In a recent tweet, IOG Chief Executive Officer Charles Hoskinson said that the term “smart contracts” is actually an inaccurate term when it comes to Cardano.
Hoskinson suggests that instead of using “smart contracts”, the crypto community should use the more accurate term ”programmable validators” which could better explain the blockchain-based functionality.
IOG developer Matthias Benkort said that using the term “smart contract” on Cardano’s proof-of-stake blockchain platform is a “semantical inaccuracy.”
He said that Cardano’s programmability is highly different from other blockchain platforms such as Ethereum and Solana mainly because of its “eUTXO” transaction model. In other words, smart contracts cannot be actually deployed on Cardano.
No such thing as ‘deploying’
In Cardano’s platform, there is no such thing as “deploying”, which is one of its major differences from Ethereum and Solana’s platform.
Instead of deploying, validators are implicitly referred to by hashes prior to their use and they are disclosed upon activation. Benkort said that until now, the crypto community still tends to mix up validators and smart contracts.
But he also admitted that adopting terms such as “on-chain validators” will be confusing from a marketing perspective.
Benkort added that if he had his way, he would certainly prefer the terms “on-chain validators” and “off-chain code”, but he conceded that these are unappealing terms, compared to the non-technical smart contract.
A closer look at Cardano
Cardano is a public blockchain platform. It is designed to be open-source and decentralized, with consensus achieved using proof-of-stake. It can facilitate peer-to-peer transactions with its crypto cryptocurrency called $ADA.
The open-source platform was established in 2015 by Ethereum co-founder Hoskinson, and the development of the project is overseen, managed, and supervised by the Cardano Foundation.
Cardano is considered the largest cryptocurrency that uses a proof-of-stake blockchain, which is seen as a more environment-friendly alternative than proof-of-work protocols.
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