crab notes 🦀 lobsterdao pinned «The role of a VC in crypto. What have we been jerking off to in 2017–2018? There is already another good article on this, have a look at it. I will restate some of the misconceptions and hopium doses people usually take when they see big VCs. First of all…»
Web2 vs Web3
If someone has to pay for gas costs on a decentralized network, and that someone isn’t the people using the service, then who will pay?
🤔 bit.ly/2PCgCf9
If someone has to pay for gas costs on a decentralized network, and that someone isn’t the people using the service, then who will pay?
🤔 bit.ly/2PCgCf9
Koreans have saved us yet again… Chicken airdrops 🐔
So you know how airdrops are usually done, right? You get bounty tokens and whatnot for social activity. But Koreans revived this market - they are aidropping chicken to the most active community members. You heard it right: for social activity they give you food. This is just next level. Talk about UBI (universal basic income) - this is it!
So you know how airdrops are usually done, right? You get bounty tokens and whatnot for social activity. But Koreans revived this market - they are aidropping chicken to the most active community members. You heard it right: for social activity they give you food. This is just next level. Talk about UBI (universal basic income) - this is it!
ETHalik comes. ETHalik sees. ETHalik gives ETH to those in need. Incredible community support!
twitter.com/vitalikbuterin/status/1075181710730506240?s=21
twitter.com/vitalikbuterin/status/1075181710730506240?s=21
”Clickbait has become so prominent” and here I am using it - to show what web2 started with and what it has become. About subnoscription economy, clickcbait ads and so on. That Stellar shill at the end is uncaled for though. But it’s interesting to see the narrative of the past and see what we are doing today when we say “oh, EOS is usable, it’s fine”…
Also have a look at the previous post about web2 vs web3.
Think about it: every video, every article you read - has some brand mention or focuses on either directly or indirectly sellign you some stuff. Spin back the last few articles you read and the last few videos you watched. Makes sense now, right? Now think of what scaling such a system would turn into.
Also have a look at the previous post about web2 vs web3.
Think about it: every video, every article you read - has some brand mention or focuses on either directly or indirectly sellign you some stuff. Spin back the last few articles you read and the last few videos you watched. Makes sense now, right? Now think of what scaling such a system would turn into.
The Atlantic
The Internet's Original Sin
It's not too late to ditch the ad-based business model and build a better web.
A step-by-step guide on becoming a crypto maximalist.
Hacker Noon
The Definitive Guide to Becoming a Crypto Maximalist
The first rule of maximalism is that there is no maximalism.
Talking about trends: today’s guest is NFT
NFT is a non-fungible token. A unique asset - only one of a kind exists on the blockchain, it’s authentic. Think CryptoKitty.
So people started jerking off to NFTs a few months ago. Which always seemed confusing to me. If I just make something scarce, but it has no utility - it will still not appreciate in value. If I make IvanCoin, and burn 90% of the supply - it won’t go x10, because there is still no utility for it. Not even an imaginary perceived value (emotional value people attribute to coins quite often called HODL). For an NFT to really shine, it first needs to represent or acquire that ‘collectible’ value. Again, the blockchain does not solve cancer. There is no default value in NFT.
Think of MTG. One can think that only the physical cards have collectible value since you can touch and feel them. But no, MTGO (online cards) have that too. So do PokemonGo avatars. But that was about transposing the existing user base into the digital world - and making the value travel there. There were already people collecting those things, and then they started attributing value to it. That happens quite rarely, it’s not easy to replicate such a phenomenon. It was not just a no-use-case NFT created from nothing.
So here you go, two nice tech/conceptual rants about NFTs.
ONE & TWO
NFT is a non-fungible token. A unique asset - only one of a kind exists on the blockchain, it’s authentic. Think CryptoKitty.
So people started jerking off to NFTs a few months ago. Which always seemed confusing to me. If I just make something scarce, but it has no utility - it will still not appreciate in value. If I make IvanCoin, and burn 90% of the supply - it won’t go x10, because there is still no utility for it. Not even an imaginary perceived value (emotional value people attribute to coins quite often called HODL). For an NFT to really shine, it first needs to represent or acquire that ‘collectible’ value. Again, the blockchain does not solve cancer. There is no default value in NFT.
