The distributed bitcoin-powered marketplace app OpenBazaar has published a long-term roadmap in a bid to become a global leader in censorship-resistant trade. Since launch, OpenBazaar has seen a wide variety of vendors sign up to sell goods including caramel waffles, chili peppers and cannabis seeds . The project grew out of an earlier effort, dubbed DarkMarket, that sought to build a marketplace that, through its distributed nature, could not be completely shut down.
Now, the team behind OpenBazaar, according to the new roadmap, is expected to seek expansive growth in the months ahead.
Plans include the deployment of private listings, job postings, a built-in social network, and integrations with the InterPlanetary File System (IPFS) and the anonymizing Tor network. The team is also planning to release a mobile app.
The roadmap explains: "OpenBazaar is and always was a mammoth project with an ambitious goal to become the backbone of global commerce. Every marathon begins with the first step." Formally launched in April of this year, the distributed marketplace quickly found supporters, with developers stating at the time that the software had been downloaded 25,000 times its first day in business.
By the time the app and its parent company, OB1, had swept the Blockchain Awards earlier this month at ConDesk’s Consensus 2016 blockchain conference, it was downloaded more than 110,000 times. Function, content plans ahead
Immediate goals, according to the roadmap, focus on improving the customer experience of the app as well as onboarding other types of purchasable content.
The next three months will see the addition of “advanced digital goods” including music. Additionally, OpenBazaar plans to add support for registering a blockchain ID within the application.
Other features planned for the coming three months include email notifications, webhooks, cloud-storage backups, enhanced order and inventory management, a more intuitive user-interface, and an improved sales […]