Following reports of skyrocketing RAM prices on the EOS blockchain, Dan Larimer, EOS creator, has announced a three-step solution. He also mentioned that Block.one is building a free wallet for iPhones.
Last week, news broke[1] that the price of RAM on the EOS blockchain had drastically risen. After peaking on July 8, the price has been drifting downward and currently stands at 0.34 EOS, or $207, per kilobyte (at time of press). To create an account, a user must purchase at least four kilobytes.
The price increase led to discussions of whether RAM was being purchased for speculative reasons rather than for actual use, and whether the current trend could lead to a shortage of RAM. A shortage could potentially become a threat to the entire EOS project itself, either by driving up the cost of EOS account creation or by choking off the processing power.
On Saturday, during the height of the RAM controversy, block producer EOS New York tweeted:
The block producer in question, LibertyBlock, later released a statement[2] indicating that the crash had actually occurred because of a configuration error, not because of an overuse of RAM.
Still, the issue remains unresolved, and on July 12, EOS creator Dan Larimer presented a three-step plan[3] for lowering the cost of RAM and, consequently, the cost of EOS account creation. His three recommendations are: increase RAM supply, lower account memory usage, and give free accounts to users of Block.one's iOS wallet.
Increase RAM Supply:
Block producers have the power to increase the amount of RAM available, though such a move would have to be approved on a vote of two-thirds plus one of the block producers. Larimer wrote:
"I recommend that the producers immediately start growing the RAM at the
