For some strange reason Apple has decided to distance itself from the Bitcoin community and the company has gone as far as rejecting several apps from being downloaded from the App Store, all because they have Bitcoin functionality. Many say its because of the unclear regulatory issues surrounding the currency and at the moment Apple just aren’t ready to allow something onto their App Store they don’t fully trust or know the full legal ramifications of.
So at the moment for non jailbroken users the idea of having a Bitcoin related app in the future isn’t going to be happening very soon. But that could soon change if this guy achieves his crowdfunding goal. Kyle Drake is asking fellow Bitcoin users for $55,000 for his Indiegogo campaign to build his new app, Coinpunk. A HTML 5 web app which runs on Safari, Chrome, Firefox and others to handle all your Bitcoin transactions on the move. The good thing, by making it platform varied and web based, companies like Apple are not able to block it.
Right now you are able to sign up to start creating your own Bitcoin wallet which you will be able to use when the app is released. But if you can’t wait till then, for the full stable release then you can install the beta version of Coinpunk right now by using the following instructions.
Kyle already has the basics of the app working so check out his pitch video at the bottom of the page to see him use his Coinpunk app to buy a sandwich at Subway. By supporting Kyle and his team you not only get a Bitcoin app for your iPhone when development is complete you’ll also receive a variety of stickers, posters and other cool perks depending on how much you pledge to the project. The following is a statement from Kyle explaining what the $55,000 is going to be used for.
We will use the funds to help developers working on Coinpunk pay living expenses, pay server and development bills, improve coinpunk.com, fund improvements to watch-only address support, and conduct security audits. All of the funds will be stored in a cold wallet Bitcoin address, and we will document where Bitcoins are sent and why (and you will be able to confirm it via blockchain inspection.)
