On this episode of the “Bitcoin Magazine Podcast,” host Christian Keroles sat down with a professor of philosophy at Northern Illinois University, Craig Warmke. Warmke is quite unique in academia because he has fallen deep down the Bitcoin rabbit hole. As a scholar in philosophy, ethics and human nature, Warmke is fascinated by Bitcoin’s incentive structure and the implications of Bitcoin on society.
Warmke is saddened by the state of academia and lamented about the broken incentives around tenure that force academics to hyper-specialize rather than encouraging them to take more complete and holistic worldviews and studies. Warmke believes it is this hyper focus in academia that causes most academics to miss Bitcoin altogether.
Warmke is currently managing a research collective focused on the ethics and philosophy around Bitcoin called Resistance Money with two fellow Bitcoin philosophers, Andrew Bailey and Bradley Rettler. The three write papers to demystify why Bitcoin is good and they are working on a book titled “Resistance Money.”
Please enjoy this wide-ranging conversation with Professor Craig Warmke.
Follow Craig on Twitter @craigwarmke. Learn More about Resistance Money at https://www.resistance.money/.
Dilbert creator Scott Adams is selling a pair of NFT versions of his famous comic strip on marketplace OpenSea.
And one of them is a bit “naughty,” according to the author.
The non-fungible tokens, which went on sale today and will be on auction until May 1, feature bespectacled office drone Dilbert chatting with his pet, Dogbert, about the high prices non-fungible tokens are demanding. A digital artwork from Beeple sold for $69 million last month, and everyone from Grimes to Rob Gronkowski have cashed in on multimillion-dollar sales.
Introducing the Dilbert NFTs — One nice, one naughty. Which one will go for more in the auction? Let’s find out.https://t.co/ZTExqlfLXj
— Scott Adams (@ScottAdamsSays) April 15, 2021
In one PG-rated version, Dogbert explains that he bought an NFT for $600, to which Dilbert retorts, “There is literally no good reason to own any collectible digital art.”
Dogbert responds that he’s sold the item for $120,000. The mild-mannered Dilbert proceeds to go ballistic, screaming (mug still in hand): “Can you let me be right for one minute?”
The PG-13 version is identical apart from one key detail. After Dogbert informs him of the money he’s made, Dilbert yells, “Can you let me be right for one f-ing minute?” (We at Decrypt prefer our funnies G-rated.)
Dilbert NFT. Image: OpenSea
Newspapers, where Dilbert appears, don’t usually publish comic strips with cursing (unless it’s Family Circus, of course) making this an apparent first for the character.
Responding to fans and/or trolls via Twitter, Adams admitted he didn’t quite get the fuss:
“For those who wonder, NFTs are digital art that is collectible because the original is registered on the blockchain. Yes, anyone can copy digital art. But you can’t copy its entry on the blockchain, which makes it collectible. Does that make rational sense? Nope.”
Of course, as Adams suggested, it doesn’t have to make rational sense to make money.
Nor does it make a ton of sense to pay extra for a curse word, but the top (and thus far only) bid on the PG-13 version is over $7,077. As of the time this article was published, no one has bid on the PG strip.
The energy sector is seeing a complete paradigm shift:
Bitcoin’s monetary network effect
Monetization of energy
Leads to an arms race of energy tech becoming more and more efficient and productive
Cheap energy production allows for cheap energy utilization
Cheap energy utilization allows for cheap manufacturing, mineral mining and product R&D
Photo by NASA on Unsplash
Bitcoin
Ripples and splashes are being made in the financial realm. Since its entry onto the world stage, the Bitcoin network has been growing. With each addition to the horde of nodes and miners that are scattered across the globe, Bitcoin continues to dig in. Supplying the world with a financial vehicle that provides solutions to the failed experiment that is Keynesian economics, inflationary monetary policy, savings, and it cannot be forcibly removed from an individual or entity. If you can’t see the value there, then I won’t hold you.
