When Kitties Jamm the Ethereum Network

Today Mr. Positive Blue and Mr. Negative Red meet Mrs. Inquisitive Brown to talk about Blockchain Performance. Mr Neutral Black has taken a look at the scene and Mr Technological Green is around just in case. Mr Market Purple has joined today for a beer.
- Today I was sending some ether to the Game Flip token sale and it seemed that I just could not get the transaction through.
- Oh, yes, there is a known issue these days, the network has so many transactions that you would need a huge gas price.
- What's that?
- You pay a fee for the transaction to be mined on the Ethereum network. If you set that price too low, it will take a while for any miner to be interested in processing it.
- You can see the recommended prices here at gas station.
- I see. So, why is the network congested?
- Well, typically very large ICOs or lots of trading in particular moments. But on this occasion there is kind of a funny side effect of a DAPP called Crypto Kitties (https://www.cryptokitties.co/)
- I know that one, prices for kitties are mooning now.
- How do you know?
- Oh, see, you can see the major burners here and the first one is that DAPP / game.
- But, is the Ethereum network really that vulnerable?
- Yes and no. We spoke the other day about companies that try to use it as a payment network for regular purchases and how that is still not possible. However there are projects like the Plasma Protocol and the Raiden Network that are already providing solutions.
- That's good, I would not like to be in a market where a cat can ruin an operation.