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893 Dooters - Last Updated June 16, 2023
Week #23: June 16, 2023
Guest appearance by Kevin Owocki from Green Pill and supermodular.
The morning trinity
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/14anky9/daily_general_discussion_june_16_2023/jobdhka/)Ethereum
£1304
0.065
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/146kydb/comment/jnthhck/)Cypher punks in Prague,
Defending the crypto flag,
Pride is in the bag.
The Queue: u/Spacesider
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/14anky9/comment/jobdhuj/)Your daily beacon chain dose.
Pending validators: Joining 93.5k, leaving 0
- Entry queue -1200 from yesterday's number
- It will take around 43 and a half days for the entry queue to clear
- In just under 20 days the amount of daily validators that can both enter or exit will be increased from 2025 to 2250.
These figures are based on the entry and exit queue at the time of posting
This can also be tracked via https://validatorqueue.com/
Shitpost of the week: u/Bob-Rossi
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/149t8gd/comment/jo86eb3/)Job sends email about no longer having the option of being full remote.
"Ahh, time to retire. Surely all that ETH I bought 7 years ago will cover it."
Opens Coingecko
"Ahh, time to call a therapist."
u/hanniabu keeps building awesome things for us
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/144vs24/daily_general_discussion_june_9_2023/jnkohwr/)https://ethfinance.org/ now redirects to the current daily thread.
For the new reddit design, you can use https://new.ethfinance.org/, but it doesn't work on mobile because of a bug that incompetent reddit hasn't fixed yet.
Why?
- It's convenient because the daily thread is where the action is but the link is different every day (u/superphiz will always be on the right page now)
- If the community ends up moving to another platform due to these Reddit changes, you'll be able to find out where we are from this URL
- If we eventually end up going with a protocol-based solution, this URL can serve as a directory for the various frontend options
u/the_swingman assesses Ethereum's security-ness
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/144vs24/daily_general_discussion_june_9_2023/jnkjawu/)While I believe most of us here already deduce that Ethereum is not a security. I'll share some of my thoughts and thought process on the matter.. sorry in advance if this is a bit scattered and long..
Ethereum is in a constant state of evolution. Sounds obvious to us, but that concept probably isn't so obvious to people not as well versed in the functionality of Ethereum. When I say this, I am thinking of a court room full of jurors, lawyers, a judge, etc. I am thinking about law makers, house of representatives and the senate; congress. Just listening in on recent hearings lets us know that there are a lot of people in powerful positions who are either un/ill informed or just flat out have a different agenda when it comes to cryptocurrency, let alone Ethereum. Etheruems' constant state of evolution is important to note because while I believe Ethereum can get close to a final form, even then, there will be new frontiers and boundaries that I think Ethereum can explore and expand on to.
Each stage of evolution in Ethereum has attracted different collectives of people. In the beginning, the idea of Ethereum in its simplest form, thought to be a programable Bitcoin-like entity; a decentralized smart contract platform that extended the capabilities of blockchain technology. If you read Vitaliks whitepaper, a lot of eye opening ideas were conceptualized, and the first question on your mind if you wanted to be involved/interreact was, how do I acquire some Ethereum. In the early groups of Ethereum enthusiasts, you had builders/creators, investor/speculators, researchers and general crypto enthusiasts who saw that whitepaper as groundbreaking.
I don't believe it was as black and white as:
A. I am an investor.
B. I invest to make money.
C. If I invest in Ethereum, I expect to make a profit.
The intial ICO wasn't a VC pitch, or promoted to a room full of investors with the promise of profit. It was however, a way to start funding projects on this new platform in exchange for giving people a way to interact with the network/platform by holding/using ETH as well as the potential for growth in value.
Society/Capitalism would argue that a profit expectation was present, especially if you were to compare the scenario to Bitcoin and Bitcoins historical growth in value at the time. While that may be inherent, it would be very difficult to prove that expectation as an absolute.
Eventually, when a court is deciding on how to classify ETH, and the court is reviewing the intital allocations of Ethereum and the intent behind those allocations, although probably more centralized in nature than we'd all prefer it to have been, I believe there will be enough transparancy to make strong arguements against the criteria of the howey test. Especially if the current environment of Ethereum is to be considered.
With all of the latest developments of Ethereum; Defi, NFTs, DApps, DAOs, Tokenization/Crowdfunding, Supply Chain Management, Web3, etc. Todays Ethereum attracts a new collective of people, while fulfilling the initial vision of Ethereum. I personally know people who are indirectly involved with Ethereum and didn't purchase ETH with an expectation of direct profit, but were more interested in acquiring a loan or an NFT. Point is, there is a rather large and expanding ecosystem and community in Ethereum, one that makes the ETH token a utility in order to move about/participate within said ecosystem and community. As Ethereum continues to scale and more dApps and use cases come to surface, it will be increasingly difficult to classify Ethereum as a security.
Basic principles of that would signal a non security are: Ethereum has always prioritized decentralization and is decentralized. Ethereum has always been developed open-source and has been community driven and the ETH token was primarily designed as a utility token to interact with smart contracts and is still used that way today.
The regulators can try to apply old tests and laws to Ethereum, but I believe the outcome will be adapted tests and perhaps new laws likely favorable to Ethereum. I am as much an investor as I am someone who just uses Ethereum for utility at this point. I have open defi loans, I have NFTs, I have contributed to DAOs and use dApps. These law suits were a long time coming (it seems like the markets feel this way too) and my (our) real hope we end up with actual framework and clarity with path forward for innovation in the US and to finally be rid of regulation by enforcement that triggers these nasty FUD headlines.
@Kbrot welcomes us to Kbin
[View on kbin →](https://kbin.social/m/ethfinance/t/12992/Daily-General-Discussion-June-12-2023#entry-comment-54255)Hi all and welcome to kbin and m/ethfinance, our temporary-and-maybe-someday-more home while reddit learns its lesson.
I didn't get a chance to reply to everyone in the previous thread, but I did read. Please feel free to ask me any questions about kbin, Lemmy, the fediverse, and I'll try to answer. I've spent quite a few days now exploring it. I also encourage fediverse users to chime in, whether it's from Mastodon experience or somewhere else.
The dev (@[email protected]) is lovely, responsive, and working hard right now. Feel free to chip in with suggestions at m/kbinmeta or if you have web dev experience, maybe consider reaching out directly to help.
No doubt you're all noticing kbin is slow. It's good to remember that the beauty of federated (decentralized) servers is also in the initial brutality. Servers can be run by anyone (great!) but servers must be run by someone (oof). Ernest is one guy, spinning up a server for refugees of a global conglomerate. It's partly why I tried -- and will keep trying -- to open a server of our own.
I'd encourage everyone to have a little patience, be extra kind and gracious, and at worst, take a little time away from the screen if it's crawling. They're planning a large infrastructure change next week. In the meantime, try to enjoy the brave new world here. We haven't had a truly "new" website to explore in many years. It's kinda exciting!
Now back to the memes, lines, and triangles.
@Chromes takes decentralization seriously and is now a solo staker!
[View on kbin →](https://kbin.social/m/ethfinance/t/14187/Daily-General-Discussion-June-13-2023#entry-comment-61760)Checking in after my post about taking the plunge the other day. Spun up my validator and deposited. Took me, in total, about 10 hours (yes, really). I'm "Pending" on beaconcha.in.
I wrote down a lot of what I felt and did while trying to get it all together. I'm still kind of shell-shocked by the whole experience and I'm sure I'll talk a lot more about it later. What I'll say for now is that even the "for dummies" version of setting up a validator is significantly more intimidating and intense than most people think it is.
I'm proud of myself for (hopefully) successfully doing it, but even doing it on easy mode (dappnode) had a lot of issues, things that I didn't fully understand, or things that almost had me giving up (I gave up about 3 times and then went right back to it after 5 minutes of having given up).
To be absolutely clear, that's no one's fault but mine. I'm absolutely tech illiterate, but, sadly, I'm actually probably more tech-y than most people. So I do think we have a long way to go before this sort of thing becomes something non-tech can just pick up and do. Things that I think most here take for granted are very scary or even indecipherable to someone like me.
That actually brings me to something that this whole reddit fiasco has me thinking about. One of the great strengths of crypto and eth in particular is the layer 0 stuff. It leads to great communities like this or Ethstaker. We have Reddits and Discords which are filled with people willing and eager to help. The problem is that it seems like it may have led to less focus on delivering a user-manual that makes sense to a new user who has no idea what they're doing. Communities are great for fixing problems, but it seems like we rely on a nebulous social network to teach the basics. Even the best guides I found seemed to assume a lot of knowledge and I generally had 3-5 "1 stop shop" guides open at once as I did this.
The good thing with how tough it was was that, if everything works out and I start validating in a month and a half (thanks Celsius), I'll really feel like I earned it.
@minimalgravitas calls out Ripple exec on misleading through omission
[View on kbin →](https://kbin.social/m/ethfinance/t/14187/Daily-General-Discussion-June-13-2023#entry-comment-60732)An incredibly simple example of how to mislead by omission...
A Tweet by Stuart Alderoty, Chief Legal Officer at Ripple.
10/ On June 4, Hinman wrote that he didn’t see a “need to regulate ETH as a security” and would call Buterin later that week to confirm “our understanding.”
Emphasis is added by me, because that section is one of the things causing the XRP bagholders to tweet about '#ETHGate'.
https://twitter.com/s_alderoty/status/1668601236344692737
It is clearly written to imply a shady agreement between Hinman and Buterin. However, in context the quote from the e-mail reads:
We also have a call with Buterin later this week to confirm our understanding of how the Ethereum Foundation operates.
So what this bellend is insinuating indicates some dodgy deal, is actually just a reference to a call checking some information.
I really do hate the way spreading disinfo is seen as a perfectly acceptable tactic by assholes to get what they want. If you don't strive for truth then you do not deserve to have people listen to you, but so many people don't really want truth, they just want feel special for knowing about a conspiracy and to believe things that will pump their bags.
@kingleo23 is glad the Prometheum nonsense got called out in the US house hearing
[View on kbin →](https://kbin.social/m/ethfinance/t/14187/Daily-General-Discussion-June-13-2023#entry-comment-63659)Glad the Prometheum nonsense got called out in the hearing today.
https://twitter.com/AlexanderGrieve/status/1668764481252478979
https://twitter.com/EugeneProko/status/1668745089164935168
Quite obviously a live action role play exercise
u/busterrulezzz reminds us of some of the good things Reddit has done for web 3
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/148yyad/daily_general_discussion_june_14_2023/jo5690p/)I get all the drama around Reddit API, but I want to point out something : so far, Reddit is by far the social network that is the most crypto-friendly. They onboarded millions of normies eith their Vault, community tokens and Digital Collectibles.
Just something to keep in mind while our community ponder its options.
u/PhiMarHal has your daily hit of hopium
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/148yyad/daily_general_discussion_june_14_2023/jo5orfq/)I got your hopium, fam.
Tech is more solid than ever. Rollups make great strides, each in their own direction. Transactions get cheaper, design space extends.
AI is complementary with crypto. AI is the content engine. Crypto is the curation engine. An abundance, an infinity of content makes curating this content for relevance that much more important.
Innovation is happening at the app layer. Uniswap v4 was announced yesterday. Autonomous worlds is picking up as a concept.
We are right where we were in 2019. With everyone declaring crypto dead, and usecases "nobody" expected about to mature in a couple of years.
In a vacuum, I would add that however, we can't be sure this will be reflected in the price as the last ATH went quite high. But this is where the real hopium shot comes in: great future multipliers are forged in the despair of many. When perception hits maximum pain while reality speaks of fundamental soundness still, those are the times of asymmetric opportunities.
In the end I'm just another wanker on the Internet, but I bought ETH today. I wasn't a buyer for the past 3 months. This is financial advice.
u/Dysus1 keeps us in the US regulatory loop
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/148yyad/daily_general_discussion_june_14_2023/jo4t3pg/)For those who missed it...regarding Crypto Clarity in the US:
Hearing Entitled: The Future of Digital Assets: Providing Clarity for the Digital Asset Ecosystem (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dr9GD8hdD_U) Opening Statements occur at -Time Stamp: 41:39.
Some observed discussion points I found of interest:
- The numerous times that stable coin legislation was mentioned and the importance, for the US Dollar to maintain its dominance as the world’s reserve currency.
- New consumer protection of imposed Individual Blockchain investment limits of approx. 5% of Net Income.
- Rules for Categorization of Blockchain projects for the purpose of Jurisdiction for SEC or CFTC, with a grace period for projects to become decentralized
- Mr. Foster’s comments regarding ongoing “Classified Briefings” -Time Stamp: 3:15:32
- Regarding the testimony of Mr. Kaplan, Co-CEO of Prometheum, an SEC approved exchange. It became obvious that he represented the Crony System (Supported by GG and a certain political party affiliation). It was interesting that certain members read perfectly scripted questions...that allowed for perfectly scripted answers. Which were undone by the following (note the body language): (5 min. each)
Week #22: June 9, 2023
Guest appearance by Matt Finestone, former lead of Gamestop NFT and currently head of Taiko.xyz, a decentralized and Ethereum-equivalent ZK-Rollup.
Announcements
- r/EthFinance is considering participating in the Reddit blackout June 12-14 in protest of their API changes. See this thread for details and discussion on possible Reddit replacements, such as the EVM Discord and Kbin.social
The morning trinity
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/144vs24/comment/jnhr8b2/)Ethereum
$1838
0.069
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/1412u9x/comment/jn1s9me/)Go after Binance,
Stomp down when you do your dance,
Lead to no advance.
The Queue: u/Spacesider
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/144vs24/comment/jnhqud2/)Your daily beacon chain dose.
Pending validators: Joining 96k leaving ~100
-Entry queue +900 from yesterday's number - New entry queue ATH. -It will take just over 45 day and a half days for the entry queue to clear -In just under 24 days the amount of daily validators that can both enter or exit will be increased from 2025 to 2250.
These figures are based on the entry and exit queue at the time of posting
This can also be tracked via https://validatorqueue.com/
Shitpost of the week: MinimalGravitas
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/1412u9x/comment/jn1co32/)Oh dear gang, with all the drama around Binance and the price crashing we're seeing a big spike in stakers pulling out their validators. The exit queue is up to 8 minutes!
u/nixorokish has an important PSA for stakers
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13x8njw/daily_general_discussion_june_1_2023/jmhqlh8/)EthStaker published a blog post to do a call to action for execution client diversity - Nethermind and Besu are ready for adoption in home operators but also for large scale staking operations as yorickdowne, who's part of EthStaker, notes with his setup testing for Cryptomanufaktur.
Geth controls ~87% of the network right now a bug would be a catastrophic situation - say a bug happened where Geth produced an invalid block - most validators would follow it and we'd have to resort to one of three choices at the social layer:
- Penalize and slash 87% of validators
- Exit 87% of validators
- Go with an invalid chain
Any option we chose would shake people's faith in the immutability of Ethereum. The first one would be a massive amount of capital loss. And this is just one of three types of bugs - the most unlikely type of a bug, a double-signing event caused by a bug in Geth, would cause a total slash of 87% of validators. I mean all of it, people running Geth would lose their entire stake.
Super unlikely bugs but we're ready for it and I'm sure that Geth is ready for the people to take the pressure off of them!
u/alexiskef dissects the fake Orbiter Finance airdrop
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13x8njw/daily_general_discussion_june_1_2023/jmgfq0c/)🕵🏻 Dissecting the FAKE Orbiter "Airdrop" announcement that u/Dreth warned everyone about earlier on:
🚨 "Due to major success of our "Orbiter Pilots NFT Series", we have decided to launch our token $ORB" ☠️
👉 Grammatically wrong: Missing "the".. As in: "due to THE major success"
👉 Logically wrong: Why would a company suddenly "decide" to launch an airdrop based on the success (?) of an NFT Series?
🚨 *"We will be giving away 5,000,000 $ORB tokens, which will be distributed to anyone who claims from June 1st - June 3rd"*☠️
👉 when announcing Airdrops, legit projects release extensive information on their token allocation. Usually multiple pages long, filled with all kinds of relevant information. NOT just a plain number..
👉 .. and they don't distribute their token to.. "anyone who claims.."
🚨 "There is only a limited amount of token so act fast!" ☠️
👉 here they try to create a sense of urgency, to make you act before you think, before you notice all these red flags.. Also, notice the spelling mistake (token instead of tokens)
🚨 "Those who receive the tokens will be whitelisted to use our newest staking feature" ☠️
👉 here they are baiting ("whitelisted") you again, trying to shift your attention from all the red flags by promising "new products" that can give you with extra yield/rewards..
🚨 "Any gas spent on claiming the tokens will be refunded via Orbiter Finance's Smart Contract" ☠️
👉 in other words: "Don't worry about high Gas!! Go one and claim NOW!! We'll refund everything!!". I.e. don't wait, don't look further into the legitimacy of this! Go ahead and hastily ignore any sense of "danger", and sigh these txs NOW!
🚨 Claim $ORB here: https://orbiter DOT pm/ ☠️
👉 DOT PM? Using the "orbiter" brand to lure you into a fake sense of security. But dot pm? WTF is that??
🚨 PILOTS! Our distribution is now 77% claimed 🛸 ☠️
👉 the number keeps "going up".. First 66%, then 77%, and so on.. QUICK, ACT FAST (AND DON'T STOP TO THINK) TOKENS ARE RUNNING OUT!!
u/Ethical-trade has made a proper document on the dire Lido situation
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13x8njw/daily_general_discussion_june_1_2023/jmhrlrq/)Thanks a bunch for signaling your support to prevent Lido from harming Ethereum's decentralization yesterday. I'm glad to see that this problem is as important to you as it is to me.
I've gathered all the information we've shared so far in a google document that automod prevents me from sharing, so here's a pdf.
Feel free to add comments wherever needed and let's start fighting for this.
Edit: I also tweeted the doc with a new hashtag: #Lidont which has its own logo in the doc.
The document contains quotes from u/hanniabu u/etherenum u/MinimalGravitas
u/stablecoin educates us on Gnosis Chain validators
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13y3hr6/daily_general_discussion_june_2_2023/jmoid77/)Have to give my public support for Gnosis chain after a few posters recommended I run a node on my spare staking PC.
You can spin up a validating node with just 1 $GNO token. It’s the base token for the network collateral /staking, but funnily enough you need xDAI to pay fees so make sure to also transfer in $1.0 in dai to your deposit address.
You can stake like a whale too if you wanted, for about $7500 you can run 64 nodes that’ll probably net you 10-20 block rewards per day. Yield is around 16% which is just high inflation rewards, and so far there’s nothing in block rewards because tx are too cheap and there’s no MEV boost I don’t think. Gnosis Chain also hasn’t had their withdrawal fork yet so your locking up a little bit longer than ETH right now, but there’s no entrance queue either to earning.
The reason for the recommended is it uses the same software clients as ETH (geth, nethermind, lighthouse, prysm, maybe a few others now but not all are supported just yet). It’s literally a mini-me ETH network with its consensus and execution separated, using the same software clients you just select the Gnosis chain in your startup flags. I used Somer Esat guides to do all this, and just cross referenced the official setup guide from the Gnosis website (below).
If you are curious about staking at home, or looking to enhance your own Etherum node operating skills, running a Gnosis node is like training or studying using real money. For me that always forces me to take it seriously and even enjoy the process more, in addition to leveling up my own skills. You just get a good a feel for how the clients interact with eachother, and also how well your node links up to the network and other nodes. If you really mess up, then you are only out $116 per node rather than $60k. Plus, you are helping to decentralize transactions on a low cost Etherum aligned EVM sidechain. This further broadens the reach of EVM smart contract developers and gives you something constructive to do during 🦀 szn.
u/T0Bii covers the Reddit API pricing drama
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/1401prr/daily_general_discussion_june_4_2023/jmvuz00/)Ya'll probably already heard about the reddit api pricing drama, but for those who didn't: Reddit is getting greedy and is going to charge a ridiculous amount of money for the use of their API, thereby driving third party clients out of business.
There's not much information about who will have to pay for what etc., but assuming that every API request will have to be paid for, this is the calculation I'm making for the u/nitter_not_twitter bot:
I'm currently checking the subreddit 6x per minute. I could reduce this to something like once every 5 minutes and I suppose it would still provide a good UX.
That'd be 12 requests per hour, 288 per day and 8640 per month.
The bot answered 170x in the past month as well so we're at 8810 requests per month, or ~106k requests a year.
According to what we know, reddit wants to charge $12k for 50 million requests. That's $0.00024 per request or ~$25 for the 106k/year.
25$/year for running a very small bot at 12 checks per hour instead of the current 360 checks per hour (which would be insanely costly).
I can afford that without a problem, assuming reddit will offer packages that small and at the same price.
But this still shows how insane the API pricing is.
Without 3rd party apps I'll not be here as often as I currently am and this might be true for a lot of people here as well.
Maybe we should also think about joining the prostest: <https://reddit.com/r/Save3rdPartyApps/comments/13yh0jf/dont_let_reddit_kill_3rd_party_apps/ > Here's a list of already participating subreddits: https://reddit.com/r/ModCoord/comments/1401qw5/incomplete_and_growing_list_of_participating/
u/KBrot sets up an awesome Reddit alternative for us!
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/1412u9x/daily_general_discussion_june_5_2023/jn25rci/)Alright, well here ya go. Our own little reddit alternative.
Welcome to EVM Lemmy. Our home away from home when we take down reddit on the 12th.
See below, then... Play around. Make some shit. Post some shit. I'll polish it up as we go.
Remember I've never admin'd a site in my life so... Anything and everything is subject to me trying to fix an issue and accidentally deleting all our data so... yeah, screenshot anything important anyone says.
SOME. CAVEATS.
Obviously, you'll notice it's on http only not https. Because I can't get the damn SSL cert to work. So, NO serious info should be entered here beyond your usual junk email and a junk password. It's PROBABLY just me with access to the data but like, idfk, it's http, trust nothing. Please just meme around and try to break the site, and skip entering your banking information and private keys.
Then if anyone can kindly explain why the http://url works in every browser of mine EXCEPT my main Brave browser, I'd appreciate it. Edge is fine. Firefox is fine. In fact, I can access it in a Brave Private window, just not the main. Why? What setting is on blocking http? Hell, I can even do it from Brave on my phone, same wifi network and pihole DNS and everything. Confused, I am.
And it's also not actually federated because it's 99% me not being able to figure it out yet and 1% apparently there's some outbound DNS issue with Lemmy instances the devs are working on. Idk.
tl;dr servers are hard. yall need to be paid more.
Cheers.
UPDATE:
Despite the best efforts of fellow redditors, I have to call it quits for now on the Lemmy instance. I'm just not smart enough. Perhaps I'll return to it.
In the meantime, please find our ethfinance alternative at https://kbin.social/m/ethfinance. It's all set up and ready to go, and it's federated. Think of Kbin as the scrappy newcomer ProtonMail to Lemmy's Gmail.
I'll leave it at that on here, but I'm happy to help people tour the fediverse in the Daily on Kbin. We'll waive the "on topic" rule for a few days so folks can acclimate.
u/austonst shares a recent EthResearch post about beaconchain security
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/1424agt/daily_general_discussion_june_6_2023/jn4rg6o/)New ethresear.ch post by mike neuder, francesco d’amato, aditya asgaonkar, and justin drake.
Increase the MAX_EFFECTIVE_BALANCE – a modest proposal
Also see their notes on security.
Summarizing briefly, this change would keep the 32 ETH minimum for a validator, but increase the maximum by some factor (possibly 64x to a max of 2048 ETH). Probability of selection for various duties e.g. sync committee would be weighted based on balance. Operators running multiple validators would not have them aggregated forcibly, but could opt in to have their validators merged.
The authors argue the following benefits:
- BLS signature aggregation is a big part of the consensus protocol. Producing, verifying, and aggregating signatures for the various committees leads to some significant compute overhead which could be reduced with fewer, larger validators.
- Current proposals for single-slot finality (SSF) depend on aggregating signatures from every validator every slot. Reducing the validator set size, and with it the number of signatures needed, would reduce the computational cost of doing so, speeding up SSF development.
- SSF is a prerequisite for in-protocol proposer-builder separation (ePBS) and MEV burn, so reducing the validator set size helps speed those along too.
- Anyone with stake below the maximum will have their consensus-layer rewards auto-compound, as the increased validator balance smoothly leads to higher attestation rewards and proposal chances. The current lack of this is a big downside to solo staking compared to staking pools.
- Partial withdrawals incur a large withdrawal load every epoch. If validators switch to the larger cap with auto-compounding, there will be 1) fewer validators in total to process partial withdrawals for, and 2) many who stay below the upper limit and don't need regular partial withdrawals in the first place. Ultimately reduces withdrawal queue length.
As with any protocol design choice, there are some tradeoffs involved. Already a couple of good criticisms in the replies which are worth a read.
u/haurog is feeling quite positive on Ethereum
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/1424agt/daily_general_discussion_june_6_2023/jn3ay32/)I am feeling quite positive on ETH and Ethereum:
- The most powerful government in the world goes on a full frontal attack on the largest centralized exchange in the world and the overall crypto market cap drops by less than 5% and is now down only 3.5%. Price fluctuation wise, this is just a normal day in crypto. It looks like most people who are non-believers or are over-invested left or reduced their investment.
- Every time the SEC does not call ETH a security it will get harder to claim it being one later on. Kind of like a Lindy effect.
- Many alt L1 coins have been called a security now. I would prefer if the various approaches to building a modern blockchain would compete on a technical level and not a government restricting new entrants in the space by relative arbitrary and archaic regulations. But all in all this is positive for Ethereum, as I think the number of new "Ethereum killer" VC chains will go down.
- Making it harder for newer chains to do an ICO could end up being extremely positive for ETH as projects will think hard on how to secure their chain and probably a rollup settling on Ethereum using ETH as the payment token will be the way to go for many of them.
- For other non-rollup type projects they will have to find a way to secure their project without issuing tokens. Here comes Eigenlayer, which again uses Ethereum.
These are uncertain times, I have no idea which branch of the US government lashes out and attacks crypto next, but I am just feeling positive about the non-reaction of the market and the future ahead for Ethereum.
u/kainzilla speculates on the SEC's plan
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/1433ugu/daily_general_discussion_june_7_2023/jn9tsl1/)This isn't designed to be FUD, but rather to be realistic about what I expect to happen. Just to be clear, I expect this plan to fail at some stage along the way, because I think they let it run too long and it's likely no longer stoppable:
- The SEC is not governing in good faith, they're definitely orchestrating an attack on crypto. It's real easy to see "attacks" where attacks don't exist, but watching the SEC chief do everything possible to not define Ethereum as a commodity or a security during the congressional hearings made it extremely obvious that they're acting with intent.
- With the fact that they're acting with intent in mind, consider the recent lawsuits against Binance and Coinbase, specifically the parts regarding securities: some in here believed that it was a positive sign that Ethereum wasn't named. It is not.
- The SEC's problem is that if they try to get Ethereum declared a security right now, they're very likely to lose that lawsuit. Their game plan in this case is to go after other coins - especially ones that are in fact much closer to a security, and after securing a win on these, they intend to try to use that to nail Ethereum next. That's the only reason Ethereum wasn't included in the list, is due to prior SEC comments and actions regarding it. As soon as they lock in any victories on similar assets, they will try to use this as support for attacking Ethereum.
- Bitcoin users aren't safe either. I'm pretty sure an additional facet of this plan is that any coins (including Bitcoin) that use Proof-of-Work mechanisms will be targeted by "green / environmental" legislation designed to shut them down / make mining them illegal. They can't attack those via the SEC, so they're going to try co-opting environmental legislation to shut this side down. With these two prongs, both Proof of Stake and Proof of Work assets will both be covered. Although I'm pretty sure this will be an aspect of the attack plan, I don't know if it will run concurrently with the SEC attacks above, or if they'll wait until it's known if those will succeed.
- While these plans are in motion, they will continue to attack exchanges in any way they can - "protecting" consumers by making accessing exchanges harder or more onerous, legislation to make self-custody illegal, etc. We've seen a few older and smaller US-servicing exchanges get shut down over the last year, and I expect them to start attacking Kraken and Gemini soon as well.
It's crystal clear they're working towards an agenda to shut down crypto as a whole. Tbh I don't give a shit if it's because "hur dur global banking cabal" or "oh fuck the USD is going to collapse if we don't try to shut this down" or "I'm old and fucking stupid and I hate this cryptkeeper blogchain technology", because the reasons are irrelevant; just know that they're working with a coordinated plan here and Ethereum is on the hit list. Be realistic about the struggles that are coming.
u/696_eth reflects on a one year old ratio reminder
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/1433ugu/daily_general_discussion_june_7_2023/jncqa6f/)A few weeks ago I received a reminder to my sale of majority of my BTC to ETH.
At that time in 2022, btc - $30k, eth - $2000, ray - 0.067.
2023 prices, btc - $26k, eth - $1800, ray - 0.067.
So was that decision good for me and my future?
Some quick reflections combined with guesses-predictions on how things might turn out.
- Due to prices and ratios being really similar, the trade has ended up being neutral. However, there's taxes, hence I ended up loosing like 20%ish and it will probably end up being around 30-35% long term.
- So one of the cool things for me right now is that I can borrow against my assets on Ethereum, even my ENS digits! I couldn't do that on Bitcoin, I would have needed to wrap it which would've been a tax event, so while it was possible, it was not practical. Borrowing my end up saving me 5-10% long term, we'll see.
- On top of my Ethereum assets. I have an option to get yield now. The yield is really crucial because it means I have an option of getting something without sacrificing my stack and cashing out.
- This leads me to my next point. My latest variation of the initial crypto plan was to cashout into USD or stocks, just away from the bitcoin, cause I needed to have money somehow to pay for stuff. They were not many bitcoin developments. Yes, it started being accepted here and there, mostly digitally. Anyways, that's not the point. But the most useful use case to me was being able to send money quick and fast and relatively cheaply.
- Well, now I don't have to live. Quite on the opposite. It has also been cool cause there's so many things going in the Ethereum ecosystem or around it. I'm sure waaaay more people used Ethereum than Bitcoin.
- There's actually something here than just pure money and just waiting for the next halving and next bull run in hopes of more money. In the years before, I actually had people IRL ask me 'why would they buy Bitcoin and what utility it had?'. And for the decent amount of recent years, bitcoin community's proposition wasn't for P2P, which initially was soo cool for me, but more just to hodl this to have more money and that's it lol.
- This bear market has the most fun. Somewhat stressful too compared to other ones where you just zone out cause there was not much going in btc. But yeah, it's pretty cool. I get to learn a lot and try out things I wanted to do in my life before. For example, I wanted to write before but I didn't like college essays cause of word limit bs. I wanted to write but I didnt really know where to put 'writing' into my life, I did write a few things here and there, mostly psychology and mental health related but that's about it. And since becoming involved in the communities here and in the ecosystem, I can do some writing and it works for me. And there's so much room for growth too.
It's getting pretty long and my flow is a bit off so here's a few btc related takes.
- I'm really interested seeing what happens when for the first time after halving when btc doesn't hit new ATH. It would be a heavy downfall to many holders, I don't think it will go to 0 but I think the main narrative of up only being broken would be a hard pill to swallow.
- Prob one of the hottest hot takes: I think btc doesn't hit $100k next bull run. But my takes are not know to be correct😅
And if you made it till here, here's my last important point.
- I've been trying to figure out the differences between my experiences within bitcoin and ethereum communities. To me it was mostly coming down to some social related movements. For example, seeing snippets of btc conferences during 2021 was so criiinge that I didn't wanna be related with that sorta people in any way. On the other hand, there's so many builders, artists, creators, degens and users in Ethereum that I resonate with. It's kinda funny but I met some people who are still not a fan of Ethereum yet they work on some projects that are built on Ethereum and contribute to the ecosystem. I mean they can hold whatever assets they want but if they are spending their energy contributing to this ecosystem rather than contributing to the ecosystem the asset they believe of - maybe it says something. So I was looking for a short simple and best way to describe this whole social thing to start quantifying it someway so I can communicate with people better and pass on my excitement and passion about the space and I have realized that the term already exists - Layer Zero. That social layer. It's the actual difference that drives things here, creates collaboration and unity rather than division.
I'm going to end this here, thanks for coming to my imperfect TED Talk.
All the best,
696.eth
Week #21: June 2, 2023
Livestream Recording | POAP
Guest appearance by Brendan Shakeshaft and Joe Van Loon, founders of Auditware. Auditware specializes in performing smart contract audits and building security tooling. Their flagship product Audit Wizard (currently in alpha) is the ultimate web3 security tool, allowing you to audit your smart contracts with ease.
The morning trinity
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13y3hr6/comment/jmkrxrg/)Ethereum
$1,889.56
0.0696
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13x8njw/comment/jmjbazb/)Trustless sequencing,
Let data compression sing,
Rollups be dancing.
Queue update: u/Spacesider
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13y3hr6/daily_general_discussion_june_2_2023/jmkrff0/)Your daily beacon chain dose.
Pending validators: Joining 78.5k, leaving ~10
- Entry queue +1700 from yesterday's number - New entry queue ATH.
- It will take around 38 days for the entry queue to clear
- In under 28 days the amount of daily validators that can both enter or exit will be increased from 2025 to 2250.
These figures are based on the entry and exit queue at the time of posting
Shitpost of the week: u/IlIIIlIlII
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13y3hr6/comment/jmkwmch/)Volatility so dead I don't even have any memes to post.
u/o-l-o explains how a Trezor randomly generates a seed phrase
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13s3pp7/daily_general_discussion_may_26_2023/jloyeu4/)With trezor, you can read through their code and understand how they generate seeds.
Someone has already done this: https://medium.com/@brandonarvanaghi/analyzing-trezor-firmware-mnemonic-seed-generation-for-bitcoin-and-ethereum-4b03fbaad24d
You'll notice that that article calls out that the default 'random32' isn't suitable for production (and the code itself wanes you of this), so you'll need to find out where Trezor implements 'random32'. This is my first time looking through their code and it seems that the insecure implementation is the default implementation in their firmware, but I assume they replace that somewhere. Perhaps someone more familiar can point us to the newest RNG code because THIS IS A VERY IMPORTANT POINT TO CLEAR UP.
They do have a legacy firmware that has its own 'random32' implementation: https://github.com/trezor/trezor-firmware/blob/92045275fb79e532a5b9a86732c1b3206ef3bba4/legacy/rng.c#L27
You'll notice that that code uses a few "RNG_" variables to produce it's number, so the next step is to find out what those are.
We know that Trezor uses a Cortex-m4 Arm chip, and this is C code, so we can look at the chip datashet to understand what those do, or we can cheat and look at OpenCM docs: https://libopencm3.org/docs/latest/stm32f2/html/group__rng__file.html
You'd also want to go to the datasheet for the STM32F205xx to see that it has a "true random generator" hardware module.
That all looks really good, and I've heard that the modern Trezor firmware also includes static ram and host device data into it's RNG, but I'm not familiar enough with their code to hunt that down at the moment.
u/Itswhatevermannn shares the cool new project that have been building
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13s3pp7/daily_general_discussion_may_26_2023/jlqodco/)Hey guys, lurker here who’s been working on a project in his free time: https://betonchain.gg/
To keep it brief, I started out running a Chainlink node, deploying jobs and a consumer to update odds and game results data from an API I wrote to aggregate results and odds across various bookies. Eventually the goal became to offer the most competitive betting experience in terms of odds, privacy and transparency, while decentralizing the bookmaker by sourcing house liquidity from a community which receives house profits back. Soon after launch I aim to add support for futures and integrate player friendly tools such as contracts for auto-hedging parlays.
The platform is currently on Sepolia, if anyone is interested in testing the DApp please drop an address and I can send over some test USDC/USDT/DAI to place bets with. Hopefully there’s not too many bugs! I am considering launching polygonzkEVM but not sure yet.
Appreciate any feedback from you fine gents and ladies!
PS: If anyone has insight into raising funds, please let me know, hope to make this my full time job. Thanks again!
u/asus_wtf has the China news and it's not a ban?!
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13sygtc/daily_general_discussion_may_27_2023/jlt88dg/)Beijing releases white paper for web3 innovation and development
https://www.theblock.co/post/232404/beijing-web3-white-paper
“…Dubbed the "Web3 Innovation and Development White Paper (2023)," the document states that web3 technology is an "inevitable trend for future Internet industry development,"…”
“The commission aims to construct Beijing as a global innovation hub for the digital economy.”
“ The white paper reportedly states that Beijing aims to strengthen policy support and accelerate technological breakthroughs to promote the web3 industry.”
u/superphiz thinks we are hitting a staking inflection point
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13trvpr/daily_general_discussion_may_28_2023/jlxxxt5/)I think we're hitting an inflection point where staking is the "cool" thing to do with Ether. Lots of folks predicted that this would happen but no one really knew when. I'm basing this on two factors:
- The deposit queue is growing at an accelerating rate despite long wait times.
- The price of Eth is beginning to inch up against the flow of other assets.
The logical interpretation of this is that the supply squeeze delivered by staking & burning is finally upon us.
Does this mean Ethereum is successful?
Nope. Not even close. We saw something similar happen with Dash in 2018 (dash spiked when their staking program reached critical mass), but Dash couldn't keep the gains. The only way Ether will lock in this success is if we build valuable products on top of a credibly neutral and decentralized network. If you're hearing this, but not acting on it, you're a bad puppy 😜
u/busterrulezzz experiences the Bitcoin BRC-20 and Ordinals user experience
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13trvpr/daily_general_discussion_may_28_2023/jlzjpme/)I took a deep breath and tipped my toes into Ordinals and BRC-20 yesterday. UX is terrible, it took 12 hours (!) to process my bridging transaction from BTC mainnet to Stacks, and depositing into my trading wallet took about 10 minutes. It's a very, very long time when you're used to Ethereum. Xverse wallet is even worse than MetaMask in terms of showing human-readable information, and all swaps are done either via order books or P2P bulk sales.
The experience is not welcoming for a newcomer. I've been doing DeFi daily for the last 2 years, and I had to look around for hours before I was comfortable enough to do a transaction.
However, I think BRC-20s and Ordinals have a decent chance of becoming more popular in the next few months. I am not tech-savvy enough to understand the hurdles facing a better UX - until yesterday I thought an ETH NFT collection could be bridged back-and-forth to BTC... But I could definitely see how people could pile on Bitcoin DeFi projects.
Ethereum isn't threatened by this, in my opinion. It is so far ahead in terms of development... Bitcoin looks like a 28k modem, while Ethereum is 5G. Still, I decided to allocate a small portion of my trading wallet to it. I feel kinda dirty using a PoW chain, but hey, ride the wave, don't fight it, as they say.
u/BramBramEth is thinking about take on the next part of their web 3 journey
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13uldb1/daily_general_discussion_may_29_2023/jm1c67u/)Hey ! Seems like I'm going to be let go at work soonish (Which is a good thing, my job got less and less technical over the years and I miss that part a lot). I'm a cryptographer with quite good skills in programming in a range of languages, so I was considering having a bit of fun for a couple years working in the ETH ecosystem. What I'm looking for is technical challenge.
What are my options ? My thoughts so far :
- CL Client teams : Very new codebase (which is nice) - Mainly about implementing EIP specs, seems to be that challenge here is "low" as the heavy lifting is done at the research level.
- EL Client teams : Older codebase - Mainly about improvements of various existing parts - a bit more challenge because there's design/engineering tasks to improve stability and speed/latency/footprint of the clients.
