is designed to help those who want to date someone with common interests, such as religions or hobbies. Anyone with Ponder Gold can create a group for 100 Gold. The owner sets rules, and new recruits pay 5 Gold to the group owner. Once the group has 50 members who are single, every new member pays a fee chosen by the owner with the profits spread across the Group based on their total matches within the past month. Group matchmaking has the same interface for matching as basic matchmaking, but the couple needs to get five suggestions before being notified, and they pay 50 Gold if they agree with the match.
Conclusion
The statistics for Ponder’s success rates and matchmaking so far are promising, and this method seems to have potential for those who are looking for romance online. The platform should become particularly beneficial once the uses extend to non-romantic introductions, such as business-related matches, making it something to watch in the future.
1 Comment
I have never heard about Ponder before, very interesting platform!