Think of MTG. One can think that only the physical cards have collectible value since you can touch and feel them. But no, MTGO (online cards) have that too. So do PokemonGo avatars. But that was about transposing the existing user base into the digital world - and making the value travel there. There were already people collecting those things, and then they started attributing value to it. That happens quite rarely, it’s not easy to replicate such a phenomenon. It was not just a no-use-case NFT created from nothing.
So here you go, two nice tech/conceptual rants about NFTs.
ONE & TWO
Twitter
Mike Bithell
OK... unfortunately someone set me off on crypto-based game objects. The idea that you can own a game object on block chain. Like your gun from Halo? Why not own it on the blockchain! Take it anywhere! Use it in other games! Power to the people! Let's break…
www.opera.com/dapps-store
Shiiit this looks quite neat! Still need to try it out, but looks pretty cool. Not actually using Opera, but maybe will switch to it. (where is my brand contract huh?!)
Shiiit this looks quite neat! Still need to try it out, but looks pretty cool. Not actually using Opera, but maybe will switch to it. (where is my brand contract huh?!)
Governance tokens: Melonport, 0x, Maker, Aragon
An awesome article about governance and most popular governance tokens. It’s just so on point! 🔖 The maximum price a network participant (maybe a relayer) will pay for 51% of governance tokens is bound by the cost associated with a network fork. Cost is equal to the difference between the net present value of the pre-fork and post-fork business.
The most obvious problems with governance tokens:
1. Plutocracy. Governance tokens which have only coin voting mechanism in place are like pre-selling a new cartel system (the first ones to grab the supply win). So since we moved away from nodes implementing all the changes, and give the power to users - does this model actually solve what we wanted?
2. Hard to calculate the token valuation, or even impossible. The network value here might be completely different from the token value (see Aragon and 0x). The question here is do you really lose the network effect here? You are supposed to, that is the assumption, but perhaps it’s not even the case.
3. Generalized mining, instead of ICOs or private sales, is probably better suited for governance token models. More users, less speculators. But essentially you still end up with speculators there, since coin voting = economic incentives. Maybe it’s escaping the intended scenario yet again.
a) Aragon: probably a bad governance model where latest coin voting had no turnover. (read the edit below)
b) 0x aka ZRX is just a bad model too, and there is not even governance in place yet (hello, hydro fork).
c) MakerDAO is the best concept in place since there is a link between network value and token value (because it is more of an equity token where you can have diluted ‘shares’ in case of bad governance, so essentially it’s a security token much more than the others, not even a doubt).
d) Melonport has a hybrid implementation trying to balance of different councils responsible for different features, where there is still central authority checking off on ‘identities’ - probably too complicated for what it needs to be doing, but creative.
Overall, governance tokens do not seem to be doing much if it’s just coin voting. Implement a link between the token value and the network value, and you end up being labelled as an outright security… so be it? Let’s discuss in @tokencode (and also feel free to join @cryptocodereviews and @de_fi for quality discussions).
EDIT (27.12.2018, 00:00 CET): Aragon has more use cases to its token than ZRX, and ANT is used for staking as collateral where they attempt to minimise the risks of volatility by a reserve fund, and also for governance to control the inflation rate. The token does have multiple use cases within the system, and those look decent. You can find the whitepaper here.
An awesome article about governance and most popular governance tokens. It’s just so on point! 🔖 The maximum price a network participant (maybe a relayer) will pay for 51% of governance tokens is bound by the cost associated with a network fork. Cost is equal to the difference between the net present value of the pre-fork and post-fork business.
The most obvious problems with governance tokens:
1. Plutocracy. Governance tokens which have only coin voting mechanism in place are like pre-selling a new cartel system (the first ones to grab the supply win). So since we moved away from nodes implementing all the changes, and give the power to users - does this model actually solve what we wanted?
2. Hard to calculate the token valuation, or even impossible. The network value here might be completely different from the token value (see Aragon and 0x). The question here is do you really lose the network effect here? You are supposed to, that is the assumption, but perhaps it’s not even the case.
3. Generalized mining, instead of ICOs or private sales, is probably better suited for governance token models. More users, less speculators. But essentially you still end up with speculators there, since coin voting = economic incentives. Maybe it’s escaping the intended scenario yet again.
a) Aragon: probably a bad governance model where latest coin voting had no turnover. (read the edit below)
b) 0x aka ZRX is just a bad model too, and there is not even governance in place yet (hello, hydro fork).
c) MakerDAO is the best concept in place since there is a link between network value and token value (because it is more of an equity token where you can have diluted ‘shares’ in case of bad governance, so essentially it’s a security token much more than the others, not even a doubt).
d) Melonport has a hybrid implementation trying to balance of different councils responsible for different features, where there is still central authority checking off on ‘identities’ - probably too complicated for what it needs to be doing, but creative.