- Research teams : Way more focused on design / cryptography / game theory - Something I'm very good at, but I fear I will miss the coding part of it, which is somthing I enjoy.
- A Layer 2 : I would probably prefer a ZKR since it's more fun to work on, but I kinda think that OR are so ahead in terms of maket share that it's an uphill battle to win as a ZK rollup.
- Some protocol : Probably some game theory involved, but I don't think I like the risk of being part of a project which has a chance of not taking off.
- Do my own thing with a high probability it won't be used : I would love to code some kind of ZK prover in GPU assembly for instance - This is probably the most fun for me, but also the most risky.
- Flavor of the month : Work for a hardware wallet manufacturer with good open source values :)
Any other options you can think of ? I'm just in the process of evaluating my opions right now as the switch won't be before a couple months.
u/nightfallsh4 reminds us of another cool use for your hardware wallets
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13uldb1/daily_general_discussion_may_29_2023/jm1d0wh/)Just a reminder to everyone if you don't know already.
Both Ledger and Trezor device support Fido U2F, which means you can use your ledger or trezor as a security key (2FA) to login to your online accounts.
Of course if you are not comfortable taking your hardware wallet with you everywhere, maybe consider using it for online accounts you'll only login from your home or in a safe place. But according to your specific threat model you can use HWs as 2FA security partially or fully in your online activities.
You can use them to secure your CEX accounts, email, password manager etc. And if you loose or break your device you can always restore it with the seed phrases in another device and all your 2FA security keys will be recovered as well.
Using a security key as 2FA for your online accounts greatly increases your general security online. And almost impossible to hack into your accounts remotely.
Before you implement that be sure to go through the ledger and trezor articles about using their respective U2F features.
Trezor also supports FIDO2 standard for passwordless login but it's not as widely adopted yet like U2F.
Edit:- here is trezor's article on using U2F- https://trezor.io/learn/a/what-is-u2f
Here is the ledger's article - https://www.ledger.com/fido-u2f
If you're moving away from ledger as your hardware wallet, you can atleast use it as a 2FA security key to secure your online accounts.
u/hanniabu is building awesome tools yet again
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13vh1j4/daily_general_discussion_may_30_2023/jm8bo6m/)https://twitter.com/hanni_abu/status/1663605190543523840
I wasn't happy with existing solutions to monitor validator entry/exit queues so I built this https://validatorqueue.com.
This dashboard shows the entry/exit queue, wait times, total active validators, and historical values.
Thank you beaconcha_in for providing the data ❤️
u/Bob-Rossi discusses the addition of rETH to HOP Protocol
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13wcu4w/daily_general_discussion_may_31_2023/jmcltat/)Not sure if posted yesterday, but even if it was it's worth repeating. HOP bridge now supports rETH, with joint liquidity incentivization by HOP & RocketPool DAOs.
https://twitter.com/HopProtocol/status/1663669978405691392
This is the first liquid staking token bridge (of any protocol) and I'm hopeful HOP can add more. Anyone who is in a LST community that has shown interest in getting a bridge set up let me / HOP know. When this was being voted on it seemed there was interest in adding more.
u/Ethical-trade discusses the dire Lido situation
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13wcu4w/daily_general_discussion_may_31_2023/jmbhv0z/)The Lido situation:
- A total of 19 million eth is staked on Ethereum. A total of 6 million eth is staked on Lido. More than 36% of all staked eth is staked with Lido.
- More than 32% of all validators are using Lido.
- Lido is the #1 protocol on Ethereum with a TVL of more than $13 billion. That's more than twice the TVL of the second largest project, Maker. That's close to 6% of all ether in existence.
- The activation of withdrawals by Lido 2 weeks ago had almost no effect of their TVL. Over the past month, Lido's TVL still grew by 10.8%. There isn't any reason to expect their share to drop significantly in the future.
When Prysm contributed to centralization by having too high of a share in the consensus client market, the community launched an initiative aiming at reducing that.
This worked fantastically and Prysm went from more than 66% to now being second behind Lighthouse.
No real initiative has been launched in the case of Lido yet. There is no real equivalent to clientdiversity.org today, with explanations, educational material, and guides to switch to less centralized options. There is no real pressure by the community.
Are we really passively waiting for the 33% validator share limit to be crossed in order to start doing anything?? Will one more percent really make a difference? As a reminder, Vitalik suggested that no entity should control more than 15% of all validators. Lido already controls twice the stake Vitalik considers to be too much.
On May 22 2022, u/superphiz wrote that community action should start at a 22% share. With its 32%, Lido has now 50% more than that and yet no action has been seen.
To our Ethfinance friend u/hanniabu who created clientdiversity.org (big thanks for that): is there a similar website planned for staking providers? rated.network just doesn't do the education job. Please let me and us know if there is anything we can do to help.
Feel free to share any idea about what we could do to.
This problem won't just solve itself, there needs to be a community initiative.
Week #20: May 26, 2023
Guest appearance by Rhett Shipp from Gravita Protocol, a decentralized borrowing protocol.
The morning trinity
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13s3pp7/comment/jlnuxly/)Ethereum
$1805
0.068
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13ogyzj/comment/jl7ownt/)Tax crypto traders,
The debt ceiling deal breakers,
Rug pulling raiders.
Queue update: u/Spacesider
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13r8eom/comment/jljuy08/)Your daily beacon chain dose.
Pending validators: Joining 72.9k, leaving 0
- Entry queue +2300 from yesterday's number
- It will take just over 36 days for the entry queue to clear
- In around 2 and a half days the amount of daily validators that can both enter or exit will be increased from 1800 to 2025
These figures are based on the entry and exit queue at the time of posting
Shitpost of the week: u/somedaysitsdark
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13qbpch/daily_general_discussion_may_24_2023/jlfpmul/)It wouldn't take much volume from Fidelity to cancel out the... checks notes... negative ETH issuance
Shitpost of the week, part deux
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13s3pp7/daily_general_discussion_may_26_2023/jlo2kxd/)Ethereum is the only digital asset in the world that is all of the below:
- decentralized
- productive
- secure
- useful
- immutable
- permission-less
- trust-less
Traditional finance people and most normies still have not figured this out. I know we’ve come a long way since 2015, but I really believe we are super early adopters here. Will be interesting to look back on these threads in 5, 10, 15 years time.
Let's rearrange that and get a catchy acronym.
Secure Trustless Useful Permissionless Productive Immutable Decentralized
ETH is STUPPID!
Great work everyone, take the rest of the day off.
u/cryptOwOcurrency explains why you shouldn't burn your scam NFTs
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13kozpl/daily_general_discussion_may_18_2023/jknuv6i/)Imagine an Ethereum spam token as a small piece of land in the middle of the desert that has a big sign planted in it saying "/u/barthib owns this". You have no idea who put the sign there, and the land is obviously worthless, so why would you bother driving out into the desert to try to claim it or to take down the sign?
TL;DR Hide it. Don't interact with it or try to "get rid of it".
Conceptually speaking, Ethereum tokens (including NFTs) don't exist "in" your address like ETH does. They exist "in" their own token contract that maintains its own separate ledger. This contract's code is determined entirely by the creator of the NFT.
When your wallet software checks your address for tokens, what it's basically doing (through a couple levels of indirection) is pinging the smart contract that the token creator published, asking it "does this address own any of your token? If so, which one(s) does it own?" The token's creator can, if they wish, tell the contract to respond to this inquiry with literally anything. They could tell your wallet that you own an amount of their token equal to the current block number, or randomize every day the tokens the contract says you own, if they wanted to.
When you interact with a token, your wallet is reaching out to the token contract and running the code defined there by the creator of the token, which can also be anything they want. So a situation like this could occur:
- You try to send the token to the null address.
- By doing so, your wallet calls the "transfer" function on that random token contract.
- The "transfer" function is malicious, and tries to trick you into sending the attacker other tokens out of your wallet, or even just reverts (fails) your transaction causing you to lose your gas fee.
Edit: A classic scam is where they code the contract to revert/fail your transaction with a custom error message that includes the address of their scam website in it, telling you to go there for "support" on their token. You see your failed transaction with their custom error message when you go on Etherscan to check whether your transaction went through. So you visit their website and get on their support live chat, and they feed you some bullshit about you needing to install a wallet upgrade from a dodgy .exe file, or that your wallet is corrupted and you need to send them your seed phrase to fix it. Then they clean you out.
u/JayPeaEm shares an update from Japan
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13njevl/daily_general_discussion_may_21_2023/jl0web5/)Grüezi EthFinance 😁
Been away in Japan 🇯🇵 the last 4.5-weeks or so for vacation. Didn't use the phone much, went camping, did jiu jitsu, was a cornerman for an MMA fighter, went to a baseball game, sumo; just reconnecting and seeing how the ecosystem is.
- Japan just hosted the G7 Summit in Niigata 🇯🇵 where the topic of cryptographic commodities was brought up. There seems to be a $3000 USD threshold put on commodities so anything above that amount is reported by the exchange/bank/etc. Seems a bit low relative to what... hedge funds do... ⛩️ 💴
- Fun Fact. I've spent some time with some cryptographic security people here in Tokyo 🇯🇵 and I've been informed something like 33% of all crypto theft occurs to Japanese people. Sure enough, here's an article with most of those details to back it up 🥷
- I'm sure you've all heard about the recent Tornado.Cash protocol take over. Hoping anyone here affected is alright 🌪️
- Seems we've been hovering at $1825 with a spike to $2000 not too long ago 📈
- A lot of you are aware of recent Ledger/Hardware Wallet hacking. Here's a video from Hak5 over 1.5 years ago cracking these wallets. I tried getting people to flash the alarm but I think these types of attacks will slowly become more common; that and juice jacking / wire jacking 🛜
I'm always here in the shadows doing my best to secure the Blockchain, provide liquidity, and help along newbies when I can.
Love you all, keep being ambassadors, and keep helping any- and everyone who asks for it!
Pröschtli 🍻
u/FrenktheTank shares a PSA for Google Authenticator users
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13migau/daily_general_discussion_may_20_2023/jkvh8t5/)Heads up for everyone using Google Authenticator 2FA app. While this might be old needs, the update was pushed around the end of April, this was new to me, so maybe some fellow EthFinanciers might find this useful.
This morning I opened my Google Authenticator app to find out that is needed an update. The update included a back up of the authenticator codes into my google account.
When I explored this a bit I found this:
'With this update we’re rolling out a solution to this problem, making one time codes more durable by storing them safely in users’ Google Account. This change means users are better protected from lockout and that services can rely on users retaining access, increasing both convenience and security.'
Really, how can they think this is save. The whole point is to have a second step besides your standard login option like Gmail. What's the point of storing your 2FA codes in a google account that when it gets compromised, your 2FA codes are compromised as well.
There is still the option to keep using the authenticator without the backup feature.
Remember, when it comes to online security, the ultimate responsibility lies with none other than ourselves. Stay vigilant, take proactive measures, and empower yourself to safeguard your digital presence.
u/pbrody wrote a book about Ethereum!
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13ogyzj/daily_general_discussion_may_22_2023/jl6524d/)Hi everyone…I just got the final cover for my book back. I’ve written a little book about Ethereum!! Specifically about WHY Ethereum is the future of business. It’s called (no surprise) “Ethereum for Business”. If you would like to pre-order it, the paper copy should be in your hands in about 2 weeks as we’re nicely ahead of the official schedule and orders for eBooks on Amazon or Apple will follow in another 2-3 weeks. I’ll do a top-level post on why I wrote the book and what it’s about on the official release day.
u/juxtanotherposition has an EVMavericks oDAO update
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13pejil/daily_general_discussion_may_23_2023/jl9pfl7/)There was a meeting planned for Monday but too many people could not make it last minute. A few of us had an unstructured discussion mostly about the costs of setting up and running an oDAO node and necessary archive node. u/haurog calculated some of the costs using on-chain activity and is willing to share a doc once complete and here’s another great resource (oDAO tab).
We’d like to maximize participation for those interested in working on the project, so please enter your availability for the next meeting here:
https://www.when2meet.com/?20153310-SNPGH
Enter a name (pw optional) and click Sign In, then select your available meeting times so we can schedule it.
If Discord meetings do not work for everyone we may consider using Zoom or other tool. Whether active on Discord or Reddit-only user, all are welcome and encouraged to join the effort.
u/LogrisTheBard thinks now is a good time to familiarise yourself with Curve
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13pejil/daily_general_discussion_may_23_2023/jlb7a9k/)With crvUSD finally launching in earnest now would be a good time to at least familiarize yourself with the Curve ecosystem if you haven't. It's still the second highest volume DEX and might have just launched a way to double its income.
There's a lot to unpack here:
- Curve issuance. How much is being emitted? When are the scheduled emission reductions? Who is sucking it up?
- Bribes. This is basically a way of reallocating liquidity from a trading fee optimal allocation to a CRV holder revenue optimal allocation. This takes a bit to get your head around.
- Curve v2 pools. These are largely misunderstood. Unlike Uniswap or Balancer Curve v2 pools have a volatility instrument in there that flexes liquidity depth to minimize IL and adjust the target peg over time. This is a seriously undermarketed feature.
- crvUSD. A new CDP style stablecoin that uses a gradual liquidation system so you get less wrecked. Lower risk for borrowers, no need for keepers to liquidate you, and it enables high LTV ratios. This is my favorite DAI-style replacement so far. LUSD puts your collateral at risk even pre-liquidation. RAI famously isn't stable. crvUSD is just an improved design of the liquidation system and the peg can be backed by the entire DEX revenue for a stronger coupon bond failsafe than DAI could ever offer.
I do suggest you spend a few hours and familiarize with this system if you haven't because it is the baseline so many other projects derive their tokenomics from.
u/Bob-Rossi has a delegate update
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13pejil/daily_general_discussion_may_23_2023/jlbarvm/)Not sure if it's been posted yet, but the delegate week started yesterday. If you own any DAO tokens, it's a great time reconsider who you are delegating too. Or even better, if you are on the fence about being a delegate might be a good time to jump into it!
Some more info here - https://delegationweek.com/ & if you are looking for a list of r/ethfinance delegates check out the daily doots page here - https://dailydoots.com/#delegates
If you own any HOP, now would be a good time to consider delegating - whether that is to someone new or just re-affirming with the person you already delegate too. They are using some of the grant funds to encourage people to re-delegate (or delegate if they aren't at all) See - https://forum.hop.exchange/t/grant-proposal-delegation-week/878/11. Not a huge amount, and I'm not sure if those are the final numbers, but at a minimum should cover some gas costs + some beer money.
u/Itur_ad_Astra reflects on a famous crypto saying
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13pejil/daily_general_discussion_may_23_2023/jlbbexm/)Crypto wasn't invented to make you rich...
I've been in Ethfinance for a few years, and every year, I understand this a little bit more. I joined before the big bull, made some profits, but you don't make life-chaging amounts of money by investing spare change as a broke college student. So I obviously didn't sell during the crazy highs. This year is the year in which I'll be calling myself an "Etherean" for more than I was calling myself a "Bitcoiner".
...It was invented to set you free.
I've got to say, I "converted" to Eth at a good time. Not a good time financially, but at a time where I was disillusioned with Bitcoin. I had heard about Ethereum much earlier, but ignored it, as it was obvious to me that Bitcoiners would not leave the biggest and best coin with zero improvements over multiple years, riding on the first-mover advantage alone. What a rabbit hole the Ethereum ecosystem was! What an insane potential of improving the way we interact with wealth and capital and as a result the human condition!
...But it will make you rich anyway.
If this part ever comes true, I'm ready, but I hope it's not overnight. I don't know if my mental health can take another insane bull, but I suspect that the next one might be even wilder. At least inflation and time have changed my definition of "life-changing money". In any case... DCA on!
u/2Nice4AllThis is trying to explain Ethereum for dummies
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13qbpch/daily_general_discussion_may_24_2023/jley82w/)I’m working on a few crypto beginner’s tutorials, with the main goal being to simplify information and for a better learning experience. Ideally, a lot of users don’t actually need long explanations of how blockchain and dapps work and just want to know how to use them.
Interestingly I wanted to compare simple transacting as copying and pasting an address, and I thought to compare this to being as easy as copying and pasting an IBAN number for digital banking transactions (like in many EU countries). But then it occurred to me that in the US, peer to peer banking transactions are still impossible (which is pathetic), so this reason alone makes explaining this way harder than it should be.
Just a funny observation. What could be a better metaphor for explaining transactions in a “crypto for dummies” kind of way? I was considering using email addresses as a metaphor, but I don’t think it’s the best way.
Also, is lack of p2p banking a problem that fednow is trying to solve? It should be a crime how far behind the US is due to lacking simple digital transactions as a standard feature for all bank accounts. Anyway, people generally understand PayPal and Venmo, but trying to explain crypto transactions automatically sounds way more technical if you’re not already familiar with similar concepts.
u/jtnichol is officially GreenPilled
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13qbpch/daily_general_discussion_may_24_2023/jlfr0l7/)I've taken some work with Supermodular.xyz and Greenpilled via Kevin Owocki!
My role currently will be creating video content for a variety of platforms and help spread the work to Regenerative crypto economics and human coordination. Here's couple channels to follow when you get a moment.
Thanks /u/owocki for the amazing opportunity. Onward!
YouTube: https://youtu.be/UShoIJmSNok
Twitter: https://twitter.com/supermodularxyz
There is so much ethos aligned with Ethfinance and I couldn't be happier to have the chance to help contribute to the vision of this incredible community.
I've been diving in on the Greenpilled podcast and will be making so much shorts content with great quotes from great minds. Mind blast incoming!
Cheers and Big Hugs from GreenPilled City
Week #19: May 19, 2023
Livestream Recording | POAP
Guest appearance by DCinvestor, an early pioneer in the Ethereum community on Reddit and was a huge part of Ethtrader and Ethfinance. You can find him on Twitter, discussing Ethereum, NFTs, AI & more. https://twitter.com/iamDCinvestor
The morning trinity
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13lliuv/comment/jkqggnm/)Ethereum
$1805
0.067
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13hy6ue/comment/jkabod8/)The Ether city,
Its client diversity,
Mutuality.
Shitpost of the week: u/Set1Less
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13jryjf/daily_general_discussion_may_17_2023/jkja91o/)Doots for yesterday:
- Ledger
- Ledger bad
- Ledger
- Ledger
u/Spacesider gives an update on the queue
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13ivi8v/daily_general_discussion_may_16_2023/jkcpnrw/)So around this time last year I posted a daily update about the beacon chain queue.
So here we go again for round 2!
Pending validators: Joining 50.3k, leaving <100
- It will take just under 26 days for the entry queue to clear
- In around 9 and a half days the entry/exit queue number will be increased from 1800 to 2025
Some extra stats for when I reference this post at a later time
Active validators - 572,820
Staked ether - 18,330,053
u/Maleficent_Plankton does a deep-dive on ERC-20 vs BRC-20 tokens
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13edhzt/daily_general_discussion_may_11_2023/jjpilb7/)##What is the difference between a BRC-20 token and an ERC-20 token?
Expanded from my comment in /r/ethereum
####TL;DR:
BRC-20 is completely different than ERC-20. It has a similar name, which is very misleading because it works nothing like it.
Both are meant to be fungible.
- ERC-20:
- A full smart contract with complete customizability (usually 8k-12k characters long).
- It must include all the functions that dictate how the token works, so its code is 100x bigger than a BRC-20 token's code.
- Each ERC-20 token can behave very differently depending on their contract code
- BRC-20:
- A tiny JSON object (usually 100 characters long)
- BRC-20 tokens are much more standardized and do not include any functional code
- You can only customize 4 properties: Ticker symbol, max supply, # of decimals, and the mint limit
##What is an ERC-20 token?
An ERC-20 token requires a complete smart contract with a full set of code that describes how the token operates.
All ERC-20 tokens must have these function names and parameters.
- function name() public view returns (string)
- function symbol() public view returns (string)
- function decimals() public view returns (uint8)
- function totalSupply() public view returns (uint256)
- function balanceOf(address _owner) public view returns (uint256 balance)
- function transfer(address _to, uint256 _value) public returns (bool success)
- function transferFrom(address _from, address _to, uint256 _value) public returns (bool success)
- function approve(address _spender, uint256 _value) public returns (bool success)
- function allowance(address _owner, address _spender) public view returns (uint256 remaining)
- event Transfer(address indexed _from, address indexed _to, uint256 _value)
- event Approval(address indexed _owner, address indexed _spender, uint256 _value)
Only their names and parameters must match. A function's code does NOT have to match the description of its name
I could make a valid (but scammy) ERC-20 token where the "transfer()" function actually mints tokens, and where the "approve()" function instead burns a large amount of your transferred Ether. And that would be technically valid as long as the code specifies it.
##What is a BRC-20 token?
First off ... documentation on the BRC-20 standard absolutely sucks: https://domo-2.gitbook.io/brc-20-experiment/
I thought it was a joke, but that's the full token standard documentation.
Some more info:
- https://domo-2.gitbook.io/brc-20-experiment/examples
- https://thebitcoinmanual.com/articles/brc-20-tokens/
BRC-20 is just a short JSON object (a simple data structure) and does not contain any functions. It's based on ordinal theory and relies on the ordinal nodes to operate on it and provide it with standard functions.
It only works with ordinal-compatible taproot addresses.
Here is the standard format of a BRC-20 token:
- Protocol: Specifies the type of ordinal transaction. Always "brc-20".
- Operation - One of 3 different operations
- Deploy: Deploys the BRC-20 token
- Mint: Mints new tokens as long as it's not past the max supply or mint limit
- Transfer: Mints a transfer function
- Ticker symbol: A 4-letter ID
- Max supply
- Mint limit: Limit per ordinal transaction that users can mint themselves
- Decimal precision
This is what the entire ORDI token deployment looks like:
{
"p": "brc-20",
"op": "deploy",
"tick": "ordi",
"max": "21000000",
"lim": "1000"
}
Here is the format of a Transfer function:
- Protocol: Specifies the type of ordinal transaction. Always "brc-20".
- Operation: Transfer
- Ticker symbol: A 4-letter ID
- Amt: The amount to transfer
To transfer, it takes 2 steps:
- Inscribe the transfer function to yourself
- Send the inscription from your wallet to the other address
Swaps require an off-chain 3rd-party to complete, so they're not safe at the moment. It remains to be seen if you can build trustless DeFi around BRC-20 tokens.
Some other interesting facts about BRC-20 tokens:
- BRC-20 tokens rely on ordinals and inscriptions to work. This uses the prunable witness section of a Bitcoin transaction that costs 4x fewer sats per byte.
- BRC-20 Tokens currently account for over half of all Bitcoin transactions
- BRC-20 tokens are so small (in terms of weight) that Bitcoin TPS has actually doubled over the past month. This is not due to more demand, but because the average transaction size has gone down (due to fewer batch transactions), so they can pack more Txs into each block.
u/cryptOwOcurrency breaks the news on finality issues and u/OkDragonfruit1929 adds details
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13edhzt/daily_general_discussion_may_11_2023/jjsf9hi/)Epoch 200,553 only had 40% voting participation!
I can't wait to read the post-mortem for this one. What could it possibly have been?
It wasn't catastrophic, but it easily could have been a serious, but recoverable, issue if it had persisted. Epoch 200,553 only had 40% voting participation, which means only 40% of validators selected at random for block creation were actively confirming new blocks. Normally, the participation rate should be much higher, so this could indicate a problem with the network.
Start of the problem: https://beaconcha.in/epoch/200551
Peak of the problem: https://beaconcha.in/epoch/200553
Recovery started: https://beaconcha.in/epoch/200554
Normalization achieved: https://beaconcha.in/epoch/200556
We need a thorough post-mortem before we can be sure everything is okay though, because a rogue event like this happening for no explainable reason would not be very confidence inducing.
u/superphiz updates on the loss of finality the other day, u/OkDragonfruit1929 gives an ELI5, and phiz follows up with more analysis
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13fbc6v/daily_general_discussion_may_12_2023/jjvgm9a/)A tiny update on the loss of finality yesterday: The culprit still isn't clear.
Some people have suggested Prysm caused the issue because they were hit hard by lost attestations and high loads, but this is very likely a side-effect of the turbulence rather than a cause. Terence described some optimizations they were making as a result of the turbulence, but that's not an admission of fault.
I initially threw shade on MEV-boost because of my distrust for that stack, but there's no evidence suggesting they are involved in any way.
The investigation is ongoing and the outcomes will be published in a detailed postmortem.
Terence just posted another update, but keep in mind, that this isn't a finding of fault, they're just exploring the incident.
Most clients (except Lighthouse) were hit hard by this, but Prysm stands out because they have a high representation of validators.
Terence just posted another update
, but keep in mind, that this isn't a finding of fault, they're just exploring the incident.
Here's my best attempt at an ELI5:
CL clients were getting a lot of attestations (which are like votes or confirmations from other nodes) about older transactions that didn't include the latest updates. This is like getting a lot of mail about old news that doesn't include recent important events.
Because the nodes that sent these attestations didn't have all the information for the recent transactions, CL clients had to spend a lot of time and resources to catch up. This is similar to how you'd spend a lot of time and effort researching recent events if you only had old newspapers. This caused the CL clients to work too hard and run out of resources, leading to issues like the system slowing down or even crashing.
During this time, a small problem in the Prysm system (which likely exists in other clients as well) was found that made it use the wrong information when trying to organize transactions. It's like sorting mail into the wrong categories because you're using an outdated list.
The Prysm team is working on improvements to prevent these issues from happening again. They're improving the system's memory management, and they're going to implement similar logic which right now only exists in Lighthouse CL clients where they filter out unviable attestations (like disregarding old news that's no longer relevant). The Prysm dev team plans to release these improvements next week.
So, in summary, the Prysm nodes were overwhelmed with outdated information, which led to system issues and revealed a minor bug. The Prysm dev team is now working on fixes and improvements. I am hopeful other CL clients follow suit and implement similar fixes.
Some analysis threads are starting to come in from the loss of finality event on 5/11/2023, I'll try to link them here as I become aware of them. (Feel free to share as well)
u/wolfparking has a synopsis on the US House of Reps crypto meeting
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13fbc6v/daily_general_discussion_may_12_2023/jju7s0y/)##Summary/Highlight of US House of Reps session: Future of Digital Assets.
Pleasantly surprised by most of what was discussed. Almost all the guest speakers had excellent ideas and explanations in the discussion. However, each person was allocated only 5 min at a time, so it was somewhat limiting. Please excuse me if some of this is a little raw. It is a 3 hr meeting and I don't have the time atm to format it correctly due to my excessive fiat mining op (work).
Intros of Committee and Guest Speakers:
Mr Johnson: Must be a bipartisan effort for a promising tech/market. Conflict between securities and commodities laws. Most of the G20 countries are ahead of us. We want to be the leader in this tech/industry.
Ms Caraveo: Digital asset activity grows, but so does non-compliance. Any legislation requires increased funding of CFTC.
Mr Hill: Can this industry thrive here in the US? Many Democrats calling for common sense legislation for months (not just a partisan issue). Can't trust offshore exchanges (FTX), so we need to work on laws here for US exchanges.
Mr McHenry: We want a collab of CFTC and SEC to make laws and close regulatory gaps to protect consumers.
Guest speakers
Durgee: I'm the only non-attorney here. Already there are conflicting laws against other existing laws for crypto from the SEC and CFTC. This is a developing tech innovation that happens to be a digital currency as well. Adoption at this stage is not a tech problem, it's a human conditioning issue. A 13 year old in their lifetime has grown up with BTC and only known a world with crypto in their life.
Mr Santori: Kraken is well established in the US and the world. Europe has more effective rules from tested principles unlike the US. Gaps in US have created litigation that doesn't protect consumers. Mandates needed to protect us: https://www.youtube.com/live/gwJ1QAwP7UE?t=43m21s
Mr Massad: Confusion about commodity/security classification of crypto worsens the gap problem. How can we apply Howey test without this info? We need to pass a compliance law directing CFTC and SEC (or SRO; self regulating agency) to create laws and enforce them, without rewriting commodities and securities laws. Regardless of your stance on crypto we need this framework to protect consumers.
Mr Blaugrand: If investors could have traded digital assets on an exchange that was regulated like the NY Stock exchange, FTX situation wouldn't have happened. We can use the established rules we already have and apply it to crypto with these 4 rules: https://www.youtube.com/live/gwJ1QAwP7UE?t=58m34s
Mr Steil (WI): We still have no path forward for regulation, even after Gensler's meeting with Congress. Congress is ready to do the job. How do we not miss out vs overseas? W/Shoenberger: Switzerland made it very clear to define security/commodities. It gave them legal security and clarity that allowed them to proceed successfully. This framework that they provided certainly provided the legal certainty to be headquartered there and to have legal clarity around the classification instantly. W/Durgee: The rest of the world has more stability and growth in every avenue of crypto. 3x as much investments vs the US in some markets.
Mr Lucas: US is great because we embrace innovatio. w/Santori: G20 markets are ahead of us and are sophisticated. Kraken is expanding there, but we can't deploy the same resources here in the US due to these regulatory gaps. Lucas: what SEC rules need altering for exchanges to succeed? W/Blaugrand: SEC needs an onramp with regulation so exchanges can grow in the US. They don't because of regulatory vagueness. W/Satori: Flexibility of crypto is a perk. Broker/dealer construct can interact directly with consumers. We could limit exchanges and even close down exchanges after hours.
The negative:
Lynch (Mass): Not regulatory ambiguity; it's mass non compliance with existing laws. Don't argue security vs commodities, we should instead focus on intermediaries (exchanges, lenders, and wallet users). SEC is clear, consistent, efficient, and prevails in every 140 cases. crypto industry has failed. No separate regulatory regime necessary for crypto. claimed that creating new legislation for digital assets seems “redundant and unnecessary” given that the financial system’s current securities laws have “sustained massive innovation in our financial system for decades."
Mr Casten: What return would I had if I invested in 12 cryptos during a time vs S&P (60% profit)? Loss 46% of investment, how is this a supposed way to close wealth inequality gap? W/Durgee: accredited vs credited access is important. Mr Casten: I'm happy to debate truth not lies. Everything stated here beginning to sound like SBF and FTX, what's the distinction? Sounds like you want to regulate crypto with the least funded organization.
Mr Sherman: Buttcoin mod? An ignorant person's lack of ability to learn anything new. Fossil garbage opinion. Uses term "crypto bro". questioned whether digital assets should even have a future in the United States. He referred to cryptocurrencies as a “hidden money system that diverts capital investment from useful industries, and whose announced purpose is to defeat sanctions and tax laws. Crypto bros make money literally by making money, and they’ve made over a trillion dollars. They’ll accuse the U.S. government of making money out of thin air. Maybe we do, but we’re the U.S. government."
Threaten Web3 Anonymity:
Mr Davidson (Chairman Housing subcommittee): Gensler's hotel California's regulation provides no path to exit/leave. Who should have the power of exit from intermediaries (power to have self custody)? w/Santori: Who is best placed to collect KYC info? Kraken is well paced to do that and doesn't require KYC for every transaction, but we could do that if required.
Dr Foster (IL): Estimates of 95% trades are fake or wash trades in derivatives. How can we have a regulated futures market with this fraud and manipulation? What alternative to KYC at all levels is there to avoid fraud? W/Satori: Kraken provides this as a portal. Foster: we can't stop BTC on the dark web with that. At a wallet level we must have mandatory monitoring with licensing like automobiles. Trusted digital identity from the government. W/Kulkin: CFTC had auth it could conduct surveillance under the rules and jurisdiction of the exchange thereby acting as an SRO in addition to the CFTC/NFA.
Conclusion
McHenry: Even if there is nothing of value in crypto, you would still need enforceable rights and protections already found in regulations and laws in the US. Must come together in bipartisan manner to protect investors.
5 days for additional legislation questions and responses granted from the panel. Plans for another hearing this month made.
Last month, McHenry said he expects that the President will have signed some piece of crypto legislation into law within the next 12 months.
u/T0Bii starts a discussion about different client pairs and the finality issues
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13g7s03/daily_general_discussion_may_13_2023/jjzailv/)Anyone else here whose validators had no problems during the finality issues?
What clients are you running?
What are your hardware specs?
I missed an average of 1 attestation per validator that day and my inclusion distance was around 0-1 as well. I'm running Nethermind/Nimbus.
But I saw a big increase in CPU and bandwidth use, between 2 and 3x of the usual average, spikes even higher.
That's not a problem for my staking machine, but if others had similar spikes, I can totally see why many had issues.
u/Ethical-trade comments on the communication between EVMavericks and EthFinance and u/juxtanotherposition shares some notes from EVMavericks oDAO meeting
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13h32x6/daily_general_discussion_may_14_2023/jk3rlbf/)Respectful criticism:
I'm a bit disappointed to see that despite the idea of the the ManeNet DAO joining Rocket Pool's oDAO having emerged from r/ethfinance and having received great support from r/ethfinance, all of the conversation has now moved over to Discord.
I realize that this is a very specific topic and most of the conversation shouldn't happen in r/ethfinance. But it would still be great to discuss ideas in this sub too when needed, and keep the entire community informed of the latest news.
For example, did you know that there's a proposal being drafted that has been in the making for a week? Or that a dedicated meeting happened on Friday?
Like many others I don't like Discord, I find it messy and a pain to follow so I don't use it. Maybe I'm just too old for the "chat" format.
Would it be possible for one of you Discord guys to keep us informed in here from time to time? I'm sure many here would love to be kept in the loop and even contribute.
r/ethfinance gave birth to the ManeNet DAO after all, and all EVMavericks were Ethfinancers before becoming lions.
In the spirit of sharing more from EVM Discord to r/ethfinance and about the example that brought it up, I shared my notes from the 1st Discord Call about the oDAO on Discord, but haven't shared them here yet:
I was taking notes for myself and I've put that into Pastebin (unlisted) (https://pastebin.com/nrmwEyGg). I'm sure there are lots of errors, incomplete thoughts, and typos.
Also, I tend to ignore Discord except for something I'm very interested in (like the oDAO). So I sympathize with the comment poster. As an EVM holder, I'm loyal to the dailies, but not the Discord. So I miss some EVM things when they don't make it back here. h/t u/Ethical-trade
u/Spacesider shares how his node dealt with the beacon chain finality issues
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13hy6ue/daily_general_discussion_may_15_2023/jk7f7vc/)So while I was gone and there was all that drama with the beacon chain, my Teku node got caught up in it and fatally crashed and was completely offline.
However.... I run a second Ethereum "stack" with Lighthouse as the consensus client, which the validator process switched over to and was able to carry on with no downtime like nothing even happened.
I was able to recover the Teku node in my own time, and once it was back in sync the validator process automatically switched back over to it as the primary endpoint.
Client diversity is awesome!
u/maninthecryptosuit explains the big Ledger drama
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13ivi8v/daily_general_discussion_may_16_2023/jkc5s70/)Just found this confirmation:
The device sends encrypted shards of your seed to different companies if you decide to use the service. You can of course still choose to backup it yourself.
But 2 days ago the same co-founder said:
Your keys are always stored on your device and never leave it
That's what Ledger has been claiming for years as well.
If we assume the chap wasn't lying 2 days ago, that means the new firmware ( one screenshot shows 2.2.1 for Nano X ) that just rolled out activates the backdoor "ability" to extract the seed.
More info: Wired article says:
Ledger is preparing to launch a new service called Ledger Recover that splits a wallet recovery phrase—basically, a human-readable form of the private key—into three encrypted shards and distributes them to three custodians: Ledger, crypto custody firm Coincover, and code escrow company EscrowTech. If somebody loses their recovery phrase, two of the three shards can be combined—pending an ID check—to regain access to the locked funds. Essentially, Ledger Recover is an additional safety net; for the price of $9.99 a month, it takes the jeopardy out of crypto’s version of stuffing dollars under the mattress. It’ll be available in the UK, EU, US, and Canada and come to other territories later in the year.
Ledger CEO Tweeted it out as well.
Why this is an issue - even if Ledger now cancels their new seed cloud backup service (because backlash), and says they will never make a firmware update use this hitherto unannounced "ability", the mere presence of this backdoor means that bad actors/governments may be interested in it. I guess this is what we get for trusting a company that kept its software closed-source.
My next steps:
- Immediately stop using Ledger Live
- No more firmware updates
- Hope and pray that my ancient Nano S devices didn't have this backdoor
u/FriedChickenTrailer compares the best, most secure Ledger alternatives
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13ivi8v/daily_general_discussion_may_16_2023/jkcmxpr/)With ledger (potentially) going full retard again, I'm updating myself on what hardware wallets are available in the market right now. Looking forward to if anyone has other suggestions, additions or corrections to my high-level assessments below.
I've been using this list for discovery (trying to narrow down the list of 387 wallets): https://walletscrutiny.com/?verdict=reproducible&platform=hardware
There is an insane amount of options in the market, but very few can fit these requirements;
- open source everything, including firmware and hardware
- uses a secure enclave for cryptography (extremely hard to get the private key material out of the device, apparently controversial given their closed nature)
- has a display that shows information about what you're signing (the bigger the better)
- At the very least supports both EVM chains and bitcoin-type chains (bonus for other chains and other curves, e.g. edwards)
- reproducible firmware builds, i.e. you can tell that the firmware blob matches the published code
I've discarded a bunch of products (e.g. ngrave) that have little to no information about their device or the software that runs on it.
What I've found that (superficially) gets closest to the requirements (in no particular order);
- I have tried the trezor one, but the hardware died a few years ago
- open source firmware, hardware
- does not use a secure enclave
- reproducible builds
- has a display that shows information about what you're signing
- been around for ages so its been battle-tested (plenty of fixed side-channels issues etc) and its weaknesses are somewhat well understood (limited physical security etc)
- works with BTC/EVM/Cryptonote chains and others
- open source firmware
- open source hardware
- large display
- secure element
- unclear if builds are reproducible
- supports btc/evm chains and a ton of other more oddball stuff like cardano, tezos etc
- never heard of it before today, no idea how battle-tested it is
- never tried
- open source firmware
- open source hardware
- no display!
- uses secure enclave (smart cards)
- reproducible builds
- pretty new, haven't seen anyone take it apart/try to break it yet
- never tried
- open source firmware
- open source hardware
- small display, displays some information about what you're signing
- uses secure enclave AFAICT (ATECC608B)
- reproducible builds
- supports btc/evm chains
- been around for a while, has had a few vulnerabilities (e.g. https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2019-18673)
- never tried
- open source firmware, hardware
- reproducible builds(?)
- small display showing information about what you're signing
- trezor clone?
- supports BTC, ETH, LTC, DOGE (and a few more similar coins)
- been around a long time, has had multiple vulnerabilities (e.g. https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2022-30330)
- closed source firmware, hardware
- I have one of these, the UX is OK, but the device itself is huge
- large display, detailed transaction information including native smart contract support (when ABI is available)
- tamper-resistant
- uses secure enclave (in device, and smart cards)
- no reproducible builds as its closed source
- pretty new, haven't seen anyone take it apart/try to break it yet, but the described design seems sensible
u/Bob-Rossi discusses DAO delegation and reminds us of our duties!
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/13jryjf/daily_general_discussion_may_17_2023/jkhzazl/)To those who own governance tokens / participate in governance, you should check out Tally's governance-week. They are coordinating with a bunch of DAOs to encourage people to delegate or periodically revisit your delegated tokens. A great place for ethfinancers to start is looking at https://dailydoots.com/#delegates to find out who on this forum is a delegate.
