Dogecoin just sent $11,000 over Twitter. Instantly.
If you've tried to transfer cash online, you've probably faced a process that'll hit your wallet and take an age to complete.
Cryptocurrencies are changing that, and sending cash across borders is now as easy as sending a tweet.
That's just what Twitter user Hood did yesterday, sending 14m Dogecoin to the Doge4Water campaign - which aims to provide safe access to water in Kenya.
Dogecoin is a meme-based currency that's been gaining popularity since December. In practically no time at all that money - $10,780 at present values - was sent via the alternative currency.
Reddit user D_Satoshi_Nakamoto says that the transfer would have cost Hood around $0.01. Send the same money via PayPal, and you'd face a two to four day wait, and fees of 65,000-210,000 Dogecoin ($50.05-161.70) according to Mikbob's calculations.
This means that Dogecoin is 2000000% cheaper and 360000% faster than using PayPal.
Thanks to Dogecoin users, Doge4Water has now raised 40m Dogecoin ($30,900) for the drilling of two wells in Kenya. That will provide access to water and tools to retrieve and store it.
Preston Byrne, a fellow of the Adam Smith Institute and a commercial lawyer specialising in securitisation and cryptocurrency in the City of London, added: "the Dogecoin community demonstrates again that there are socially useful and politically neutral applications for this technology which should be encouraged."
Hood sent that money using the Dogecoin tip bot for Twitter. The Dogecoin community have become active "tippers", sending sums of money using Twitter and Reddit quickly and at minimal cost.
Byrne says that "the ease through which cryptocurrency can be 'sent' through apps developed on the Twitter/Facebook/Reddit APIs illustrates a major regulatory blind spot for those businesses, as well as a significant threat to existing players in money transmission and payment processing."
"Given the significant market demand for using cryptocurrency in charitable applications, I hope regulators will take a future-oriented view to this activity and find ways to ensure it remains legal," says Byrne.
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