Overall, governance tokens do not seem to be doing much if it’s just coin voting. Implement a link between the token value and the network value, and you end up being labelled as an outright security… so be it? Let’s discuss in @tokencode (and also feel free to join @cryptocodereviews and @de_fi for quality discussions).
EDIT (27.12.2018, 00:00 CET): Aragon has more use cases to its token than ZRX, and ANT is used for staking as collateral where they attempt to minimise the risks of volatility by a reserve fund, and also for governance to control the inflation rate. The token does have multiple use cases within the system, and those look decent. You can find the whitepaper here.
Medium
On Governance: Coordination, Layers, and Structural Integrity
“Bosh! Stephen said rudely. A man of genius makes no mistakes. His errors are volitional and are the portals of discovery.” ~James Joyce…
It’s not about the tech, it’s about incentives and economics
… not that I would know, because I was skipping economics classes in uni, but as they say “a dozen of econ medium articles a day, keeps a boring textbook away” (no one says it, don’t trust me). The idea of a distributed database is fine, but then who will maintain it? How do you make it trustless? How do you automate it all? Buuuah, incentives!
This allows you to model behaviour of different actors based on different scenarios. Making the system dynamic can be perceived as bad (forks) or impossibly bad (if implemented with governance, which works like shit for now). In any case, this is true for evertything that we do. Properly mapped out incentives can make you, your dog or your girlfriend (lol, you don’t have one) - do however you model it (don’t try this on people). It can be done via some economic incentives, a loyalty programme, an elite community pass and etc.
Which is why me and a few other homeless investors find token economics to be one of the most interesting and exciting concepts in crypto: because you can game it in various ways and get cool results. I have 1 test drive coming up related to this, but honestly curious to see if there are move ways to do fun things with behavioural psychology.
This is just an intro article on rewards + motivation, but probably lacking an instagram picture with a booty and a motivational quote 👧
… not that I would know, because I was skipping economics classes in uni, but as they say “a dozen of econ medium articles a day, keeps a boring textbook away” (no one says it, don’t trust me). The idea of a distributed database is fine, but then who will maintain it? How do you make it trustless? How do you automate it all? Buuuah, incentives!
This allows you to model behaviour of different actors based on different scenarios. Making the system dynamic can be perceived as bad (forks) or impossibly bad (if implemented with governance, which works like shit for now). In any case, this is true for evertything that we do. Properly mapped out incentives can make you, your dog or your girlfriend (lol, you don’t have one) - do however you model it (don’t try this on people). It can be done via some economic incentives, a loyalty programme, an elite community pass and etc.
Which is why me and a few other homeless investors find token economics to be one of the most interesting and exciting concepts in crypto: because you can game it in various ways and get cool results. I have 1 test drive coming up related to this, but honestly curious to see if there are move ways to do fun things with behavioural psychology.
This is just an intro article on rewards + motivation, but probably lacking an instagram picture with a booty and a motivational quote 👧
Hackernoon
How To Get Motivated According To Behavioral Psychology | HackerNoon
Work is hard. There’s always a lot to get done and there’s never enough time to do it. You need to be focused and energized at all times.
Binance, OKEx, Kucoin, Bittrex, Huobi... everyone is doing launchpads now. Waiting for Bilaxy launchpad next!
Bilaxy: we will launchpad your token without you even knowing about it!
Bilaxy: we will launchpad your token without you even knowing about it!
About the concept of money, prisoner's dilemma and more sociological-economic modelling, interesting and easy to read 🙏 https://medium.com/coinmonks/a-universal-framework-for-understanding-incentive-design-in-crypto-and-fiat-systems-part-1-e15e8179e2
Lazy. Proud. Shill. 🦐
Ye this is a shill. But Matic's good. This needs a deep code dive, but everything apart from that looks hot. No idea what metrics are, idc. This is about F u N d i M e N T a L z.
What is Matic about? At the core of it, it's a scalability play. I hate those! So what's different here?
