What is 0x?
0x is an open and non-rent seeking protocol engineered to facilitate trustless, low friction transactions of Ethereum-based assets. Developers may use 0x as a platform, to construct exchange applications on top of. Clients may use, the 0x infrastructure on a wide selection of user-facing applications; such as 0x Portals,and decentralized applications that facilitates trustless trading of Ethereum-based tokens between known counterparties.
In the 2 yrs since the Ethereum blockchain's genesis block, numerous decentralized applications (dApps) have been created on the Ethereum platform through smart contracts for peer-to-peer exchange. Rapid iteration and little best practices have left the blockchain scattered with proprietary application-specific implementations. Consequently, clients are exposed to smart contracts of varying quality and security, each with unique configuration processes and learning curves, that ultimately implement the exact same functionality. This process pushes unnecessary costs on to the network by fragmenting users with the particular dApp each user is actually using, eliminating valuable network liquidity.
0x is a solution to this dilemma by acting as modular, un-opinionated foundations that can be assembled and reconfigured. 0x protocol token (ZRX) is used in two ways: 1) to resolve the coordination problem and drive network effects around liquidity, developing a feedback loop where early adopters of the protocol take advantage of wider adoption and 2) to be useful for decentralized governance over 0x protocol's update mechanism, allowing its underlying smart contracts to be replaced and improved over time.
