Lisk is a blockchain application platform, founded by Max Kordek and Oliver Beddows in early 2016. Based on its own blockchain network and token LSK, Lisk will enable developers to build blockchain applications and deploy their own sidechain linked to the Lisk network, including a custom token. Thanks to the scalability and flexibility of sidechains, developers can implement and customize their blockchain applications entirely. Lisk aims to make blockchain technology more accessible with a SDK written in JavaScript, special focus on user experience, developer support, in-depth documentations and the Lisk Academy. The Lisk network is operated using a highly efficient Delegated Proof of Stake (DPoS) consensus model, which is secured by democratically elected delegates. Lisk, headquartered in Zug, Switzerland, raised over 14,000 Bitcoins in funding during its ICO (Initial Coin Offering), making it valued at over $4 billion at its peak. Lisk is an open source blockchain platform which is powered by Lisk (LSK) Tokens that allows developers code decentralized applications (dApps) in JavaScript programming language. With Lisk, developers can build applications on their sidechain linked to the Lisk Network, and also with their custom token. In that sense, Lisk is similar with the Ethereum blockchain. However, the Lisk platform hasn’t been built to create smart contracts, but to develop diverse apps and functionalities using the LISK AppSDK framework. It is a modular cryptocurrency as this coin involves ‘modules’ that serve as the basis of its design and construction. The overall design is its trump card - the Lisk system allows anyone to use its ‘designing blocks’ to construct their own decentralised apps. It utilises 'sidechains'. Besides, many former members of Ethereum core members joined Lisk. On June 8 2016, Lisk CEO Max Kordek announced the addition of Charles Hoskinson (ex-CEO of Ethereum) and Steven Nerayoff (ex-advisor for Ethereum) as Senior Advisors of Lisk, to facilitate Product Development.
Nano, a low-latency cryptocurrency built on an innovative block-lattice data structure offering unlimited scalability and no transaction fees. Nano by design is a simple protocol with the sole purpose of being a high-performance cryptocurrency. The Nano protocol can run on low-power hardware, allowing it to be a practical, decentralized cryptocurrency for everyday use. The original Nano (RailBlocks) paper and first beta implementation were published in December, 2014, making it one of the first Directed Acyclic Graph (DAG) based cryptocurrencies [6]. Soon after, other DAG cryptocurrencies began to develop, most notably DagCoin/Byteball and IOTA. These DAG-based cryptocurrencies broke the blockchain mold, improving system performance and security. Byteball achieves consensus by relying on a “main-chain” comprised of honest, reputable and user-trusted “witnesses”, while IOTA achieves consensus via the cumulative PoW of stacked transactions. Nano achieves consensus via a balance-weighted vote on conflicting transactions. This consensus system provides quicker, more deterministic transactions while still maintaining a strong, decentralized system. Nano continues this development and has positioned itself as one of the highest performing cryptocurrencies. Nano is a trustless, feeless, low-latency cryptocurrency that utilizes a novel blocklattice structure and delegated Proof of Stake voting. The network requires minimal resources, no high-power mining hardware, and can process high transaction throughput. All of this is achieved by having individual blockchains for each account, eliminating access issues and inefficiencies of a global data-structure. We identified possible attack vectors on the system and presented arguments on how Nano is resistant to these forms of attacks. Check out CoinBureau for the complete review of Nano.