Designing a Crypto Wallet

A Brief Introduction of the MDT Wallet

About the MDT Ecosystem

The MDT ecosystem comes from the team’s vision for a better, more efficient data exchange economy that rewards users for sharing anonymous data.

In the MDT ecosystem, users get rewards for the data they contribute. Once the user is opted-in, his/her data is anonymized, aggregated, and exchanged as big data. The value of their data contribution will be calculated in the transaction process (written in a smart contract) and allocated to their MDT wallets.

FAQ: What Is MDT And Why Should I Know About It?

The Wallet

The MDT wallet is currently designed as an SDK. Any partner who wants to join the MDT ecosystem can integrate the SDK in their apps. The users can then opt-in for data sharing and get rewards. Meanwhile, an MDT API system and backend will support task-based MDT rewards, allowing app providers to better engage their users.

The first stage of the MDT wallet will be a centralized one, where users can earn MDT by completing tasks or sharing data, spend MDT and manage their MDT. However,According to our tech roadmap, the MDT wallet will launch before the MDT data exchange platform is ready. This means that the early version of the MDT wallet does not support data-sharing rewards.

Design Goals

The MDT Wallet will be launched in MailTime app, as a new feature. MailTime is an email messaging app with over 5 million users. The app makes email as quick and easy as messaging.The app is one of the first to join the MDT ecosystem.

For the early version of the MDT wallet, we set up the following design goals:

1. Introduce MDT to MailTime users
2. Increase MailTime user engagement
3. Prepare users for getting more rewards by sharing data

To better understand the design goals, let’s have a look at MailTime users:

MailTime users are mostly in their late 20s to early 40s, more male than female. Most importantly, as MailTime is an email app, it is very likely that only few of its users are familiar with cryptocurrency.

Therefore, even though the MDT wallet is essentially a cryptocurrency wallet, a lot of the features will resemble points system or reward system — think about airline miles or Starbuck stars. It is much easier to introduce MDT as reward points to MailTime users, rather than as a cryptocurrency.

The other 2 goals for the MDT wallet are more inherent to the product itself:

• Increase MailTime user engagement
• Prepare users for getting more rewards by sharing data

It is quite common that companies collect user data and make huge profits, but it is another story to put it on the table. We assume that it takes some time and efforts for users to trust the MDT wallet and the ecosystem behind it. We want users to feel comfortable and safe about sharing anonymous data and get rewards accordingly.

Wireframing MVP

Before drafting the wireframes, we mapped out most of the features and identified the MVP features.

Feature Mapping of the MDT wallet. Some are grayed out.

Based on the MVP features, we sketched out the wireframes. The home page looks quite the same as any crypto wallet but much simpler.

Wireframes of the MDT wallet MVP. The texts and MDT rewards for each task/reward are not finalized.

One thing special about MailTime, or any email app, is that a user can login multiple accounts at once. The multi-account system is reflected in the designs of the MDT wallet as well. Each email account actually has an assigned wallet address for blockchain transactions. The actual wallet address is not visible to users, though.

Since each email address is an individual wallet, each has its own set of tasks. For example, the register reward is claimable when a user registered a new email account in MailTime. If a user registered 3 emails in MailTime, he/she can claim 3X the reward.

For the MVP version, there are 3 ways a user can spend or transfer their MDT. One is to exchange for 1 extra email account in the free version of MailTime iOS app. The other option is to transfer out MDT to an ETH wallet address or to an email address. In the future, there will be more appealing products and service.

Transferring MDT to an ETH wallet will be written on blockchain, and thus incur gas fee. Gas fee, or as we put it, transaction fee, will be calculated in MDT and deducted from the transaction.

Transferring to email address, however, does not require blockchain transactions, and therefore is more encouraged. If an email address is registered in an MDT wallet, the account holder will receive MDT in his/her MDT wallet. If not, the account holder will receive an email, and is prompted to register their email in the latest version of MailTime.

Visuals

Here comes the exciting part, hi-fi UI!

We started with a general direction of how the wallet will look and feel.

For the MDT wallet, we want to make it professional and trustworthy. Compared with MailTime’s color palette, the MDT wallet’s color palette look more business-related and finance-related. Another reason we did not reuse MailTime’s palette, is that the MDT wallet is an independent product and brand.

MailTime avatar color palette is inspired by traditional colors from East Asia. They look lighter and more playful.

Applying the colors to the wallet’s home page.

Wireframe -> Hi-fi. You may notice that the texts have changed while the interface developed.

A transaction page and some icon art for a sneak peak:

Transferring MDT via Email, MVP version, and some icon art. The interface is designed to look simple, clean, and professional.

What’s Next

User testing!

Our team has iterated the designs a couple of times in our internal meetings. Above is just a brief summary of our design process so far.

The next step is to launch the MVP version! We are very excited to test the designs with beta testers and gather more insights.

So stay tuned for our beta testing announcements, design process, and more! Let me know if you have any questions and we will response below.