Telegram‘s active involvement with Telegram Open Network (TON) is over. Telegram founder Pavel Durov took to his public channel to announce the discontinuation of TON due to the ongoing legal battle between the company and the US Securities and Exchange Commission.
He wrote “Today is a sad day for us here at Telegram. We are announcing the discontinuation of our blockchain project. Below is a summary of what it was and why we had to abandon it.”
An accompanying blog post said that a judge from the U.S court was led to the decision in banning Telegram from launching TON or distributing its gram tokens based on the notion that people should not be buying or selling grams as they would with bitcoins. The court added that not only are the grams prohibited from being distributed in the U.S, they are also prohibited from global distribution. It indicated that the prohibition stems from the fact that some citizens might discover a way of accessing the TON platform after its launching.
Durov added in the blog post, “Sadly, the US judge is right about one thing: we, the people outside the US, can vote for our presidents and elect our parliaments, but we are still dependent on the United States when it comes to finance and technology (luckily not coffee).”
“It can use its control over Apple and Google to remove apps from the App Store and Google Play. So yes, it is true that other countries do not have full sovereignty over what to allow on their territory.”
Durov referenced third party engagements in launching their independent projects. He assured however, that no present or past member of his team is involved with any of those projects.
The Telegram CEO concluded his blog post expressing, “I want to conclude this post by wishing luck to all those striving for decentralisation, balance and equality in the world. You are fighting the right battle. This battle may well be the most important battle of our generation. We hope that you succeed where we have failed.”
https://telegra.ph/What-Was-TON-And-Why-It-Is-Over-05-12
[image: flickr]
