比特幣挑戰者出現 "恆星"貨幣可免費領取

Stripe is diving into digital currency in a big way.

Stripe公司正在大舉挺進數字貨幣領域。

The San Francisco-based startup, whose technology lets businesses accept online payments, helped introduce a new Bitcoin-like currency on Thursday called “stellar,” as well as a payments network that lets users send any kind of traditional and digital currency including U.S. dollars, pesos, euros and Bitcoins. People will be able to send one kind of currency across the globe and have it automatically converted into another — a sort of all-inclusive online money exchange.

這家初創公司位於舊金山，它的技術能讓商家接受在線支付。上週四，該公司推出了一種名爲“恆星”（stellar）、類似於比特幣的新型貨幣，以及一個支付網絡，該網絡可讓用戶使用任何一種傳統貨幣或數字貨幣進行支付，包括美元、比索、歐元和比特幣。用戶可以在全球範圍內採用任一種貨幣支付，並由網絡自動將其兌換成另一種貨幣——這相當於一個無所不能的在線貨幣兌換平臺。

At first, Stellar will be given away for free as a way to introduce more people to the nascent world of digital money, or so-called “crypto-currency.” It’s also a sure-fire way to get stellar to as many people as quickly as possible.

目前，“恆星”是免費發放的，以吸引更多人進入數字貨幣（或所謂的“加密貨幣”）這一新興領域。採用這一方式，也能確保它以最快速度讓更多人使用。

Stellar was developed by the Stellar Development Foundation, a non-profit created by Stripe CEO Patrick Collison and Ripple co-founder Jed McCaleb plus $3 million in initial funding from Stripe. The foundation’s board and advisors boast impressive names like ex-PayPal executive Keith Rabois, YCombinator partner Sam Altman, AngelList cofounder Naval Ravikant and Automattic CEO Matt Mullenweg, among others.

“恆星”是由非盈利組織“恆星開發基金會”研發出來的，該基金會由Stripe公司首席執行官帕特里克o克里森，與創新支付企業Ripple公司的聯合創始人傑德o麥凱萊布共同創建，初期投資是來自Stripe公司的300萬美元。這個基金會的董事會和顧問團隊可謂大佬雲集，比如貝寶公司（Paypal）的前高管基思o拉布伊斯、著名孵化器YCombinator的合夥人山姆o奧特曼，衆籌平臺AngelList的聯合創始人納瓦爾o拉維康特，以及博客平臺運營商Automattic的首席執行官馬特o穆倫維格。

Collison had been kicking around the idea of an agnostic online payments network since 2011, shortly after he and brother John began working on the technology for Stripe. “Even before Stripe launched, we were thinking about what crypto-currencies mean for Stripe and in particular, how we can take advantage of them in order to accomplish the things we want to do,” Collison explained to Fortune earlier this week. Collision has talked over the years of wanting to make online payments universal and ubiquitous, and he felt crypto-currencies dovetailed with that vision.

2011年，克里森和他的兄弟約翰開始爲Stripe公司開發相關技術。此後不久，他就萌生了一個念頭，要搭建一個當時還聞所未聞的在線支付網絡，併爲此不斷鑽研。本週初，他在接受《財富》雜誌（Fortune）專訪時表示：“其實早在Stripe公司成立之前，我們就開始思考加密貨幣對公司的意義，尤其是我們如何才能利用好這種貨幣，實現自己的夢想。”多年來，克里森經常會談起想要推廣普及在線支付，使之無處不在這一話題，現在他感到，加密貨幣的出現與實現這一願景恰巧不謀而合。

So several months ago, Collison began brainstorming with McCaleb, who had helped build Ripple, a Bitcoin rival. “We were having these conversations, and it was so clear what Stripe thought should exist, and what he thought should exist, and they almost precisely [matched up],” Collison recalled. “So it made sense to decide to do something together.”

幾個月前，克里森開始和麥凱萊布探討這個想法。麥凱萊布曾幫人創建了Ripple公司，它後來成了比特幣平臺的對手。克里森回顧稱：“談過幾次後我們發現，Stripe公司的想法理應實現，他所設想的東西也應該實現，所以這兩者幾乎是精準（匹配的）。所以我們兩方決定攜手合作也就在情理之中了。”

Collison and McCaleb agreed that establishing a non-profit separate from Stripe to be in control of developing Stellar was the best strategy. “We felt the basic parts shouldn’t be controlled by one single entity,” said Collison. They also decided to give away the majority of stellar currency for free: half of the 95 billion stellar coins will be given to people who sign up via Facebook , for instance.

他們倆達成共識，最佳策略是創建一個獨立於Stripe公司的非盈利組織，以直接掌控“恆星”的開發。克里森稱：“我們都感到，基本部件不應該由一個單一組織掌控。”他們還決定，大部分“恆星”貨幣都將免費發放：比如，950億“恆星”貨幣中，有一半都將發放給那些通過Facebook註冊的用戶。

Many questions remain about Stellar, not the least of which includes whether the currency will achieve any sort of significant value — something that will depend on how much it’s used — and whether the network it flows through takes off. Collison readily admits it will take time for their so-called “experimental research project” to take hold, if it does at all.

不過“恆星”未來的命運還籠罩在衆多疑問中，比如這種貨幣是否會具有很大的價值——這取決於它的使用量——它所賴以流通的網絡是否能順利運行。克里森也坦承，他們所謂的“實驗性研究項目”要想站穩腳跟還需假以時日。

Look no further than Bitcoin’s own slow, growth for proof of that. Although the cryptocurrency has earned countless headlines since January 2009 — the culmination being Newsweek’s March cover story — in reality, Bitcoin’s user base remains lower-than-expected: Over 1.2 million as of this January, by some estimates. But what Bitcoin has sparked is a serious conversation about the way money can and should be processed online, to the point where even more traditional services like PayPal have said they are closely following Bitcoin.

只需看看比特幣緩慢的成長道路就能明白這一點。儘管自2009年1月以來這種數字加密貨幣已登上了無數頭條——而且《新聞週刊》（Newsweek）三月的封面報道造成了一個小高潮——但實際上，比特幣的用戶基數始終低於預期：有人估計，截至今年1月，用戶數剛超過120萬人。但是比特幣卻引發了一場嚴肅的討論，即貨幣可以且應該通過網上支付，甚至就連貝寶公司這樣更爲傳統的金融機構也表示，他們一直在密切關注比特幣的發展。

With some of Silicon Valley’s brightest at the helm, Stellar has just as good a chance as any current crypto-currency perhaps to be, well, stellar.

不過，既然有硅谷的一些頂尖大佬掌舵，“恆星”也很有可能會和現在大行其道的一些加密貨幣一樣躋身“一流”的行列（stellar也有“一流”之意——譯註）。