A fair launch is easy to promise and harder to show. This article looks at the one part of our plan that is not mined like everything else, the team allocation. We explain what it is, what we will publish about it, and what we cannot tell you yet.
What ATON is, in short
ATON is a public blockchain for payments, and it is still being built. Its coin is also called ATON.
You mine it with an ordinary graphics card, using one memory-hard proof of work. Blocks can be made at the same time, and a GHOSTDAG-style rule puts them in one agreed order, so parallel blocks still add up to one shared history.
There is a hard cap of one billion ATON. Those coins are paid to miners through a long emission that slows into a small tail.
Nothing has launched. There is no coin to hold yet, and there is no first block.
The plan: a fair launch
Our plan is simple to state. There will be no premine and no sale. Nothing is sold on the site, and the site takes no orders.
That means coins are meant to come into existence through mining. If you want ATON after launch, the planned route is the same for everyone: run the proof of work and take part in making blocks.
The one exception
There is one planned exception, and we would rather name it clearly than leave it for you to find.
It is the team allocation. Its size and its vesting will be published before the first block. Neither is decided yet.
We are not hiding a number here. There is no number to hide. When the decisions are made, they will be published before mining begins, so you can read them while nothing has been mined.
What size and vesting mean
Two terms carry most of the weight in this exception.
- Size is how much of the one billion ATON cap is set aside for the team.
- Vesting is the schedule on which those coins become usable over time, rather than all at once.
Together they answer the questions most people ask about any team share: how much, and how fast. A small share released quickly and a large share released slowly are very different things, so one figure without the other tells you little. That is why both will be published, not just one.
Why before the first block
The first block is the point where the chain's rules start working on real coins. Before it, everything is still a plan you can read and weigh.
Publishing the team allocation before that point gives you a fair chance to judge it. You can see the size and the vesting, compare them with the rest of the design, and decide whether you want to take part. A disclosure made after mining begins would ask you to accept terms that are already in motion.
A fair launch is not only about what happens at the first block. It is also about what you are able to know before it.
What we cannot tell you yet
Honest limits matter more than reassuring words, so here they are.
- We cannot tell you the size of the team allocation. It is not decided.
- We cannot tell you the vesting schedule. It is not decided either.
- We cannot tell you the exact emission curve. It is not specified yet, beyond the shape described above: long, slowing into a small tail, under a hard cap of one billion.
We will not hint at likely figures or offer ranges. If we have not decided something, we would rather say so than give you a guess that sounds like a fact.
How to use this
If you are following ATON, the useful habit is to hold us to the order we have set out. Before the first block, you should be able to read the size of the team allocation and its vesting. If you cannot, you have a clear reason to ask why.
You can follow the project and its progress on the ATON Blockchain site. When the team allocation is decided, that is where you will read it, before any block is mined.