Fixing money fixes the world. Fiat currencies have allowed a disease of the mind to proliferate. That disease is living beyond our means. With the popularity of this false currency, companies and individuals are incentivized to spend more than they earn. We are at a time in history where companies that earn little to nothing are being valued higher than those that turn a legitimate profit. And that is just from the monetary side. Social media has seen a rise in popularity for groups and individuals to go into debt to simply project a life of luxury and excitement, while the reality is the opposite. Luxuries and services supplied by debt get rapidly destroyed when reality comes knocking and the bill is due.
Bitcoin’s hard money philosophy rewires the thought processes of those that turn to using bitcoin as a savings vehicle. The individual begins to worry less about impressing those around them and narrows their vision onto purchases that provide the most utility and value to their life. Frivolous spending becomes a practice of the past, as they focus more on stacking, saving and building their financial independence. For without financial independence, you are also without true freedom.
Bitcoin Mining and Energy Production
Bitcoin mining is energy intensive — this is true.
Is there anything that isn’t, though? Consider the amount of energy that gets expended mining gold from the earth. The amount of fuel and power utilized to power the mining industry, that is also tearing up our planet , all to acquire a heavy substance. What about the energy that gets used in the refining process? Then the transportation, packaging and shipping said gold across the world. What of the energy dedicated to handling the paperwork of this whole process? Those are man hours that somebody is paying for.
Bitcoin has come under recent fire via energy utilization moralization.
Are we guilt-tripping anyone that is using up energy to watch Netflix in their free time? Or what of those individuals playing video games? Are we considering the amount of energy that gets wasted in politics? When a speaker is engaged in a filibuster? The amount of billable man hours that goes into this process — the work of interns, analysts and drones that collect intel for politicians just so a speaker can practice a legal waste of time? And that’s without considering the valuable energy that goes into the lighting, wi-fi and heating/air-conditioning of the building!
Energy moralization is the podium from which the village idiot crows.
What bitcoin mining does is far more revolutionary.
Right now the energy sector is stuck. Fossil fuels provide energy production but at a massive loss. Not only in the energy that is capable of being captured but also at great cost to the health of our global ecosystem. Similar to the gold mining process, fossil fuel extraction is extremely destructive. Renewable energy can provide energy at less ecological cost but is not free of the mining process. These renewable projects are also being financed by the fiat monetary system that is rapidly being exposed as a disease. As the collapse of fiat money approaches its crescendo, the renewable energy sector stands to suffer heavy losses. Bitcoin fixes this.
Bitcoin mining allows for renewable energy sources to directly monetize their capture process during non-peak hours. As the energy sector operates today, the majority of the operating time is not at 100% demand or utilization. Energy production and capture stands to gain massively by incorporating bitcoin mining during their non-peak times. By shifting their production to power bitcoin miners (and mining pools) these entities get a direct monetary reward which can then be stacked onto the corporate treasury as savings or sold onto the market. Bitcoin’s trading market is active 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. This allows greater liquidity to power production.
These operations require minimal human presence once they are fully deployed. Because of this simple aspect, humanity can begin to monetize geographically dispersed energy sources. Rivers and waterfalls can provide hydroelectric power without a heavy human presence. Wind and solar farms can be built in rural or barren areas that would make life for humans difficult. The fragility of humanity becomes less of a liability when it comes to energy capture and deployment with Bitcoin.
Game Theory
Because of this radical shift in energy production profitability, we will see an arms race play out. Companies and countries will begin to scramble to bring more energy production online to earn bitcoin. Cheaper and cheaper energy sources will become the focus of desire. Cheaper energy also entails cheaper upkeep costs. Renewables provide energy with far less cost to the environment, which may be the greatest cost of all. What little does money matter if we strip-mine and burn ourselves to oblivion? The future lies with zero-cost energy. With Bitcoin — that future inches closer.
Editor’s note: Fossil fuels continue to account for a majority of domestic energy production and consumption in the United Statesaccording to the US Energy Information Administration.
Cheap Energy and Tech (Industrial Revolution?)