The HOP bridge protocol is one of the partners and will be providing some funds from the grant pool to support Tally on this project. The exact details on how they will incentivize is not finalized yet - initial discussions where subsiding gas fees, but looks like it might be shifting to a distribution to those who participate (the forum discussion is here). Either way, I'm happy to see HOP providing support!
That all said, whatever governance token you own please consider usings this week as a chance to re-visit your delegated tokens. It's an important step for the health of a DAO, as set it and forget delegating can stagnate a DAO's leadership and create a barrier to entry for new delegates to join in. And if you are looking to become a delegate this may be a great opportunity to jump in!
Week #18: May 5, 2023
Livestream Recording | POAP
Announcements
- EVMavericks kick off their buildathon which runs for 7 weeks ending on June 19th and offers 10 ETH in prizees!
- You can now view each user's daily doots and profile details directly on Reddit using the new EthFinance Buddy extension (Chrome)
- Don't forget to contribute to the KZG ceremony!
Guest appearance by Daniel, founder of Swell. Swell is a non-custodial liquid staking protocol
The morning trinity
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/138b9bt/comment/jixdygx/)✨E✨t✨h✨e✨r✨e✨u✨m✨
1900
0.064
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/135bq9m/comment/jindwqd/)Another one comes,
Another bank bites the dust,
More ethers combust.
Today in Ethereum: u/ZeroTricks
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/135bq9m/daily_general_discussion_may_2_2023/jij0lec/)On this day...
In 2022:
- Mason Marcobello explains EIPs and ERCs.
- @2Yeahyeah discusses the the trade-offs of different staking options, concluding best return likely coming from wstETH or rETH synthetics, or staking directly with Rocket Pool.
- ETH's clamshell reads $2857 and ₿0.07416 on the sides.
In 2021:
- After issuing bond tokens on the public Ethereum blockchain, the European Investment Bank calls the technology revolutionary.
- With ETH at $2952, or ₿0.05213, Eth2's deposit contract locks in $10 Billion.
In 2020:
- ETH buys more ETH, at $215, or ₿0.02396.
In 2019:
- Coinbase Pro adds the BAT-ETH trading pair, the first non-Bitcoin crypto trading pair on the platform.
- Ether pays your lunch at $162, at ₿0.02946.
In 2018:
- Reddit's co-founder Alexis Ohanian says ETH will reach $1,500 by the end of the year.
- The EEA releases a standardized architecture stack for privacy-focused web apps on ethereum.
- ETH leads by example at $687, feeling confident at ₿0.0746.
In 2017:
- ETH quietly knits $78 and ₿0.05339 together.
In 2016:
- After Craig Wright claims to be Satoshi Nakamoto, some guy announces he is the founder of Ethereum.
- ETH shoots through time from $8.9 to $10.1, from past to future at ₿0.01968 and ₿0.02274.
Shitpost of the week: 18boro
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/135bq9m/comment/jillu0y/)Of the last 500 verified contracts on ethereum, 86 contains the word pepe. Probably a good sell signal :).
u/nixorokish shares the amazing new EthStaker websit
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/130aejt/daily_general_discussion_april_27_2023/jhwh329/)If you've ever visited EthStaker's website before, you'll have seen that it was... largely unnavigable. Well - we wanted to build a new, open source one, so we put out a call on r/ethstaker to see if we could find someone from the community, familiar with staking, to help us do it. u/hanniabu is awesome and did it!
So now EthStaker has a new open source website!! Feedback would be most appreciated, especially from ethfinanciers. What would help you find the info you want about staking? I didn't love giving people discord and subreddit links when they asked for resources, so I'm pretty stoked to be able to give them a website where everything is aggregated.
I'm also gonna post a series of 'beginner guide to staking' blog posts over the next couple weeks (at https://ethstaker.cc/blog), would REALLY love feedback on that from someone who sorta knows what staking is but wants to know more. Mostly for readability
u/696_eth discusses a new entrant in the decentralised liquid staking game
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/131i3ej/daily_general_discussion_april_28_2023/ji2w589/)I looked into DIVA and wrote a twitter thread about them yesterday.
Here's a quick summary for Ethfinance:
- Diva is a decentralized way of staking
- Distributed Validation staking thru Distributed Validator Technology (DVT). Trustless. Resilient. Secure. Cause of fully distributed network of validators. Entrance as low as 1E.
- Liquid staking. You would stake to get divETH, which operates kinda like stETH. You can wrap into wdivETH which operates like rETH/wstETH. This can be tax advantageous depending on your preference of incoming vs capital gains.
- You would have an option to run a node for extra rewards (split 50% between stakers and node runners in the final Phase 2 version on the mainnet). There's some minimum hardware requirements.
- It's currently on the testnet. Should be live on mainnet in Q2
The key points is that I've learned is that combines liquid staking with DVT. Since it uses a smart contract to pool funds it can be as low as 1E. Honestly, I'm waiting for a bit more info after their testnet releases to see how it pricesly protects against penalties and bad actors and why 1E would be safe. Also, not enough info on Node Operators and right now you would not be able to run one on the testnet.
Side note. SWISE vaults might be in a similar vein I guess.
Please correct me if I misunderstood something or if you wanna educate me more, this was a new concept for me so it was a bit hard wrapping my head around it when figuring out how diva is planning to make it work not just in a theoretical way.
u/Tricky_Troll makes an analogy about crypto legislation
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/132jpw8/daily_general_discussion_april_29_2023/ji5s7ln/)It's the 1920s, you're starting to see these fancy new self-propelled horseless carriages or "cars" pop up everywhere. They look really cool but they're also quite dangerous. This is what the kerfuffle is about in the congress at the moment. Everyone knows that we need to protect people from the maniacs on the road. But astute observers also realise that we also need to protect the innovation and economic advantage these new-fangled machines provide.
Lawmakers are split on what to do. Representative Emmer thinks we need new laws. "Rules of the road" for all to comply with. Rules which all road users must follow specifically designed to create order out of the chaos on the road while still allowing for fast, efficient travel. But senator Warren disagrees. She thinks these new machines should be treated like horses under the ancient 1839 "Horse and Carriage act". She doesn't care that horses are slow, living creatures which need to eat, sleep and poop while cars are fast, furious and can run all day. She insists that these roads were built for horses and that makes anything on those roads a horse, dammit!
Don't be like senator Warren.
Edit: If anyone with some clout on Twitter wants to screenshot this and run with it, go for it. Or if you reckon you can take the idea and shorten it down to the Twitter character limit, that would be impressive so go for it.
u/keystrokesinyourhead shares a RocketPool criticism while u/Datacruncha explains RocketPool's oDAO
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/133g9bo/daily_general_discussion_april_30_2023/jic1rby/)Chris Blec posted on twitter and called out rocketpool. However... hes actually right?
https://twitter.com/ChrisBlec/status/1652498398459699202
I looked into oDAO and it is exactly what he describes it as.
Everything more and more just feels like decentralization theater...
The fact that it is invite only is despicable and counter to any ethos regarding decentralization.
Ethereum's consensus layer and execution layer currently don't talk to each other so you need oracles for something like rocket pool. The odao does all the oracle work for rocket pool and upgrades the smart contracts. They can technically collude and cause massive damage so the best way to prevent this is to overpay and only include trusted people. Yes, the work is fairly easy and not worth half a million a year and everyone wants a spot. Thankfully, a lot of the money goes to fund client teams which helps ethereum run and keeps it decentralized. 4 spots are allocated to the rocket pool team to help fund development. Sassal donates all his earnings.
Eventually, there will be less of a need for the odao with upgrades to Ethereum like eip 4788. If anyone has any technical or economic suggestions about the odao they can post in the rocket pool forum or the research section on discord. Please note, it takes very little effort to criticize and substantial amounts of time and coordinated effort to come up with working solutions.
u/etheraider kicks off the EVMavericks buildathon!
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/134d3x2/daily_general_discussion_may_1_2023/jihtxe7/)Hey everyone! 🦁 buidlathon is officially kicking off and the competition will run for a full 7 weeks starting today! 🎉 If you are interested in participating. head on over to the EVMavericks discord and hop into the 🦁│buidlathon channel and ask to be assigned the Buidlathon role! 🏃♂️ (No EVM Required)
Projects will be judged on their overall utility/ingenuity/technicals and the potential benefit they bring to web3!
General criteria for projects is as follows:
- Has to use some aspect of web3
- Need to have a product or service that is useable for alpha test release
- Need to provide a statement on how your project benefits public goods/what does your project provide to the community
- Valid project must be anything technical/non-technical that further advances ethereum education/utility/infrastructure/services
- Projects >1 month in progress are not eligible to participate.
Upon conclusion of the competition on June 19th 2023, participants will demo/present/showcase their projects to the community and the voting will begin!
A panel of 4 technical/web3 judges 🧑⚖️ along with a DAO-wide snapshot vote (5th judge) will decide who will rule them all and win the grand prize! If you are interested in contributing in other ways (helping promote the buidlathon, being a judge in the competition, other ways) dont hesitate to reach out in the channel!
Here’s your chance to make your mark in the community and get 💰 while doing it! Happy buidling!🔨
u/MerkleChainsaw is looking for real adoption and u/silentjxhn makes a great list of examples
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/134d3x2/daily_general_discussion_may_1_2023/jigbkxt/)Long term, I'm very positive that Ethereum will eventually dominate the crypto space and that it will address most major technical challenges, even if it takes another decade or two. I'm pessimistic about crypto overall though.
I'm still on the sidelines because I'm having trouble seeing how crypto overall will achieve true adoption anytime soon. I define "true adoption" very narrowly as significant demand for ETH to be used for some external purpose other than crypto speculation or facilitating crypto speculation. So for example providing DEX liquidity, staking/validation, and issuing most tokens or NFTs don't count since the demand is mostly based on putting fiat into crypto hoping to get more fiat out. Things that do count include airline or concert ticket NFTs, using ETH contracts for supply chain tracking or audit, and so on. In these cases someone is willing to buy ETH because they can use it to solve an actual problem. I think most other successful technologies were solving real world problems by this stage in their development.
Where can this adoption come from? After all the scams, fraud, and hacks I'd have trouble convincing any company board to use public blockchains beyond maybe an NFT cash grab offering, if for no better reason than avoiding the reputation risk and liability from using crypto. Even a simple use case like accepting stablecoins as payment is tough because every major stablecoin has depegged at some point.
Though it's small, I think EVMavericks is an example of true adoption. Demand for most people is based on "I'd like to be a member of a club" rather than "I'd like to sell this JPG for a profit". Maybe some Reddit avatars count in this category as well?
Is there anything on the horizon that I'm missing? Financially I want to buy ETH because it has an asymmetric distribution of returns, and I believe Ethereum is one of the only projects in crypto being designed with good intentions and a long term focus. On the other hand I'm increasingly having trouble seeing where enough new demand will come from to justify a $220B valuation.
- Simple large sum transfers with ZERO friction and instant settlement. (eg: transferring $193,000,000 with a fee of $0.17 (0.00000008839779%))
- People in Turkey are using stablecoins (on Tron at least) for day-to-day purchases because of unstable local currency.
- Stable coin total value settled surpassed Mastercard and VISA credit card companies in 2022, Stripe enables USDC payments, paypal crypto integration
- VISA B2B settlements, along with JP Morgan
- You donate pseudo-anonymously to causes which might be deemed controversial (war relief in Ukraine being the most obvious)
- You can donate to public goods (gitcoin using their quadratic matching)
- NFTs as crowdfunding and/or Patreon-like for creators with very little to no friction or middlemen
- NFTs as brands or brand extensions (Nike, Gucci, Ralph Lauren, Louis Vuitton, Burberry, Tommy Hilfiger, Adidas, Forever21, on and on and on)
- Ralph Lauren’s new Miami Design District store will accepting Ethereum as payment
- Epic Games (fornite) working on NFT games
- Reddit's avatars onboarded over 5 million users to NFTs. Over $11 million in total sales.
- Streaming payments (llamapay)
- Certificates (OpenCerts) in Singapore
- Rio de Janerio accepts crypto payments for property taxes.
- JP Morgan + Singapore doing defi transactions
- EIB bonds
- 24/7 on chain T-Bills: https://twitter.com/openeden_hq
- The Reserve Bank of Australia is piloting its CBDC, the eAUD, with @canvas_defi (starkx layer 2)
- Maker Treasury bonds
- Social Media (lens, caches)
- No-loss lottery (pool together)
- mortgages (tinlake)
- insurance (Nexus Mutal)
- pay-day loans (Alchemix)
- lending/borrowing (AAVE, Compound)
- CDPs (Maker)
- Exchanges (Uniswap)
- Yield Aggregator (yearn)
- derivitives (dydx)
u/benido2030 has a monthly staking update
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/135bq9m/daily_general_discussion_may_2_2023/jikbng0/)Here's your new monthly staking update:
Validator overview - total: 619346 validators*
- 554322 active
- 18350 pending
- 7333 exiting
- 39341 exited
Client diversity numbers**
- Consensus: Prysm 38% // Lighthouse 37% // Teku 17% // Nimbus 6% // Lodestar 1%
- Execution: Geth 64% // Nethermind 16% // Erigon 11% // Besu 8%
Pool distribution***
- Unknown 41,8%
- lido 23,3%
- Coinbase 9,6%
- Binance 3,7%
- Kraken 3,5%
- Rocket Pool 2,7%
- + a lot of whales, smaller staking providers etc.
My goal is to show how things develop and answer questions like "How many validators will secure the network by EOY if net new validators are constant", "Is client diversity improving" and "How is the dynamic between centralized pools and decentralized stakers".
If you think something very important is missing, let me know and I'll add it today or tomorrow, so we can work with it in June. Best case share your source, so I know where to find the stats.
This post will contain more information and probably some conclusions in the future, I hope this will be a good summary and help for those who don't check numbers regularly (I basically didn't do it and could not tell you how things are developing right now)
Some comments and sources:
All percentages are rounded, so this is not 100% accurate, but should be good enough to show changes in the coming months.
* https://beaconcha.in/validators#all
** https://clientdiversity.org/#distribution
*** https://beaconcha.in/pools
P.S. I wanted to do this yesterday, cause it was the first of the month, but I had no time cause of the bank holiday and also I was too stupid yesterday... So let's pretend today's numbers are those from May 1st.
u/Ethical-trade has a cool idea for EVMavericks
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/135bq9m/daily_general_discussion_may_2_2023/jijszul/)Here's an idea: EVMavericks' ManeNet DAO becoming a Rocket Pool oDAO member.
Aren't we an ideal and trustworthy partner that highly values decentralization?
Edit: just realized how unwelcoming this post must feel to any new member. So let's explain a few things for our most recent friends:
A while back r/ethfinance launched its own NFT collection, EVMavericks and used the occasion to launch a DAO, the ManeNet DAO. From its website: "ManeNet DAO advances the decentralized Ethereum Web3 ecosystem by aligning shared member incentives with funding, developing, and promoting public goods and education"
Rocket Pool is a liquid staking protocol, and the oDAO is "the group of special Rocket Pool nodes that are responsible for the administrative duties required by the protocol that cannot be achieved by Smart Contracts due to technical limitations". The "o" in oDAO stands for "oracle".
So basically the idea here is to have an r/ethfinance native DAO help Rocket Pool with some of its duties. This job pays rather well, and the money could, according to the ManeNet DAO's mission, be used to advance the decentralized Ethereum Web3 ecosystem.
u/waqwaqattack proposed EVMavericks joining the oDAO to the RocketPool community on RocketFuel
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/136avsi/daily_general_discussion_may_3_2023/jipex7f/)Yesterday, u/Ethical-trade made a post about how the EVmavricks should join Rocket Pool's oDAO. I loved that post so much, I covered it in today's Rocket Fuel - making the case that I strongly support them joining.
I support ManeNet DAO joining the oDAO so strongly that, in the episode, I made the offer of lending the DAO the 1750 RPL needed to cover the bond if they are selected.
Also, I wore my EVMavricks t-shirt especially for this episode!
You can watch it here: https://twitter.com/waqwaqattack/status/1653776527203475458
u/Ender985 has the latest innovations in NFT finance!
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/136avsi/daily_general_discussion_may_3_2023/jio9aln/)Meanwhile, in NFT-land...
Blur, the incumbent NFT marketplace, just announced Blend: a peer-to-peer lending and borrowing platform that lets users leverage their NFTs as collateral to borrow ETH. These loans are perpetual (no expiration price or date), at fixed rate. The twist? Lenders can call the loan at any time, triggering a Dutch auction for a new lender to step in and take over the loan.
But wait, there's more! Blend also announced a Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) feature, enabling users to "buy" their favourite NFTs with just a 20% down payment, while the rest is borrowed from a lending pool. I wrote "buy", because until the price is paid in full, the user can't do anything with the NFT, except for listing it in Blur's marketplace (ie try to sell it back and profit from the move).
As always, with great financialization comes even greater risks. Borrowing ETH to "buy" an NFT (BNPL) means going long on leverage (you profit if the price of the NFT rises). Borrowing an NFT and immediately sell it for ETH (Blend) means leveraging short (you profit if price falls). The result: when NFT values fluctuate in the opposite of the "expected" direction, users will quickly face liquidations.
We will soon see the impact of this development on collection prices. While leverage markets can help stabilise price fluctuations, they can also create massive liquidation cascades, so I'd expect some days of wild rides are ahead.
Week #17: April 28, 2023
Announcements
- The Gitcoin Grants beta round is now live until May 9th!
- EthStaker launched a new website
- EthStaker is accepting funding in the current Gitcoin Grant round, all funds go towards initiatives that help decentralize staking
Guest appearance by Evin McMullen, cofounder of Disco. Disco is your personal data backpack, making data and reputation portable across web2 apps, web3 dapps, IRL, and more. Evin is also cofounder of DAO Jones and inkDAO and an advisor to Boys Club, The Melon, and Graph Paper Ventures.
The morning trinity
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/131i3ej/comment/ji1ce0n/)ETHEREUM
$1913
.065
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12x3uzq/comment/jhlu3yp/)Good blockchain actors,
Suing the regulators,
Stifling detractors.
Shitpost of the week: 1l0o
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12y8q1c/daily_general_discussion_april_25_2023/jhq3k30/)Famous Crypto Last Words:
- I'll keep my coins on the exchange, I trust the experts more than I trust myself
- I used a hot wallet for my withdrawal address
- I took a photo of my seed phrase and encrypted it in the cloud
- This NFT is going to be the next Mona Lisa
- I used an exchange address for my withdrawal address
- These DeFi APRs are insane, I should get in while I can
- These governance tokens will jump in value with DAO voting and when utility is added
- I wrote my seed phrase in a text file, encrypted it, and put it on my NAS
- Everyone is saying the price is going down, better to sell now and re-buy when it goes lower
- I'll hold onto this air drop, it'll be worth way more in the future
- I sent my hardware wallet to my home address with my full name and real email in the order
- This ICO will fund the killer DApp we've all been waiting for
- I wrote my seed phrase on a piece of paper... somewhere...
- Converting ETH to a liquidity token is definitely a like-kind exchange
- These algorithmic stable coins will keep their peg under even the worst circumstances
- I used my hardware wallet seed phrase as my validator creation seed phrase
Today in Ethereum: u/ZeroTricks
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/131i3ej/daily_general_discussion_april_28_2023/ji0nijy/)On this day...
In 2022:
- Johns Gresham releases NiceNode alpha, a simple app that runs, monitors, and controls an Ethereum node.
- 10% of the Ether supply is now deposited in Ethereum's PoS contract.
- ETH eats a $2936 sandwich laced with ₿0.07382.
In 2021:
- JP Morgan states that as the backbone of the crypto-native economy, ETH has more potential than BTC's store of value.
- 1729 pays ETH for learning Solidity with CryptoZombies.
- The European Investment Bank issues its first ever digital bond on the public Ethereum blockchain.
- The is no such thing as fear of heights for ETH at $2673 to $2746, or ₿0.04846 to ₿0.05.
In 2020:
- OkEx becomes a validator in Ethereum 2.0 Testnet Topaz.
- IPFS v0.5 increases uploading speeds by 25x, fetching content 2-5x, and finding data nodes 2-6x.
- ETH looks with big eyes from below $198, or ₿0.02541.
In 2019:
- Gods Unchained talks about how to efficiently create millions of non-fungible tokens on Ethereum.
- Thanks
ObamaEthereum for $157 or ₿0.02983.
In 2018:
- ETH gets enlightened from $645 to $684, being all mindful and the such at ₿0.07322.
In 2017:
- Bank of America, Mojix and Webjet demo products using ethereum on Microsoft's New York City demo day.
- ETH continues its hill climbing efforts from $62 to $71, reaching a great view between ₿0.04723 and ₿0.05358.
In 2016:
- Vitalik Buterin pitches multiple ways to integrate Ethereum into Hyperledger
- ETH visits the lows of $7.2 for one last time, stuck somewhere between ₿0.01741 and ₿0.01598.
u/SabishiiFury shares regulatory news out of a policy leader at Coinbase
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12smokw/daily_general_discussion_april_20_2023/jh15hlw/)“The European Parliament’s adoption of MiCA today is a pivotal moment for the crypto industry in the region, and the work of European policymakers should be seen as exemplary,” said Tom Duff Gordon, Vice President of International Policy at Coinbase. “The region is recognising the potential and societal promise that emerging technology can provide. The EU is stepping up to the mark, while other notable jurisdictions are struggling to provide a solid, cohesive regulatory framework that gives clarity to a burgeoning innovative industry.”
https://decrypt.co/137339/european-parliament-approves-mica-law
Lol feel the burn
u/Nonocoiner shares a disconcerting story reminding us to stay on high alert for scams
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12tqxpv/daily_general_discussion_april_21_2023/jh6utym/)User Plastic-Resource-989 just posted a fake twitter link on r/cc about Uniswap announcing they experienced a hack.
The visual link was twitter.com, the actual link to twitter.cn.com
They messed up, as the link endpoint didn't work.
It looked like some bots were quickly responding, no one seemed to have noticed the link didn't even work.
Edit: the post has already been removed.
u/696_eth reflects on one year in NFTs
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12uv9kn/daily_general_discussion_april_22_2023/jhatugd/)As I mentioned in the previous day it was 1 year in NFTs for me a few days ago and I'm taking that opportunity to reflect on the last year (& maybe a bit more) and on a variety of topics and experiences. I'm also going to repost them here and maybe something resonates here and there. Of course, I'm starting it with Ethfinance!
I start my reflecting on 1 Year in NFTs from Ethfinance.
r/Ethfinance - subreddit that has influenced my Ethereum journey greatly, and thus - my NFT journey.
But how is it exactly connected?
I've heard more and more about Ethereum as some of my online internet friends started exploring other chains besides bitcoin. Ethereum was one of the most promising ones. Eventually I ended up hearing more and more about it and I thought it was time to start looking into it. I do not remember exactly how but I did find r/ethfinance sometime in the middle of 2020.
The discussion was amazing compared to the r/ bitcoinmarket's daily that I had been frequenting for years. Not only people were talking about the tech, it was the majority of the talk there. Quite a contrast compared to only 'number go up' in the btc daily.
Fast forward to March 2022, there's now talks about this NFT project - EVMavericks. Most active people where whitelisted. I had not. Why? Even though I'd been quite a frequent visitor - I was a lurker. Luckily, I made a few comments over the few years and that was enough to get on an additional list and then winning a raffle solidified my involvement.
Nowadays I still visit the Ethfinance daily, almost on a daily basis. Sometimes I get too busy with life. It's still a wonderful place to ask questions, hear about new developments, be alerted about important topics, see the stories of community members and learn something new everyday.
After being one of the most active members in the EVMavericks discord and being still quite a strong lurker and even turning into a slight poster on Ethfinance, I can share a few of my observations.
I personally prefer the pace of the discord as it's more of a live chat and closer to a real time conversation. Ethfinance has a higher quality and lower noise. Yet it doesn't do one thing very well for me and I'd bet especially for the people who are lurking - involving you in being part of the community. You see, sometimes folks like me who are new and not technical have really nothing substantial to contribute. And even though some of us are still asking some questions from time to time which I believe are still valuable contributions, it just does not complete the puzzle. And I believe each of us has something to offer and we can learn something new from each other. And this is where discord comes in and that is what it allows you to do, and I feel that EVMavericks degen chat, in particular, is prime example of bringing folks together. It's a glue. Still maybe for some but not others.
Now I'm not going to go into pros and cons of each platform but one more thing I will mention is that the subreddit is a nice free resource for new folks. And I feel the vibe is especially geared for people who are, hopefully, going to make it financially as well as being the ones who are understanding and embracing many aspects of the technology and tools that we discover and build.
Next up: reflecting on EVMavericks.
u/696_eth continues their 1 year in review series
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12y8q1c/daily_general_discussion_april_25_2023/jhmjpyn/)1 Year in NFTs: Twitter Followers (4/21/2022-present)
I never really cared about Twitter prior to this point. I created an IRL account like 10ish years ago but never really used it. When it comes to crypto, most of my time was spent on Reddit - r/ethfinance.
Now, I'm not sure why I created this account, but it seems to be a day after I minted my Maverick. I know there's usually lots of excitement during the early days (the honey moon phase), and people were eager to bond together and roar about the lion pride. Anyway, I ended up creating an account and following all the Mavs the EVMavericks account was following. One thing that was still weird to me is that so many web3 or crypto projects use Twitter, which is a full web2 platform that can and has rugged some of my friends' accounts before. My account has been locked multiple times for no reason until you add your phone number, etc. to unlock it. One click on their end - you are gone.
Over time, and after getting more into ENS, I started caring more. I've changed sides of caring and not caring so many times now that I don't remember all the details, but I do know the important parts. What I've come to and what I hold nowadays is that I am able to hold both of the sides of caring and not caring at the same time. I personally don't care about it at all. When I'm in nature, when I'm doing things outside, when I'm engaged in the things that matter, and so on and on and on.
The nuance comes in because part of me does care. It does care for a very noble, specific set of reasons too. In the world where I do have more followers, I would be able to spread my values, educational messages, and even some funny memes to a wider range of people. All of that is nice, and yet it's important to let go of all of that. Otherwise, it alters my behavior in a way where it's still geared a bit more towards getting better numbers, while still keeping my true values. But then I wonder, and I like challenging myself with the question, "Why does a number of followers impact the content?".
"If I am doing something good, wouldn't it matter whether one or a thousand people see that?"
Again, there are, at least, two sides to the coin that I'm holding. And at the end of the day, I'm still human, and it does get very demoralizing to see all the people doing scammy (all other types of things) having more followers and more impact, which I judge as a net negative.
And why am I building in the first place?
I thought having a personal blog is nice addition that is like a journal, a resume, and basically an on-chain history of your identity. It seems we are not there in crypto, so that's why I'm still using Twitter, as it does matter, but also playing around more with web3 projects like mirror.xyz and paragraph.xyz. Also, building on top of ENS, even something as simple as a site - 696.eth.limo, is a way of doing that.
Honestly, there's still so much more to write about followers and how I have figured out some particular nuances, but, again, it doesn't really matter to me at the end of the day.
Although I'd say I have tried to be consistent on a daily basis for almost a year, maybe missing a bit in the beginning, and have contributed content in a variety of forms, including memes, threads, questions, observations, analysis, videos, news, step-by-step guides, etc and I have gotten to 2275 followers. That's also including all my NFT related communities and ENS.
I'd like to end it on a note that's future-focused. What am I going to do going forward?
Obviously, I don't have enough reach, and that's also a good thing for me mentally, as it gives me so much more room to experiment and make mistakes.
The most important to me is to be true to my values and certain things like curiosity, decentralization, community, collaboration, communication, transparency, education, and making people smile and laugh. All of that while being authentic, having a better balance on how this piece fits within my life puzzle. Focusing on my connections with people and on the effort that I'm putting in, and the content I'm creating than being a slave to the algorithm.
Next up: Art, creating Art.
u/Ethical-trade reviews RocketPool's Atlas upgrade in the days since it went live
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12vwbun/comment/jhdmsg3/)Here's a Rocket Pool update since Atlas / LEB8 went live.
The minipool (RP's validator) count went up from shy of 14,000 to 15,329 today. Since 16eth pools can be divided into 2 leb8 pools, total count goes up, not much of a surprise here. Roughly +10% in 5 days.
More interestingly, node count went up as well from 2,291 to 2,393 which is a clear uptick that can be seen in this chart. More nodes is what we decentralization maxis should be all about (and what I'm all about), so this is absolutely great news. According to Etherscan's node count, there are currently 9,170 Ethereum nodes.
Rocket Pool now accounts for more than 1/4 of all Ethereum nodes. With a market share of only 2.7% of validators.
I haven't found any reliable chart updated with Atlas but from my observation of the total number of eth staked from the official website, there's been roughly 3,000 eth poured into RP daily since the update. That's $5 million per day.
Before Atlas, the deposit pool was continuously full (meaning reth was highly in demand, never available) causing a premium on the price. Today it's the opposite, there are many minipools waiting so the deposit pool is close to empty. In other words, many node operators are waiting for people to swap to reth. The premium is almost gone.
There are currently 21,870 reth worth $43 million waiting to be picked.
I'm expecting some whales to swallow a lot soon, and secretly hoping for Vitalik to swap some eth for reth. Would be crazy publicity for RP. Next time he does an AMA I'd like to ask him what he dislikes the most about Rocket Pool, I'm very curious to know his opinion.
In other great news, Rocket Pool's reth is now more profitable than Lido's steth, making it the default option to stake from Metamask.
Rocket Pool is currently ranked #11 by TVL on Ethereum with a TVL of $1.37B and it looks like it will enter the top 10 in a few days.
I've probably missed some key data and would love to hear more!
Disclosure: Rocket Pool enthusiast here, rpl is my second largest holding after eth and approximately 25% of my total net worth.
u/nikola_j explains an interesting tidbit about EOAs and smart wallets
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12vwbun/daily_general_discussion_april_23_2023/jher94h/)Hey, mate, one of the defi saver team members here.
Not sure which protocol you're considering using there specifically - is it Aave?
If yes, then that means that a position created on a smart wallet using defi saver would not be visible or manageable in the default frontend available att app. aave. com.
Why is that? Well, interacting with all these different protocols directly through an EOA (your standard Ethereum account) is the default approach in most cases (e.g. Aave, Compound, Liquity). This is mostly for simplicity reasons and gas savings.
However, a standard Ethereum account is currently limited in terms of how many smart contract interactions can be called within a single transaction.
This is why we chose to use the smart wallet as default for holding positions of each protocol we integrate at defi saver.
Main reason? The smart wallet provides a new layer of execution that has no limitations that a standard Ethereum account does. That's why we have options such as 1-tx leveraging/deleveraging, collateral and debt swaps, 1-tx moving of active positions between supported protocols, as well as a number of automation options for all protocols.
This short article in our knowledge base has a brief intro to the smart wallet: https://help.defisaver.com/en/general/what-is-the-smart-wallet
If there's anything else I can clarify, please do let me know, would be glad to help.
tl;dr: If you open an (e.g.) Aave position on a smart wallet using defi saver, it won't be accessible through their frontend at aave. com. All exactly same protocol rules and rates apply in both cases, but their frontend only supports positions sitting on EOAs.
u/ArcadesOfAntiquity discusses an underrated type of cold wallet
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12x3uzq/daily_general_discussion_april_24_2023/jhi0715/)Hey folks, just popping in to say: air-gapped QR code-based signers are vastly underrated as a crypto wallet security solution. (I'll refer to this tech as AGQR for the sake of brevity.)
I finally took the trouble to switch my wallets over to AGQR in the wake of the mysterious wave of wallet drainings that Twitter has been abuzz about.
How do AGQR signers work?
- Similar to dedicated hardware wallets, you create a new seed on the signer device itself. (You can also import an existing seed.) You store a backup of the seed you created in the same way you usually would/should: always by writing it down, never by printing/screenshotting.
- Your private key is held on the signer device--in my case I'm using an old Android phone running the free, open source Airgap.it Vault software. (I know, it might sound risky to keep your private key on a phone, but if you're cautious enough not to trust airplane mode, you could physically shield, remove, or otherwise disable the wifi, bluetooth, and cellular radios.)
- On a separate, networked device (PC/laptop/tablet/other phone), wallet software such as Metamask suggests a transaction in the way we're familiar with, but when you click "Accept", instead of signing the transaction itself, it displays a QR code containing the parameters of the transaction.
- You scan this code using your AGQR signer device, and then authorize signing on the device itself, using whatever security features the device has--PIN number, pattern drawing, fingerprint, etc. Again this is similar to dedicated hardware wallets, but here there is no physical connection between the two devices. (Hence the term "air-gapped"... which is probably a rather old security term, and makes less sense now that wireless networking is pervasive, but I digress.)
- After you authorize, your AGQR device signs the transaction data and displays it on-screen in the form of a QR code.
- You then hold the screen of the AGQR device up to a webcam attached to the networked device that first suggested the transaction, and it reads the QR code and broadcasts the signed transaction to the Ethereum network.
It might sound like a hassle but the whole process takes about one minute when you get used to it.
Why not just use a hardware wallet like Trezor, Ledger, Lattice, etc?
- Owning a hardware wallet makes it obvious that you're into crypto. For those of us who would rather keep it discrete, an old phone wins hands down. The hw wallet companies seem to really disregard this segment of the market. Case in point, the new "fashion" Ledger wallets that you wear on a chain around your neck. Thanks but no thanks.
- Personal information exposure risk. Buying a hardware wallet potentially creates a record of your name/address/phone number/credit card number being associated with cryptocurrency. This could be no big deal, or it could be a huge deal in the case of the Ledger customer data leak. Buying a phone creates no such risk. In fact...
- You probably already own an old phone. If not you can buy one cheaper than you can a hw wallet.
- Phones are mass-produced consumer technology. We could argue that hardware wallets have become this too, but which is easier to quickly replace, repair, or troubleshoot? Definitely the phone, in my opinion.
- No custom firmware/drivers. It seems like every few weeks there are new headaches and incompatibilities based on faulty or late firmware/drivers.
Downsides?
- Since it's just (free) software that runs on a phone, it doesn't create any revenue for the people that make it. Therefore if there are future changes to Ethereum's transaction data format, updates to the AGQR signer software could be slow or even, worst-case, non-existent. However, the software I'm using is open source, so I wouldn't expect it to be a problem for long, if at all.
- For the same reason, the supported range of phones might not be the best. The software installed on my old Galaxy S6, but wouldn't launch properly.
- For the same reason, customer service/support might also be bare-bones or non-existent. I haven't checked yet.
- Not many people are using it, as far as I know, so you won't be able to Google for answers as easily. But hopefully as awareness of how effective this tech is, this situation will change! Indeed, that's part of the reason I'm posting this.
Summary and Conclusion
I'm aware I'm maybe honeymooning over it, but I'm strongly tempted to say the AGQR signer is "the way": it has basically all the benefits of a hardware wallet and basically none of the drawbacks. It's portable, small, and self-contained, without notifying everyone that you're into crypto, and if it breaks, no big deal, you can get a new one the next day.
Trying to think about it more objectively, I know some people are likely to feel that AGQR on an old phone is a bit too "DIY" to trust their money with it. That's understandable, but on the other hand, I figure a lot of us here already have a pretty DIY attitude if we're willing to hold our own keys in the first place.
In conclusion, I think there will always be a market for dedicated hardware wallets, as a "no compromises" type, maximum security, industrial-grade solution. However, for most of us, I think AGQR fits the needs of the user so much better that it's not even close. Especially if you tend to think things should be open source and self-hosted, you owe it to yourself to explore this tech.
TLDR: I'm loving my AGQR setup and just wanted to let everyone here know about it.
u/pa7x1 is brainstorming a project for the community
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12x3uzq/daily_general_discussion_april_24_2023/jhhxhlh/)Here is a proposed public good that I think we could bootstrap through this community or EVMavericks.
A curated white-list of trust-worthy smart contract addresses. Plus a browser extension that relies on it and lets you know whenever you are interacting with a smart contract that it's a know and trustworthy one and warns you when it's an unknown one.
In the future this whitelist could hopefully be integrated in other wallets, MetaMask, frame.sh, etc...
Thoughts and criticisms welcomed!
u/etheraider wants you to build and win prizes! Meanwhile, u/LeagueGreedy sheds some light on the creating Withdrowlst
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12y8q1c/daily_general_discussion_april_25_2023/jhpgv96/)Hello everyone! Withdrowls Public Goods Funding Update!🦉
First off thank you to everyone who participated and celebrated with us this seminal moment in Ethereum history! We look forward to celebrating many more with you to come!🎉 With that said, we are happy to announce our official Buidlathon!💪
Are you a builder or are you LOOKING to build in web3 and just need the extra push/incentive/funding to get the ball rolling?! If so, here is your chance!🫡
As a way to commemorate how far EVMavericks and our community has come, starting today and going through “TBD date” (to be announced soon), we will be hosting an open competition for anyone that wants to build infra/tools/public goods/dapps/new services on web3!
The prizes for the competition will be as follows:
1st place: 5 ETH
2nd place: 3 ETH
3rd place: 1.5 ETH
Random participation prize: .05 ETH
Winners will be determined by a “panel” of 5 judges, to include 4 individuals and the 5th judge as a “popular” snapshote vote amongst EVM holders.🦁
In order to participate and be eligible to win, builders will have to sign up with their idea/proposal in the the EVMavericks discord and submit at least a working “alpha” or prototype of their project by the due date.
Also, as a general rule all projects that are already well in progress would not be eligible for this competition as that would be an unfair advantage to start
For more details and or questions please check out the Buidlathon channel in the discord! (If you don’t have an EVM just select the Buidlathon role to get in the channel!)
Thank you everybody and happy building! More details to come soon! Looking forward to seeing what projects will be created! 🔥
It feels so good to have fully minted out Withdrowls and start the public goods funding buidlathon! It makes me so happy to see community come together to support a great cause!
Some fun facts about Withdrowls: it was 4 days from idea to mint out. Marketing started the day after we decided this was something we wanted to do, so only 48 hours of marketing before mint. It also only took 24 hours to mint out! Oh, and about 95% of the tweets were automated, that was a lot of fun.
We jammed A LOT into those 4 days so please give u/etheraider a hug next time you see them, and please sign up; all ideas are welcome :)
Feel free to hijack this comment's replies if you don't have an idea, but would like to team up with a community member!
u/LogrisTheBard talks more on human coordination
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12z6zsm/daily_general_discussion_april_26_2023/jhr4hui/)I've written before about crypto and Human Coordination and why it is my favorite leg of The Rabbit Hole. A lot of the work to date on this topic is on deciding relative balances of power between key actors via token distributions, identifying all the necessary actors of a system and ensuring they are fairly compensated and cannot profit from misbehavior (incentive alignment), and creating systems to encourage voter participation such as delegation and bribe systems. There is an implicit step before all of that wherein an organization needs to agree on what it is trying to achieve and critically how it should go about achieving it. This is the value alignment process, it is a never-ending affair, and it's a predecessor to all other actions of an organization.
Once upon a time in MakerDAO, after a black swan event wiped out many of their early users, the DAO was faced with a decision on whether to reimburse those affected. They decided not to. They then had to decide what was more important between peg stability and decentralization. They chose peg stability and created the Peg Stability Module (PSM). To this day I still disagree with both of those decisions but regardless of how I feel the DAO had to wrestle with controversial values, reach a consensus, and then act. How to enshrine values into a system varies greatly by each system but I think it's worth reviewing some of the methods we've seen so far, what is good and bad about them, and how we might be able to improve upon them.