Firstly, why I hate TPS coins:
1) Usually the tech implementations are very raw, or
2) TPS coins make new blockchains and have no network effect
Meaning: by the time your new techie thing will be out, you will already be rekt by a new research paper of some PhD student. Also, existing blockchains can just take your open source code, upgrade, and bam easy-peasy. If you start a new blockchain, you are an underdog right away if your only advantage is speed, because it's very superficial. By presumably making a better ETH - you will not get the same people that love ETH, and those people are what makes ETH actually great. It's all about the community. Token holders. Builders.
Matic enables scalability not by making its own entire new public blockchain, but this with Plasma, on ETH. It's an upgrade to Ethereum, it's not a competitor. It adds to the ETH ecosystem by providing scalability and tech implementations, while simultaneously piggy backing on ETH giant community and resources. This is the potential. What is built on ETH, can be routed via Matic. Why: cheaper and faster. You are still essentually using ETH, just via Plasma implementation of Matic.
For example, Decentraland has committed to using Matic mainnet to wire its operations through it. They are also close with DAI (MakerDAO) for the same purposes. To me, the narrative of this is clear: Engine for DeFi. How realistic this is? Well, you just need to be in bed with ETH projects or have huge backing (cough, Coinbase, cough) - and then just make them all wire transactions through Matic. Done. So the buz dev story is clear: first get all popular ETH projects who lack scalability - to use Plasma. And then start building more yourself.
Ok so just to sum up, what gets me hard:
1) They are dev focused, have nice docs and innovations, so it's sexy.
2) They have a clear biz dev / community acquisition strategy. Check all the ethhub and etc. updates about them. Waiting for Vitalik to tweet next LOL.
3) They explain what the token is for (to make plasma implementation permissionless)
Value creation (Plasma as DeFi Engine) -> value capture (Staking for Permissionless Plasma) checks out.
Follow-up reading: https://medium.com/matic-network/what-is-matic-network-466a2c493ae1. FAQ: https://docs.matic.network/faq. They announced 500,000 USD grant for devs. There are a lot of dApps, but hardly any users. Their experience + resources are supposed to help new devs get started: medium.com/matic-network/matic-developer-support-program-df1f0aaa9cd0
Ye this is a shill. But Matic's good. This needs a deep code dive, but everything apart from that looks hot. No idea what metrics are, idc. This is about F u N d i M e N T a L z.
What is Matic about? At the core of it, it's a scalability play. I hate those! So what's different here?
Firstly, why I hate TPS coins:
1) Usually the tech implementations are very raw, or
2) TPS coins make new blockchains and have no network effect
Meaning: by the time your new techie thing will be out, you will already be rekt by a new research paper of some PhD student. Also, existing blockchains can just take your open source code, upgrade, and bam easy-peasy. If you start a new blockchain, you are an underdog right away if your only advantage is speed, because it's very superficial. By presumably making a better ETH - you will not get the same people that love ETH, and those people are what makes ETH actually great. It's all about the community. Token holders. Builders.
Matic enables scalability not by making its own entire new public blockchain, but this with Plasma, on ETH. It's an upgrade to Ethereum, it's not a competitor. It adds to the ETH ecosystem by providing scalability and tech implementations, while simultaneously piggy backing on ETH giant community and resources. This is the potential. What is built on ETH, can be routed via Matic. Why: cheaper and faster. You are still essentually using ETH, just via Plasma implementation of Matic.
For example, Decentraland has committed to using Matic mainnet to wire its operations through it. They are also close with DAI (MakerDAO) for the same purposes. To me, the narrative of this is clear: Engine for DeFi. How realistic this is? Well, you just need to be in bed with ETH projects or have huge backing (cough, Coinbase, cough) - and then just make them all wire transactions through Matic. Done. So the buz dev story is clear: first get all popular ETH projects who lack scalability - to use Plasma. And then start building more yourself.
Ok so just to sum up, what gets me hard:
1) They are dev focused, have nice docs and innovations, so it's sexy.
2) They have a clear biz dev / community acquisition strategy. Check all the ethhub and etc. updates about them. Waiting for Vitalik to tweet next LOL.
3) They explain what the token is for (to make plasma implementation permissionless)
Value creation (Plasma as DeFi Engine) -> value capture (Staking for Permissionless Plasma) checks out.