Cheaper energy production and storage has been a focal point for the past decade in particular. In the summer of 2016, Tesla’s radical attempt to revolutionize the battery game was met with ridicule and laughter. Look at where the company is now – a mere 5 years later.
As Bitcoin causes energy production to become radically cheaper, those dwindling costs bleed into manufacturing. Cheaper manufacturing of goods allows for higher quality products to be sold at cheaper and cheaper prices.
These goods include: household items, cleaning products, food, phones and computers, homes themselves, and so on. As more Bitcoin-focused power production comes online, the cost of living will go down. As these costs come down, it also makes improvements much, much more actionable. Research and development is a costly process — trying new things costs man hours and goods to be expended and wasted in order to trailblaze new technologies and theories. Energy production that is made profitable by Bitcoin ( both the network & the currency) allows for this process to become rapidly cheaper via free-market competition.
“Bitcoin power” (referring to the power that is made profitable via bitcoin monetization) will propel the human species into the next technological era, an era we were supposed to be in decades ago.
This process allows for us to fix the issues that plague the United States of America today: education, healthcare, employment and manufacturing. Bitcoin is the most American technology that has ever been brought into existence.
Cheap improvements on tech plus a population reverting back to financial resilience equals a healthier and better educated population. Financially stable families are physically and mentally strong. These families become capable of partaking in higher education, possibly in the way of mentorships (not the farce of “higher education” that has become the collegiate stage).
Conclusion
Ultimately, what I am suggesting is that Bitcoin is, in fact, a singularity event. Whereas it is a network effect upon the financial system that is exorcising Keynesian economics, it is also inadvertently exorcising inefficiencies in the energy production sector as well. A network effect in economics that is causing a reflecting network effect upon energy.
While money is the vehicle that facilitates human ingenuity, energy production and utilization is the super highway upon which that ingenuity vehicle travels.
References:
Angelo, Steve St. “Market Underestimates Energy Consumption By The Gold Mining Industry.” Money Metals Exchange, Money Metals Exchange, 25 Jan. 2018, www.moneymetals.com/news/2018/01/25/gold-mining-energy-consumption-001386.
Banerjee, Ryan, and Boris Hofmann. “The Rise of Zombie Firms: Causes and Consequences.” BIS Quarterly Review, September 2018, Sept. 2018.
Hodge, Tyler. “U.S. Energy Information Administration – EIA – Independent Statistics and Analysis.” Hourly Electricity Consumption Varies throughout the Day and across Seasons – Today in Energy – U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), 21 Feb. 2020, www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=42915#:~:text=This%20variation%20in%20electricity%20demand,dependent%20on%20weather%2Drelated%20factors.&text=During%20the%20winter%2C%20the%20daily,peak%20and%20an%20evening%20peak.
Rider, Christopher I. “Constraints on the Control Benefits of Brokerage: A Study of Placement Agents in U.S. Venture Capital Fundraising.” Administrative Science Quarterly, vol. 54, no. 4, 2009, pp. 575–601, doi:10.2189/asqu.2009.54.4.575.
Ross, Sean. “What’s the Average Profit Margin for a Utility Company?” Investopedia, Investopedia, 16 Sept. 2020, www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/011915/what-average-profit-margin-utility-company.asp.
Steffen, Bjarne, et al. “Experience Curves for Operations and Maintenance Costs of Renewable Energy Technologies.” Joule, Cell Press, Dec. 20, 2019, www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2542435119305793#abs0010.
Truong, Cong, et al. “Economics of Residential Photovoltaic Battery Systems in Germany: The Case of Tesla’s Powerwall.” Batteries, vol. 2, no. 2, 2016, p. 14, doi:10.3390/batteries2020014.
Weitzel, Tim, et al. Reconsidering Network Effect Theory, Association for Information Systems, 2000, aisel.aisnet.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1083&context=ecis2000.
Crypto’s leading smart contract platform, Ethereum, has set a new all-time high at $2,500.
Ethereum Sets New Record High
Ethereum just crossed $2,500 for the first time in its history.