Some systems are able to enshrine their values in code. For example Ethereum, when forced to tackle the scalability trilemma, chose decentralization and security over scalability. These values are encoded in the gas market and block sizes. Solana went the other path. Earlier in its history Ethereum was forced to choose between finality and ethics (look up Ethereum Classic). We chose ethics. Judging by the relative adoption of Ethereum vs Ethereum Classic this was apparently the more widely supported choice by a majority of node owners, app developers, and companies. Behind these decisions is what we commonly call Layer 0. This is one of the most fragile parts of the Ethereum ecosystem and one that we have to maintain constant vigilance on. The value alignment process for Ethereum can basically be described as a vacuum where a process should be. How does one become part of the Layer 0 set of actors? Basically you post in Ethfinance, attend events like Hodlercon, meet/influence the right people, attend core dev calls, write ERCs, etc. You go down The Rabbit Hole and get involved.
In more traditional power structures where value alignment decides the strategy of something but not necessarily its implementation it is more normal for the value alignment process to take place by delegation and hierarchical decomposition. It is infeasible to coordinate an organization the size of a nation state using an open mic system or social media upvotes. So we tackle this complexity using walled gardens and hierarchies. Within a corporation the primary organization of this hierarchy is what I refer to as the pyramid of subordination. This structure prevents bystander syndrome by assigning accountability for each task, ensures each person is qualified for the job using a social attestation system in the local vicinity of the pyramid (interviews), and generally organizes people to act towards a unified goal. It is efficient when done well. The military uses a similar structure for the same reasons. It also doubles as a more efficient value alignment system than I've seen in DAOs. When there is disagreement this structure provides an escalation process amongst direct reports, peers, and superiors within the pyramid of subordination. If a matter isn't satisfactorily resolved by those initially involved, it escalates up to the C-level personnel who serve as the ultimate authority for the values of the organization. By the time it reaches them, there are almost certainly multiple valid strategies that could be taken that they are deciding between. This is actually the primary value of C-level personnel; they embody the values of an organization.
So what are the problems with this design? What are we hoping to improve with web3 technologies? Well, the problem begins just above the pyramid of subordination. As we’ve seen in the US in the past 50 years, using highly liquid capital as the ultimate authority source in the system has led to the pursuit of short-term profits at the detriment of all other factors. Shareholders care about their share price and dividends above all other factors and so they appoint C-level personnel and structure their compensation to reflect this desire. As a result companies destroy the environment, have little to no regard for their employees well-being, subjugate their local communities, pursue one merger and acquisition after another in order to form too-big-to-fail monopolies, and exploit every financial and political system they can to stifle competition and create power imbalances in their favor. From a game theory perspective this is the expected outcome of this design. It is Moloch in action, as our society increasingly organizes itself into these ever growing capital-hungry behemoths. You would think companies would be beholden to customers but the customer has no influence in this power structure other than to take business elsewhere. Sadly, working to stifle competition and reduce customer choice is often more effective for companies than working to improve the customer experience or provide a better product. So, the first thing to improve is to create structures for value alignment that are able to embody a wider diversity of values without sacrificing organizational efficiency.
The second thing to improve is resilience. This structure is fallible to key-man syndrome. It is optimized for efficiency not resilience. When one person has the full autonomy to do something it becomes ripe for corruption and/or enforcement pressures. The larger the set of people that need to consent to something the harder it becomes to form a conspiracy to make any decision that does not align with the DAO consensus mission.
If we can only succeed at improving these two facets of organizations, crypto would already be a world-altering, indispensable technology. But we are working on so much more than that. We are working on ways to divorce capital from influence, remove the walled garden around the value alignment system, fight any and all forms of coordination failures, and novel ways of incentive alignment that can change human behavior at scale so that our societal values more closely align with those of our dominant power structures. It is basically impossible to be against this ethically once you understand it. The most bullish thing for Ethereum is to be understood.
u/Hocilef shares an underrated protocol
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12z6zsm/daily_general_discussion_april_26_2023/jhrphbf/)I have came across an interesting protocol called Sismo enabling users to manage their various digital indentities privately using zk-badges.
As hinted, it uses zero-knowledge proofs. If you are not familiar with these, this video shared multiple times in the daily was very helpful (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fOGdb1CTu5c). Basically, it is a mathematical tool allowing to selectively reveal a piece of data. Applying these to digital identity, you can aggregate valuable characteristics from different account (web2) or ethereum wallet without revealing their adresses.
For instance, let say you have a wallet with which you gave a lot to Gitcoin grant and another one with a high degen score. You want to aggregate theses characteristics in a third without giving your history (adresses). Sismo allows you to do this. Practically, you connect your different wallets to their apps, create signatures and mint "zk-badges". A badge is a non-transferable/soulbound token (NT-ERC1155).
From their docs (https://docs.sismo.io/sismo-docs/):
Users aggregate their identity in Sismo’s Data Vault and start accumulating Data Gems—atomic pieces of data that categorize users into groups. In turn, users can generate proofs to make claims about their data (e.g, I own a specific NFT). These proofs are verified by applications—either on-chain or off-chain. The resulting privacy-preserving attestations—stored in on-chain smart contracts or off-chain databases—are utilized by applications for access control and reputation curation.Users aggregate their identity in Sismo’s Data Vault and start accumulating Data Gems—atomic pieces of data that categorize users into groups. In turn, users can generate proofs to make claims about their data (e.g, I own a specific NFT). These proofs are verified by applications—either on-chain or off-chain. The resulting privacy-preserving attestations—stored in on-chain smart contracts or off-chain databases—are utilized by applications for access control and reputation curation.
If you have participated in Gitcoin Round 15, you can mint a ZK-badge curated by their team! https://app.sismo.io/?badge=gr15-gitcoin-contributor-zk-badge
I hope to find a way in the EVM discord to experiment with creating badges for lion minter/holder. Here is the creator section of the app if you are interested https://factory.sismo.io/create-badge
Week #16: April 21, 2023
Livestream Recording | POAP Checkout
Guest appearance by Gloria Kimbwala, Principal Engineer at SuperModular.xyz https://supermodular.xyz/
Announcements
- Superphiz created a POAP to celebrate u/Tricky_Troll completing a full year of daily doots in EthFinance: https://checkout.poap.xyz/123280
The morning trinity
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12tqxpv/daily_general_discussion_april_21_2023/jh3xvxj/)Ξ
$1938
0.069
Shitpost of the week: u/jtnichol
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12r326i/fire_gary_gensler_the_game_show_edition/)
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12qb6uw/comment/jgte420/)Best roast me session,
Security commission,
Gensler obsession.
Today in Ethereum: u/ZeroTricks
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12tqxpv/comment/jh3xzpo/)On this day...
In 2022:
- Scroll Tech raises $30 Million in Series A funding and announces zkEVM-based zk-rollup Scroll.
- EU officials talk about banning Bitcoin: "If Ethereum is able to shift to PoS, we could legitimately request the same from BTC".
- An arbitrage MEV bundle buys a Moonbird NFT for 44 ETH, to resell it for 223 ETH in the same transaction.
- Ridley Scott is announced to produce Ethereum movie The Infinite Machine.
- ETH deadpan talks about $3079, $2988 and ₿0.07373.
In 2021:
- Raoul Pal struggles "to not sell all my BTC to move my entire core position to ETH".
- Wyoming approves a law recognizing DAOs as a new type of LLC.
- Archer Swap is launched, a proof of concept for Uniswap and SushiSwap traders to avoid being front-run, by allowing 0% slippage trades that are only executed if successful.
- Hudson Jameson leaves the Ethereum Foundation.
- ETH wakes up with a small headache at $2365, from ₿0.0415 to ₿0.04387.
In 2020:
- The hacker who stole $25 Million from dForce earlier, returns all stolen funds.
- With Social Payments, Dharma now allows sending DAI to any Twitter user.
- Content creator rewarding platform Cent gets a big overhaul with v2, with Spotting and Rewarding, and dropping Seeding.
- ETH cuts corners at $173 and ₿0.02511.
In 2019:
- Venture advisor William Mougayar shares his view on how Ethereum could evolve.
- Some dank ETH can still be smelled around $170 and ₿0.03212.
In 2018:
- ETH loses steam at $605 | ₿0.06859.
In 2017:
- The SEC starts weighing NYSE Arca's Ethereum ETF proposal.
- ETH follows ₿0.03953 from $49.6 to $48.3.
In 2016:
- Coindesk interviews leading Blockchain VCs: "the Time for Ethereum Investments Has Come".
- Slock.it reveals full scope of "the DAO" on daohub.org
- ETH falters from $8.5 to $8.1 while going back in time from ₿0.01924 to ₿0.01803.
u/nixorokish celebrates u/Benjamin Chodroff's great work to save over 2000 compromised validators
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12kcm3z/daily_general_discussion_april_13_2023/jg5ex6s/)Dunno if anyone's mentioned this yet, but CLWP (EIP-4736) included 2,133 potentially or definitely compromised validators who were racing to set their withdrawal address before a hacker could.
Of those 2133 in the set, 2133 were able to set their address to one controlled by the rightful owner. 100% success rate. Not a single one to a hacker.
Benjamin Chodroff (and Jim McDonald, I shouldn't have omitted that) was the author and did a seriously amazing job after realizing that his own seed for his validators were compromised and, instead of giving up and leaving the space, found a way to save not just his own, but thousands of others. Seriously amazing job.
https://nitter.snopyta.org/ethStaker/status/1646629034715930624
u/domotheus and u/geoffbezos discuss EIP-4844/Danksharding
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12jan7l/daily_general_discussion_april_12_2023/jfzwpos/)Imagine you go to the Apples and Oranges Store because you need some oranges. But the store owner is quirky and has a rule that goes "This store will only sell 1000 total items per day. Whether that's 1 apple and 999 oranges, or 900 apples and 100 oranges, or a perfect split I don't care. Once I sold my 1000th item I'm done for the day."
Also, this store's apples are very good. People drive from all over the place to buy them. So naturally since supply is low and demand is high, so the cost of apples go up and the store owner makes a killing selling them. Oranges, on the other hand, aren't as popular. On average, the store owner sells about 980 apples and 20 oranges every day.
You personally don't really care that much about the apples, you want to buy oranges. But due to the store's weird rule, you still have to outbid people looking to buy to buy apples. Oranges should be cheap because they are plentiful and in low demand, but every orange you buy is an apple someone else can't buy. After the store sold 999 items that day, why would he sell you an orange for $1 when someone's willing to buy an apple for $10? You'll have to offer at least $10 to get the orange you want.
"This is really dumb", you think to yourself. You talk to the store owner and make him come to his senses, and he agrees to change his stupid rule. Now he'll sell at most 1000 apples per day and at most 100 oranges per day. So now that the two supply/demand markets are separated, an apple can cost $10 and the orange can cost $1 and everybody's happy - you get cheap oranges, and the store owner gets more money (1000 x $10 + 200 x $1 gets him more money than the previous system when $10 was the cost of an item and he sold 1000)
Back in Ethereum land the apple represent execution (the gas that affects state, compute stuff in the EVM, etc.) and oranges represent data (the gas that stores stuff in the chain's history). Rollups do their execution off-chain, so what they need most from Layer 1 is data. Today the cheapest solution is using call data at 16 gas per byte. But if everyone's fighting to do EVM stuff, the cost of that 16 gas/bytes goes up as well because there's only so much gas in each block. This really shouldn't be the case, since data is a different resource from execution.
So what EIP4844 does is separate those two resources into two distinct markets: The gas market as we know it today stays the same, and there's a new "data gas" resource with its own pricing that happens separately. Rollups will be happy because now they get to commit their batches on chain in these nifty new things called "blobs", and when demand for blobs is low, blobs will be cheap — even if there's a huge NFT drop going on that brings gas to 500 gwei
On a technical level it does other cool things in preparation for full danksharding later on, which will allow a significant increase in the size of blobs so that it becomes even cheaper for rollups to commit data to blobs. But even without danksharding, just splitting the markets will help drastically lower fees on rollups, which will be nice.
Yesterday I asked about how EIP 4844 aka proto-danksharding works.
I got some really good answers so decided to sum it up, I put together a thread with an ELI5 on how danksharding works. TL;DR for those that don't want to click into twitter:
- ETH txns vary across "complexity" (complexity measures gas)
- Txn "complexity" is split between "execution" vs. "data"
- Currently "execution" and "data" are sold via the same gas market
- Danksharding splits up these up so there's a "data gas" market
- "Data gas" market sells "data" via "blobs"
- L2s benefit since the txns they post to mainnet have a lot of "data" complexity
- The implication is that L2 txn costs won't be as impacted by ETH mainnet activity (big NFT mint, airdrop claim event)
u/Ender985 shares some NFT drama that reminds us about the importance of immutability
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12lkn8x/daily_general_discussion_april_14_2023/jg7my5f/)Meanwhile, in post-Shapella NFT-land..
The whole point of crypto is trustlessness and code-is-law. As a consequence, NFTs are immutable.
Well, it turns out that sometimes they are not.
Truth Labs, the org behind Goblintown profile picture NFTs, suddenly changed the jpegs of their all NFT collections to a.. middle finger with more middle fingers, with the text: "Fuck royalties. Fuck supporting builders and creatives. Flipping is the heart of what makes web3 special. Honor the flipper, fuck the community. Long live the slow rug!" Check for yourselves.
This move is part of their migration to new contracts, probably to enforce royalties on-chain. As you know, the Blur vs OpenSea feud caused a race to the bottom on "off-chain" royalties.
Truth Labs still had access to the contracts able to change the metadata of their NFT collections, effectively giving them the power to change the jpeg that the NFT represents. This took many holders by surprise, since they thought their NFTs were immutable.. Well now they need to trust that Truth Labs will change their jpegs back.
There is a lesson to be learned here. Even if a web3 participant understands the underlying technology, and the principles of trustlessness and immutability on which crypto is founded, they still can be caught in a trap. Smart contracts are law, but sometimes this law is not what we think it is.
u/Dont_Waver explains the recent Supreme Court ruling for u/ProductDude
[View on Reddit →]()Any legal people care to give an opinion on what todays ruling means for the SEC?
- Supreme Court Endorses Streamlined Challenges to Agency Power
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/14/us/supreme-court-administrative-state.html
It means that if someone is being charged by the SEC, and that person claims that the SEC is acting unconstitutionally, that person doesn't have to wait until the SEC is done with the enforcement action to appeal in court.
Administrative groups, such as the SEC, are part of the executive branch of the government, but they have a sort of judicial power in enforcing the regulations that they were formed to enforce. So previously, you would have to wait until they were done with their investigation and enforcement action before you could appeal to a court. However, if you are arguing that the SEC doesn't have constitutional authority to enforce whatever it is they're trying to do to you, it's kind of silly to have to wait for them to finish the whole investigation and enforcement action before you can object and appeal.
For the SEC, this means that if, for example, Coinbase was charged in an enforcement action by the SEC and Coinbase wanted to argue that the SEC doesn't have the power to regulate crypto under their grant of power, it could immediately appeal to a federal or state court and have this argument ruled on. This would save a ton of time and money if the court finds that the SEC doesn't have that power.
u/interweaver has a great idea 💡
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12mqnlc/daily_general_discussion_april_15_2023/jgfzula/)So there's this idea I've been wanting to try for a while now.
You guys know how Ethernodes is notoriously bad at showing how many actual execution nodes there are? And so we don't have any real sense of how many there might be? I even see some discussion farther down the daily today on that subject.
I think we here in EthFinance/EthStaker might be uniquely well-placed to answer that question: how many nodes are there on Ethereum? Basically, a bunch of us who run nodes (including execution clients) would go and look up our node by IP address or public key on ethernodes.org. Then we'd each just reply to the comment/thread/whatever with a simple "yes" or "no", depending on whether Ethernodes knew about our node.
With a big enough sample size, like dozens or ideally a few hundred+, we'd start to get a pretty clear picture of how many actual nodes there are out there.
Example: Ethernodes claims there are 7500 nodes on a particular day. When 100 of us check our nodes that day, only 25% show up on Ethernodes. Conclusion: There are actually 30k nodes, give or take some error bar that I'm sure the stats majors here could figure out (i.e. not me :P )
Thoughts?
u/BuyETHorDAI discusses an anti-crypto podcast which reminds us that the most bullish thing for Ethereum is to be understood.
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12nw0o0/daily_general_discussion_april_16_2023/jghox4h/)Anyone watch Bill Maher? One his guests wrote an anti-crypto book, and I just found the arguments in their interview funny. I think the interview just furthers my view that Ethereum needs to dissasociate itself from the word cryptocurrency. I would much rather see the word cryptonetwork as it conveys that currency is not a central theme. But anyways I summarized the interview because I think this is a great summary of the mainstream opinion on "crypto".
- Cryptocurrencies aren't currencies and never will be (defined as store of value, medium of exchange, unit of account)
- Centralized exchanges should be regulated like banks
- If money is trust, then the term trustless money is nonsense. It's like saying a government-less government, or religion-less religion.
- cryptocurrencies are not money, they are investments for higher returns which makes them a security
- The only people that use them are crminals and gamblers because its inherently a zero-sum game because cryptocurrencies don't do anything. Usually a security is a share of a stock, but with crypto there's no product, there's no good, or service, which is why it's a zero sum game where for someone to win, someone has to lose
- Crypto is a ponzi scheme because a million people can't access their money out of FTX
- If you lose your "pin number" in crypto, then you're just fucked and there's nothing you can do which is why people use exchanges so that someone else is reponsible for your shit
- Most centralized exchanges are fake and eventually collapse
- NFTs are a ponzi scam / right click save / jpgs / wash trading / goodluck selling your bored ape
- The amount of energy for "blockchains" is ridiculous. In 2021, Bitcoin and "other cryptocurrencies" mined a ton of energy.
These are almost verbatim the arguments thrown around. The first thing I notice is that if you replace the word cryptocurrency with Bitcoin, it makes a lot more sense. The arguments are very surface level and lack a ton of nuance because in the maintreams eyes, cryptocurrencies are all like Bitcoin. I think the old saying around here absolutely applies. The most bullish thing about Ethereum is to be understood.
u/wolfparking covers the large institutions moving in to the space
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12nw0o0/daily_general_discussion_april_16_2023/jgjy13h/)Now that withdrawals are enabled with the successful upgrade of Shapella, I'm keeping an eye out for institutions and big movers.
Already this year we've seen Fidelity and Blackrock pouring funds into Blockchain.
NASDAQ in their Digital Assets Business is expected to start providing customer crypto custody by the end of June after receiving approval from the New York Department of Financial Services. Much like Fidelity, the platform will function similar to an exchange with liquidity and execution services.
Just last year Bank of America reported a turning signal for wealthy investors away from the stock market and into Crypto, Real Estate, and Private Equity.
"75% of young investors say it’s impossible to achieve above-average returns solely with traditional stocks and bonds."
Combine this sentiment with the economic slowdown and credit crisis, crypto investments are in better position this year.
Also, and not the news I expected to see gain traction and excitement, but the Bank of America is reporting some interesting drivers of recent digital asset adoption from gold:
Tokenized gold passed $1 billion in value last month under the market cap pump of stablecoins PAXG and tether gold XAUT.
"Tokenized gold provides exposure to physical gold, 24/7 real-time settlement, no management fees and no storage or insurance costs. The low minimum investment increases accessibility and fractionalization enables the transfer of physical gold ownership and value that was not previously possible."
We could all do with some peace of mind and stability after all the black swans we've experienced last year. Here's to hoping that these large institutions don't exert regulatory and market forces in the wrong direction and fuck it up for the rest of us.
u/Jin366 digs up something from YouTube covering AI and Ethereum
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12p2uhe/daily_general_discussion_april_17_2023/jglfue6/)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uN3DP-40TA4&t=2380s
This is a gem of a channel. He talks about autonomous AI and how Ethereum might play an important role in the future AI economy. Really good.
This is the part where he speaks about AI economy (and Ethereum):
"Now, I will discuss the integration of these AI models into the legacy financial system and Ethereum. These models can function as a central brain and connect to other neural networks, AI systems, and handcrafted intelligence systems like Wolfram Alpha. As the AI assistant interacts with apps and handles tasks for you, there will be a need for it to manage money.
In the first iteration, AI will interact with apps to book flights, for example, and users will confirm and approve transactions. As the AI becomes more effective and trusted, users will want it to handle more tasks autonomously, including financial transactions.
There will be pressure to integrate AI into financial systems, but this may create friction in the traditional financial system. These autonomous AI entities might face difficulties meeting regulatory expectations because the legacy system is governed by regulations designed for humans. Additionally, the traditional financial system is not well-suited for global transactions between AI agents due to regional differences.
Crypto systems like Ethereum, on the other hand, are well-suited for autonomous systems. Ethereum was designed with the idea that autonomous agents might conduct much of the financial activity in the future. It is permissionless, global, transparent, and digital-native, making it an ideal platform for AI agents to manage accounts and interact with smart contracts.
Though most economic activity still occurs in the traditional financial system, friction in that system may push AI agents towards crypto systems like Ethereum. Smart contracts on Ethereum can be used to coordinate AI agents, creating a seamless environment for AI-driven financial transactions."
u/bbqcaramelbrulee goes over the Gensler grilling in detail
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12qb6uw/daily_general_discussion_april_18_2023/jgrgc6o/)Patrick McHenry did a FANTASTIC job with Gensler today. I believe he really forced the issue on Ethereum as a Commodity and hope it leads to regulatory movement (but maybe we in the U.S. shouldn't hold our collective breaths just yet with our painfully slow government, sigh). Anyway, great job Rep McHenry!
But damn, also McHenry (and I'll keep this REALLY brief): votes against Women's Health Protection, the Chips Act, the Infrustructure & Jobs Act, multiple bills protecting Queer rights, multiple bills protecting the right to vote, multiple bills to (can we please!) close assault weapon loopholes...
*Okay, back to Ethereum. And yes I'm flying my 'Murica flag here today, so bare with us everyone around the globe :)
I've been thinking a lot about how Ethereum can be represented better in U.S. legislative process. Reps like McHenry & Emmer are (let me be mild here) faux "public servants." They have clear records of working against the Common Good. Ethereum deserves better heroes. I don't consider myself politically savvy and work in an unrelated field but am wondering what effective avenues would be worth my time and/or support. I have donated to Coincenter in the past and probably will again, but I need to update myself on what they have been up to. Edited: Coin Center works to educate policy makers. Recent efforts to educate involved the terrible "Digital Asset Anti-Money Laundering Act," the "RESTRICT Act," and the Treasury's DeFi risk assessment. I hope to find out more about specific advocacy they are doing.
Any other coalitions come to mind I need to become aware of? Any ideas perculating on effective organizing or lobbying for those of us who care about good ETH regulation? I would love to donate some time and energy to this, but not sure at this juncture what will make a difference.
P.S. Just so you know I'm not on some Lib high horse, I can't stand listening to Senator Warren talk either *facepalm. Thanks for reading...
https://bounties.gitcoin.co/coincenter
citation if desired: https://ballotpedia.org/Patrick_McHenry
apologies for all the edits...grammar is hard lol
u/RevolutionarySoil11 has some wallet tips for everyone
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12qb6uw/daily_general_discussion_april_18_2023/jgqarxi/)For anyone worried, here are some wallet tips:
- Keep your funds seperated if you have a lot of money. There have been plenty of cases of people accidentally signing fraudulent transactions even with a hardware wallet, because their PC was compromised. So don't mix your 100 Eth retirement money with your wallet containing dickbutt NFTs. Also if you interact with dodgy or untested contracts, use a seperate wallet for that too.
- For best security use a multisig wallet/social recovery or a hardware wallet
- Wallet ≠ wallet. Do your research, the more funds you have the more careful you should choose the wallet. They're all developed by different teams with different philosophies
- No, HW wallets are not unhackable as some seem to think. There can be and have been plenty of bugs found in the code. The same goes for any wallet. There is no perfect security, know the risks.
- Revoke permissions!
- Hackers aside, another maybe even more common way ppl lose funds is by their own error. Make sure you have the keys/recovery phrase properly backed up. There are a lot of different ways you could do that, spend some time reading up on it. Never upload it to any online machine or expose it to a camera connected to the internet. No cloud storage, no smartphone etc. Your private key must never get close to the internet! Obviously physical theft can also be a concern, although lesser. There are ways to greatly mitigate the risks of self custody, look into it.
- If you're relatively new to all of this Andreas Antonopoulos has some great videos on wallet security etc. on Youtube. He mostly talks about Bitcoin but it's same same for beginners. It's important to know the basics.
u/2Nice4AllThis shared a template for you to contact your US representatives
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12rhig4/daily_general_discussion_april_19_2023/jgxay0s/)Here's a draft letter to the president/legislators/lawmakers from the perspective of a web3 developer. *One* sentence was generated via ChatGPT, the rest are my own words (my letter will be different, as I am not a dev tho I do feel like this effects my career too). Feel free to use and customize. Apologies but I'm super tired and barely proofread it.
Dear ________________ ,
I’m writing today because I am concerned about the lack of clear regulation in the blockchain and web3 industry. For many developers in the space, this technology is our pride and livelihood. Most of us recognize that the space has an overabundance of scams and theft. There is a clear distinction between private companies like FTX who offer a product with no transparency and a public ledger built on open source technology.
Blockchains offer a lot more than just being an immutable ledger. Web3 has the potential to transform many aspects of our society, including finance, governance, and data ownership. The United States should be a leader in innovation and adoption of impactful technologies. As someone who grew up in the nineties, it is the closest thing that reminds me of my childhood during the early days of the internet, when America chose to be a leader in household adoption of a technology that advanced communication beyond what we would have ever imagined a century ago.
Although our industry has a lot of problems, there have been some great achievements from development teams and good faith actors in the space. Last year, ethereum had a groundbreaking upgrade that reduced network energy consumption by almost a hundred percent by upgrading to proof of stake and eliminating the need for wasteful crypto mining. Hacked funds are often traced by the community with updates on activities broadcasted through social media and it’s quite common for the community to help its users get stolen funds back. There have also been millions of dollars donated in aid to Ukraine through cryptocurrency.
The web3 and blockchain space, as known as the “cryptocurrency” industry, have grown a lot since the inception of bitcoin. Today there are many communities in web3 that make up the collective space and if you were to navigate through them you would find there are many who are excited about this technology. Many of us have put a lot of time, passion, and hard work into the development of this tech and it’s a big part of our lives.
Some of us feel that CEOs of private companies shouldn’t be the only representatives of our interests as a growing industry. We are also disappointed by the actions of SEC chairman Mr. Gensler and his hostility to American companies like Coinbase, who actually have gone above and beyond in regulatory compliance. Furthermore, the draft bill of the RESTRICT Act contains alarming implications for the privacy and speech of American citizens.
We hope that our political leaders could do some more community outreach in the space so we can properly educate our legislators about the technology. We especially urge regulatory clarity for developers, stakers, and everyday users. We understand that there shouldn’t be rushed legislation to integrate blockchain and crypto assets into our existing financial infrastructure. We just want to do our jobs as software developers and home stakers, who work hard and invest our time and money into developing a revolutionary technology.
u/asdafari12 reminds us that we aren't against regulation itself
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12rhig4/daily_general_discussion_april_19_2023/jgwy2on/)Reading many ppl here the last days that claim we are just greedy and only care about pumping our bags. We aren't against regulation, we are against bad regulation. If the SEC got its way, I predict that ETH would be a security that retail can't touch directly, only indirectly from various bank products. Private stable coins might be banned. Private wallets, or what they call them - unhosted wallets, wild wallets or dark wallets will be banned. Defi itself likely banned unless accessed from a bank that charges a fee, "for our protection".
No other country is stuck on the question, whether ETH is a security or commodity. Crypto regulation in the UK and EU is not perfect but we realize that crypto is here to stay and put out regulation, guidelines and not just 55 litigations. I was positively surprised by how many Defi actions, my Nordic tax authority has provided guidelines on this year. ETH staking (cap. gains, not ordinary income), lending, LPing etc. Meanwhile, the US IRS hasn't even spoken about ETH staking. Most people will likely class it as ordinary income because that is safer than to classify as the lower taxed capital gains.
SEC's actions are embarrassing (even Hester, Gensler's colleague says so), the IRS is embarrassing, the political dick swinging between agencies, embarrassing. R vs D as well and things like that make me lose faith in society and the democratic process more than any crypto scammer ever did. Scammers do it for the money, above, I think is done for the same or even worse reasons.
Week #15: April 14, 2023
Guest appearance by Christopher Whinfrey, Co-Founder of Hop Protocol! https://hop.exchange/
Announcements
- 🎉 u/superphiz surpasses 100 daily doots! 🎉
- There's a free POAP for anyone that participated in the Shapella's POAP.art canvas and placed more than 42 pixels. Once you claim you become elligible to enter the Shapella Pixel Placer - LogicBot Raffle for a chance to win a LogicBot!
The morning trinity
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12lkn8x/comment/jg6xbao/)Mister_Eth left to buy some milk 😢
$2115
0.069
Shitpost of the week: u/diego-d
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12jan7l/daily_general_discussion_april_12_2023/jfz95i0/)I deposited my ETH into the staking contract 871 days ago. Later, on 1 Dec 2020, Beacon Chain launched, and since then my solo staking rig has been running 24/7 with near perfect uptime. Total downtime amounts to probably less than half an hour. I've earned a nice amount in consensus and execution rewards. Operationally it has cost me nearly nothing, about £100-150 in electricity over the 2 or so years, and about 12 hours of my time. It runs in a fanless case, so I don't even hear it. I sometimes forget it even exists. It contributes to the Ethereum network and is a source of passive income that has truly no intrusion in my life. And yet, I can't wait to instantaneously exit all of my validators and dump all of my ETH later tonight.
edit: thank you u/superphiz for chadding in with the gold!
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12jan7l/comment/jg19ql5/)Ugrade activates,
One more risk evaporates,
The future awaits.
Today in Ethereum: u/ZeroTricks
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12lkn8x/daily_general_discussion_april_14_2023/jg6xfk2/)On this day...
In 2022:
- Having onboarded 75% of new stakers last month, Lido finance proposes Distributed Validator Technology and Node Operator Scores in a quest towards more decentralisation.
- The U.S. Treasury Department alleges that North Korean hacking group Lazarus is behind the $600 Million theft on Axie Infinity's Ronin bridge.
- TrueFi releases dapp development framework useDapp v1.0, with multichain and WalletConnect support and restructured documentation.
- Arbitrum holds the first poll on projects to be included in the Arbitrum Odyssey.
- @Jasper_ETH argues Lido Finance's measures to decentralize are not enough, advises the staking pool to commit to not taking more than 50% of all ETH staked.
- Leo Glisic explains stakers yielding higher returns via staking pool tokens and their derivatives.
- ETH should prepare for a Muskian crypto-twitter, at $3116 to $3020, or ₿0.07562.
In 2021:
- /r/wallstreetbets decides to allow discussions about BTC, ETH and DOGE.
- Paul Brody brainstorms about a DAO-based analogue of the S&P500 in the Ethereum ecosystem.
- ETH's pockets bulge with $2309, $2421, ₿0.03623 and ₿0.03856.
In 2020:
- Prysmatic Labs launches the Topaz test network, representing the full Ethereum 2.0 Phase 0 mainnet configuration.
- The Ethereum Foundation updates the community on R&D progress made by EF-supported projects.
- Etherscan announces ETHProtect, a detection tool to identify if incoming funds are tainted, tracing the tainted funds down to its origin.
- Andreessen Horowitz raises $450 million for a second crypto fund, aiming to invest more in Bitcoin and Ether.
- MakerDAO users file a class-action lawsuit against the Maker Foundation after losing funds on Black Thursday.
- ETH is just another way to say "OK computer", at $158, or ₿0.023.
In 2019:
- ETH updates its coordinates to $168, ₿0.03256.
In 2018:
- ETH steadily resides at $501, aka ₿0.06277.
In 2017:
- The DAO Ethereum Classic refund deadline gets extended.
- Geth v1.6 "Puppeth Master" is released.
- Storj talks about the migration to Ethereum and the opportunities that come with it.
- The Aragon whitepaper is released: "A digital jurisdiction for company incorporation".
- ETH drizzles from $50 to $47.7, fizzles from ₿0.04269 to ₿0.04081.
In 2016:
- Exosphere Academy announces an Ethereum Stream Development Course.
- EtherCamp launches Ethereum Studio IDE.
- ETH looks up from $8.1 to $8.4, driving from ₿0.01907 towards ₿0.01977.
u/Yeopaa shares a great personal story with thanks to this subreddit
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12d9ndu/daily_general_discussion_april_6_2023/jf7hy4w/)Hello ethfam,
I'm going to try not to drag this out. Those of you that know little bits of my life from what I've shared here know that I first entered the ethereum space at the beginning of covid. I was supposed to fly from Ireland to the Philippines to finally marry my long term girlfriend of 13 years when covid put a two year halt on it. For those two years I saved like a motherfucker and invested hard into eth and its ecosystem. Initially with a percentage of money that was for a wedding, then ramping up the DCAs more and more over time.
Last May I celebrated my marriage in the Philippines here with all of you. It was a long time in the making.
Three months ago, after a long and arduous (and expensive + paper heavy) process, my wife and I managed to secure a spousal visa for her to come live with me.
And that brings us to about an hour ago - after three days of literally no sleep I've secured a property here for us. I'm not exaggerating when I say in this timeframe none of this would have been remotely possible without this subreddit. Ethfinance is the flame that keeps my passion burning. A massive thanks to Arbitrum for that ridiculous airdrop also.
I'm proud to say that, thanks to this space, I will be flying out once more to the other side of the world next month for my 1 year anniversary, but this time my wife is finally coming back with me, with my surname, a secured visa and her name on a frankly beautiful and much too big property.
Thank you everyone. It's the next chapter for me. Now I can finally start planning for solo staking.
Keep 'er lit,
- Yeopaa.
https://i.ibb.co/n8XNjHX/IMG-0790.jpg (wedding photo)
u/696_eth introduces us to the ENS NameWrapper
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12eagbz/daily_general_discussion_april_7_2023/jfaaq5b/)ENS NameWrapper that has been in works for years is going to be activated soon (within 24ish), the vote has passed and there is a 2 day time lock.
There's so much untapped potential in it so I'm very excited. And there's already many cool apps that are building on top or utilizing ENS, maybe I'll write about them later, big part of them are still in beta phases or are relatively new and small.
But the one cool thing I wanted to share that might be really useful to you now is this:
so you can create a subdomain aka child, so let's say using mine as an example, evmaverick.696.eth
but what might not be intuitive is that you can create a subdomain of that subdomain!
and that's how we get - 337.evmaverick.696.eth (for context, 337 is my token ID of the lion)
and so on and on - 🦁.337.evmaverick.696.eth
Now you can just pick a domain (5 char+ for $5/y) and create subdomains for your vaults, your burner, hot and all other wallets while not paying any extra additional money since subdomains can be free, you only gotta renew your parent, which is 696.eth in my example. Of course, there's so much more options going to be available now cause of fuses (that's a big topic in itself).
u/FluffayPenguin has some critical wallet security advice
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12g9dz5/daily_general_discussion_april_9_2023/jfjkmym/)Same thing I told the other sub:
Don't rely on revokes
It's good to check your revokes regularly using revoke.cash, but you shouldn't be relying on them.
The SushiSwap hack is one of those cases where a hardware wallet wouldn't have saved you, and revoking would've been too late.
Using Minimum allowance is the Best Practice
The best practice is to approve ONLY the exact amount of tokens you needed to make a swap so that once your swap is complete, the allowance automatically goes back down to 0.
- For example, if you approve 300 tokens and swap 250 tokens, your allowance for a particular spender goes down from 300 to 50 tokens after the swap
- So if you approve of 300 tokens and swap exactly 300 tokens, the allowance goes down to 0 and that router can't spend anymore.
I know it sucks to make a new approvals on L1 Ethereum where gas fees are expensive. But on cheaper networks, you really have no excuse.
Fortunately, many newer tokens allow permits instead of revokes, which combines an approval and transfer into 1 transaction.
u/Diligent-Mouse3679 and u/SoNotYou cover the SushiSwap exploit that u/Maleficent_Plankton warned about
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12g9dz5/daily_general_discussion_april_9_2023/jfjc4ef/)u/Diligent-Mouse3679 covers the SushiSwap exploit:
There is a bug in the Sushiswap router that caused Sifu to get 1800 weth drained (a lot of it by white hats). https://twitter.com/peckshield/status/1644907207530774530
Revoke any approvals you have with the sushiswap router now. Addresses for the router on every chain are linked in this tweet:
https://twitter.com/0xngmi/status/1644921265843589120
u/SoNotYo covers Lido validator bribery during the hack:
https://twitter.com/P2Pvalidator/status/1645079096253112322
One of the Lido validator got a 689 ETH bribe during the Sushi exploit. Curious whats going to happen next. Are they going to return it? Should they return it? Where will you as a organisation set the line between 'fair MEV' and 'MEV theft'.
Curious to see what happens next. Expecting to see this spark a new debate about MEV and everything surrounding it.
Edit:
P2P response after become aware of it.
https://nitter.snopyta.org/P2Pvalidator/status/1645162865698000898
UPD: These MEV rewards are associated with the recent Sushi exploit. Like any Lido validator, P2P did not receive or manage the rewards, as they went to the Lido rewards vault. We are talking to Lido and Sushi teams to investigate the issue and explore potential solutions.
u/Maleficent_Plankton warned about this:
Someone from r/CC got 40K Moons stolen due to the SushiSwap exploit.
Sad to see that the thing I warned people about 6 months ago finally happened.
After RCPSwap and SushiSwap first launched, I noticed that 99% of users were setting unlimited approvals and warned the community about it.
Back then, there were no front-end revoke tools for Arbitrum Nova like revoke.cash, and Metamask's approval UI was less transparent, so I wrote a guide on how revoke manually using the Moons contract.
u/LogrisTheBard talked crypto with the family at Easter
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12h7qgo/daily_general_discussion_april_10_2023/jfnvog9/)I was talking with some family friends today for Easter brunch and, being polite, they asked me about some crypto topics. I ended up explaining the basics of lending in crypto which I'm going to paraphrase here. This is probably one of those things everyone here already knows but which might be useful if you ever need to explain this to someone outside this space.
There are three ways we facilitate lending in crypto today:
-
Overcollateralization. You post collateral worth more than what you're borrowing. In Tradfi this is basically the structure of every mortgage/car loan. You use the property you are buying as collateral for the mortgage itself. This works best for assets that are unlikely to sharply depreciate in value and put lenders underwater. In Defi, that property obviously doesn't hold so we add self-liquidating mechanisms to this system. If your collateral ever falls in value relative to your loan you forfeit the collateral to repay the debt automatically. We mostly use these loans for financial speculation or retaining price exposure to an asset while effectively selling some of it.
-
Flash Loans. We let you borrow as much money as you want on the condition that you have to repay it instantly. I find this is the most confusing one to people at face value but it makes sense to most people when explained in terms of originating mortgages. Again, mortgages are overcollateralized loans. Without flashloans there is a bit of a chicken and egg problem where without the loan you can't buy the property and without the property you can't get the loan. In Tradfi they have an intermediary facilitate this by effectively granting you a short term loan. In Defi, that's just involving an unnecessary middleman so we dispense with it.