Follow-up reading: https://medium.com/matic-network/what-is-matic-network-466a2c493ae1. FAQ: https://docs.matic.network/faq. They announced 500,000 USD grant for devs. There are a lot of dApps, but hardly any users. Their experience + resources are supposed to help new devs get started: medium.com/matic-network/matic-developer-support-program-df1f0aaa9cd0
Medium
What is Matic Network?
Matic Network provides scalable, secure and instant Ethereum transactions using side chains.
NuCypher: NEW crowd sale 🔥
Participants in the token distribution escrow ETH into a smart contract where it is locked. In return, they receive tokens. Participants are free to use those tokens however they like:
- if participants use the tokens for their intended purpose (e.g. running staking nodes) they will recoup their escrowed ETH after producing some amount for work
- if participants choose not to use the token for its intended purpose, they forfeit their escrowed ETH, which is effectively burned.
This means NuCypher is not actually raising money. Thus, the circulating supply can end up being absolutely... negligent. This is insane.
blog.nucypher.com/the-worklock
Participants in the token distribution escrow ETH into a smart contract where it is locked. In return, they receive tokens. Participants are free to use those tokens however they like:
- if participants use the tokens for their intended purpose (e.g. running staking nodes) they will recoup their escrowed ETH after producing some amount for work
- if participants choose not to use the token for its intended purpose, they forfeit their escrowed ETH, which is effectively burned.
This means NuCypher is not actually raising money. Thus, the circulating supply can end up being absolutely... negligent. This is insane.
blog.nucypher.com/the-worklock
Quantitive analysis of Governance
Sometimes it feels like CoinFund is producing 90% of the crypto content ⚖️ This time Jake with some cool thoughts and data on how to analyze the value of a governance token model: twitter.com/jbrukh/status/1112778758321332224?s=21
Sometimes it feels like CoinFund is producing 90% of the crypto content ⚖️ This time Jake with some cool thoughts and data on how to analyze the value of a governance token model: twitter.com/jbrukh/status/1112778758321332224?s=21
Rocco with two cool pieces: on token distribution aka Fair Launch meme + a response to NuCypher's WorkLock model 🎓
On Fair Token Launches
-> http://bit.ly/2I40DGm
How to distribute tokens to as many people in interest as possible in a fair way. Touching upon interesting distributions by Numerai (dedicated data scientist airdrop), Handshake (contributors airdrop), and Livepeer (potential workers airdrop accessible to all ETH holders).
WorkLock --> WarLock
-> http://bit.ly/2K26X43
His idea is to make this like this: Participants receive 25% of their escrow back after ‘x’ work provided. 75% of ETH is pooled and forms an exogenous block reward which is granted in addition to the network’s native block reward...
Imho: this is a positive incentive type for workers to stay in the network. Positive incentives better apply to speculators... no, to be honest, they don't. Speculators would rather get less money but be safu and dump at a smaller profit at the start. If we are talking about the community in actual interest (loyal members), they would not need this superficial extra incentive. However, what it does do is make sure the team, which is able to stake and mine, will not be selling token rewards for USD to fund the development, but will be getting part of that ETH escrowed amount while not actually being in the initial WorkLock contribution (but... zcash premine much?). Share your ideas in @TokenCode
On Fair Token Launches
-> http://bit.ly/2I40DGm
How to distribute tokens to as many people in interest as possible in a fair way. Touching upon interesting distributions by Numerai (dedicated data scientist airdrop), Handshake (contributors airdrop), and Livepeer (potential workers airdrop accessible to all ETH holders).
WorkLock --> WarLock
-> http://bit.ly/2K26X43
His idea is to make this like this: Participants receive 25% of their escrow back after ‘x’ work provided. 75% of ETH is pooled and forms an exogenous block reward which is granted in addition to the network’s native block reward...
Imho: this is a positive incentive type for workers to stay in the network. Positive incentives better apply to speculators... no, to be honest, they don't. Speculators would rather get less money but be safu and dump at a smaller profit at the start. If we are talking about the community in actual interest (loyal members), they would not need this superficial extra incentive. However, what it does do is make sure the team, which is able to stake and mine, will not be selling token rewards for USD to fund the development, but will be getting part of that ETH escrowed amount while not actually being in the initial WorkLock contribution (but... zcash premine much?). Share your ideas in @TokenCode
Medium
On Fair Token Launches
What is a Fair Launch?
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Exchanges in 2019: we know how to recycle your 2018 dead bags at the expense of early investors! 👻 Coming soon to your favorite 2018 "Very High" project! Who is next?