Source: TradingView
The second-ranked crypto has enjoyed a parabolic run in recent months, fuelled by growing interest in the digital currency space.
Ethereum has fared particularly well over the last few days; it’s up over 25% in the last week.
Various other assets have soared amid heated market conditions. DeFi staples like Aave, Uniswap, and Synthetix all jumped in price today. Binance Coin, Ripple, and Cardano also hit new highs throughout the week. But the biggest gainer has been Dogecoin, which is trading at $0.18 after a 200% rise this week.
Aside from the ongoing bull run, Ethereum has had various notable developments that have helped its surge this year. Earlier today, the blockchain successfully completed its Berlin hard fork (though there was a brief setback shortly after the event, involving a consensus error at block 12,244,294). Ethereum’s next major upgrade is happening this summer, when the long-awaited EIP-1559 “ETH buyback” proposal will ship as part of its London hard fork. After that, the move towards Proof-of-Stake is expected to follow sometime later this year.
At $2,500, Ethereum’s market cap is now over $288 billion. That’s more than Intel, Toyota, and Netflix.
Disclosure: At the time of writing, the author of this feature owned ETH, AAVE, and SNX. They also had exposure to UNI in a cryptocurrency index.
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The information on or accessed through this website is obtained from independent sources we believe to be accurate and reliable, but Decentral Media, Inc. makes no representation or warranty as to the timeliness, completeness, or accuracy of any information on or accessed through this website. Decentral Media, Inc. is not an investment advisor. We do not give personalized investment advice or other financial advice. The information on this website is subject to change without notice. Some or all of the information on this website may become outdated, or it may be or become incomplete or inaccurate. We may, but are not obligated to, update any outdated, incomplete, or inaccurate information.
You should never make an investment decision on an ICO, IEO, or other investment based on the information on this website, and you should never interpret or otherwise rely on any of the information on this website as investment advice. We strongly recommend that you consult a licensed investment advisor or other qualified financial professional if you are seeking investment advice on an ICO, IEO, or other investment. We do not accept compensation in any form for analyzing or reporting on any ICO, IEO, cryptocurrency, currency, tokenized sales, securities, or commodities.
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Cryptocurrency analyst and YouTuber Benjamin Blunts is revealing five altcoins that he believes will perform better than Bitcoin.
The cryptocurrency trader who called Bitcoin’s bottom after the 2017 then-record-high six months ahead of time, kicks off the list with Ethereum.
“…if Bitcoin still continues up to $100k and beyond while this is happening, that’s just going to mean ETH is pumping even more so, you know. If Bitcoin doubles from here that means ETH will triple from here because it’s going to be outperforming Bitcoin.”
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The second altcoin that Blunts believes will record larger percentage gains than Bitcoin going forward is blockchain oracle Chainlink (LINK).
“I’m not 100% sure how high LINK will go. I’m not sure whether or not it’s going to make a new all-time high against Bitcoin. But I do think from here it’s going higher, and it’s going to outperform Bitcoin, and its USD value is going to explode.”
The other altcoin on Blunts’ list is decentralized exchange SushiSwap (SUSHI). On the SUSHI/BTC charts, Blunts projects that the decentralized exchange will appreciate by around 70%, and this will translate to larger gains when SUSHI is paired with stablecoins.
“[SUSHI will] probably go up around 70% or so against Bitcoin. So in USD value that will probably be more again.”
Decentralized finance lending protocol Compound (COMP) is another altcoin that Blunts believes will record bigger gains than Bitcoin percentagewise. The cryptocurrency analyst expects COMP to rally by over 160% against the flagship crypto asset.
“So I think ultimately Comp is another nice DeFi project… 164% target against Bitcoin.”
Litecoin is the fifth altcoin that Blunts predicts will outperform Bitcoin and other leading cryptocurrencies by market cap. According to Blunts, “Litecoin is going to outperform a lot of the majors” in the short term.
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Cryptocurrency news and analysis, covering Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple, XRP, altcoins and blockchain technology
The price of Dogecoin has surged seemingly without any push from prominent figures on social media or major developments in the project.