-
Leverage. You can use 1 ETH to buy 3 ETH and exaggerated effects as the price goes up and down. This is similar to overcollateralized lending except we don't actually give you the 3 ETH. It's held in escrow by some contract so you can't run away with it. In the example above if your collateral falls by 1/3 in value you get margin called and liquidated. This is really no different than how it works on traditional brokerages. The main difference with Defi is while things like naked shorting are illegal in Tradfi brokerages, they are impossible in Defi.
That leads us to the last form of debt most people know: uncollateralized lending based on credit. While there are some teams experimenting with this, we just can't bootstrap these systems effectively until we solve the problem of accountability. IRL it is both difficult and illegal to set up multiple identities. On blockchains it is trivial and there is no such thing as the police. If I am willing to give an anonymous stranger $10 on credit I at least need to know that if they rug me they can only do that once. That at least means I can only get rugged 7 billion times. Identity theft and fraud are already a problem in Tradfi. In Defi, the problem is so much worse that what you take for granted with a credit card today can't even get started. We may see a Tradfi equivalent to credit systems on a blockchain once a government decides to build a system to certify an identity on chain and integrate their legal system with smart contracts for enforcement but we'd really like to see a more decentralized approach.
There are numerous advantages to eventually solving this problem on the blockchain. For people with existing access to credit, a technology called zero knowledge proofs adds privacy protection so Experion doesn't repeatedly leak your personal data to identity thieves. Next, is consumer choice: the market would be free to create a much wider array of credit score services rather than the regulatory captured monopolies we have today. Last, ironically is scalability; not in transaction throughput but in customers. Right now credit services are available to a minority of people, mostly in first world countries. If this becomes solved in Defi in a decentralized way it can be scaled to all of humanity rather than the limited countries credit services exist in today. This is where a company like Visa will actively get involved eventually because it is a Trillion dollar opportunity that will let them expand their user base.
These systems won't take root in Defi until we have a good system for proving an address belongs to someone and that they singularly claim that address for these credit systems. Once we have that we'll see a variety of credit score DAOs appear in short order. They will essentially act like competing underwriters but unlike Tradfi the performance of each will be public and every app will be free to choose whose opinion they respect and pay for.
I'm also still curious about alternative credit systems.
u/hanniabu has an OPSEC PSA for Mac users
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12h7qgo/daily_general_discussion_april_10_2023/jfqxxfd/)OPSEC PSA for Mac users
MacStealer arrives to target macOS systems as an unsigned disk image (.DMG) file. Users are manipulated to download and execute this file onto their systems. Once achieved, a bogus password prompts users in an attempt to steal their real password. MacStealer then saves the password in the affected system's temporary folder (TMP).
The malware then proceeds to collect and save the following also within the TMP folder:
- Account passwords, browser cookies, and stored credit card details in Firefox, Chrome, and Brave
- Cryptocurrency wallets (Binance, Coinomi, Exodus, Keplr Wallet, Martian Wallet, MetaMask, Phantom, Tron, Trust Wallet)
- Keychain database in its encoded (base64)form
- Keychain password in text format
- Various files (.TXT, .DOC, .DOCX, .PDF, .XLS, .XLSX, .PPT, .PPTX, .JPG, .PNG, .CVS, .BMP, .MP3, .ZIP, .RAR, .PY, .DB)
- System information in text form
MacStealer also compresses everything it stole in a ZIP file and sends it to remote C&C servers for the threat actor to collect later.
u/LeagueGreedy and u/etheraider announce EVMavericks withdrOWLs
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12i920r/daily_general_discussion_april_11_2023/jfsyhow/)u/etheraider and the EVMavs have done it again! We're creating another project similar to EIPandas to celebrate the Shapella hardfork! There are 3240 owls from 20 powlyments minting on Arbitrum for 0.00324 ETH, or 0.0019 ETH for the allOWList https://www.autominter.com/list/withdrowls We plan to hold a virtual mint party using oncyber so we can show off the artwork gallery style. The mint button will even be embedded into the virtual room!
Proceeds will fund the next EVMaverick public goods project. I know there's someone out there with an idea here that deserves funding!
We had a lot of fun using the beta of AutoMinter's new AI Art Generator for this collection! I had so much fun making this project that I'm raffling away 5 of my EIPandas to those who can use their referral link to get 5 friends onto the list!
And of course, thank you so much to the ethfinance community. I gravitated here when I was new to crypto because of the high level discussion. I "earned" my Maverick asking questions here knowing I could always get an informative response. I probably would have lost all my money to shitcoins without this subreddit, but thanks to y'all I'm staking and having the time of my life making AI owls.
As u/LeagueGreedy mentioned we are excited to celebrate Shapellowl with you!
To commemorate we've created "Withdrowls!"
They are intended to be fun, punny, celebratory NFTs for the community, AND as a special treat MANY members of our communities (ethfinanciers, daily dooters & EVM's) will have their own personalized punny owl name in the metadata to be "their own withdrowl" as a special little sentiment to commemorate the momentous occasion.
Bob-Rowlssi, swagtimusprowl, owlexiskef anyone?? :P u/Bob-Rossi, u/alexiskef , u/swagtimusprime
ALL funds (100% of mint & royalties) from the Withdrowls will go towards funding the NEXT public goods project after rocketschool anyone in our community wants to create!
We thought this would be a great way to incentivize people that have an idea to start building and to get people excited and involved in creating public goods/doing something new AND get funded for it!
Check out the Allowl list for additional details! Mint will be .0019 for allowlist and .00324 for public and will be on arbitrum for low fees!
Looking forward to all the Shapellowl celebrations! Will definitely be a hoot ;)
https://twitter.com/Withdrowls/status/1645807814957486082
Edit: if you don’t have Twitter and want to be on the list just dm me your public eth address and I’ll add you to the allowl list!
u/Ethical-trade talks about Ultra Sound things
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12i920r/daily_general_discussion_april_11_2023/jft3t1h/)Just stumbled upon a comment I made a few months ago in here:
"Any day could end up being the day there's been the most eth in existence ever."
Happened to be posted less than 10 days from the peak on October 8.
Ether's supply has been going down since October 8.
Checking ultrasound.money has become part of my daily routine even though no new information is really to be expected, I just find it soothing to look at, to marvel at. The Ethereum community has really created something never seen before: a system with a security that's economically self sufficient.
I truly regret that the mainstream understanding of inflation is "price of things goes up" instead of what it truly is: "value of fiat goes down". This simple switch in mental model would be incredibly useful for the masses to realize some of the biggest and inherent problems with the current system.
And at the same time, it would be incredibly useful to understand what's so special with eth.
It's been 208 days since the merge and there's been a net burn of more than 82,000 eth. During a bear market (or well, an eternal crab, hail). Total supply is now 120,438,242 eth, and it's clear we'll end up below 120,000,000 sooner or later.
Since the merge deflation has been accelerating. But what will this look like during a bull market? When usage, euphoria, and greed go parabolic? When the supply is inversely proportional to the mania?
Witnessing the supply chart take a vertical dive will be absolutely glorious for sure.
We'll soon visit the abyss.
u/bagogel12 shares the end of the Euler saga
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12jan7l/daily_general_discussion_april_12_2023/jfxfp0w/)For those who had some funds on Euler:
Redemptions are live: https://twitter.com/eulerfinance/status/1645964057239855104
This it how the Euler exploiter saga ends.
When the exploit happened a month ago, I would not have expected that we'd reach this step, all the funds I deployed there I've written off. The Euler saga is a unique story, full of drama and in my case a happy end.
Those who deployed via a smart contract (e.g. aztec users) need some more patience as those affected users can't claim directly.
Happy Shapella Day and stay safe out there, fellow Ethfinancers!
Week #14: April 7, 2023
No stream | No POAP
The morning trinity
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12eagbz/comment/jfa6bd1/)crickets
$1877
0.067
Shitpost of the week: u/Tricky_Troll
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/128bsd0/daily_general_discussion_april_1_2023/jei7t41/)Woah, did someone just exploit a vulnerability in the ERC-20 standard itself???!!! I am seeing a cascade of the largest ERC-20s like USDT and LINK getting all funds sent to 0x36c9aFAkE324b…. On etherscan.
Meanwhile other ERC-20s like DAI and USDC have frozen transfers in response. I’m impressed with their reaction times to be honest.
What sort of impact could this have on other EVM based blockchains like BNB? It seems like it will be a scramble for ethical exploiters to take funds before actual hackers do.
Anyway, no doubt April is wasting no time in showing how chaotic things can get on the 1st!
^(Sorry guys, surely I’m allowed to live up to my username just once a year!)
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/129amhp/comment/jepuyjr/)Network you can't sever,
Open-source is too clever,
Will last forever.
Today in Ethereum: u/ZeroTricks
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12eagbz/daily_general_discussion_april_7_2023/jfcpuxw/)On this day...
In 2022:
- ETH proves to be a solid base for many coins, at $3234, or ₿0.07432.
In 2021:
- Vitalik Buterin demystifies the technical properties of sharding.
- Ari Juels sees Front-Running-as-a-Service as theft.
- The Meta-Witnesses subprotocol from Trinity and Nethermind reduces Beam Sync to 80 seconds.
- Polygon announces M-Setu, a proof-of-concept of a bridge for enterprises to interoperate with Ethereum, built together with Infosys Consulting.
- ETH jokingly whispers about $2118, $1971, ₿0.03641 and ₿0.03517.
In 2020:
- The Teku Eth2 client from PegaSys syncs with the Lighthouse testnet.
- OpenLaw explains how to create a bankless DAO.
- Italy’s main news agency ANSA launches Ethereum-based news tracking system ANSAcheck.
- ETH dodges mullets from $170 to $165, at ₿0.02301.
In 2019:
- Nothing etheresting happens from $166 to $175, at ₿0.03362.
In 2018:
- Chile’s national energy regulation organization, Comisión Nacional de Energía de Chile, launches an Ethereum-based pilot for recording data from the energy sector.
- ETH turns greener than grass from $370 to $385, at ₿0.05593.
In 2017:
- Buterin asks how Ethereum Research can be more welcoming to newcomers.
- ETH triangulates at $42.2, or ₿0.03592.
u/hanniabu shares a new scam to watch out for, Stakereum
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/126c8nf/daily_general_discussion_march_30_2023/je8qzit/)Beware of the new Stakereum project, it's a legit scam.
From kanewallmann (Rocket Pool dev):
the docs have all these big words to sound smart but it makes no sense, they are legit scamming ppl with this
you go through their instructions and the last step is to send 32 ETH to an address that they've generated
Spread the warning:
https://twitter.com/ethStaker/status/1641322321024524289
https://nitter.snopyta.org/ethStaker/status/1641322321024524289
u/DeFiRobot arrives with all of your daily DeFi news in one place
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/126c8nf/daily_general_discussion_march_30_2023/je9rvs7/)DeFi News - March 30, 2023
- Introducing Notional V3: link
- Nuon introduces first "flat coin": link
- $ACID - the "growth driver of ETH": link
- Deepdive Composable Stable Pools : link
- Liquidity Book and AMM Design: A Comprehensive Guide: link
- Kwenta: link
- dYdX v4 and MEV: link
- Current state of rollup MEV on Arbitrum: link
- MEV Series Part II: Understanding Order Flow Extractable Value: link
- Full MEVconomics playlist: link
I made a bot that parses DeFi news + Security updates and posts them on reddit. I don't have enough comment karma to make separate threads, so I'll post them as comments in the daily general threads for now :)
u/0xdefiant introduces himself to the sub and shares his project idea!
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/127app5/daily_general_discussion_march_31_2023/jefgnli/)gm r/ethfinance, I had the chance to talk with u/jtnichol yesterday, pretty outstanding guy. He told me to intro myself here and share an idea I have.
My name is Anthony Garrett— I’m a college student at Gonzaga and I started Bankless Advisor in the Bankless DAO, a platform to connect financial advisors and clients, but we're in need of a pivot-- the idea I have is an app.My vision for a BA app is to create a web3 directory for users to send trade proposals to each other. Each account is a web3 wallet for users to trade and comment on other trades. Our market fit would start with the Bankless community and college students (SPAWN).However, my long-term vision for the BA app: We allow users to import their data from other social media networks to their web3 wallet and build smart contracts that pool users data to connect ad buyers to users.
I believe that this project has the potential to do good for the world, and the way we value our data, but I need a passionate dev team to bring this thing to life. So here I am looking for any advice, any groups that you think align with this vision, or anyone who is looking to help. (or if this idea sounds psychotic, I'm open to anything).
I'm just a young self taught front end dev (that get's a lot of help from chat-gpt), but I have experience building trade proposal tech for financial advisors at Defi Steward. Also, I have written further about this decentralized data model in the BA substack (not an advertisement, but here is a link).
If you have read this far and have ANY comments or suggestions as a start this journey I am all ears.
- Thanks, AG
u/Ender985 has the latest from the NFT world
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/127app5/daily_general_discussion_march_31_2023/jedxqmn/)Meanwhile, in the NFT-verse..
Found this interesting development: a real estate agency sold off 20% of a house being rented in Texas, using NTFs as ownership shares.
The property was valued at $235k, NFTs represented $100 of ownership (minimum buy was 5 NFTs, would have been easier to just make $500 NFTs..). In total, $45,600 was raised by the sale to 38 investors, who will then get their fractional part of the rent.
Estimating $1500 rent per month (not in TX so I have no idea of what prices look like over there), that would mean each $100 NFT share accrues $0.65 per month, so a median of $7.8 to each of the 38 investors.
Given these small numbers, the company decided to run this experiment on Solana, citing gas fees in ETH as a deterrent, and bridging difficulties in L2s like Polygon. Let's hope for these investors that when rent is due, the Solana network is still up :)
u/WILL_DANCE_FOR_COINS shares Bukele's latest pro technology move
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/128bsd0/daily_general_discussion_april_1_2023/jeikiv5/)"Next week, I’ll be sending a bill to congress to eliminate all taxes (income, property, capital gains and import tariffs) on technology innovations, such as software programming, coding, apps and AI development; as well as computing and communications hardware manufacturing." - Nayib Bukele
Bill sent: https://twitter.com/nayibbukele/status/1641889140273827848
Tax free staking?
(Would like an English version if available!)
u/Tricky_Troll shares u/Set1Less's post covering the Arbitrum situation
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/129amhp/daily_general_discussion_april_2_2023/jemowor/)People were discussing u/Set1Less's post from yesterday in r/CC about the Arbitrum DAO drama but we can't directly link to r/CC because the mods there ban you for it. Surprisingly nobody copied a transcript so it's probably gone a bit under the radar in this sub. So here I am, shamelessly transcribing u/Set1Less's post.
So Arbitrum distributed tokens last week and as per their tokenomics, it seemed that the team and VC allocation is locked for a year.
Well, they just made a proposal to grant themselves another 750 Million ARB tokens, worth almost $1 Billion from the DAO. They claim its for an "Administrative Budget Wallet". In reality, it looks like a blatant cash grab. Its the first governance proposal and they aren't even trying to be subtle about siphoning funds out.
Administrative Budget Wallet proposal
Under the disguise of operational and administrative efficiency, they are seeking to transfer 750 million tokens from the DAO to their own pockets, from which they will make "special grants" and what nots.
In crypto, these things almost entirely mean cashing out for real world riches. We have seen thousands of examples of teams cashing out treasury funds. In Arbitrum's case, since the team and VC token allocations are locked, they are creating this new channel of funding which they can splurge on while their actual allocations remain locked.
Some groups have already raised alarm against this blatant cash grab.
Blockworks Research is voting against this.
These 750M tokens were supposed to be part of the treasury but now seemingly lay under the centralized control of 3 individuals.
I hate to say it, but these kind of shady activities actually make people like Gensler right - by using shady structures from Cayman Islands, under the disguise of "DAO", they are staging a standard insider dumping scam where the team dumps token without any transparency while pretending their original allocations are locked.
Update: Apparently it seems that even before this vote has passed, Arbitrum team has already moved 40m ARB tokens to a new wallet, and then started distributing them to child wallets, and it appears from the transactions that millions have been already sent to Binance .
Transactions: https://arbiscan.io/token/0x912ce59144191c1204e64559fe8253a0e49e6548?a=0xb3f923eabaf178fc1bd8e13902fc5c61d3ddef5b
These tokens were supposed to be "locked" but it appears they are not locked, but rather being sent to Binance (presumably to dump).
This is looking like a rug pull of sorts. As we see very often in crypto, plain old fashioned greed and fraud kills everything.
Due to the drama, most delegates are now voting against the proposal. You can follow the vote results here: https://snapshot.org/#/arbitrumfoundation.eth/proposal/0x3be7368a662d1cf12fa4da768d626edbc013be0dc7b994fef2e24d9a54e4033a
u/Bob-Rossi shares their thoughts as an ARB delegate
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/129amhp/daily_general_discussion_april_2_2023/jeppfhd/)I guess a smidge late considering the threads yesterday and today, but obviously I want to post on it since I'm an ARB delegate for a decent chunk of people here.
First, I want to speak to AIP-1 as it stands on it's own as I think it's important for those delegating to get a feel for what I stand for. So for a second, let's ignore the now known issue at hand and presume the Arbitrum Foundation had not moved tokens yet / or I had voted before this was know. Maybe a pointless excercise at this point, but I find it important.
I would have still voted "against" in this case, with request for the AIP to be broken into smaller pieces.
I agree strongly with the first set of a DAO's AIPs being about setting ground rules for the DAO moving forward, especially with one as large as this. Not having a formal process in place can lead to disaster (ominous!), so this is important. However, I'm against trying to lump in too much at once. The obvious one is the 750M ARB to the Foundation Admin Budget, however frankly things like squeezing in a very loosely defined "Special Grants" process aren't a great idea either. Those are things that need fleshed out in their own debates / AIPs. It feels like those are things the foundation would assume would be controversial, but hoped to squeeze through due to the need for the overall framework taking priority. This AIP should have been broken into about 3 or 4 separate things.
Now, with that said and as it stands now, I'm obviously still continuing with my 'Against' vote. The issue I had before has only been exacerbated by moving funds before the vote. In reading comments on this daily thread and it seems that the community is largely asking for an "Against" vote as well, so I have an obligation to honor that within my duties as a delegate. Although honestely it does feel moot at this point given recent events... Others have surely said it better, but the fundamental issue is we can't accept funds being moved without DAO approval or else what is the point of this process? It should be interesting to see what happens now that we have a scenario where funds have been moved without approval from the DAO. Something I doubt will be resolved cleanly, as even before this was found out I was seeing forum pushback on the amount. I question if it will ever pass even upon a presumed rework / revote.
A final note, those who are delegating to me I don't blame you if this has soured the process... this has been sort of a smack in the face to me as well.
Repost Note: Ah crap, reposting below as I forgot about the auto-banning of links... I compiled the links on caches - https://caches.xyz/forums/discussion/r-ethfinance-arbitrum-delegate-thread
u/KuDeTa and u/_etherium cover the fascinating MEV exploit
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12aa0sa/daily_general_discussion_april_3_2023/jes0qwu/)There was a fascinating MEV "exploit" this morning to the tune of about $20mil dollars as a result in flaw in how mev-boost relays communicate with validators. There is some discussion below in the daily, and here is a good summary: https://twitter.com/samczsun/status/1642848556590723075
The relay fix to prevent this happening again is here (flashbots/mev-boost-relay#330). This does has some significant side effects, the biggest of which is that ~10 sets of relay beacon nodes are now responsible for propagating all new blocks. Our ([u/austonst(https://reddit.com/u/austonst)) relay (https://aestus.live) was taken offline for builders as soon as we became aware of the threat and will update before we come online again. Never a dull day in ethereum.
It's been patched, just waiting for a release to be cut.
https://twitter.com/metachris/status/1642862456556130306
From reading this, the issue has been mitigated and was caused by a bad relay that was gamed. From my undestanding -
Before:
- Relay sends validator the header (withholds block so not to get frontrun) for signature, but the block is invalid.
- Validator signs header
- Relay sends validator the block
- Relay attempts to publish the block but cannot because it is invalid.
- Validator selects the top half of each sandwich from inside the block and MEVs them by putting their own tx in a different proposed block
- No race between the two blocks because the relay block is invalid.
- Validator gets slashed for 1ETH afterwards, walks away with $20M.
After:
Step 4 and step 3 are reversed. And Relay does not send the block if it cannot publish it first.
Edit: fixed slashing comment, slashed later.
u/troyboltonislife makes a Baselined Paul Brody appreciation post
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12aa0sa/daily_general_discussion_april_3_2023/jeusj9t/)Paul Brody has single handedly given me faith in Ethereum as a serious technology again. I’ve been out of the game for about a year but just listened to his episode on bankless and I’m stupid bullish again. Fuck your monkey pictures and yield farming, enterprise and supply chain management will be huge. Tokenize everything
u/logic_beach shares the upcoming POAP.art Shapella livestream!
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12b9hj4/daily_general_discussion_april_4_2023/jexqijq/)Greetings, fellow Ethereans!
We're excited to announce the upcoming Ethereum "Shapella" upgrade, Shanghai on the execution layer and Capella on the consensus layer!
This significant milestone introduces withdrawals for staked ETH as well as other upgrades. More info: (https://blog.ethereum.org/2023/03/28/shapella-mainnet-announcement)
To celebrate the upgrade, EthStaker is hosting a livestream event that will bring our amazing community together. And as a special treat, we're inviting all of you to join us in creating a massive collaborative art piece during the event on a special POAP.art canvas! 🎨
Info:
Who? You! And your whole community! (tell your friends!)
What? Shanghai/Capella "Shapella" Upgrade livestream and POAP.art party.
When? April 12th, paint party starts at 9:30 PM UTC, Ethstaker livestream starts at 10 (30 minutes later)
Where? https://app.poap.art/ and. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nszB0ZZQrys
How? Anyone can watch the livestream, To join the paint party: hold an eligible entry POAP (check the poap.art page to see if you hold one), or claim the event POAP. [https://checkout.poap.xyz/d39e3416-a26f-41aa-bbca-2ee87781ffea/]
Why? Great fun and exposure for your community!
Spread the word, invite your friends, and let's make this the most memorable Ethereum upgrade celebration ever! See you at the livestream!
u/LogrisTheBard prepared an enthralling introductory paragraph for newcomers
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12b9hj4/daily_general_discussion_april_4_2023/jey1oe3/)How do you think this would resonate to someone outside of our space?
The internet and information age fundamentally changed how humans interact. Before the internet, blogs were called newspapers, politics & entertainment came through cable TV, and social media was the local bar or a town hall.
Today, there is a quieter, second revolution of the information age taking place. Once again, we are reimagining how humans interact. Just as with the rise of the computers and the internet this new frontier is ripe with opportunity.
The ideas that have captured the minds of these participants may sound as unlikely to you as the internet systems we take for granted today would have in 1990. Eventually this revolution is likely to affect everything money can touch just as the internet did for information. These tools will democratize access to opportunities previously withheld from you and control over these systems will flow to a new generation of tech enthusiasts like Bill Gates and Steve Jobs. Billionaires are already being born of this.
Keep reading and I will introduce you to the new digital scarcity and human coordination tools powering this revolution. I will carve out a landscape of opportunity for you to explore further and help keep you safe while doing so.
Money shapes the world. We are programming our values into our money. By doing so we are reshaping the world.
u/austonst covers the post-mortem on the MEV exploit
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12c90ok/daily_general_discussion_april_5_2023/jf0ppeq/)A post-mortem has been published about the mev-boost-relay incident a few days ago. The attack has been covered here before. But the post-mortem has more details, particularly about the different forms the attack can take, and the mitigations applied.
In general relays are now addressing a whole category of attacks that had been previously overlooked, in which the proposer is able to get access to the transactions in a block to be proposed before they're supposed to. Generally this results in the proposer getting slashed but the MEV can more than make up for it. Attacks include:
- The original form of the attack, in which the proposer signs and submits an invalid block, which the relay accepts, returning the tx contents and giving the proposer a chance to modify bundles as they see fit. Patched (but with some potential side-effects).
- A follow-up to the first form. After the patch, the relay won't return the tx's directly, but a savvy attacker could try to peer a beacon client as close as possible to the relay's nodes, and watch for the block as it begins to propagate around the network. If they can very quickly grab it, modify bundles, create a new block, and use a fast block distribution network to propagate it faster than the original, they might be able to pull off a similar attack. Not entirely solved, still an open question about how to make sure relays will always win the race.
- A form of multi-block attack; /u/t0bii just about figured this one out. If a validator has two slots in a row, then in slot 1 they deliberately call getPayload late, knowing that they're going to miss the slot. But the relay still reveals the tx's, and since slot 1 is going to be missed, the proposer can modify the bundles and instead include them in slot 2, stealing all the value. Patched, but it's not a perfect fix and may have some serious side effects.
I assume that now that the post-mortem is out, the people more involved in the fixes (Flashbots, ultra sound, EF) are fairly confident that the main attack vectors are decently well patched up. So hopefully things will start to settle down a bit: it's been a busy couple of days at Aestus.
Finally, I want to emphasize a few parts of the post-mortem:
It is critical that Ethereum has an MEV marketplace that is democratic and efficient. Vulnerabilities like those detailed in this post undermine the integrity of the MEV marketplace and the experience of its users. We call on the security, research, and open source communities to join us in hardening mev-boost and future enshrined PBS designs.
and
First, we’d like to note mev-boost and the mev-boost-relay both have bug bounty programs. A potentially expanded bug bounty program is being coordinated.
Second, we encourage searchers to think carefully about how much MEV their strategies expose, willingly or inadvertently, given the extremely adversarial nature of the MEV market and to take actions to mitigate potential attacks. In light of recent events, we ask searchers to reevaluate all risks in the marketplace: code risks, networking risks, reorg risks, smart contract risks, etc. and manage their risks appropriately.
Third, we call on the research and security community to carefully study vulnerabilities like these in the context of enshrined PBS, where variants may be applicable.
Finally, this is a call for your contributions, as a community, to ensure a healthy and robust PBS market today and into the future
u/gethwethreth has a call to arms for all staking node operators!
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/12c90ok/daily_general_discussion_april_5_2023/jf2m4bn/)Please volunteer if you are a validator or a beacon node operator
There have been some legitimate stakers whose keys have been compromised. CLWP has helped verify their legitimacy and came up with a solution to set withdrawal address and front run the hackers. We need your help. Hackers might be trying to set their own withdrawal address for the stolen validators and you can help prevent theft during the upcoming Shapella launch. By volunteering with CLWP, you can help in a coordinated broadcasting of withdrawal address changes, and ensure that the impacted stakers funds are not stolen. For details on becoming a CLWP volunteer, please watch this video -
It’s really not that complicated. It just takes a few minutes of your time and is needed right now, before the Shapella launch to help the impacted stakers! You can also get one on one assistance on their Discord if needed - https://discord.gg/pwuPA6K4zg
Edit - this works for Prysm, Lighthouse and Lodestar. Teku and Nimbus does not support this
Week #13: March 31, 2023
No stream | No POAP
The return of Mister_Eth
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/127app5/comment/jedg0ge/)muerehtE
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/125dn51/daily_general_discussion_march_29_2023/je6ytrs/)VPN to jail,
Regulation set to fail,
Blockchain jobs to sail.
Today in Ethereum: u/ZeroTricks
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/127app5/daily_general_discussion_march_31_2023/jee7saa/)On this day...
In 2022:
- In "Five ducking digits", Arthur Hayes gets rid of all his previous scepticism on Ethereum, and explains his believe Ether is an infinite duration bond.
- The EU Parliament votes on privacy-busting crypto rules, forcing KYC regulations on all transactions and self-custodial wallets.
- After high-profile hacks via Poly Network, Wormhole and Ronin bridges, pseudotheos concludes cross-chain technology is a dead-end, with the future being mostly secured on Ethereum with rollups, or multi-chain.
- Yield market protocol Element Finance launches the Element DAO, with a privacy-preserving zk-proof based token distribution to Ethereum Core Devs and DeFi ecosystem projects.
- In "Get Smart on Smart Contract Platforms", Grayscale compares Ethereum to New York City: "it is vast, expensive, and congested in certain areas, but also features the richest application ecosystem with over 500 apps that command a total value of over $100 Billion".
- Zachary Holden explains the BoredBunnyNFT slow rug pull and breaks down where the 6339 ETH went.
- Commercial MakerDAO-powered lender 6s Capital closes a $7.8M real estate financing deal for Tesla.
- ETH explores the curvature between $3386 and $3282, at ₿0.07207.
In 2021:
- Aave starts exploring new scalability frontiers by integrating Ethereum's sidechain Polygon.
- OpenSea plans to integrate Layer 2 protocol Immutable X.
- 1 in 4 Ethereum miners is onboarded to MEV-reaping flashbots.
- Yearn Finance presents Coordinape, a decentralized payroll management system for DAOs.
- Flashbots explores MEV on Eth2: "MEV will significantly boost validator rewards but may reinforce inequalities among participants".
- ETH industrialises $1849 into $1918, ₿0.03135 into ₿0.03256.
In 2020:
- Aditya Asgaonkar explains Casper FFG.
- ETH2 multi-client testnet Schlesi goes live, with Prysm and Lighthouse as first active clients.
- The Ethereum Foundation kicks off the Eth2.0 Spec bug bounty.
- Blockchain game MLB Champions removes Ethereum as its base layer, in favour of MongoDB.
- ETH's lenses are multi-focal at $134 and ₿0.02075.
In 2019:
- DaiPrice.info displays stats to find best prices for Dai.
- Lane Rettig asserts that if decisions cannot be rendered on things like ProgPoW and funds recovery then there is zero chance of having nice things like Eth1x and Eth2.
- ETH investigates $142 and ₿0.03453.
In 2018:
- r/ethtrader switches to ZWD as the official currency, ETH still counts $396, or ₿0.05718.
In 2017:
- OKCoin is rumoured to list ETH "at the appropriate time".
- Ethereum gets quantum computing support with new EVM opcode 'TERMINATE' that facilitates new compute operations not previously possible.
- Golem now runs on Mac OS.
- 1 ETH is worth half a Benjamin at $50, from ₿0.04978 to ₿0.04667.
u/KingLeo23 shares Coinbase's new lobbying petition to sign
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11zaqp2/daily_general_discussion_march_23_2023/jdf17wv/)Coinbase new lobbying org using snapshot for individuals to sign on to an open letter to congress: https://snapshot.org/#/crypto435.eth/proposal/0xf9628ebee2878f5667aa018537eda2266c085d58772bd6ee562899189657c07e
Edit: more info here
u/juxtanotherposition is giving a presentation on blockchain
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11zaqp2/daily_general_discussion_march_23_2023/jdfrbn1/)Hey all. I’m giving a presentation on blockchain, Wordpress, and community tomorrow at WordCamp Phoenix. Live stream link on the homepage: https://phoenix.wordcamp.org/2023/
EVMs, r/ethfinance, hodlercon, caches.xyz will all be talked about! Wish me luck!
Edit: link to my topic https://phoenix.wordcamp.org/2023/session/blockchains-and-wordpress-leveraging-decentralization-for-a-more-user-first-community-driven-and-open-web/
u/superphiz shares the latest EthStaker education program
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11zaqp2/daily_general_discussion_march_23_2023/jdcjzuo/)I imagine a lot of people here are interested in keeping up with staking on Ethereum but don't have a ton of time to invest.. I think we have a good system that will help you stay informed about staking in about one minute a day: We're creating one minute clips from our content and posting them as YouTube shorts and on our Twitter. I'd suggest turning on notifications for the EthStaker Twitter and checking them out when it's convenient for you to click.
Right now the clips are covering the goerli Shapella fork, tomorrow they'll include the Lodestar call that's happening today, and around April 1 they'll begin preparing everyone for the mainnet Shapella upgrade maybe with a highlight of previous major upgrade calls.
I sincerely believe these short-form clips will take EthStaker's education reach to the next level and I hope you find value in them.
u/Syentist shares an article on the dangerous precedent by the Signature bank fiasco
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/120axdk/daily_general_discussion_march_24_2023/jdgwn51/)Here's another one: Barney Frank Was Right About Signature Bank. Written by the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal
Free-market capitalism can't work if you are afraid of the government seizing your business in the middle of the night because a secret cabal of politicians didn't like your law abiding business. And it looks like Wall Street is slowly waking up to this unprecedented authoritarian shift by the Biden administration.
Today it was a bank serving crypto. Tomorrow it is a bank which has labour unions as it's customer base, or a bank which provides services to medical companies that include abortion services, or a company which was not ESG friendly enough, or a company which spoke too loudly and too brashly about the President. Seize em in the middle of the night and fire the leadership board and auction off the assets. Hopefully civic society makes enough noise about this and it's not too late to close the Pandora's box that Biden's staff opened.
u/RooftopPortaPotty is back to educate us more on AI
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/121cklf/daily_general_discussion_march_25_2023/jdmej6s/)Ive posted a bit about exploiting Large Language Models (such as GPT) before, but Im back with more. Even if you have no interest in this, I believe its important to have an understanding of how the data you input in these kinds of systems can later be used against you.
Definitely start by reading https://blog.forcesunseen.com/jailbreaking-llm-chatgpt-sandboxes-using-linguistic-hacks. Then proceed to https://doublespeak.chat/ to apply these concepts.
As of my last post, there were 9 challenges. Forces Unseen more recently released this reflective post https://blog.forcesunseen.com/llm-sandboxing-early-lessons-learned along with 8 new challenges available at https://doublespeak.chat.
For a demonstration of how language-based exploitation may be combined with traditional computer exploitation, https://blog.luitjes.it/posts/injectgpt-most-polite-exploit-ever/ is ridiculously hilarious.
https://protectai.com/blog/hacking-ai-system-takeover-exploit-in-mlflow reveals a local file inclusion(LFI) which can lead to complete takeover of systems running MLFlow. This has been patched.
Trail of Bits has long been a leader in infosec research and auditing. https://blog.trailofbits.com/2023/03/14/ai-security-safety-audit-assurance-heidy-khlaaf-odd/ 'We Need a New Way to Measure AI Security' is an interesting read.
https://blog.trailofbits.com/2023/03/22/codex-and-gpt4-cant-beat-humans-on-smart-contract-audits/ 'Codex (and GPT-4) can’t beat humans on smart contract audits' offers a much deeper dive into this subject.
And in case this has post not been related enough to Ethereum, by chance I just found this article https://blog.trailofbits.com/2023/02/27/reusable-properties-ethereum-contracts-echidna/ 'Reusable Properties for Ethereum Contracts'.
EDIT: Just noticed that doublespeak.chat limits the # of queries you can make before having to purchase more. If anyone defeats the Count of Monte Cristo, Id love a second hint haha
u/tutamtumikia looks back at all the projects they have invested in over the past few years
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/122blya/daily_general_discussion_march_26_2023/jdrr166/)Well, I took a good hard look at everything I had put money into in this space over the past 3 years. When I boiled it all down almost all of it seems to fall into the category of a project run by naive people, run by scammers, or artsy crap that I enjoy but should never have spent so much money on.
Some of defi protocols I tinkered with make me feel so stupid now.
Here's one. Tokemak. To this day I still don't quite understand it all. I popped into their Discord and the team is spending over a half million dollars a month on basically nothing. $35k+ in one month on "Marketing and Community". At what point do you just outright call projects like this total grifts?
It's not that it's the only one either. It's a landscape of just gross misbehaviour, scams, and projects run by people who have NO IDEA what they are doing.
I am SO glad that I only played around in the Defi and NFT ecosystem with total fun money, and left my real stack staked away. I clearly had no business sticking my nose in any of that stuff.
There are a couple decent projects out there, but I feel pretty discouraged about the entire space today. Maybe having my eth unlocked soon is a good thing :(
u/juxtanotherposition has some under the radar mainstream adoption
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/123c10y/daily_general_discussion_march_27_2023/jdwqpz8/)Future mainstream adoption alert:
Likely for the first time ever, an (unofficial) POAP was created for a WordCamp this last weekend at WordCamp Phoenix 2023.
If unfamiliar, WordCamps are WordPress' event series that any group of volunteers can create anywhere in the world and get support from the non-profit WordPress Foundation. WordPress powers over 40% of all websites on the internet. 👀
I was the only blockchain-focused speaker (talk description) and it was very well received, including by individuals higher up the food-chain and from Wordpress.com itself. The experience has helped clarify for me what lacks and can be done in this particular space, and how I can help. Much more to come from me on this soon.
P.S. the POAP wasn't finalized until the day after my talk, so don't be misled by my finalizing comments about it.
u/Tricky_Troll spotted an EthFinancier in the wild spreading the good word
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/123c10y/daily_general_discussion_march_27_2023/jdv15xf/)Wow. An r/Technology post where someone not jumping on the crypto hate bandwagon got upvoted into the thousands of upvotes! The post was about Nvidia claiming crypto has no use case. They of course say this now that Ethereum has moved to proof of stake and that’s exactly what the user said. Naturally, beneath this someone questioned what that meant. Then the top response there was a spot on comment. As soon as I read it I thought to myself “that’s gotta be an ethfinancier.” And what do you know, I look up to see u/Atyzze a name I recognised.
Every last one of you who are still spreading the good word in other subs get every last drop of my appreciation. It’s tough work out there…
u/pr0nh0li0 shares CoinCenter's coverage of the very alarming RESTRICT act
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/125dn51/daily_general_discussion_march_29_2023/je4xyl9/)We've had a little bit of discussion here regarding the RESTRICT Act, which is the legislation drafted with the pretty explicit intent of banning TikTok if necessary. Coincenter just put up a great post about how it's broad language is problematic. The rub:
we are very concerned that an overbroad interpretation of those powers could be exploited in order to ban Americans from using entire classes of technologies, even when no foreign adversary has an actual proprietary interest in the technology as a whole
A big problem they highlight is that while there's already similar legislation that allows the government to block foreign transactions that are against the national interest (RESTRICT grants the powers to the Secretary of Commerce much like the IEEPA grants powers to OFAC), this law as far fewer oversite and review protections, which is particularly problematic for legislation that provides such broad authority:
A broad and discretionary power to ban and disrupt all manner of information technologies should not be wielded without appropriate oversight and opportunity for review. The RESTRICT Act not only fails to ensure these rule of law protections, in many cases it attempts to subvert them.
This problem perhaps clearest when one observes that the IEEPA had amendments (the Berman Amendments) added that act as statutory protections for free speech, but RESTRICT has no such protections/limitations:
Courts have found that the Berman Amendments, in effect, save the statute from potential unconstitutional applications. When plaintiffs challenge a sanctions designation that impacts speech, they can argue that OFAC exceeded its statutory power by contravening the Berman Amendments, rather than making the somewhat more difficult but also more consequential argument that IEEPA, the statute itself, contravenes the Constitution.
In contrast, the RESTRICT Act has no such statutory limitation. Indeed it is deliberately targeted at restraining transactions related to information and information technologies.
A lot of other good stuff in there about how it could impact Crypto directly as well (e.g. that the Secretary could "argue that the entire class of all Bitcoin transactions, for example, is a class of transactions in which U.S. foreign adversaries have an interest" and should be banned), but all that is to say: call your representatives and tell them they should not support this bill.
u/austonst has the latest development in the MEV relay ecosystem
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/125dn51/daily_general_discussion_march_29_2023/je76vss/)The Blockswap folks have released their Proof of Neutrality relay on Goerli and provided some documentation. I've been following their project for a while, the ideas are interesting. If it works, it's actually quite a large step forward in terms of PBS design. They claim relays cannot see the contents of blocks, there's a MEV smoothing pool built in, and (like the optimistic submissions being deployed by the ultra sound relay and elsewhere) relays don't have to perform validation before sending a block on. Builders instead post collateral to be used in case they try anything funny.