According to data from CoinMarketCap, the price of Dogecoin (DOGE) is more than $0.18 at time of publication, with a market capitalization of roughly $23.8 billion. The token’s most recent rally had its price surge more than 63% over the last 24 hours, passing both Uniswap (UNI) and Litecoin (LTC) and become the 8th largest cryptocurrency by market cap.
More retail outlets have adopted the currency as a form of payment in recent days. On Tuesday, a popular Miami nightclub announced it would be accepting DOGE upon reopening as payment for tables, drinks, and merchandise.
Dallas Mavericks owner and DOGE proponent Mark Cuban also reported the basketball team’s store had sold more than 122,000 DOGE worth of merchandise — more than $16,000 at the time of publication — since first accepting the token in March. Cuban said the team “will never sell 1 single Doge ever.”
Though Tesla CEO and DOGE enthusiast Elon Musk has tweeted one of his memes amid the token’s price surge, the recent rally may simply reflect the climate around the crypto market. Mainstream media attention was largely focused on Coinbase’s COIN stock being listed on the Nasdaq this week as both the price of Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) reached new all-time highs.
Ripple has announced a partnership with Novatti Group, which will see RippleNet and ODL used in remittances.
The partnership will focus on Australia and the Philippines and is part of Ripple’s efforts to sign deals in the Asia Pacific region.
Ripple prices are performing well, perhaps due to positive developments in Ripple’s SEC case.
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Ripple has announced that it is partnering with Novatti Group, an international payments firm, to help it use XRP-based services.
Ripple and Novatti Work on Remittances
According to Ripple, this partnership will initially focus on remittances between Australia and the Philippines. It will specifically be carried out through the financial services company iRemit.
Ripple says that Novatti expects to process “several thousand transactions per month” through RippleNet and its On-Demand Liquidity (ODL) service. Novatti also plans to extend the service to other customers and countries in the future.
The news is notable due to Ripple’s regulatory troubles; the firm is currently facing charges of securities violations put forward by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Its decision to add Novatti as a partner is a sign that the firm is continuing to seek partnerships in Asia, a relatively crypto-friendly market.
Though Ripple initially signed the deal in December 2020, it did not reveal the full details of the partnership until this week.
XRP Prices are Trending Upward
XRP prices are performing fairly well. The cryptocurrency broke outof an inverse head-and-shoulders formation on Apr. 4, recently rising bynearly 240% to reach a three-year high of $1.98.
XRP/USD on TradingView
Though XRP be may overdue for a correction by some metrics, other technical data points to further gains.
Based on the inverse head-and-shoulders pattern, XRP could surge by another65% and reach its previous all-time high of $3.30. Meanwhile, an upward impulse past the January 2018 all-time high of $3.30 could sendXRP into a parabolic arc towards the 127.2% Fibonacci retracement level at $8.30.
Though the recent Novatti partnership is unlikely to have caused these trends, positive news regarding the lawsuit between Ripple and the U.S. SEC could be responsible. Recently, Ripple was granted access to SEC documents, while the SEC itself has been blocked from viewing the bank records of Ripple executives.
Both of those decisions cold help Ripple win its case. However, if Ripple fails to win thelegal battleagainst the SEC or faces further trouble, a steep crash to $0.60 or lower can be expected.
Disclosure: At the time of writing, this author owned Bitcoin and Ethereum.
This news was brought to you by Phemex, our preferred Derivatives Partner.
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The information on or accessed through this website is obtained from independent sources we believe to be accurate and reliable, but Decentral Media, Inc. makes no representation or warranty as to the timeliness, completeness, or accuracy of any information on or accessed through this website. Decentral Media, Inc. is not an investment advisor. We do not give personalized investment advice or other financial advice. The information on this website is subject to change without notice. Some or all of the information on this website may become outdated, or it may be or become incomplete or inaccurate. We may, but are not obligated to, update any outdated, incomplete, or inaccurate information.
You should never make an investment decision on an ICO, IEO, or other investment based on the information on this website, and you should never interpret or otherwise rely on any of the information on this website as investment advice. We strongly recommend that you consult a licensed investment advisor or other qualified financial professional if you are seeking investment advice on an ICO, IEO, or other investment. We do not accept compensation in any form for analyzing or reporting on any ICO, IEO, cryptocurrency, currency, tokenized sales, securities, or commodities.
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There’s a physical gallery space for NFT art in New York City.
We checked it out, and here’s what we thought about it.
For the past few months, artists, collectors, and begrudging crypto journalists alike have been confronting the phenomenon of NFTs, or non-fungible tokens. These are unique digital assets on the blockchain: tokens that can be attached to any file (usually images and looped animations, like JPEGs and GIFs) and sold as proof of ownership.
The appeal is in the blockchain’sveneer of permanence—the sense that these transactions are publicly recorded—as well as artificial scarcity, which leverages our impulse toward exclusivity.
One of the critiques of NFTs and the “crypto art” they’ve enabled is that once you buy in, your options for actually enjoying the work aresomewhat limited. You can either display your NFT through certain online marketplaces and platforms, or just let it sit in your wallet, content in the knowledge that everyone knows it’s verifiably yours.
For the past few weeks, a gallery called Superchiefhas been looking to remedy that problem with a dedicated physical exhibition space for NFTs (it claims to be the first of its kind). It’s a small-ish space south of Union Square in New York City, with a few screens on each wall. Its first show, “Season One Starter Pack,” features works from 300 different artists rotating in throughout the day. But what’s new about NFTs, from a tech perspective, isn’t the kind of thing you can put on display; take away that piece, and what you’re left with is underwhelming.
When my editor asked me to check out the show, I made a point of not reading up on it ahead of time. This was my first mistake: thanks to some hasty Googling, I initially ended up at Superchief’s main gallery, in SoHo, rather than the one for NFTs. But on my brief subway ride uptown, I imagined what sort of themes the exhibition might explore. Would it trace the relationship between physical and digital spaces? Would it reckon with the slippery realities of digital ownership?
Inside the Superchief NFT art gallery in New York. Image: Decrypt
Surely these questions are part of the NFT bargain. Even before Napster, the internet was enabling an exchange of endlessly reproducible ideas: an entirely transient online ecosystem of words, sounds, and images, with a copy-and-paste function that made it explicit. NFTs portend a future where everything is tokenized, everything is one-of-one, and everything is for sale.
It’s proved to be a powerful idea. The market for NFTs hasexplodedover the past few months, as crypto’s nouveau riche have poured millions into digital artworks and auction houses. Tweets have been auctioned off as NFTs; an NFT attached to Nyan Cat, a meme from the early 2010s, recently sold for nearly $600,000; and the electronic producer Jacques Greene made an NFT out of the publishing rights to a recent single. The splashiest moment for the market was the $69 million sale of an NFT-backed image by the digital artist Beeple, at Christie’s.
Nothing that interesting or novel was happening at Superchief. After spending just a few minutes with each of the wall-mounted screens, I felt ready to move on. Online images are defined by speed and ease of access; we’re used to spending a few seconds with an image before scrolling past it. The incongruity between the slowness of the gallery setting and the aesthetic quickness of these internet-native artworks made for a disorienting experience.
The problem is more with the fact of the exhibition than with the images themselves. ”Season One Starter Pack” features works from Alex Schaefer, Ghostshrimp, and plenty of other established visual artists and illustrators. Edward Zipco, who co-founded Superchief and runs the NFT space, told me that about 70% of the artists in the show have backgrounds in the traditional art world, and the other 30% are already entrenched in NFTs.
I was also annoyed to discover that the space is also essentially an ad for Blackdove, a company that sells glorified TV monitors as “digital canvases” for NFT artworks. One of the screens was accompanied by a QR code that I thought would link to some explanatory writing, but instead led to the Blackdove website.