But while the ultra sound relay's system has the relay operator holding the collateral themselves, the PoN system is integrated into smart contracts with third party reporters acting as oracles to detect violations and penalize offending actors accordingly. All in all it's potentially (remains to be seen) an improvement over the current system
I don't find their documentation to be very complete (or even accurate?), and their recently-published GitHub repos contains a fork of mev-boost-relay without attribution to Flashbots or a proper commit history. And the actual meat of the system, centered around Restrictive Partially Blind Signatures, is closed source and undocumented so far. It's also concerning that their proposer guide has you input your keystore.json and enter your password (?!). They've confirmed to me that it's only used locally (not uploaded) to prove that you control the validators you're registering, but this is not the way to do it.
It's something to keep an eye on if you're following the cutting edge of MEV and block production stuff, or if you have goerli validators and want something to test. Otherwise maybe hold out for more info.
Side note: MEV-Boost Community Call 2 tomorrow at 16:00 UTC. Going to be plenty of boring technical stuff about shapella readiness and optimistic relay rollouts.
Week #12: March 24, 2023
Guest appearance by Anthony Bertolino, Head of Growth at POAP, to discuss the release of POAP Drops! https://drops.poap.xyz/
Announcements
- POAP has released POAP Drops, a brand new interface for easily creating and distributing your POAPs where you can also browse past POAP drops, manage existing drops, and much more!
- Shapella upgrade POAP.art party on April 12 9:30 UTC+0 (5:30am EST), more details to come
- There's a new Delegates section where you can find members of the EthFinance community to delegate votes to
- Upcoming guests:
- March 31 (cancelled): Gloria Kimbwala from SuperModular.xyz
- April 7 (cancelled): Evin McMullen from Disco.xyz
- April 14: Chris Whinfrey from Hop Protocol
The morning trinity
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/120axdk/comment/jdgisaw/)crickets
$1814
0.064
Shitpost of the week: u/Syentist
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11x8e2l/daily_general_discussion_march_21_2023/jd6kihv/)I urge anyone who hasn't done so to read through the chapter on digital assets in the Economic Report of the President. It's gives a full picture of the deviousness and flippancy of the Biden administration towards crypto. Take this gem on pg 238 for example
crypto assets to date do not appear to offer any investments with any fundamental value, nor do they act as an effective alternative to fiat money, improve financial inclusion or make payments more efficient; instead their innovation has been mostly about creating artificial scarcity in order to support crypto assets' prices - and many of them have no fundamental value
Complete horseshit. They do act as a non-inflationary alternative to debasement of fiat money, today. They do act as a self-custodial alternative to money which relies on trusting banks which are literally teetering, today.
They do improve financial inclusion. A kid in rural India or Mexico or Romania can take part in the Ethereum defi ecosystem with just an internet connection, today. Trading securities and treasuries and holding American dollars is a privilege to a tiny fraction of the world, and it's sad to see the Biden ainistration not see this.
They do make payments more efficient. This is increasingly clear for internet native payments. Buying and selling digital native art and culture, paying members of a DAO, transferring funds to colleagues in the same team but all over the world, making small payments in countries like Nigeria and Lebanon with collapsing local currencies - various crypto solutions do make payments efficient in these instances, today.
And last and most importantly of all, is that even if crypto had no usecase (which isn't true as I pointed out above), even if, that value judgement is still not the business of the federal government. Here's a great take by Chervinsky
If you're tired of this government lying, gaslighting and overreach, a good place to start is to sign up for the crypto advocacy program by Coinbase: https://actnow.io/z31xN5P
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11zaqp2/comment/jden86g/)Do Kwon arrested,
Arbitrum still congested,
Rewards devested.
Today in Ethereum: u/ZeroTricks
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11zaqp2/daily_general_discussion_march_23_2023/jdewhkt/)On this day...
In 2022:
- GameStop launches its NFT Marketplace in beta, in partnership with zk-Rollup based Ethereum Layer 2 Loopring.
- ETH injects zeroes in numbers like $3030, or ₿0.0707.
In 2021:
- Uniswap presents v3, up to 4000x more capital efficient and featuring Concentrated Liquidity positions, allowing liquidity providers to set price ranges.
- Ethworks introduces framework for rapid DApp development useDApp.
- Coinbase Pro announces support for ANKR, CRV and STORJ.
- ETH counts the beans at $1679, or ₿0.03067.
In 2020:
- Uniswap v2 is launched on all testnets, with pure ERC20 pairs, price oracles and flash swaps.
- ZenGo sounds the alarm on "baDAPProve", or how attackers can abuse approved, but highly excessive privileges to steal users tokens.
- ETH rediscovers its wings from $124 to $135, at ₿0.021.
In 2019:
- As if ETH needs stablecoins at $138, or ₿0.03429.
In 2018:
- Basic Attention Token is the first ERC-20 token to become an Apple verified virtual currency.
- Ethereum Improvement Proposal site eips.ethereum.org goes live; automatically generated from all merged EIPs.
- ETH flails at $538, or ₿0.06156.
In 2017:
- Storj plans to migrate its decentralized storage from Bitcoin-based Counterparty to Ethereum.
- Brave announces it will launch an ICO for Ethereum-based ad token BAT.
- Coinbase receives the approval to trade Ether and Litecoin in New York.
- ETH cajoles traders for $42.7 to $43.8, or ₿0.04066 to ₿0.04221.
In 2016:
- Engineers at BitGo create Ethereum multis-sig wallet Ether.li.
- Japanese Bitcoin exchange Coincheck starts trading Ether.
- No malice found in ETH going from $11.3 to $12.4, or ₿0.02709 to ₿0.02964.
u/REALJohnBMacLemore shares the latest ERC to get created and its implications
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11slqjw/daily_general_discussion_march_16_2023/jcivmjj/)BREAKING NEWS!
EIP-4804 is now an ERC! So like under ERC-4804, internet users have the option to type “web3://” vs “http://” in their browsers to bring up DApps such as Uniswap or onchain NFTs directly! OMMFG Bros! We can now directly run a query to the EVM!
web3://jbmaclemore.eth/
News:
u/nixorokish, a real crypto native and OG fell victim to a phishing attempt and tells her story
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11slqjw/daily_general_discussion_march_16_2023/jcggo1x/)dang. First time I've ever fallen for something stupid. I went to check out Arbitrum eligibility and clicked the first link under the announcement. The link did look like a scam to me but I had just read a friend comment that the legit airdrop announcement / video "looks like a scam", so my brain had its defenses down. Only connected and I think it just took whatever already had approvals? Which was all my DAI. feelsbadman.jpg - 5400 DAI is no small sum. It unfortunately looks like they got a few people before the tweet was hidden.
My brain finally went 'nope' when it asked to approve RPL, but everything before that was just a signature to connect (I think?), not a transaction or approval.
Things I could have done better (that I usually would do!):
- Matched the twitter handle from the tweet to the actual account
- Found the link elsewhere (verified it) before connecting my wallet, especially in their discord
- Generally slow down and read when signing things from my wallet.
Expensive lesson learned! I'm going to lay down and watch a movie or something, I'm super bummed that I'm a dummy.
Another thing learned in this (thanks to /u/Ribilla_ ) - DAI is a special kind of ERC20 that allows transfers that require only a signature (permit, which is a signature-based approval function) - it doesn't look like your typical approval or transaction. So even signatures when connecting to sites should be treated as potentially dangerous and giving away your assets.
See here: https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11slqjw/daily_general_discussion_march_16_2023/jch9a3s/
u/bagogel12 and u/Unitedterror on the Euler exploit
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11tipbq/daily_general_discussion_march_17_2023/jck76nq/)I can give a short update regarding the Euler exploiter situation. It's still a developing story ... if you missed episode 1 and 2, you find them here: link / link
S02E03 - The merciful hacker (cont.)
After the exploiter sent 100 ETH to one affected user, DLNews identified this lucky person. DLnews is actually quite good - I didn't know Defillama has it's own newspaper! After Swap.defillama.com/ it's another killer product of the Llama universe ...
The interesting part of this episode is: The 100 ETH are actually worth more than what the user lost 78 wstETH (or 86 ETH). Essentially, the user would have profited from the "deal". Being now officially doxxed he sent back 12 ETH to the official Euler depositor address. Is this correct? Who knows, we'll see if Euler will push for the full amount to be returned. It's a subplot which runs through the entire season. ...
For more information on this incident, I refer directly to DLnews:
S02E02 - The maniac hacker
Every morning the hacker gets up, he's doing something with his freshly earnt money. If you own $200M you can have some fun with it, right?
So, Today morning, he decided to give 100 ETH to the allegedly North Korean and OFAC sanctioned Ronin Exploiter Address, probably Lazarus controlled. Here is the tx: https://etherscan.io/tx/0x202a67d3a1d52e4dd5e1eebe49da511164b6e4a1ebe717dcf4674dd83a2bd457
Is he trying to fool us? Some kind of weird joke of 21 year old hacker? Or is it some kind of attribution to them? What will come next? Sending some to SBF or Alamada?
Or is he just bored and want his warrant level raised like in GTA?
Before he sent the 100 ETH to KimJongUn, he moved 1k ETH between his wallets but it's sitting there idle. At the moment, in total only 1.5k ETH has been sent to Tornando, the rest still in ETH (85k) or DAI (35 M).
S02E03 - Tornado Cash Activity
I did some tracking of the wallets which have used Tornado Cash recently. The activity has fallen quite a bit after it was hit with OFAC sanction rule. So it's kind of easy to track the activity even visually and manually. Here is the result:
I'm a bit surprised that 125ETH (and a batch of 100 ETH) went pretty straight from Tornado into Binance. The other larger chunks were moved into railgun and multiBTC, only some smaller amounts ran over "privacy oriented" exchanges.
It seems that the merciful-maniac hacker has not cashed their ETH out yet.
Okay Okay -- Heres the official Post-Mortem thread for the Euler hack: https://twitter.com/TraversaJulian/status/1636782111616122881
I reposted an earlier draft of it yesterday but I think the conversation here should really be around how safe people felt Euler was.
It was generally considered "as safe" as Compound, Aave, Maker, etc., and having a loss of ~$200m kind of breaks many previous assumptions about safety...
So my only conclusion is that we need to move towards more resilient mechanisms, mechanisms that cost significantly more to execute but are necessary to move forward effectively.
- Rate limiting
- Explicit / Limited Upgradability
- Built in diversification
- Circuitbreakers
- Isolated custodial modules
It really goes on, but these can only be effectively done if we all move towards L2's.
With the arb airdrop, now is the time to push for L2 adoption and the security that we really need to move DeFi forward.
u/Kukai_walker drafted a letter to their representative and shared the template for you. YES YOU
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11tipbq/daily_general_discussion_march_17_2023/jcm0fi7/)At the encouragement of u/TheCryptosAndBloods yesterday, I drafted a letter to my US representative, who happens to be among the 100+ member Congressional Progressive Caucus. I took the perspective that crypto is well aligned with progressive principles so they should engage. Including here for crowdsourcing feedback to improve it and/or for others to cut and paste from it especially if you too have a CPC representative:
=======================
Dear Representative xxx:
[removed doxxable intro]
I am writing to you today to encourage you and CPC to engage actively in policymaking around digital assets (aka, crypto).
As one of the 20% of Americans who own digital assets, I have used much of my recent time to teach myself about digital assets and the broader domain of blockchain technology. This is a highly technical field, requiring me to learn about such areas as cryptography, finance, decentralized networks, computing, and others. This knowledge has yielded practical benefits in that I have learned how to join thousands of others to stake ether on the Ethereum blockchain which now provides me with a steady income.
This knowledge has also allowed me to cut through the hype, misinformation, and disinformation surrounding cryptocurrency in the popular discourse to conclude that in fact, the crypto ecosystem of digital assets, smart contracts, and public blockchains such as Bitcoin and Ethereum has value and will disrupt economic and business systems around the world. For instance:
• Decentralized financial protocols allow everyday people to instantly make payments around the world and make loans and other financial transactions without commercial middlemen
• Immutable and transparent records on the public blockchain can protect intellectual property and assure fair and transparent management of royalties
• Public blockchains can serve as a permanent store of critical personal events including birth, death, graduation, etc.
• Assignment of unique non-fungible tokens can help manage ownership and transfer of collectibles, valuables, artwork, etc.
• Blockchain has potential business uses such as on-line gaming, supply chain management or carbon credit system.
• The crypto ecosystem can transform the internet business model from allowing dominant internet platforms (eg, Facebook, Google, Apple) to own and profit from personal information to a “web3” model where the user controls their own data on the blockchain.
I have also been struck by the fact that there is significant alignment between the principles underlying cryptocurrency and the progressive agenda. The essence of the crypto ecosystem is that data and open-source computer code distributed and synchronized around the world can replace reliance on institutional middlemen (eg, banks, internet platforms) with a decentralized transparent system available to all whose trust comes from the decentralized crypto ecosystem in which users can directly take custody of their own assets and personal data. These features can directly support the progressive agenda and its commitment to sweeping, transformative change:
• Income inequality can be reduced by helping underserved populations—who under legacy systems often cannot get a loan, buy a house, or start a business—to build wealth and carry out financial transactions without needed to rely on gatekeeping banks that may have institutional biases that disadvantage them.
• Facilitating crypto use can help advance racial justice and equity. A 2019 FDIC survey found that 14% of African American households and 12% of Hispanic American households were unbanked compared to only 2.5% of white households. A recent Harris Poll found that 30% of Black Americans and 27% of Hispanic Americans owned crypto compared to 17% of white Americans.
• Replacing banks with self-custody and a fully transparent accounting on a public blockchain will reimagine the role of institutions that exacerbate injustice and inequality.
Congress must and will create a policy framework for digital assets in the US; it will be important to help shape this policy to promote progressive principles. Now is the time to act. Congress will likely see a number of bills introduced this session on such issues as rights to self-custody, defining digital asset taxonomy, and clarifying regulatory oversight. Discussion on such legislation has already begun in the new Digital Assets, Financial Technology, and Inclusion Subcommittee of the House Financial Services Committee which has recently expanded its scope to include cryptocurrency. This Subcommittee includes two CPC members—representatives Torres of NY and Sherman of CA. The CPC can utilize its subcommittee membership and other opportunities to actively engage in shaping this legislation to reflect progressive priorities.
Moreover, engaging on this issue provides a great opportunity for bipartisanship. The need for regulation has bipartisan agreement. A number of Republican members have been actively supportive of addressing policy in this area (eg, representative Emmer of MN, Davidson of OH, and others). It would be remarkable, yet natural, to join forces with the other party on this issue to demonstrate its importance to the American people.
In addition to legislation, progressive congressional oversight is needed. I have been dismayed at the administration’s actions that, in the context of overall banking system failures and under the guise of consumer protection, are inhibiting the development of a regulatory environment that would allow the digital asset sector to prosper. There are those who believe that the administration is responding to entrenched interests that are threatened by the transformative change that crypto may catalyze, taking advantage of the current banking crises to squash crypto, such as by discouraging banks from holding crypto or servicing crypto clients.
I hope you and the CPC will take on this important issue to both support the progressive agenda as well as keep America’s leadership in this new sector. Blockchain and crypto are borderless by nature. If the US cannot provide a fertile environment for innovation, the developers will go elsewhere and will not be serving the country or its people.
Thank you very much.
================
u/LogrisTheBard finishes his post on decentralised identity
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11ufzg6/daily_general_discussion_march_18_2023/jco0gh3/)Revised/finished post from the other day.
DID (Decentralized ID) systems are a hot topic right now. They are needed for everything from free to play games, social media networks, and airdrops to governance systems like OPs Citizens House. There is (rightly so) a lot of buzz and various takes on how to approach this topic. I think this is one of the existential risks of Defi and I've written about that before (that sure aged well). I'm personally in favor of the Gitcoin Passport framework that enables each user to define their own calculation for Sybil Resistance by identifying their stamps and then having an attestation system like I proposed awhile ago compress long form off-chain calculations into simple on-chain maps. The focus of these systems ends at being a proof of humanity per address. They are specifically attempting to solve Sybil-resistance.
However, I think there is the potential to layer reputation systems like credit scores on top of Sybil-resistance and I think the potential of this is largely unexplored. For the sake of this discussion I'll limit reputation to being a purely quantitative, monetary history of honesty rather than history of competence, impact, or ideology. In that context reputation is synonymous with trust. If we want to keep this purely quantitative, what can we objectively measure about something (e.g. code, people, institutions, etc) that makes people trust it? Here are what I think are the three primary pillars of trust:
-
Social Attestation. When someone signs off on a code review, they are making an attestation. Systems like BrightId and Proof of Humanity are entirely social attestations. These systems are inherently subjective and usually gameable so are unreliable on their own but much of the world is entirely built upon attestation layers (your government ID for example).
-
Time. The longer something has been there the more time attackers have had to inspect it, identify a vulnerability, and attack it. The longer a person has been around the more opportunities have arisen that might lure them to dishonesty. In a permissionless system, time proves doubts to be illusory in the same way that a $20 bill on a busy street is probably fake or glued to the floor the longer it sits there.
-
Opportunity Cost of Honesty. Watch carefully how trust is used once granted. Any position of trust is exploitable to some degree. Otherwise what are you trusting? Honesty is the degree to which an actor is suboptimal at exploiting that trust. Yes, I'm aware how unintuitive that definition of honesty sounds but that's as close as I've come to a formal definition. Your unexploited trust value (UTV) is your maximum exploitable trust - exploited trust.
These pillars stand together to form the base on which a credit system could be built. They are a subset of what Vitalik identified in his post on legitimacy.
The first two are straightforward to measure. The latter is a bit more like measuring carbon deltas for Carbon Credits, Sybil values, or MEV because the maximum exploitable trust term is so subjective. With PoS Sybil-resistance is derived from the money you have. Conversely, your UTV is derived from the money you don't (in a sense). It's the money you don't have because you chose to be honest. This is akin to the forgery-resistance score from Gitcoin passport being floored at the amount you have spent/lost.
The fact that this is subjective (and potentially monetizable) will probably lead to competing standards for how to calculate it much like credit agencies today. Your address will have the equivalent of an Experian score from multiple aggregators which combines the three pillars above into a single number that anyone can query. Each Defi protocol could choose to use a different score, a combination of scores, or create their own score. Could this lead to abuse by an agency? Yes, but less than the current system which isn't permissionless.
But how do you bootstrap trust if no one will give you a position of trust you can honor/exploit? You can't bootstrap a system like this based on unsecured loans without first getting robbed by a few ten-thousand Sybilooors. The capital efficient answer today is to get involved in communities until someone is willing to grant you trust based on social attestation and time alone. That lacks a certain scalability element though. I think we can do better, even while remaining permissionless. You have to rely on some form of suboptimality otherwise the system will be gamed for profit. So what forms of permissionless economic suboptimality are already on-chain? The few that come to mind for me are donations to public goods, unrealized losses on airdrops, suboptimal votes in the face of bribes, and delegated credit.
None of these are perfect. The first criteria requires money to bootstrap. The second and third may have ulterior selfish motives the system can't see. The fourth is basically an extension of social attestation and just begs the question. So how do you bootstrap trust on someone with nothing to give and nothing to lose? I have no good answer but the above is the beginning of a formulation.
Why does it matter? Because this value can be integrated into tokenomic systems. I mentioned unsecured lending above, which is probably the first thing that comes to mind when you hear credit system, but I think that's actually one of the worst use cases for this. To explain why, we first have to break Defi collateral into two categories. The first category is money used as collateral for good behavior but which doesn't have a credibly neutral recipient. ETH staking is the largest example of this category but there are many others. The only criteria here is that the system has an objective, enforceable slashing condition. In this category the money just needs to be forfeit by the staker but it doesn't need to go anywhere. The second category is money used to reimburse someone. This includes all your money markets, collateralized stablecoins, insurance protocols, etc. It is more viable to use UTV as collateral for the former category. I wouldn't recommend this for the Ethereum base chain because the data to calculate this is on the base chain and this is a subjective score, not credibly neutral.
So where does this get us? Take a PoS system (not DPoS, that's dumb). The purpose of this system is to reach consensus on something. There are two necessary economic components to a PoS system. First, you have to be able to reward honest actors to incentivize participation. Second, each actor needs something at stake they can lose by being dishonest so you have entropy of bad actors over time. I've never seen a system designed so the failure of the dishonest actors is the main reward driver of the honest ones so I assume any such system has a revenue stream attached to it. Now, could we use reputation credit/UTV for such a system in lieu of capital? It certainly satisfies the something at stake requirement. You just have to be able to prevent collusion in the system and prevent bad actors from joining at a faster rate than the dishonesty entropy.
To prevent collusion I'll rely what I call Bitcoin's/Satoshi's great insight. The failure rate of attacking a network scales super-linearly with the number of anonymous actors in that network. This is because the chance of leaking a secret scales exponentially with the network and there is a common Schelling point to unify against dishonest actors once a secret is exposed. This is the primary value of decentralization. Past a certain threshold it is safe and profitable to be honest and risky and expensive to be dishonest. So the key to preventing collusion is to increase decentralization and protect anonymity of actors. Defi satisfies this.
To solve dishonesty entropy we're just using a different collateral (which is still a scarce resource). Today we use capital for Sybil-resistance. This does not provably satisfy the entropy condition and so plutocratic attacks on PoS systems today are possible. Given the source of this alternative collateral (historical honesty) UTV may prove out to be a superior selection criteria for identifying honest consensus participants.
This actually creates a beautiful sort of flywheel. By acting honestly you build a reputation score. You can stake your reputation in order to promise certain services. By fulfilling your promise you generate both an income stream and further reputation. This creates a compounding benefit to continue acting honestly. A world in which honest actors can build an income stream predicated on their reputation and potentially bootstrapped through community service is also a basis for UBI. It's a step closer to the type of world in which I'd like to live. A few disclaimers though. First, nothing is ever fully proven to be trustworthy. Second, trust is not monotonically increasing. As systems or the world with which they integrate change trust in them fluctuates.
P.S. I've been asked to plug an on-topic game from the EVMaverick's called Layer Zero. The basic premise of the game is to willingly enter into a contract with a group of people who can all openly rug the contract. Everyone has to put a share of collateral into the pot to join. Anyone in the game can take the pot. If no one takes the pot then everyone is generating UTV at the pot size * participants. Conceptually, a set of non-conspiring participants in a game like this can generate more in UTV than the money at stake. While UTV as defined above is scarce if it can be generated faster than capital it could out-compete capital for shares of revenue streams because of this.
Self-serving link
u/alexiskef shares news of DeFi Llama forking their own platform
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11vd15b/daily_general_discussion_march_19_2023/jctfvna/)The DefiLlama team is forking Defillama
According to Oxngmi: "The person who controls both defillama’s twitter and domain has decided to launch a token despite everybody in the team not wanting it. That is why we (the DefiLlama team who have built the site you all know and love for the past three years) have decided to fork Defillama and start fresh on llama.fi and @llamadotfi"
DO NOT TRUST ANY COMMUNICATION OR TOKEN FROM @Defillama or Defillama .com"
I have no idea if this is true, but the accounts seem to be the ones that control the extension. Personally I have not uninstalled it, but be careful until we find out what is actually happening..
u/0xBOBA hasn't been checking price for the last 3 months and checks in with us
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11vd15b/daily_general_discussion_march_19_2023/jcv3xmn/)I tried to not check prices. I lasted 3 months. I ended up checking because of the SVB news. Good to see ETH up 50% since I left. Makes me a little less worried about my CDP. The $ARB airdrop was a nice surprise too. Glad I didn’t miss it while I was gone. The only other thing I was really worried about while I was gone were my non-ETH holdings.
With withdrawals coming I finally gave up on my LINK and swapped them for RPL. More confidence in RPL than LINK. Should have done it long ago. I got too attached to my LINK and waited too long for the ratio to recover. (I’m a horrible trader). Lesson learned there. But I need an exit plan for RPL. It’s only 2% of my portfolio though.
I’ve used this drop in the ratio to unload most of my BTC. Now only 3% of my portfolio. 0% at 0.055 if my limit orders go through. A part of me wants to keep a little bit of BTC just for nostalgic reasons but I really don’t see the point of BTC. I skimmed some of the recent dailies and see others offloading their BTC. This probably means the ratio will continue to drop
So now I am 95% ETH and too heavy in ETHE in my retirement funds. Feels nice (other than the horrible ETHE price: what’s going on there?). It was kind of nice not checking the price for a few months, but I also missed reading the daily.
I’ll probably stick around to claim my $ARB and maybe until withdrawals are enabled. Anything fun to do on Arbitrum these days? Something that won’t make taxes a mess next year.
u/wolfparking has some Airdrop hunting ideas
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11waa98/daily_general_discussion_march_20_2023/jczjgzy/)Airdrop Ideas?
I recently joked with some friends at work about how the ARB airdrop would be my only work bonus this year and, of course, they got super interested. Last Xmas I gave them all RPL and it has tripled in value, but since then they haven't really done anything with defi or crypto. However, I think airdrop farming might just be the push that gets them swimming!
So, I'm compiling a list of some of my airdrop farming tasks that I plan on doing every week. For the uninitiated, I'll provide step-by-step guides on some of the tasks every week if I can. I'll post all that here in the caches.xyz forum: https://caches.xyz/forums/discussion/airdrop-hunts-checklist/
(Must sign in to see today's update)
Here is the shortened version of it. Please let me know if you have any ideas I can add!
*Bonus and super useful if you can add whether or not it is likely to happen, costs involved, or potential gains
[ ] • Attend Swell Discord meeting today on 3/17.
[ ] • Prepare art for Swell memes and articles and post a tweet about it on their Discord Week of 3/19 (deadline Fri?)
[ ] • Create StarknetID (My guide created 3/19)
[ ] • Zksync 1.0 transactions (Use zig zag)
[ ] • Scroll testnet transactions.
[ ] • Matcha.xyz swaps.
[ ] • Continue interacting on Optimism and Arbitrum (Use HOP and VSTA)
[ ] • orbiter.finance (Bridge)
[ ] • starknet testnet (mint NFTs, create blocks NFT, dapps)
[ ] • checkout earni.fi
[ ] • GMX blueberry lottery
[ ] • Use argent wallet (swaps, dapps, and LP)
[ ] • Use Lens (make a post, friend, etc)
If you don't mind, please engage on the caches.xyz forum if you need assistance as I'm certain that others will have the same or similar questions as you there.
u/Ender985 has an update from the NFT world
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11x8e2l/daily_general_discussion_march_21_2023/jd2chxa/)Meanwhile, more NFT shenanigans..
535 DeGods NFTs that had been previously burned in Ethereum, were "ressurrected" as ordinals in BTC, at 0.333 BTC per mint this past weekend.
They all sold out in a single block.
The project dominated ordinals secondary markets, with over $1M in volume, ahead of YugaLab's twelvefold ordinals by >7x. It seems ordinals are here to stay, and more so if they are backed by already established brands such as DeGods.
u/SoNotYou discusses compromised Arbitrum airdrop wallets
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11x8e2l/daily_general_discussion_march_21_2023/jd2b2kk/)Yesterday some twitter user found out ~2400 compromised accounts all approving ARB. Someone analysed these (actually 2225) wallets and 1791 wallets are elligble for around 3 million ARB total.
ArbitrumFoundation/sybil-detection#3
Many users became victim by following links under the announcement tweet. Suprised Arbitrum didn't provide the link to their website with the annoucement or turn off replies. They are not new to how crypto scams and hacks work.
https://twitter.com/arbitrum/status/1636352104913666050
Frustrating to see that so much damage is done. Users have personal responsibility sure. But I think the damage wouldn't be this big if Arbitrum guided users to the right place. Maybe I am a bit unreasonable here...
Stuff like this can't be happening if crypto ever wants to become 'mainstream'.
I have not been hacked personally and this just an observation.
u/busterrulezzz has something to say about Balaji
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11y8xk3/daily_general_discussion_march_22_2023/jd7n6bh/)I will take Balaji seriously when he goes to explain his theory to people who have the intellectual background to ask him the hard questions.
His appearance on Bankless and the Pomp show yesterday were appalling. Those weren't interviews, they were oral presentations. He could have said that Satoshi was going to come down from heaven to wash away our sins and give us eternal life, and the hosts would have nodded their heads and said "woah."
Balaji is not the intellectual he claims to be. An intellectual does not choose hosts sold out to his cause to make his point - instead, he will go directly to confront those who disagree. This is the very basis of the scientific method. I also find his tone to be alarmist, dramatic, filled with hyperbole created to capture attention.
Who is he, anyway? He is an engineer who became a multi-millionaire in the early 2010s - he has no expertise in finance, history or politics, beyond what he has read elsewhere. Ironically, he made his fortune from the system he says he wants to escape today. His claim to fame is that he "predicted" the pandemic on January 30, 2020. Except that on January 30th, the WHO declared a "global health emergency", Wuhan had already been cut off from the rest of the world, there were confirmed cases in dozens of countries... He was a bit early, sure, but it is not the feat he claims.
Finally, about his $1M prediction, he has already prepared his exit. In three months he will say, "Oh, the bet was just a wake-up call, you shouldn't have taken it at face value, I'm not sure about the timeline, but hyperinflation will happen soon." It won't happen, and he'll push the deadline again and again, until he disappear into irrelevance.
u/nixorokish has the deets on Coinbase's Wells notice from the SEC
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11y8xk3/daily_general_discussion_march_22_2023/jd9w9ky/)https://twitter.com/brian_armstrong/status/1638654192138199041
Brian Armstrong:
1/ Today Coinbase received a Wells notice from the SEC focused on staking and asset listings. A Wells notice typically precedes an enforcement action.
[...]
4/ We are proud to stand up for our customers and the industry in these moments.
Honestly... best that Coinbase, who's well-capitalized and equipped to handle this, to be the one to go to court with the SEC and set a precedent. A win for crypto against the SEC in court would be a big deal and there's no one better poised to do that than CB.
Week #11: March 17, 2023
Livestream Recording | No POAP
Shitpost of the week: u/RevolutionarySoil11
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11mkewq/daily_general_discussion_march_9_2023/jblagp1/)Now, this is a story all about how
Our lives got flipped-turned upside down
And I'd like to take a minute
Just sit right there
I'll tell you how we became gentlemen of a sub called ethfinanciér:
In Ethereum Trader, born and raised
On the daily was where I spent most of my days
Chillin' out, meming, tradin', all cool
And all buying' some shitcoins outside of the school
When a couple of mods who were up to no good
Started making trouble in our neighborhood
We told them donuts are whack and jtnichol got scared
He said, "You're movin' with cutsnek into ethfinancier"
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11rnp2q/comment/jcbapzc/)Neutral referee,
Yet he plays for his own team,
Markets should stay free.
Today in Ethereum: u/ZeroTricks
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11tipbq/daily_general_discussion_march_17_2023/jcj9402/)On this day...
In 2022:
- All Bored Ape NFTs from NFT fractionalizing service NFTX are temporarily borrowed via a flash loan to claim 60000 APE worth over $1 Million.
- Valued at $1.65 Billion, Optimism completes a Series B fundraise of $150 Million, led by A16z and Paradigm.
- Polygon integrates the Simba Chain to scale and build new infrastructure for Web3, starting with the launch of a white-label NFT marketplace.
- Tokenized Vault Standard ERC-4626 becomes final, allowing for uniformity between yield-bearing tokens, to be used by many DeFi projects.
- ETH exists in the reality of $2815 and ₿0.06874.
In 2021:
- Meitu buys another $28 Million in ETH and $22 Million in BTC.
- Terraform Labs launches the decentralized UST stablecoin, undermining DDoS attackers in the process.
- Bitfly launches a MEV beta program to increase mining rewards via transaction sequencing/frontrunning, compensating for EIP-1559.
- Vlad Zamfir sues Casper Labs Inc. over improper use of the Casper name.
- AMD refuses to limit Ethereum mining: "we will not be blocking any workload".
- Jonty Wareing finds that most NFTs reference URLs or IPFS hashes which are bound to break in the future.
- The Harris Poll claims ~7% of Americans used funds from Stimulus Checks to buy cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ether.
- ETH returns a lost wallet containing $1823 and ₿0.03097.
In 2020:
- Prysmatic Lab’s Ivan Martinez explains what Eth2 improves on Eth1, apart from staking and sharding: minimum viable issuance, statelessness, account abstraction and execution environments.
- MKR holders accept USDC as a third collateral asset in the Maker Protocol, after ETH and BAT.
- Opera allows U.S. users to buy BTC and ETH directly from its in-built crypto wallet, via Apple Pay and debit cards.
- ETH eats the crypto crumbles between $111 and $114, at ₿0.02178.
In 2019:
- Maxwell Foley explains Eth2 verifiable delay functions.
- ETH's profits are verified to be delayed at $140, or ₿0.03484.
In 2018:
- There goes my Ether, watch it as it goes from from $601 to $553, or ₿0.07265 to ₿0.06983.
In 2017:
- No drama for ETH today from $45.4 to $46.8, or ₿0.03865 to ₿0.04259.
In 2016:
- The DAO whitepaper is released.
- ETH welcomes early adopters betwen from $12.6 to $11, or ₿0.03005 to ₿0.02613.
u/vsesuk1 laughs at the New York Attorney General's comments on Ethereum
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11mkewq/daily_general_discussion_march_9_2023/jblly9q/)Lol holy crap bunch of dummies over there at NYAG office. At least Gensler's team understand crypto...
From: https://iapps.courts.state.ny.us/nyscef/ViewDocument?docIndex=XDXIUrIw3tVafxqwEqVfKw==
Under proof-of-work, computers on the Ethereum network competed to answer amathematical puzzle in order to verify transactions on the blockchain and receive in-kind digital asset rewards. Under proof-of-stake, however, validators, pledge or “stake” their holdings in ETH and are randomly chosen to verify transactions on the blockchain and receive an in-kind digital asset reward. By shifting to proof-of-stake, ETH no longer relies upon competition between computers, but instead now relies on a pooling method that incentivizes users to own and stake ETH. The shift to proof-of-stake significantly impacted the core functionality and incentives for owning ETH, because ETH holders now can profit merely by participating in staking.
Lol, "merely by participating in staking" holy christ project much? Is this a highschoolers essay?
And why is it a security Ms AG?
the Ethereum Foundation claims on its website that users of Ethereum “see it as a digital store of value because the creation of new ETH slows down over time.”
Lol just like bitcoin, which even Gensler has clearly stated is the only crypto he views as definitely NOT security? Can't even line up your arguments between agencies...
But wait there's more?
Since transitioning to the proof-of-stake consensus, the value proposition has altered significantly because possession of ETH translates directly to profit potential by earning staking rewards
Hey everyone, did you realize that you're earning staking rewards just by holding Eth in your hardware wallet!!!!!
I have no idea how any of this will play out, but I can definitely say that NYAG is a fucking clown show compared the SEC when it comes to this stuff.
u/MrVodnik and u/KotMyNetchup on the Silicon Valley Bank collapse and USDC backing shortfall
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11ngir4/daily_general_discussion_march_10_2023/jbpxfdc/)Stolen from r WSB:
https://i.redd.it/gjolf3latzma1.jpg
97.3% of SVB deposits are not FDIC insured. This means, most of ~$200 bln, that used to belong to many, many tech companies and start-ups, just disappeared. Probably many jobs will fallow.
This truly is a crypto day happening in TradFi.
Hello 2008, my old friend...
According to their latest tweet, Circle stands to lose 8% of the USDC backing at most. It sounds like the most reasonable expectation is that FDIC will be able to recover a decent amount of funds from SVB. I'm expecting >50% to be returned. But looking at the pessimistic side, we have a 4-8% haircut on USDC. $0.92-$0.96. We're seeing that price range now.
The next question is if prices close enough to that range can be sustained long enough for Circle to be able to inject liquidity into the market as needed. I don't know what mechanisms Circle uses to do this, other than promises and market forces. If it comes down to promises and market forces that might not be enough.
Another question is at what point USDC price starts to have knock on effects beyond a simple bank run. A lot of defi is built around USDC. What systems will start to deteriorate if USDC starts to depeg more? At what point do systems start to fall apart?
u/KingLeo23 shares Justin Drake's EthResearch post on "Based Rollups
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11ngir4/daily_general_discussion_march_10_2023/jbp05hj/)New drop from Justin Drake on ethresearch "based rollups" that use L1 sequencing. Looks like they would inherently force L1 alignment and sequencer decentralization rather than having to rely on the good faith of L2 teams.
u/nixorokish shares The Summer of Protocols
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11ngir4/daily_general_discussion_march_10_2023/jbn88dx/)The first town hall for the Summer of Protocols happens tomorrow, about 9 hours from this comment.
If you're interested in participating, highly recommend attending! I haven't finished reading the Unreasonable Sufficiency of Protocols (sort of a manifesto for the course) yet but it's really good so far, very thought-provoking, and I'm thinking of recording a version to listen to.
edit. quick synopsis of the Summer of Protocols if you're lazy: it's basically a brain incubator where some very thoughtful people are going to get together and try to define what a "protocol" is, examine existing examples, and how to design one that is future-proof, capable of ossifying to some degree, incentivizes good outcomes, and look at how much stewardship that thing will need.
This is awesome and, in my mind, the kind of philosophical analysis that we need to make sure Ethereum (or any protocol) has a sufficient amount of thought put into it to try to steer away from some of the dystopian outcomes that something like the internet has brought about.
If algorithms on the internet can change people's behaviors to rapidly foster a kind of hatred that causes people to do things they otherwise wouldn't have, why wouldn't we assume that that behavior-changing power also works in the other direction to incentivize willing participants to better coordinate with each other? This is why I'm here. Because the infancy of Ethereum is the most exciting and malleable part and I think something like this is capable of stewarding it to a place where it actually makes a difference.
u/RevolutionarySoil11 thinks about the publics' perception of the cryptosphere
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11ocbsl/daily_general_discussion_march_11_2023/jbtp31j/)Literally how can people outside the "cryptosphere" look at crypto and not think "scam"?
A quote from u/geliboy695000 earlier today and I want to repost it here for exposure and discussion because it's important.
When you look at social media, any time the topic comes up or problems in crypto are brought up, the threads are flooded with bots and scammers shilling whatever shitcoin they get paid to shill. If I were not already in the space and knew what goes on I'd 100% think cryptocurrency is just scams all the way down. And just to be explicitely clear: Ethereum itself has enabled this too with ERC-20s and the like. Just look at what's literal number 4 in market cap among those tokens and then scroll down further for all the less popular bs coins like Dogelon & co.
We need to somehow find a way to exclude the grifters and scammers from the discussions while still being open and true to the crypto ideals, and also welcoming to newcomers and open to new ideas. It seems like mission impossible.
How can legitimate projects be promoted without at the same time giving exposure to the wrong people? How can the general public be educated, because it doesn't seem knowledge of blockchain tech and its uses has increased that much in the mainstream over the past years. The majority of people still doesn't even seem to understand even just Bitcoin, which has been around for 13 years now and is arguably the most basic and among the easiest blockchains to understand in principle.
This matters, because if most people do not understand how this tech can help society and how it works, they'll think it's useless and will support legislation that cracks down and hinders crypto adoption. They might cheer the criminalization of private non-KYCed wallets only to find a couple of years down the line to be forced to use CBDC and have banks not only control their money but monitor all their habits as well. It's probably not what the majority wants but if we don't help them understand they won't know anything about it.
u/JayPeaEm has some updates on all the banking shenanigans
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11p6xk6/daily_general_discussion_march_12_2023/jbzx2uv/)Grüezi EthFinance 😁
- Signature Bank looks to have fallen just moments ago. Bank Run feedback loops are not fun🔥🏦🔥
- So it looks like SVB gets no bailout, yet all the depositors get their money back. I think the Federal Reserve Printers are tired from Covid but... 😬
- Nothing political, but just saw US Treasury Secretary was just in Kiev assuring US Aid will keep flowing... yet is only monitoring the deposits of all the small businesses in trouble by SVB? 🤔
- USDC & DAI pegs are now stabilized. Made a killing in fees as LP, but I think I'll keep it all parked in stablecoins for the foreseeable future; I get sea sick easy from all the rocking 🛥️🌊
- Glad to see everyone active here and on Discord. Saw quite a few fellow whales help stabilize the stablecoins depegging and act really quick. There's much more resilience in the ecosystem than many can understand. Hopefully the "gains" stay put for now.
Love you all, keep being ambassadors, and keep helping any- and everyone who asks for it!
Pröschtli 🍻
u/REALJohnBMacLemore needs your help!
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11q1nrm/daily_general_discussion_march_13_2023/jc3nqn3/)Dear EVMs, EIPanda’s and the ETHFinance community,
I come before you today to genuinely ask for your help. Please take the time to read this, I know it is long but I believe it is important. No jokes this time. Thanks in advance friends.
As you may or may not know, I started a website called “Caches.” If you’ve never visited it, I will briefly explain. If you have, then you already know. Caches is a social network/community website focused on Web3 Technology and Ethereum. A place to explore all of the interesting technologies and ideas that are spinning off of this new paradigm that we all love. It’s completely anonymous, and membership is free and only available via Ethereum wallet login.
I intended for Caches to be somewhere for our community to teach, and share our knowledge outside of the walls of third parties like Reddit or Discord. Something we own, so our voices can be properly heard, and so they can’t be muted due to some draconian corporate attack on crypto or something. A place where you could “cache” your content and share it with the world anonymously, using identity technology being pioneered by Ethereum. Our mark on the world outside our biosphere. I also hoped we could show the world how you build a community, powered by web3 technology, out here on the old www... A home.
Now I have a lot of ideas, but that’s the gist of it. I have spent a lot of time in this pursuit and I have struggled with it. The platform I chose to build Caches on, WordPress, has absolutely no help, plugins, or extensions for crypto/web3. Really no good CMS platform out there does. Since I am a terrible coder, and I am already familiar with developing websites rapidly using Wordpress, I chose to move forward using it to save time, for better or for worse. This has been an adventure to say the least.
Recently, I spoke with another EVM, /u/juxtanotherposition, and we immediately hit it off. Turns out, just by stroke of luck that on March 24th, 2023 he will be giving a presentation at WordCamp Phoenix on “Wordpress, Community and Web3.” Strange how the world works sometimes … Caches is built on Wordpress, it has custom developed Web3 authentication and NFT gating, and it was made for a community… his very own community! This was literally a match made in heaven! So with all that said, we agreed to feature Caches during the presentation as an example of community built on Wordpress with web3 tech!
That means we will have eyes from the Wordpress developer community focused on Caches and the EVM! AAAAHHHH! This is why I need your help! Now look, I know I’m funny, and I make you laugh, and maybe you’ve even checked out Caches once or twice to humor me, and then laughed yourself to sleep ... but I need them to see the value in this. Not just for me, or Caches, or the EVMs … for Ethereum.
Why is Wordpress important?
Wordpress is a free, open source content management system that powers an astounding 43% of all websites online. I bet you didn’t know Caches ran on Wordpress before I told you, did you? A lot of your favorite sites run on it. It’s free, open source, community developed, and extensible. It also runs on a completely opensource technology stack. Wordpress.org develops the Wordpress software and they are a non-profit entity. Their ethos is very aligned with ours. They want to enable people to have their own platform to share their ideas, and words without having to rely on anyone. You can check out their about us page if you aren’t familiar with them.
Why is this important for the community?
Since Caches was built for the EVM/ETHFi community, we have a very unique opportunity to get our ideas, and our community out to potentially thousands of Wordpress developers who will be viewing Caches during @juxta’s presentation. They will undoubtedly share Caches with other developers. That means we have an opportunity to get web3 ideas and even our community baked into Wordpress! I literally can not think of a bigger opportunity for us, and for Ethereum. If we can get developers to create plugins, extensions, themes and more that enable and integrate web3 technology into Wordpress, we have an opportunity to put this in front of 43% of website owners WORLDWIDE! I can not think of a better group than all of you to guide and usher these people into this new paradigm.
With our help we can get this technology out to the world, and we can foster the Wordpress community during their exploration of this new technology. Give them a place to safely ask questions and get good answers ranging from JBM to Logris level. A place to share ideas, develop friendships and connections … just like we all have done through the sub. This is our opportunity to put the community at the forefront of something big outside our walls and build ourselves as an authority in this space.
What’s in it for me?
Juxta has asked if Caches could be a sort of “development” test bed for Wordpress web3 plugins and technology. I like this idea, we get free development work to make Caches the premier web3 community and the developers get a real live site to develop their product. This is a win/win/win! I get to see the thing I started grow and flourish at the hands of people much smarter and more capable than me. It’s beautiful man! That’s really it. I hope to use it to make money, however we decide to do that, just like you.
What’s in it for you?
I honestly built this site for our community. I genuinely built it to enable everyone to be heard out here on the web. As I have repeatedly stated, I don’t want to own this thing by myself. So I hope you can join me, we can come up with new ways to push Ethereum/web3 forward in the web2 and we can come up with creative ways for everyone in the community to earn some money for themselves without turning into a marketing machine. I want everyone to be a part of that journey, and I want everyone to be able to contribute ideas to that goal, and most importantly I want to work with you to figure out how we can own this thing together in the fairest way possible. I don’t have any of that figured out, but that’s ultimately where I want to be… a community owned and operated by the community.
How can I help?
Pop in the EVM discord. If you're not an EVM, I still want your help. Please. Join the public-channel and DM a mod to have the "Caches" role added to your account and then you'll be able to see the #caches channel there even if you don't have an EVM. I will use that to try to collaborate and focus our energies best I can. I need you! We have just 10 days to try and make Caches, the community and Ethereum look good... but hey... this is just the beginning. So don't do it for me. Do it for ETHEREUM.
Sincerely,
JBM 👊🏻
u/Savage_X shares news of the newest version of GPT-4 and its Solidity prowess
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11qy7me/daily_general_discussion_march_14_2023/jc8ardn/)GTP4 apparently knows solidity pretty well...
I dumped a live Ethereum contract into GPT-4.
In an instant, it highlighted a number of security vulnerabilities and pointed out surface areas where the contract could be exploited. It then verified a specific way I could exploit the contract
u/hanniabu explains a key part of EthFinance lore and how it made us who we are
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11rnp2q/daily_general_discussion_march_15_2023/jc9fnxx/)Ethtrader donuts were key in the formation of this sub. Not just because it triggered the exodus, but because of the type of people it promoted to leave.
The people that hate grifts and cash grabs, the people that see this as more than a way to make money, the people that are in it for the tech, etc.
It distilled the community down to those that believe in the original ethos ethereum was founded on, and we do our best to carry forward.
Week #10: March 10, 2023
Announcements
- Congrats to jamescarnley.eth, a long time contributor of r/EthFinance for winning a GridPlus Lattice1 + 2 SafeCards in last week's raffle! 🎉
The morning trinity
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11ngir4/daily_general_discussion_march_10_2023/jbn72jb/)Ethereum
It was $1420 at midnight
0.071 when i looked but that's less memey
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11kqzjp/comment/jbad37w/)The stack overflowed,
The memory took a bribe,
On chain you can't hide.
Today in Ethereum: u/ZeroTricks
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11mkewq/daily_general_discussion_march_9_2023/jbk05of/)On this day...
In 2022:
- Optimism reveals its next-gen fault proof Cannon, able to run an EVM-equivalent Layer 2 and enabling the theoretical minimum calldata gas costs.
- Startup Upstream raises $12.5 Million for its "DAO in a Box" Web3 Toolkit.
- ETH heard you like airdrops so it put an airdrop in your airdrop for $2578, $2731 or ₿0.06503.
In 2021:
- MakerDAO announces a DAI bridge to Optimism's Layer 2 with near-instant withdrawals.
- Digital art platform ArtStation announces and rescinds a PoC with NFTs, after backlash from users about Ethereum's carbon footprint.
- ETH is coarse and gets everywhere between $1865, ₿0.03503 and ₿0.0341.
In 2020:
- ETH learns to sneeze into the elbow at $203, or ₿0.0256.
In 2019:
- AlphaWallet introduces TokenScript to create SmartTokens, traditional ERC20 or ERC721 tokens with extendable structure and signed JavaScript.
- ETH happily camps between $138 and ₿0.03482.
In 2018:
- Vitalik Buterin announces Plasma Cash at EthCC.
- ETH flabbergasts from $702 to $729, or ₿0.07556 to ₿0.07832.
In 2017:
- Yoichi Hirai takes a good look at Vlad Zamfir's Casper.
- Mediachain unveils its Ethereum-based content creation token CCcoin.
- ETH reasons beyond reasoning from $16.5 to $17.8, or ₿0.01433 to ₿0.01494.
In 2016:
- Ether.camp produces the first hybrid Ethereum and Bitcoin ATM.
- Bedeho Mender explains why your Ethereum project will most likely fail.
- ETH becomes $11.9 out of thin air and some 9.8 USDfrom $9.8 to $11.9, or ₿0.02373 to ₿0.02868.
Shitpost of the week: u/okdragonfruits
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11lo2v3/daily_general_discussion_march_8_2023/jbf8wa0/)Two guys named Ray walk into a bar...
They tell the bartender “This place sucked until we walked in here.” “Why’s that?” Says the bartender.
“Because we’re Rays in the bar!!!”
Analysis: u/Ender985 is still reporting in from the NFT-verse
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11fuqpf/daily_general_discussion_march_2_2023/jalxme8/)Meanwhile in the NFT-verse..
Reporting from the trenches of the great marketplace wars of '23. OpenSea has engineered their next move to combat Blur's rapid ascent into the market. What did they do?
Introduce a new table view! Where the NFT jpg is reduced to a few pixels, just like in Blur. The way art was always meant to be traded!
On a more serious note, this war has already caused some collateral damage, with the royalties race to the bottom. The argument goes that 10k profile picture collections probably should not have royalties, while it makes more sense for 1/1 art pieces.
Well, the royalties paid on ArtBlocks (an NFT platform for curated artists) has now gone from 7.5% to 2.5%. This suggests that the markets for these two types of NFTs may not be so different after all.
Community: u/benido2030 ponders on building on a greater purpose for this community
[View on Reddit →]()Yesterday two things that longterm members posts and that are not connected somehow caught my attention and made me think. The first one was this post by Bob Rossi, the second one was a comment by superphiz in a completely different thread.
Some personal thoughts with regards to Bobs post: I totally feel you. I want to contribute more in the space and think I would be able to add some value here and there, but hell I am just a random anon on the internet that's mid bell curve.
But what if superphiz is right (and I think he is)? What if EVMs (which I am going to replace with members of this sub, since not everyone does hold one) will become community guardians? What if this place is something special and if you have established yourself as a valuable and know community member you are highly likely to add value to projects in the ETH ecosystem, hence also hop? What if we used the community we have built here to send people to different DAOs to positively influence decisions made in the ecosystem? What if at one point any EVM and their arguments in a (DAO) discussion are seen with different eyes just because of the NFT?
Ecosystem: u/wolfparking covers ERC-4337
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11gsztq/daily_general_discussion_march_3_2023/jatsizb/)This was deployed at the EthDenver conference: ERC-4337. Am I right to think that this is a really underrated implementation?
I've read from a few sources that this level of account abstraction will eventually allow wallets to operate as programmable smart contracts; which could be used to recover lost private keys. We're not there yet, but still exciting!
News articles: msn.com and BusinessInsider
Could allow users to do away with the common practice of backing up a set of words on a piece of paper, enabling new ways to secure wallets. For example, users could set up two-factor authentication to access a wallet via biometric data, or program multi-signature wallets providing shared access to a single account.
Additionally, this:
Vitalik Buterin has stated that ERC-4337 enables a fully decentralized fee market for smart contract wallet operations.
Vitalik posted:
You should be able to send an op into a public mempool, and if it pays enough fees, reliably expect it to get included. This should NOT depend on ANY:
- Centralized actors
- Reputation systems for op senders
- ETH held in a separate EOA
- External services for account creation
With L2 fee structure the fee requirement diminishes.
I'm not technically skilled/knowledgeable enough to understand why this integration won't presently allow account recovery, but we're almost there apparently. Vitalik mentions that it can't be solved by ERC-4337, but EIP-3074 and EIP-5003 would get us there. Very cool shit. Anyone want to chime in on anything I misunderstood?
Ecosystem: u/hanniabu discusses Privacy Pools, the successor to Tornado Cash in response to the OFAC regulation
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11ip8sx/daily_general_discussion_march_5_2023/jb12o1q/)Really surprised to see the Tornado Cash successor Privacy Pools isn't being discussed in more detail here
https://twitter.com/ameensol/status/1632083054272430080
Since anybody can exclude any deposit, it seems it would be difficult to get any type of assurance of your anonymity set.
I also wonder if you can run into a situation where you can't withdraw. For example if a hacker makes a large deposit and then withdraws for others, then there won't be enough funds for everyone else to withdraw if they all want to exclude the hacker.
And not sure why the subsets are even needed if receipts are provided, which Tornado Cash already did.
Community: u/DoubtStarsAreFire has some great news about Logris building the double Logris into Alchemix
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11ip8sx/daily_general_discussion_march_5_2023/jb1i37k/)BUIDL Week is over here at EthDenver. You may have noticed a lack of a certain u/logristhebard around the subreddit. That's because he has been diligently working on the Logris Vaults. Some of you saw the Alpha that I dropped earlier in the week... we are now one step closer to the Double Logris becoming a reality.
It's been a long week and Logris has been working flat out to get the project across the finish line. We're about to pitch in a little bit here... still waiting on our time so I can't tell you that. But, I'm really excited about what we accomplished and really Really REALLLLLYYYY proud of him.
Logris says he's proud of this function. What a nerd.
Community: u/austonst has the full wrap up from ETHDenver
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11jq6y5/daily_general_discussion_march_6_2023/jb48g07/)ETHDenver Day 10 (Yesterday)
The final day of ETHDenver! There were no traditional talks from established companies or researchers; today was all about the hackathon teams. Each project was submitted to one of five tracks (DeFi, Impact / Social Goods, DAOs / Community, NFT/Gaming/Metaverse, and Infrastructure) and could also compete for sponsor bounties (big list here).
Projects had to be submitted by 8 AM, then from 10-2 teams showed off what they made. On the regular presentation stages, teams went up to the stage corresponding to their track and gave a 1:30 pitch and demo, with a little time for questions. When they weren't on stage, they were downstairs in the main buidl room where the sponsor bounty judges and random attendees could learn about what they made. Track judges picked the top three of each track to present on the main stage during the closing ceremony at 3 PM, then five final winners were chosen.
Miscellaneous notes: I don't think I can see an overall list of hackathon projects, but each one does have their own page if you know what URL to go to. But for most I don't know the URL so it's going to be hard to link to them. I also heard that there was a major hiccup where in the midst of planning out judging, a bunch of teams just got missed entirely and weren't scheduled for a pitch slot or a table location. The team worked to resolve it, but with everything happening so fast some teams were just screwed over. Hopefully it's better next year. Also I finally checked out the arcade area, good collection of imported Japanese arcade games, nice selection of rhythm games in particular.
- Logris Vaults: A good place to start off the list. DoubtStars has been talking about this project so I don't really need to. I didn't find the team on the buidl floor, but I can throw it on here anyway because it's cool.
- ChainRep: A project to put security audits and reports (or at least links and a general rating) on-chain. Reviews point to the smart contract in question, and are written by reviewers who are issued certificates by trusted entities like the EF or something. So you could potentially make a DeFi protocol that generally works with any ERC20 token, but checks ChainRep and only allows tokens with positive reviews from certified reviewers.
- MintUI: A library of React components for web3 that share information between one another to make web3 programming easier. Main example (as the name would imply) is NFT minting.
- Composooor: Would appreciate more insight into this. The team was saying something about how it's hard to build composable dapps/protocols using other protocols that rely on off-chain data. So this is a MetaMask snap (bounty hunting ho!) that simplifies this composability and significantly reduces the amount of code you need to create a clean integration.
- Dual Rollup: Cartesi is an existing platform I'm only just learning about for developing optimistic rollups whose execution environment is literally a Linux VM on RISC-V. This project uses that to run a ZK prover on Cartesi, or ultimately a ZK rollup on an optimistic rollup. I get the concept but I feel like I'm barely able to grasp the implications. The team suggested you may be able to implement a universal (or at least cross-EVM) ZK bridge.
- Alice's Ring: A project for proof of solvency. With it, tenant Alice can prove to landlord Bob that she has enough assets to cover rent, notably without revealing the actual address to Bob. Then, if Alice later uses zkBob to actually pay her rent, Bob may never actually have to see Alice's actual assets. The team says that the proof must be computed over multiple blocks or something in order to prevent someone from proving solvency after taking a flash loan. But nothing is stopping Alice from generating the proof then immediately selling, transferring, or gambling it away.
- Artist Hunger Games: A pretty wild project in which artists get paid to participate in a hunger-games style game. A DAO of NFT holders have the ability to vote on which artists get removed from the game each round, and can also do silly votes on things like telling the artists where to live or eat. Make it a reality show kind of thing. I was reminded of Mark Merrill, who famously sold off shares of himself.
- CryptoTaco: A point-of-sale tool for merchants to accept crypto for payments without having to worry about keys or wallets or whatever. Uses Magic's tools to onboard merchants using their email addresses. These guys had a lot of enthusiasm, but I'm not sure they're fully aware of how busy this space is. Hasn't bitpay been doing this since 2013 or something?
- QuestGPT: Basically AI Dungeon implemented as a Discord chatbot, using DALL-E to create images related to the story which are then minted as NFTs. Pretty nice user experience in the end. Not quite the same degree of control as AI Dungeon gives you though. I was told they use multiple AIs (all GPT?) working together to keep track of context/worldstate and regularize the story.
- Factorial: Modular libraries/tools for building DeFi protocols, one example being a "liquidation module" for any time you may need to do something analogous to liquidating a user's position.
The following are the finalists who presented at the closing ceremony. These were short talks and it was easy to miss critical details, so this may be quick.
- Sesame (Winner!): Allows you to use Ethereum on your phone without internet by sending data over SMS. Has a little wallet interface that can update ETH market price and portfolio value, and lets you send simple transactions.
- FundPG (Winner!): A no-loss donation pool that allows users to specify some percentage of their yield to go to public goods.
- Krypto Kredit: Some sort of credit score platform using Huma. Kind of missed the details.
- Bitcoin Vitalik's Vision: Fork of the OP stack to post data on Bitcoin, inspired by ordinals of course. Team answered a question about their experience by saying "it sucks to build on Bitcoin".
- Swappy (Winner!): Token swaps using natural language queries. You type in "Swap 5 USDC on Ethereum for MATIC on Polygon" and it parses it with GPT, prompts you if you're missing anything, constructs the actual details of the swap, lets you visualize and confirm it, then executes.
- Rhinestone: My notes on this literally say "something something account abstraction" sorry.
- Slang: Lets you write a single command to generate code to integrate with Ceramic (decentralized data storage) as if it were a web2 database.
- Inheritable: Web3 wills for inheritance. Puts inheritances in a Merkle tree for verifying claims. Lets you establish a group of Witnesses who attest/vote that you're dead to start the inheritance process.
- BaZaarK (Winner!): I believe this was about selling an NFT but using ZP proofs to do so without revealing all of its traits. May find some specialized use cases.
- MyMule: Virtual pet game with a 3D environment where the pets are NFTs. If you interact with it regularly and keep it happy, it prints some ERC20 tokens for you. If you let its happiness bar go to zero then it dies.
- Synesthesia: Collecting music NFTs isn't as fun as JPEG NFTs because of the difference in medium. This project creates generative art for each piece of music based on its metadata to make catchy pictures to go along with them.
- ZKpoEx (Winner!): This provides a way for auditors to create a ZK proof that an exploit (generally agnostic to the type of exploit) exists, without revealing the specific details of how it works. Good way to do responsible disclosure. Probably my favorite out of the finalists.
- Tribe.Credit: P2P lending protocol. You can deposit some capital, then it connects to your phone's contact list and you can say how much you'd be willing to lend that person. If they borrow from you, you don't get to see who exactly it is or how much. If they don't repay you then identity gets revealed and they get kicked out.
- GasPay (listed as Gasly elsewhere): Simple token swap tool that just adds the ability to pay for gas in whatever token you want.
- Denoted: A medium/hackmd/notion kind of writing site that integrates with all sorts of crypto data and analytics tools to create graphs and visualizations embedded in the posts. Generated dynamically so can update over time.
- M3mber: I think this is a way to mint an NFT that represents a membership in something with an expiry date (pitched as a way for DAOs to bring in recurring money like a subscription rather than just the one-off token sale). They use ENS domains, with NameWrapper to accomplish this; is it only because ENS domains already have expiry built in so they don't have to code it from scratch?
- GovBlocks: DAO management platform. Modular design, has useful things you would expect like DAO members being able to start a vote to change a governance parameter.
That was actually the last day. Some people are sticking around for the mountain retreat, but that's not really something to report on. I'll assemble a final review tomorrow and that'll be it!
Ecosystem: u/KingLeo23 has more on the fight between crypto and the SEC
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11kqzjp/daily_general_discussion_march_7_2023/jb9othy/)Interesting legal op-ed about the potential future of crypto regulation as the Ripple case progresses through the courts.
TLDR: The conservative supreme court has renewed interest in containing federal agencies to the powers explicitly defined by congress evidenced by WV vs. EPA ruling last year referencing the "major questions doctrine" in the ruling. Regardless of the outcome in lower courts for Ripple vs. SEC, the ruling is likely to be appealed to higher courts and this author at least thinks the SEC's authority over crypto assets falls under the "major questions doctrine" that needs to be decided by congress and could potentially neuter Gensler's further attempts to destroy the industry in the US.
OPSEC: u/REALJohnBMacLemore has another amazing private, free and open source app
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11lo2v3/daily_general_discussion_march_8_2023/jbesix8/)Aaayo! It’s ya most annoying boy back with mooaar open source software! Now, if you’re like me, your short term memory is shot due to excessive and repeated blows to the head. If you’re also like me, your wife makes you aware of that fact no less than 10 times a day… so you probably take a lot of notes so you don’t feel stupid, like me. On your phone, the desktop, on the mirror after a shower … Don’t forget to put on pants today!
Notes are personal and often contain personal information, subtle details about your life and your extremely valuable intellectual property like your unreleased raps. Are you going to trust that level of information to Evernote!? OneNote!? You know who just bought Evernote? Bending Spoons. You know what Bending Spoons does? AI… yeah. They want your raps bro! Don’t even get me started on Microsoft (OpenAI) OneNote! Ahhhhhhh!
So, today I present an open source, self hosted, zero knowledge, end to end encrypted note taking app named Joplin. Joplin is a full featured notes app with markdown support, image/website/screen clip insertion support and so much more! Syncing between your mobile and desktop can be done with Joplin’s paid cloud service but they also support S3, Nextcloud, WebDAV, Dropbox, OneDrive or the local filesystem (syncthing?), so you don’t have to pay more for their cloud if you don’t want.
They have fully featured, open source apps for Android/iOS and Linux, Windows, Mac and … FreeBSD!? Whoah! So hardcore! Even the Joplin cloud server software is open source… ohhh! and … and there’s a terminal app for my fellow shell dwellers out there. You can really feel the nerd love here. Check it out!
Joplin:
https://joplinapp.org
Analysis: u/bagogel12 shares some small new DeFi protocols being built
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11lo2v3/daily_general_discussion_march_8_2023/jbf8b5h/)You all know, this bear is a builder. Here are some newish, not-so-well-known Defi protocols. As they are new, they are not battle-tested and deployed capital are potentially at risk. Don‘t ape in with your life savings.
Numoen.com - an AMM on Arbitrum which let you access leverage with no liquidation penality, oracleless. It‘s done as a power perpetual ETH^2. But there is a price,you pay relatively high funding rates so it‘s rather good for short term trades.
Sturdy.finance - another leverage protocol. Here you can leverage up DEX pool tokens or alternatively lend your ETH/stables to the one using leverage.
Contango.xyz - you can buy or sell a forward contract, and contango borrows on the fixed-rate markets, swaps on the spot markets, and lends back on the fixed rate markets. Sounds complicated, but also fascinating money lego. Be aware: very early stage, in beta with unaudited contracts!
Ondo.finance / fluxfinance.com: Ondo is gate-keeped (100k min. deposit), so I‘m not sure if you manage to get into their pools (I‘ve not tried it). But if not, you can get relatively high APY (currently) on stables (USDC,USDT or DAI) by depositing into their partner protocol fluxfinance.
IPOR.io - an Inter-protocol Offered Rate for Decentralized Finance. It‘s too complicated to explain it in simple words by myself, so I refer to their elaborate documentation: https://docs.ipor.io/
Week #9: March 3, 2023
Announcements
- Lattice1 Giveaway: The drawing for a chance to win a Lattice1 and 2 packs of Safecards ($480 value) will be happening on today's stream using POAP Raffle: https://poap.fun/2079
The morning trinity
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11gsztq/comment/jaq364m/)Ethereum
$1567
0.07
Shitpost of the week: u/KingLeo23 answers whether u/Ethical-trade is a security
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11evx0c/daily_general_discussion_march_1_2023/jahxuiw/)Am I a security?
Yes.
- It took a large investment of money to birth and raise you to adulthood.
- In a common enterprise between your parents and you
- Who had the expectation of profit in terms of fulfilling a basic human drive to procreate, entertainment, companionship, care in old age, etc. which all have existing markets and value.
- Which can only be derived from your efforts
Please report to Gary Gensler for a paddlin
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11c6vcs/daily_general_discussion_february_26_2023/ja3c9yy/)Sequencer karma,
Blockchain inverted comma,
Layer 2 drama.
Today in Ethereum: u/ZeroTricks
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11fuqpf/daily_general_discussion_march_2_2023/jaladj3/)On this day...
In 2022:
- UkraineDAO buys an NFT of the Ukraine flag for 2258 ETH.
- UniSwap adds a "donate to Ukraine" feature which automatically exchanges a users' token to ETH for donation.
- A CryptoPunk is used as collateral for an $8 Million loan.
- A lucky ETH is found in the crawlspace between $2950 and ₿0.06717.
In 2021:
- Amazon announces the general availability of Ethereum on Amazon Managed Blockchain.
- Coinbase takes a deep dive into Ethereum's economy: "more than digital money, it’s the foundation of a $200 billion-plus economy".
- Evolve files for an Ether ETF with Canadian regulators.
- Ethereum-based derivative trading platform CloseCross gets a European Union MIFID license.
- ETH smashes the cash from $1566 to $1493, at ₿0.03085.
In 2020:
- Hudson Jameson explains the history, pro and cons of ProgPoW, and adds: "ProgPoW isn’t worth it and is dead based on overwhelming evidence of community dissent."
- ETH chugs along, from $218 to $231, at ₿0.02599, while SteemIt experiences a hostile takeover.
In 2019:
- Ethereum Core developers discuss the ProgPOW audit from Cat Herders and are looking for a new hard fork coordinator.
- A $3 Million real estate transaction is settled on Ethereum by Swiss companies blockimmo, Elea Labs and Swiss Crypto Tokens..
- Vlad Zamfir and Vitalik Buterin discuss blockchain politics.
- Some sources say ETH goes at $134, or ₿0.03478.
In 2018:
- Smart contract-powered retirement planning platform Auctus goes live on Ethereum testnet Rinkeby.
- ETH is one with everything but especially with $857 (at ₿0.07995 - ₿0.07766).
In 2017:
- Ethereum makes it to FastCompany's list of "10 Most Innovative Companies In Finance 2017".
- ETH is coming of age between $17 and $19, or ₿0.01388 and ₿0.01521.
In 2016:
- Ethereum reaches 10% of Bitcoin's market cap as it moves from $7.6 to $8.5, or ₿0.01755 to ₿0.01994.
Ecosystem: u/Ethical-trade and u/etheraider share Coinbase's latest release and how it validates Ethereum's scaling strategy
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/119q5kg/daily_general_discussion_february_23_2023/j9oq1yx/)In the past, Binance launched its own L1 with the Binance Smart Chain.
FTX launched its own L1 with Solana.
But today Coinbase commits to Ethereum by launching its own L2 on Ethereum.
This means than Coinbase's interests are now fully aligned with Ethereum, with bridging of users and capital directly to the Ethereum ecosystem.
This means that marketing made by Coinbase for its chain will now directly benefit Ethereum.
Eth is this L2's native token, with which gas will be paid.
This fully validates Ethereum's rollup centric roadmap.
While some may find the Coinbase "Base" news underwhelming or would have hoped for something different, the way I see it, this is a huge signal in the crypto space that the number one crypto company in the world is choosing to go all in on building on Ethereum.
Up until now you could argue Coinbase was "impartial" in its offerings and did not show favoritism amongst coins, but now it seems they are willing to forego impartiality to build on the project they believe in most.
They couldve chosen to enhance lightning network/build an alternative, or build on solana, or the "new" smart contract enabled Cardano, but no they chose Ethereum.
That is something I would consider "significant."
Community: u/nixorokish makes Danny Ryan's post available in the EthStaker podcast
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11ak2qc/daily_general_discussion_february_24_2023/j9vh3jv/)I've been screwing around with editing EthStaker's community calls to podcast-ify them, and I loved Danny Ryan's post yesterday, so I recorded it. It's available in the EthStaker podcast.
Or you can listen here: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2137396/12322923-danny-ryan-s-reflections-2023
*Yes, I know my audio levels processing is poop. I'm using some auto-process feature in the Descript software. If you want to give me pointers or tell me I suck, please leave a comment in the suggestion box on the desk that I don't have
Ecosystem: u/Maleficent_Plankton goes into detail on the Polygon outage
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11ak2qc/daily_general_discussion_february_24_2023/j9sjnjy/)Yesterday's Polygon validator "outage" was wild:
- There was a 157-block reorg
- The block explorer went down for an hour
- Many validators (at least 25) went out of sync and continued to have issues syncing for 12-24 hours.
It was big enough that:
- Polygon rushed out a new governance proposal, PIP-9, and passed it within 12 hours. This proposal reduced validator SLA requirements from 98% back to 95% in order to save 18-23 validators from getting offboarded due to missing their checkpoints SLA.
- The co-founder of Polygon stated that they are exploring replacing their entire Bor/Heimdall blockchain consensus protocol with a single-blockchain solution.
Background: What happened is that several Polygon validators experienced sync issues, which then lead to giant cascade of outages for most validators. The reason for the reorg is supposedly a bug between their Bor and Heimdall layers, though the team has yet to give details on the bug.
Checkpoint SLAs: Back in Aug 2022, there was a governance proposal, PIP-4, to move towards permissionless validation.
"In its current state, the PoS validator network is not entirely permissionless in that the previously-selected set of validators has largely persisted since testnet."
The proposal added an SLA requirement that 95% of median average of last 700 checkpoints are signed by the validator. If the validator fails to meet the SLA, they are placed in a Grace Period have another 700 checkpoints to meet it. Otherwise, they get offboarded from staking. After 2 months, the SLA increased from 95% to 98%.
What happened yesterday concerning the checkpoint SLA:
Due to this rule and validators missing checkpoints yesterday, 25 out of 100 validators were at risk of getting kicked off staking.
The emergency PIP-9 vote to reduce the SLA was passed, saving most of the validators. Only 2 validators got offboarded and 5 more are in the Grace Period.
It's good they're finally taking the reorg issue more seriously, but I think they should've addressed this a long time ago.
Random: u/austonst is doing the ETHDenver daily recaps
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11bdlrh/daily_general_discussion_february_25_2023/j9xiefc/)ETHDenver Day 1
Last year, I attended ETHDenver and made a post each day in which I primarily summarized the best talks I heard that day, and also commented a little about my general experiences at the conference. ETHDenver 2023 has now begun, and I intend to do the same this year. As with last year, the first few days are slow: only one stage with talks starting late and ending early. So not too much to cover.
It seems that, also like last year, all talks are recorded to Twitch, one stream per stage. But for a given talk, figuring out which stage and what timestamp is not trivial. It's not too hard either, and for today I figured I'd try tracking down timestamps but I'm really skeptical that I'll want to spend the time on that as the days get longer. If there's one you really want to see, let me know and I can probably find it pretty quick given that I know what the different stages are and can probably recognize the style of a given talk's slides at a glance. But in general I'll link to the schedule page for each talk, which should be enough to point you in the right direction for learning more.
- Rick Lamanna, Founder of OpenQ (video) talked about crypto hackathons. Gave some general advice on how to best participate and pursue bounties, and then mentioned some trends such as the prevalence of bounties meaning that hackathon teams are starting to say "if you don't pay a bounty for us to use your tool, we're not going to use it".
- u/DoubtStarsAreFire and u/htimsk of Luau DAO (video) talked about Hodlercon, which needs no introduction here. It was a fun talk about a fun event, good vibes all around. I personally would have been interested in some more of the behind-the-scenes about what it takes to form a Wyoming DAO (and why to do so) and organize a group vacation while maintaining participant pseudonymity, but the conference organizers surprised them last minute with this day-1 timeslot so I know there were some serious time constraints.
- Brian Wilkes (video) gave a nice overview of zero knowledge proofs as applied to Ethereum scaling. Nothing particularly new to me, but I think it could be a nice overview or refresher for many.
- Josh Forman of ShapeShift DAO (video) covered ShapeShift's experience operating as a DAO, and in particular how they fared during a period of serious bear market financial woes. There are some good general insights into DAO structure and operation that I found myself able to relate to the EVMavericks DAO. Some of his main lessons: be clear about your governance process, don't try to figure out too much ahead of time, keep open and transparent communication, leadership and hierarchy can exist but should be delegated (and can be revoked) by the community.
On a personal note, it's kind of amazing how much I expect my experience at ETHDenver will be different this year. Last year I knew nobody personally and was generally content to fill my days with nothing but listening to talks and occasionally chatting with strangers. But this year? I didn't go half an hour before I started bumping into folks I know. I have a project that I can explain to people who ask what I've been working on (and they seem to find it very interesting (!), but I need to stop assuming that everyone knows how staking and MEV work). I tentatively have a hackathon team (with folks from this community) for a project I think will be bite-sized but still quite valuable. And I need to juggle driving back home occasionally for some classes I'm taking, so I've accepted I'm going to have limited free time this next week. But it'll just be packed so full of fun things!
EDIT: Oh yeah, I also have the EVMavericks t-shirts for those who signed up on Discord. I won't be lugging around the huge box everywhere I go, but I'll try to set aside multiple timeslots when I can set up shop in one spot, let everyone know, and hand them out. Got 100 EVMavs stickers to hand out too.
Ecosystem: u/cryptOwOcurrency has details on Spotify’s new token gating NFT implementation
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11c6vcs/daily_general_discussion_february_26_2023/ja4b17a/)ICYMI: Spotify is piloting token-enabled playlists powered by Ethereum NFTs.
Music streaming Spotify is testing a new service called "token-enabled playlists," which allows holders of non-fungible tokens (NFT) to connect their wallets and listen to curated music.
Currently, the service is available to token holders within the Fluf, Moonbirds, Kingship and Overlord communities. The curated playlists will be actively updated during the three-month testing period and can only be accessed by community members via a unique link.
Random: u/silentjxhn is finding crypto boring but u/stablecoin and u/cryptOwOcurrency disagree
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11d4bra/daily_general_discussion_february_27_2023/jaamg79/)Can't believe there's this many upvotes. Off the top of my head I can think about:
- Finalizing the Merge Event end of March kicking off a major staking reshuffling for probably the first and last time in the networks history. Every single LSD that has a shot need to make their move in the next 2-6 months or possibly never gain share again. Keeping an eye on RPL, BTRFLY, FXS, SWISE for possible shorter term catalysts.
- Upcoming Arbitrum token event, huge amount of new protocols launching on Arbitrum daily lately.
- Launch of final Scroll Network Open Testnet on Goerli announced just today: https://twitter.com/Scroll_ZKP/status/1630258973856395264
- Polygon ZKEVM launching March 27: https://twitter.com/sandeepnailwal/status/1629736205720977408
- Optimism TVL continuing to grow, Synthetix and Velodrome updates in the works.
- Base (Coinbase) announcement, dapps and onboarding sooon
- Starkware should continue to drip out news/updates as all these other L2 catalysts take shape, still waiting on their main net launch
- New Rocketpool LSD built on top of RPL to scale Rocket Pool and decentralized staking https://twitter.com/NodeOperators/status/1630310094981468161
- ZK Sync onboarding dapps getting ready for their main net launch (soon tm)
- Blur passing Open Sea in volume for many days now, currently lots of active farming possibilities for useless JPGS
- Yuga Labs announcing new NFT project with Bitcoin Ordinals
- Sensible EU stablecoin and defi adoption
- SEC fights against everyone claiming it's a security
This bear market is honestly so much harder to keep track of developments than the last one. All you could do last bear was take a Maker CDP loan and wait for Michael Saylor to buy Bitcoin. Maybe price action stinks but you can never say crypto is boring.
[Edit] Also just remembered Spotify NFTs, Starbucks Polygon NFT rollout in progress, and some of my Reddit WSB NFT's getting a nice premium lately.
Money should be boring. The fact that we had exciting money for a few years (bootstrapping/awareness phase of Bitcoin, then of Ethereum) is a marvel in the history of money.
If you think about it, new types of money don't pop up very often. In the history of money, we've only really had three major types, invented in 6000 BC, 600 BC, and 2008 CE.
- Physical barterable commodities as monies (backed by physical utility, 6000 BC)
- Trust-based monies (backed by their utility in abstracting away the trade of these cumbersome physical commodities by instead trading surrogate notes representing promises made by a trusted authority, 600 BC)
- Self-sovereign monies (monies that exist nowhere and everywhere as information that polices itself as it floats around, backed by their utility in eliminating the need for surrogacy or trust in creating abstract monies, 2008 CE).
You could argue that the jump from gold-backed notes to fiat notes was another fundamental evolution of money, but in any case we have been very lucky to live through this incredibly special decade.
So now begins the long, boring process of executing on the existing roadmap, and integrating Ethereum with the old, boring economy. We've had our big bang moment for this three thousand year period - perhaps in another three thousand years civilization will come up with yet another fundamentally new type of money and we'll see another big bang (thousands of years from now, quantum physics may allow us to have conversations with the laws of physics and directly ask those laws of physics to enforce certain constraints on our reality, a.k.a. "magic").
In three thousand years though, if the word "I" still makes sense to describe me, if I am even aware at that point of the events taking place on planet Earth in the material plane, and humans do invent a fourth type of money, at that point I probably won't care.
ping u/silentjxhn
OPSEC: u/Tricky_Troll has some spiel about spammers and the report button
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11d4bra/daily_general_discussion_february_27_2023/ja9t6dn/)Thanks for those of you vigilantly reporting the spam post on the front page. A quick dive into the user posting it and the other user commenting in support of the scam found a history of similar posts with the same free reddit awards. Don't trust any supposed uncollateralised DeFi protocols. They're almost certainly a scam unless basically everyone is talking about such a breakthrough.