It’s possible to understand NFTs as pure speculation. Detractors have argued that they’re entirely divorced from art, and that to spend millions on a JPEG file is to misunderstand what you’re paying for. Some have argued, even more cynically, that NFTs are being used as a vehicle for wash trading and money laundering. And who’s to say the most expensive NFTs aren’t just being traded back and forth by the same few collectors in an attempt to juice the market and sucker in more retail investors?
But NFTs didn’t commodify art, or pioneercollecting as a mode of money laundering. The question is whether crypto art will end up replicating existing structures, rather than creating new forms.
Maybe it’s not Superchief’s fault that the show doesn’t get at what’s actually interesting about NFTs. The potential of NFTs is in their capacity to shift how artists get paid, crowdfunding individual works and allowing for investments in fractional ownership.
This sort of thing isalready happening on publishing platform Mirror, where the experimental writer Emily Segal raised money for anNFT-tied novelthrough a sale of ERC-20 tokens representing equity. NFT protocols can also allow creators to take a chunk of all secondary sales, creating a kind of persistent financial connection between the artist and the work—something that’s much rarer in the traditional market.
That connection is part of why Zipco is so interested in getting the word out about NFTs. “The fact that there is now a system that has sustainability built into it, that is about supporting artists long term—I think that’s huge,” he said.
The current hype around NFTsisn’t entirely representativeof what they can do. Crypto art and associated protocols aren’tjustabout selling JPEGs, but they are definitely on some level about selling JPEGs. In a gallery setting, it can be hard to see the bigger picture.
Chainlink the Whitepaper for its second iteration. Chainlink 2.0 has been created to allegedly take the “next steps in the evolution of decentralized oracle networks”.
With one of the most used applications in DeFi, these protocols need oracles to feed them with off-chain information. In the new iteration, Chainlink could go beyond, as the document claims:
We foresee an increasingly expansive role for oracle networks, one in which they complement and enhance existing and new blockchains by providing fast, reliable, and confidentiality-preserving universal connectivity and off-chain computation for smart contracts.
Chainlink 2.0 will be based on a concept called Decentralized Oracle Networks (DON). Maintained by “a committee of Chainlink nodes”, the platform will be able to support an “unlimited” number of functions.
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What are Chainlink’s hybrid smart contracts?
The DON will be a layer to deploy smart contract interfaces with the capacity to support off-chain computing resources without the intervention of a third party. The Whitepaper says:
Decentralized Oracle Networks can go on to create a decentralized metalayer that enhance smart contracts with highly scalable, confidential, and secure forms of off-chain computation, in addition to the external data that Chainlink already provides today.
With the above capacities, Chainlink’s team of developers will focus on 7 core areas, as described by the document: Hybrid smart contracts, scaling, confidentiality, trust-minimization, incentive-based security, less complexity, and order fairness for transactions.
Focus on the goal of expanding oracle services beyond a data provider in a current environment with growing demand for oracles, Chainlink 2.0 will enhance its network to:
(…)offer strong trust minimization through a combination of principled cryptoeconomic mechanisms such as staking and carefully conceived guard rails and service-level enforcement on relying main chains.
The new system will be more flexible, per the Whitepaper, cost-efficient for transactions in terms of gas with a new policy for their “fair ordering”. The outline vision in the document seems to aim towards a “new architecture” beyond blockchain technology with DONs taking the center stage:
The flexibility of DONs will enhance existing Chainlink services and give rise to many additional smart contract features and applications. Among these is a seamless connection to a wide variety of off-chain systems, decentralized identity creation from existing data, priority channels to help ensure timely delivery of infrastructure-critical transactions, and confidentiality-preserving DeFi instruments.
Already a strong competitor in DeFi, Chainlink 2.0 seems pegged to cause a commotion with a ripple effect felt across the DeFi sector and for the benefit of the users.
At the time of writing, LINK is trading at $42,84 with a 9.2% profit in the 24-chart. In the weekly and monthly chart, LINK has 37% and 56% gains respectively.
LINK in an upwards momentum in the 24-hour chart. Source: LINKUSDT Tradingview