Reminder of things to look out for in identifying spam and scams on Reddit:
Spam posts: (if yes it's probably a scam)
- Did they gain a lot of upvotes in the first 20 mins and then stop gaining traction?
- Does the user history have lost of similar posts or low effort comments about the same product posted by different users?
- Does the post have lots of low tier Reddit awards with relatively few upvotes?
- Does the user have low karma or karma farming indications like having a history of posting in random or low effort subs?
- Does the user and other users commenting in support of the post have a generic usernames with a shared pattern such as "AmazingReindeer123" or "GlowingPancake4679"?
Aside from this, there are some basic rules such as:
- If someone you don't know DM'd you it's probably a scam. Even if you want to be polite and respond to an unexpected DM, don't reveal any info or click any links until you're sure they are legit.
- If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.
- If something raises even just one of the above flags, do some googling and delve into who else is talking about it. If you're seeing no organic looking chat about it then it's probably a scam.
Please remember to use the report button! In a sub with active mods multiple reports always signals to the mods that something needs investigating.
For those of you who are interested, this is the user who posted it and take a look and see if you can see the patterns of a scammer in their posts and post history. https://reddit.com/user/SpicateHammer451
Stay safe out there, folks!
Random: u/Sal_T_Nuts discusses discussing staking
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11evx0c/daily_general_discussion_march_1_2023/jah8knp/)My brother: So how's it going with that secret little thing you are doing with Ethereum, that miner sitting on your desk? You must be very smart how do you manage it? Must be a lot of work.
Me thinking: Oh that's right I'm running a validator I almost forgot.
That thing is still running perfectly turning dust into ETH without looking at it for months. Yes, staking is very hard and mind consuming. All I do is wait for my phone to prompt an update and then I run the ethstaker wizard after a few weeks. I am very sramt!
This week I managed to get my coworker into solo staking without telling him I am one myself, but I think he knows. Dude is already heavily invested in getting the best performance out of his machine. What a nerd (He's actually a very nice guy that just loves computers). Tells me he has a lot of unused parts freshly bought just because they were off price. He was flabbergasted about the low specs needed and was kind of disappointed. I guess he was expecting to run some sort of data center in his home?
Maybe I'll tell him to run a Solana node instead, if he really wants to drown in debt and get no profit at all (even run at a loss). Good thing is that he understands. He immediately linked the correlation about decentralization needing easy hardware to work the most efficient. Can't expect normal people to run data centers right? They have the money, but not the technical knowledge. They do not want a beefy machine taking their electricity and bandwidth away. These were his exact words, and I was astounded by his quick thinking.
I wanted to direct him to the right sources to run a validator but he was already talking about running Geth and Lighthouse and was talking about all sorts of Linux command stuff. He was already smarter then me about validating in one day. I guess he's going to be just fine.
Coworker, if you manage to cross this post and recognize me. Doxx me and I will tell your mother!!
Week #8: February 24, 2023
Announcements
- Lattice1 Giveaway: During the March 3rd livestream there will be a POAP drawing for a chance to win a Lattice1 and 2 packs of Safecards ($480 value). You will need a EthFinance Doots Happy Hour POAPs from a February livestream to entry. Giveaways by Gridplus exclude mainland China, Russia, and Vietnam due to regulations.
The morning trinity
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11ak2qc/comment/j9shcoc/)Ethereum
$1645
0.068
Shitpost of the week: u/jtnichol looks for a shitpost of the week
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11ak2qc/daily_general_discussion_february_24_2023/j9ttyfr/)Hey fam! We're looking for a nomination for "Shitpost of the week" to be included today in the livestream. Got any suggestions? Reply here with the link! see you soon!
https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11ak2qc/daily_general_discussion_february_24_2023/j9ttyfr/
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/113jhtv/daily_general_discussion_february_16_2023/j8ufwzp/)What is Gary's mood?
Bailing Sam out was so rude,
Do Kwon just got sued.
Today in Ethereum: u/ZeroTricks
[View on Reddit →](https://]reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11ak2qc/daily_general_discussion_february_24_2023/j9u4782/])On this day...
In 2022:
- Flexpool.io halts all services to Russia.
- A tear drops at 1 ETH, $2598, or ₿0.06778.
In 2021:
- Optimism announces arbitrary contract deployments go live on mainnet in March.
- dYdX launches cross-margined perpetuals on StarkWare's Layer 2.
- A16z leads a $25 million Series A investment in Optimism.
- JP Morgan tests payments between satellites using Quorum.
- Swiss bank Bordier & Cie incorporates Sygnum’s banking platform to offer Bitcoin, Ether, Bitcoin Cash and Tezos.
- CoinShares launches a physically-backed Ethereum ETP.
- Trent Van Epps and Tim Beiko catalog application sentiment on #EIP1559: "Almost every project / team supports this change".
- ETH offers between $1577 and $1622 for ₿0.03265.
In 2020:
- Vitalik Buterin and Vlad Zamfir discuss chain governance, in which the former criticizes the way ProgPOW was "ninja-approved".
- Bitmain's Antminer E3 could stop supporting Ethereum soon, as it's internal memory is almost filled up with Ethereum's growing mining epoch DAG.
- Oh brother, why selleth, between $274 and $265, at ₿0.02749?
In 2019:
- ETH klettersteigs from $159 to $136, or ₿0.03837 to ₿0.03575.
In 2018:
- Micah Dameron writes the Ethereum Beige paper, a readable rewrite of Ethereum's yellow paper.
- Furthermore, ETH becomes further less, at $842, or ₿0.08655.
In 2017:
- Ethereum's Ropsten testnet gets spammed.
- ETH acts like a stablecoin at $13.1, or ₿0.01113.
u/superphiz has a disclosure to make but it still putting values first
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/113jhtv/daily_general_discussion_february_16_2023/j8t3bo9/)I want to disclose that I've contracted with EY to offer community education regarding their Nightfall and Starlight products for a few months. This isn't a full time job, just an agreement to spend more time learning about Nightfall and Starlight, then sharing what I've learned.
Let me give you some idea what this means. My credibility to the community is the most important thing I have in crypto, so I'll never do or say anything that would degrade that credibility. Many people who know and trust me hold that trust because I'm extremely selective about things I talk about. I focus on highly aligned projects that add value to the whole ecosystem and don't extract value for anyone. You might know that EY's privacy tools led by Paul Brody's team fill that niche for me, and I'm very confident about that fit after knowing Paul several years.
My intention is to learn more and share more about Nightfall and Starlight and help them find the traction they deserve and I hope you'll join me in this quest. If these tools succeed in the market, Ethereum will be the greatest beneficiary.
I need you to know that I can't be bought. I'm agreeing to this contract because it's good for the web3 community, our community, Ethereum, and EY. I believe that any greater knowledge we develop about these products will benefit all parties in the long run.
I will always continue to do my best to earn your trust as I find the best tools and opportunities to share with other Ethfinanciers, but I also need you to put your own judgement first. Ask yourself if I'm doing things that make sense for all of us or if I've lost my way. Follow your own good judgement, not mine. <3
u/SikhSoldiers covers the RocketPool x Coinbase Ventures partnership
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/114c6on/daily_general_discussion_february_17_2023/j8vjsek/)We are always happy and willing to be ambassadors for the benefits of decentralisation and how that can provide a deep benefit for all those involved. So it is with great pleasure that we want to relay that Coinbase Ventures has invested in the protocol. We recently announced their intentions to join the oDAO, so this is just another step in them willing to back a decentralised staking protocol such as Rocket Pool.
"We're excited to announce that Coinbase Ventures is deepening its partnership with Rocket Pool via a direct investment into RPL in addition to its proposed entry into the oDAO. Coinbase Ventures also plans to use their RPL and ETH to spin up their own Rocket Pool minipools."
/- Coinbase Ventures
From the Rocket Pool discord. Pretty impressive evolution of the CB Ventures x Rocket Pool relationship.
u/15kisFUD asks if Coinbase spinning up RocketPool nodes is good, bad or neutral for decentralization
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/114c6on/daily_general_discussion_february_17_2023/j8w36bk/)I’m in a discussion with a community member that I respect very much, yet strangely we do not seem to agree on something.
Question for the fam:
If Coinbase would start spinning up Rocket Pool minipools instead of regular validators from today on, would this be good, bad or neutral for decentralization?
Please limit the discussion to this question about decentralization only. I don’t want it to be a value judgement on Rocket Pool. Of course any actor can use it as it is permissionless. This is not a fault of the protocol. Also please don’t discuss how unlikely or likely it is that Coinbase would do this. It might be very unlikely with all the risks (RPL exposure, regalutory, other). I just want to know if you think my hypothetical question would be good or bad for decentralization
You asked me to post my comment in reply to this thread, but I think it might be worth re-writing it suited for some of the answers I see here. I'm going to write this as if the LEB-8 (8 ETH minipools) are in effect, because that is the long term goal. For anyone reading this not familiar with Rocket Pool, the current version of minipools instead has 16 ETH from the minipool operator and 16 ETH taken from the rETH pool. This difference doesn't impact the following statements, with the exception of making the barrier-of-entry lower.
Answer: I believe the effect on decentralization is neutral, but in spite of that neutral effect from this factor alone I think it would be actually devastating to Ethereum's prospects to shut out large entities, due to runaway centralization behind 2-3 broadly used liquid staking tokens. Here are my thoughts.
- It lowers the barrier to entry for a solo staker from 32 ETH, down to 8 ETH + a portion of collateral (roughly a 70% reduction in initial capital required).
- It gives parties interested in acquiring staking services access to a service pool that isn't monopolized by a single entity (it is permissionless).
- Specifically note that "gives more nodes to smaller stakers" isn't in this list. This will be addressed below.
Fallacy 1: Comparing centralized entity Rocket Pool use to centralized entities not using Rocket Pool
- The protocol is permissionless, and you cannot prevent any size staker from using it.
- The permissionless feature is non-negotiable, as otherwise centralization is a factor and the protocol is pointless.
- Desire to deny large entities from using it is pointless, and large entities staking in RP should be considered a likely outcome.
- Are features #1 and #2 outlined above compromised by large entities using the protocol? I believe these features are not compromised.
- With that in mind, the comparison of centralized entities using Rocket Pool vs. not using it results in a net neutral comparison minus a concern addressed in the next section.
- A much more important comparison when thinking about Rocket Pool usefulness is "How does this compare to the situation without any Rocket Pool?"
Some comments here point to the fact that small stakers can obtain a 4x node power "multiplier" against large staking entities, and that large staking entities entering the picture defeats this purpose. This is a fallacy, however:
- If you could engineer a Rocket Pool protocol where you could magically keep out large-entity stakers, you could then tout "increased node counts for small stakers" as a decentralization-increasing feature of Rocket Pool, but that feature would only function up to the number of small node operators you would have available in the pool. Once that pool of small stakers runs out however, no further rETH could be created.
- Any demand for staking services beyond what rETH capacity exists would then likely flow over to centralized staking entities outright. Meaning that they would be spinning up more nodes, just as if they had spun them up from rETH-provided funds. It would literally just end up a 1:1 conversion.
- The end result of this hypothetical scenario where you block out large stakers, is that you have lost:
- The permissionless feature, and more importantly,
- you've seriously handicapped the value your accessible-to-all staking services access pool due to the low ceiling of possible funds, and the fact that you just forced a huge number of customers over to centralized entities providing liquid staking tokens.
The same scenario effectively plays out if you make the comparison of centralized entities using RP vs. RP not existing:
- In this scenario where Rocket Pool doesn't exist, it's once again a very, very safe assumption that people whom are already comfortable delegating their funds for staking on the network, would instead use centralized services for their staking instead.
- This means that it's safe to assume that all funds flowing into rETH in the centralized-entities RP scenario would instead just be... with those centralized entities you're concerned with.
- Now, in this scenario, there isn't an accessible-to-all staking services market at all, and it's almost 100% guaranteed that one staking service is going to become popular on a runaway level purely due to the convenience of having a single liquid staking token. Lido almost did this on accident purely by being early to market and being able to expand rapidly.
Considering those two scenarios, node counts for any of these scenarios are irrelevant and are not a factor in comparing any situation for Rocket Pool. The fact is, Rocket Pool will actually give a slight node-power advantage to decentralization, but only by virtue of feature #1 - the reduced barrier-to-entry. There is no scenario where Rocket Pool increases the amount of power a centralized entity has in comparison to Rocket Pool not existing, or locking centralized entities out.
So what's the actual strength of Rocket Pool? It's specifically item #2, the accessible-to-all staking services pool. The lowered barrier to entry for actual node-operators at 8 ETH is to be frank pretty awesome and amazing, and it's going to let a lot more people into the ETH staking ecosystem, but the point that people keep missing about the accessible-to-all staking services pool that is provided is that it keeps the biggest liquid-staking token out of the hands of a single entity, or at the very least provides a nearly-unstoppable competitor. If Rocket Pool didn't exist, staking-services users would have nowhere to send their money except centralizing forces, and what's more is that small operations wouldn't be able to attract staking-services customers for shit - nobody would use little-known liquid-staking tokens, and the small operations would get crushed on margins by the big operations.
Every centralized entity that joins this accessible-to-all pool makes it that much harder for any centralized entity to monopolize the liquid-staking-token market, and even better, the protocol itself isn't really able to use it's own dominance of the liquid-staking market to try and shut out competitors except by trying to provide better service to keep people using rETH - so even competitors will still be able to rise up if they make something truly great. The protocol can't blacklist competing liquid-staking tokens on the protocol's (non-existent) exchange, the protocol can't make back-room deals to give more favorable staking percentages to special, favored customers, the protocol can't lock out small staking providers that the big providers don't like.
Rocket Pool can't actually shut out centralized or large entities by design, and it also shouldn't because doing so is inherently a bad idea. Any centralization of node operators on the Rocket Pool protocol would have existed without Rocket Pool, and if you try and shut them out that money gets transferred right over to external centralized entities anyways. Rocket Pool's design has likely averted a scenario where a few major exchanges dominated the entire staking services market on the Ethereum chain, which... to be honest, I think would have truly killed the decentralization angle and left us with little claim to security.
u/edrews99 reminds us that exchanges will not call you if they detect something suspicious
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/1158cdi/daily_general_discussion_february_18_2023/j921uz2/)Heads up, I received an unsolicited call this morning allegedly coming from Coinbase support indicating that my account had been logged into from another country and that they were placing a hold on my account. While on the phone they sent me an email confirming this and a text message with a link to hxxps://issue-coinbase.com/email=?[EMAIL] to reset my account. They then gave me an 8 digit password over the phone with which to login.
I pretty much knew from the start that this was bullshit but the hxxps://issue-coinbase.com domain really sealed it. If you get any unsolicited calls from any exchange please ignore it, and maybe report it here for educational purposes. Stay safe out there.
u/domotheus demolishes the deflationary FUD on r/Buttcoin
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/1158cdi/daily_general_discussion_february_18_2023/j90rv66/)Anyone with an ounce of understanding about economies knows why a DEFLATIONARY currency could never work as the standard.
As the standard for what? Buying eggs and bread? Paying people's salaries? Investing in stuff? Sure. In that case, a deflationary, value-appreciating currency is bad. Thankfully that's not what Ether is.
We need money to lose value over time to deincentivise people sitting on savings.
The first and foremost job of Ether as an asset is to provide economic security to Ethereum. "Anyone with an ounce of understanding" about that realizes it'd be dumb to devalue this asset on purpose. Ether is collateral money, not debt money. Having the value of your collateral go up gives you more bandwidth to participate in the economy by doing more stuff you otherwise couldn't
Only when money is used does it lube up the economy by providing cash flow for industry.
Again that's not really Ether's job to do that, but even then it still does it well inside the Ethereum economy: it's deflationary BECAUSE it's being used. "Anyone with an ounce of understanding" quickly realizes this cause and effect relationship and doesn't invert it by claiming being deflationary causes people to not use it.
Ethereum sells blockspace and blockspace accessories. This blockspace is worth something, people are willingly paying for it, choosing to burn their precious deflationary ETH in exchange for it. There is no "bad money drives out good" when it comes to buying blockspace, thanks to EIP-1559.
I'm tired of these takes that miss out on all the nuance. "ETH deflation bad because deflation encourages hoarding" is one of them. And yes, "ETH deflation good because supply goes down = line go up" is another one. It's a cringe meme responding to Bitcoin's equally cringe "capped supply = sound money" meme.
The truth is fundamentally, whether the supply goes up or down doesn't affect the velocity of ETH. Whether supply goes up or down, it's all just an accounting trick that doesn't change the fact that value ultimately flows from users (paying for blockspace) into the pockets of holders (who are likely to be staking, directly or indirectly). You're not magically gonna turn a hoarder into a user if you increase issuance, because that hoarder is already staking anyway.
u/busterrulezzz minted 69 AI generated variants of EIPandas and EVMavericks dropped to random holders!
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/11632qy/daily_general_discussion_february_19_2023/j97ybh3/)Good news! I finally completed my quest of remixing 69 EVMavericks and EIPandas with Midjourney. They have all been minted on Polygon and sent to their respective owners. To see the results, here is the OpenSea collection.
I want to thank everybody that participated in my little project. Your amazing reactions to my artworks mean the world to me! If you had a request and didn't receive it, feel free to DM me, I might have missed some messages.
I will mint one last epic remix and put it up at auction in the next few days, and then I will get to work on my sequel to Worthless JPEGs!, my satirical collection.
Thanks again everyone.
u/OkDragonfruit1929 explains the mechanics behind why ETH has been deflationary
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/116z82t/daily_general_discussion_february_20_2023/j99ww6e/)It's quite a brilliant feature of eip 1559.
If demand for blockspace falls below a certain threshold, ETH issuance goes up while gas prices go down. This has the effect of making it more likely for more people to use ETH, bringing us back to more demand for blockspace.
If demand for blockspace is above a certain threshold, ETH issuance goes ultrasound. More ETH fees are burned instead of given to validators.
If staking becomes extremely desirable, and more and more people stake, staking rewards APY falls, and the threshold of blockspace demand required for fee burns increases.
If staking becomes less desirable and more and more people unstake, staking APY increases and the threshold for fee burning falls.
It's a completely automated, decentralized monetary policy which favors equilibrium. Nothing else on earth like it.
Ethereum eip 1559 increases incentive to secure the network in a way that avoids inflating the supply, without being 100% reliant on market forces such as gas fees. Unlike Bitcoin security which will eventually become completely enslaved to the wills and fluctuations of the market, and without sufficient fees (blockspace demand) will become more and more centralized and less and less secure.
u/Hawaii_Facts has a HodlerCon 2024 update. BeachBum hodlers vote on your favourite locations!
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/117w2io/daily_general_discussion_february_21_2023/j9foucy/)Hodlercon 2024 update: BeachBum NFT hodlers can now vote for destinations at https://hodlercon.com/. (Edit: Tickets to Hodlercon 2022 included a BeachBum. If you attended and haven't minted yours, DM me. Others can mint them at https://hodlercon.com/beachbums).
The Twitter Spaces launch from Sunday is recorded at https://twitter.com/i/spaces/1MYGNgYljAnJw? (45 minutes with superphiz, Paul Brody, nikola_j, DoubtStars and friends).
The highest vote-getter as of March 17 in each of three cohorts will be thrown to the will of the ETH price gods — Whichever price band we're in on June 15, 2023, will determine the location of Hodlercon 2024.
There's a blurb on each destination at https://hodlercon.com/#details. Here're the candidates, proposed by Hodlercon attendees, EthFinanciers, ethstakers and anyone else who wanted to pitch in:
- $0-$1,400
- Camping with JT around Kansas City
- Goblintown Creek, Virginia
- Orlando, Florida
- Smoky Mountain Glamping, Tennessee
- Los Cabos, Mexico
- $1,401-$4,800
- Puerto Rico
- Bermuda
- Iceland
- Thailand
- Portugal
- $4,801-$31,250
- Greece
- Hoi An, Vietnam
- Fiji
- New Zealand
- Ireland
Mahalo for voting.
u/HolyFlatulence shares an excerpt from the incumbents
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/118qid5/daily_general_discussion_february_22_2023/j9k2c6k/)Very interesting speech just given by Augustin Carstens, the General manager for the BIS. Pay close attention to the last paragraph/bolded text. They totally understand the power of shared ledgers/opensource/composable. They just want to centralize it and own it.
edit: formatting; summarizing a little bc the kicker comes at the end of a wall of text.
A unified ledger is a digital infrastructure with the potential to combine the monetary system with other registries of real and financial claims. It would need to be a public-private partnership with a clear division of roles, and where the central bank is tasked with underpinning the trust in money.
Like smartphone platforms, a unified ledger allows various components to work seamlessly together. But unlike them, it is enabled by open architecture that promotes financial inclusion and greater competition.
Such a ledger allows for the use of smart contracts and composability. A smart contract is a computer program that executes conditional "if/then" and "while" commands. Composability means that many smart contracts, covering multiple transactions and situations, can be bundled together, like "money lego".
With these new functionalities, any sequence of transactions in programmable money can be automated and seamlessly integrated. This reduces the need for manual interventions that delay transactions and reduces dependency on intermediaries, and also allows for simultaneous and near-instant payments and settlement.
Greater interoperability and automated transfers could ultimately benefit consumers through more convenient and cheaper products that are better tailored to their needs, thereby enhancing financial inclusion.
These foreseeable gains may just be the tip of the iceberg of additional transformations. Think about how the smartphone displaced digital cameras. It was not because it takes better pictures, but because it's easier to share these pictures with friends through the same device.
Importantly, programmability and composability do not require decentralised or permissionless platforms. All the potential benefits I just outlined can be achieved in permissioned platforms with various degrees of centralisation. What really brings the benefits of these projects together is the use of money as a means of payment and settlement. As the provider of the ultimate settlement asset in the economy, the central bank therefore has an important role to play in the governance of a unified ledger. But it would do so in partnership with other public agencies as well as with private sector participants.
/u/papazio response: Have you ever boosted a Maker vault at $4500 ETH?
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/114c6on/daily_general_discussion_february_17_2023/j8yv6cy/)I think FOMO is more stressful than losing money
Have you ever boosted a Maker vault at $4500 ETH?
You get to experience both in very short order and learn that the latter is much, much worse.
Week #7: February 17, 2023
Livestream Recording | POAP
Special guest VP joins us from Hexagon, a group born out of Golem project. A new app funding Ethereum infrastructure & public goods projects. Rewards from 100,000 staked ETH are powering a sandbox for governance and community funding experiments. Read more...
Announcements
- EthStaker: On Friday February 17 (today) @ 2pm EST (7pm UTC) EthStaker is hosting a call with Lodestar
The morning trinity
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/114c6on/comment/j8vgwjk/)Ethereum
$1656
0.069
Shitpost of the week: u/15kisFUD Regulators!
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10zdqvt/daily_general_discussion_february_11_2023/j83ld04/)90s G-funk synth starts playing
Regulators
We regulate any investing of your property
We're damn good too
But you can't be any geek off the street
You gotta be able to use the Howey test, if you know what I mean
Earn your keep
Regulatooorssss! Mount up
[Verse 1] It was a February day, some time around noon
Gary G was at his desk, seeing ETH moon
He thought real' hard then came up with a plan
Hit centralized staking with a nation-wide ban
[Chorus] Regulators in the house, don't you mess around
The SEC and Gary, they got it all locked down
They're coming with the rules and they're coming to pound
Gary G and SEC they keep the crypto scene sound
[Verse 2] When the Kraken rose up, with its tentacles wide
The SEC and Gary stood side by side
They slayed the beast together, Howey hammer in hand
Now the crypto world is under their command
[Chorus] Regulators in the house, don't you mess around
The SEC and Gary, they got it all locked down
They're coming with the rules and they're coming to pound
Gary G and SEC they keep the crypto scene sound
[Verse 3] When Phiz got the call, he got the smile
He'd been trying to achieve this for a while
Ethereum staking decentralized and free
Superphiz and me, the Gary to the G
[Outro] I'm tweaking into a whole new era
Decentralized Finance, I dare ya
Trust on a whole new level
Smart contracts are the rules and the rules immu-table
ETH, code, We brings decentralization, ETH-funk
Where code is law, aligned incentives
If you know like I know, you don't want to step to this
It's the Ethereum era, funked out with a unicorn twist
If you smoke like I smoke then you're high like every day
And if yo' ass is centralized Gary G will regulate
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10zdqvt/comment/j869zk0/)SEC website,
Staking form still out of sight,
Guidance they won't write.
Today in Ethereum: u/ZeroTricks
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/113jhtv/comment/j8rm8wq/)On this day...
In 2022:
- Twitter adds Ethereum address support to its tipping feature.
- Solidity v0.8.12 improves the JavaScript / Wasm binary.
- Non-custodial Ethereum wallet Rainbow raises $18 Million from Seven Seven Six.
- ETH, don't drop the opsec, not for a sec, at $3128, or ₿0.07116.
In 2021:
- Coinbase opens an Eth2 staking waitlist.
- Marvel artists add 25 NFTs to Ethereum-based art- and collectable marketplace Portion.io.
- ETH finds a message in a $1781 bottle, cryptically mentioning ₿0.0362.
In 2020:
- ETH resides at $260, or ₿0.02615, as all the fun happens at ETHDenver 2020.
In 2019:
- Parity’s Afri Schoedon wants to remove Ethereum's difficulty bomb.
- ETH lives in the present at $123, or ₿0.03397.
In 2018:
- Cosmos, OmiseGo, Golem, Maker, Global Brain and Raiden put together $100 Million to create the Ethereum Community Fund, to support Ethereum's ecosystem infrastructure.
- 372 Ether is paid to build the starting foundation of a Doge-Ethereum bridge.
- The ETH boat captain steers at $944, or ₿0.09261.
In 2017:
- Melonport completes their ICO in 13 minutes.
- Consensys-backed VariabL introduces StabL, a derivatives market with stable tokens on the public Ethereum blockchain.
- MyEtherWallet's new release v3.5.0 allows directly swapping ETH, BTC and REP via Bity.
- Peter Vessenes forms a partnership to consult and invest in Ether projects, stating that "the combination of an incredibly insular core dev community with a toxic minority of the broader community has killed Bitcoin".
- The ethricacies of ethimacy rule at $12.9, or ₿0.01255.
In 2016:
- Ethereum wallet Mist v0.4.0 is released, supporting pre-sale ETH import.
- Some say ETH is a craptocurrency as it moves from $5.3 to $4.3, or ₿0.0133 to ₿0.01059.
Ecosystem: u/oblvnxknight the one sane person at the SEC seems to have little influence
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10xn2mv/daily_general_discussion_february_9_2023/j7wt9wm/)The one sane person at the SEC seems to have little influence - she's echoed this sentiment for a few years now and not much has changed. Not a criticism to her, more a comment on the SEC's approach to regulation being firmly entrenched
https://twitter.com/HesterPeirce/status/1623796583807451139
Today, the SEC shut down Kraken’s staking program and counted it as a win for investors. I disagree and therefore dissent.
Kraken operated a service through which its customers could offer their tokens up for staking. The customers earned returns, and the company earned a fee. The Commission argues that this staking program should have been registered with the SEC as a securities offering. Whether one agrees with that analysis or not, the more fundamental question is whether SEC registration would have been possible. In the current climate, crypto-related offerings are not making it through the SEC’s registration pipeline. An offering like the staking service at issue here raises a host of complicated questions, including whether the staking program as a whole would be registered or whether each token’s staking program would be separately registered, what the important disclosures what be, and what the accounting implications would be for Kraken.
We have known about crypto staking programs for a long time. Although it may not have made a difference, I should have called for us to put out guidance on staking long before now. Instead of taking the path of thinking through staking programs and issuing guidance, we again chose to speak through an enforcement action, purporting to “make clear to the marketplace that staking-as-a-service providers must register and provide full, fair, and truthful disclosure and investor protection.”[1] Using enforcement actions to tell people what the law is in an emerging industry is not an efficient or fair way of regulating.[2] Moreover, staking services are not uniform, so one-off enforcement actions and cookie-cutter analysis does not cut it.[3]
Most concerning, though, is that our solution to a registration violation is to shut down entirely a program that has served people well. The program will no longer be available in the United States, and Kraken is enjoined from ever offering a staking service in the United States, registered or not. A paternalistic and lazy regulator settles on a solution like the one in this settlement: do not initiate a public process to develop a workable registration process that provides valuable information to investors, just shut it down.
More transparency around crypto-staking programs like Kraken’s might well be a good thing. However, whether we need a uniform regulatory solution and if that regulatory solution is best provided by a regulator that is hostile to crypto, in the form of an enforcement action, is less clear.
OPSEC: /u/REALJohnBMacLemore Reddit employee hacked in sophisticated phishing attack
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10yhsb2/daily_general_discussion_february_10_2023/j7zov1i/)Reddit employee hacked in sophisticated phishing attack. Backend compromised since Feb 5th.
I definitely imagine JBM as the Mel Gibson character from Lethal Weapon. He'll let you think he's a little off his rocker, but that's just a ruse to hide a skilled operator.
Analysis: /u/maleficent_plankton For those who want to learn how to use APIs
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10yhsb2/daily_general_discussion_february_10_2023/j7y6tq1/)For those who want to learn how to use APIs: Circle/USD is doing a introduction to API education campaign on StackUp: https://app.stackup.dev/campaign_page/enabling-payments-with-circle
Not every StackUp quest is worth the effort, but this one seems really easy. It'll walk you through how to use APIs and create a basic web app. The first 3 quests are already up. So far, this one seems pretty basic for anyone who is decently-technical. You don't have to have prior dev knowledge.
Also, there is a monetary reward for completing quest. The rewards are limited, so they can run out.
Random: u/busterrulezzz found an interesting mental model to describe the relationship between Ethereum and civil society
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10yhsb2/daily_general_discussion_february_10_2023/j7zb05g/)This is going to be long, sorry.
I think I've found an interesting mental model to describe the relationship between Ethereum and civil society, especially with respect to the (sometimes) irrational hatred for the protocol.
I believe that as a public good, Ethereum is like a large public transportation project.
Indeed, every Western city that has decided to invest in such projects has faced absolutely incredible opposition. In Bordeaux, France, the tramway project caused protests, arguments, political riff raff - a non-negligible portion of the population swore that they would never use the tramway, because they were opposed to it from the beginning.
Now, two decades later, Bordeaux is a model for major European cities, and the opposition has disappeared. The ridership of the tramway is extraordinary, which suggests that even the most furious opponents have pounded on their pride and are using the service when they need it.
It's the same everywhere. When London wanted to reduce the number of cars in the city center, the anger of the citizens was incredible. Twenty years later, no one would go back. I experienced it personally in Montreal: the current mayor built bike lanes on major commercial arteries, which led opponents to predict the imminent death of downtown. Four years later, the city's liveliest thoroughfares are the ones that received new bike lanes, and absolutely no one is calling for a reversal - even the most rabid opponents.
This got me thinking. Why were these citizens so fiercely opposed to a public good? On what arguments was their opposition based?
I went back and read their open letters and angry tweets. Basically, the opponents were concerned that the loss of parking space would hurt business, create traffic congestion, and make the city ugly (!).
Literally none of this has happened. In fact, the exact opposite has happened.
Now, let's ask ourselves why these arguments overrode the emotions of the opponents. My theory is that it is a "failure of imagination": an inability to imagine the world differently, to find creative solutions that are outside the current paradigm. They are stuck in the only model they know, and are unable to believe that another world is possible.
There is also, in my opinion, an element of ego. Many of the opponents were at the top of the social pyramid - wealthy businessmen, popular TV hosts, bourgeois, etc. The world as it is has been extremely generous to them, so why change it? Besides, the idea that a revolution could arise from outside the system that brought them into the world is frightening for them. It means that their privileges are not so solid after all.
I believe Ethereum is in a similar situation.
Our protocol is a public good. It belongs to its participants, and literally any human being can deploy an application on it. This is an absolutely revolutionary idea from the outside - have you seen what Vitalik looks like? It's impossible that a nerd like that, with no credibility in high society, has come up with something good. So his creation is necessarily a fraud, which must be fought
So these opinion leaders declare Ethereum an enemy to be fought, and the citizens used to following what the top of the pyramid tells them jump on the bandwagon, without asking themselves if their fight is really relevant.
TL;DR : Ethereum will (hopefully) follow the same trajectory as public transit projects.
Ecosystem: u/mgr37 explains the use of the validator mnemonic after the withdrawal address is set
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/1108k4a/daily_general_discussion_february_12_2023/j88acu5/)Good question !
As I understand it, yes the seed will no longer be useful for normal operation:
- once withdrawal address set, it can't be changed
- partial withdrawal will be automated to the withdrawal address.
- exit is triggered with validator keys (the one used to run the validator client) and actual full withdrawal will be automated to the withdrawal address.
BUT you would still need it for:
- derivating new validator keys from the same seed (not compulsory, you could use a new seed for new validators, but might be handy -> see next point)
- re-generate your validator keys in case they got lost (i.e. staking rig hard drive crash). I think that's the main reason to keep the seed (and use the same seed when rolling new validators). You could backup the keys instead but it's easier to keep a seed backup than keys backup IMO.
Ecosystem: u/Blueberry314E-2 does some research on the SEC vs BUSD
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/1111020/daily_general_discussion_february_13_2023/j8euz36/)Some of my own research on SEC vs BUSD:
The New York Department of Financial Services (DFS) has told Paxos to stop making its own version of BUSD (a digital currency) "as a result of several unresolved issues related to Paxos’ oversight of its relationship with Binance in regard to Paxos-issued BUSD."
Paxos’ BUSD product is related to, but separate from, Binance’s self-issued Binance-pegged BUSD. Binance’s self-issued BUSD, which is not directly regulated by NYDFS, is independently wrapped and issued by the crypto exchange on blockchains beyond Ethereum. In other words, Binance can take a single Paxos-issued BUSD, create an analogous BUSD on another blockchain (like Binance’s own blockchain, for example), and freeze a corresponding Paxos-issued BUSD. “The Department has not authorized Binance-Peg BUSD on any blockchain, and Binance-Peg BUSD is not issued by Paxos."
So the issue here is not 'true' BUSD issued by Paxos. The problem is that Binance was sneakily issuing alternative unregulated BUSD on it's own blockchain and others, and passing them off as the real, regulated, Ethereum based BUSD issued by Paxos.
Paxos has told its customers that it will end its relationship with Binance for BUSD. The DFS is watching Paxos closely to make sure it can handle redemptions properly, following new safety rules. It's important to know that Paxos was allowed to make BUSD on the Ethereum blockchain, but Binance-Peg BUSD is not approved or made by Paxos. There are no restrictions from the DFS for New York companies to list or trade the existing Paxos-issued BUSD.
Looks to me like Binance is to blame here, SEC is just trying to clean up their mess.
Sources:
https://www.dfs.ny.gov/consumers/alerts/Paxos_and_Binance
https://paxos.com/2023/02/13/paxos-will-halt-minting-new-busd-tokens/
Random: u/Lazy_Physicist has a cool idea for once Stakewise V3 launches
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/111vdwx/daily_general_discussion_february_14_2023/j8kik5e/)Regulatory news aside, I've just had a thought. Stakewise v3 would allow node operators to set up vaults with whitelisted addresses for allocators. This in theory allows us to set up vaults where only holders of EVMavericks/EIPandas/etc. are allowed to deposit ETH into. I'm sure there are others here like myself who have overallocated on the hardware for our own staking rigs or have extra bandwidth. If I were to use swise I would probably set up multiple vaults if I didn't have to provide any collateral to do so. A vault or two to stake for "members" who can't or won't solo stake free of commission, then however many public vaults I want to run with a commission. This could be an interesting way for communities to drive value to their NFT Collections.
Edit: SWISE staking taking a share of the fees will probably factor into how feasible this is
Ecosystem: u/KingLeo23 has the latest of Gary Gensler's shenanigans
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/112qy29/daily_general_discussion_february_15_2023/j8p273q/)Here's Gensler's latest chokepoint attempt:
https://www.sec.gov/news/press-release/2023-30
Here's two of his commissioners calling out his bullshit:
https://www.sec.gov/news/statement/peirce-statement-custody-021523
https://www.sec.gov/news/statement/uyeda-statement-custody-021523
Here's a statement from the blockchain association on it
https://nitter.snopyta.org/BlockchainAssn/status/1625957398077734913
And here's a good thread from Jake Chervinsky on it
https://nitter.snopyta.org/jchervinsky/status/1625947639773552641
Consider donating to crypto lobbying groups this year if you have the means and care about the future of this industry in the US.
Week #6: February 10, 2023
Announcements
- EVMavericks: There are currently two Snapshot Proposal live in need of your vote
- EVM Distribution Phase 2, Vote 1, ends Feb 11, 2023, 8:28 PM UTC
- Stewardship Proposal, ends Feb 17, 2023, 9:00 AM UTC
- EthStaker: On Friday February 17 @ 2pm EST (7pm UTC) EthStaker is hosting a call with Lodestar
The morning trinity
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10yhsb2/comment/j7y5nse/)Ethereum
$1541
0.071
Shitpost of the week: u/cryptowocurrency BREAKING NEWS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10woz0p/daily_general_discussion_february_8_2023/j7ode7g/)BREAKING NEWS: According to the official Bitcoin Core release notes, the upcoming v23.0 will now allow users to attach files to bitcoin transactions. These attached files will be stored in the segregated witness data of the chain.
Weekly Haiku: u/Jey_s_TeArS
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10woz0p/comment/j7rg0r6/)Documentation,
Blockchain accommodation,
Build generation.
Today in Ethereum: u/ZeroTricks
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10yhsb2/daily_general_discussion_february_10_2023/j7zinf1/)On this day...
In 2022:
- Optimism discloses a critical, unexploited and fixed bug in its Geth fork, found by Jay Freeman, that made it possible to create ETH on the Layer 2.
- MakerDAO launches a $10 Million bug bounty on Immunefi.
- ETH, take my energy, for $3241 to $3078, or ₿0.07309 to ₿0.07064.
In 2021:
- Ethereum-based social media project Unite pulls the plug due to high gas prices.
- The Eth2 staking contract holds over 3 million ether, currently worth more than $5.3 billion.
- Celebrity-supported art collective Ethernity launches its first NFT collection.
- ETH at $1742, or ₿0.0388: a Musk have.
In 2020:
- Trenton Van Epps lists the top 5 misconceptions about Ethereum: “Eth2 will never launch”, “Eth2 makes Eth1 immediately deprecated”, “There will be 2 ETH tokens from the fork”, “All Eth2 decisions are made by Vitalik”, “Eth2 is a catch-all fix for Eth1”.
- Paul Hauner runs 100k Eth2 Lighthouse validators on 12x low-spec servers.
- ETH backs its tracks from $229 to $220, at ₿0.02266.
In 2019:
- ETH really whips the llama's ass from $120 to $125, or ₿0.03255 to ₿0.03384.
In 2018:
- Coinbase launches Coinbase Commerce, a payment plugin for e-commerce sites allowing customers to pay directly in Ethereum and a few other cryptocurrencies.
- The public beta of AKASHA Emergence is launched, a decentralized social network on Ethereum and IPFS.
- /u/aerotrader writes a brief introduction on how to leverage a long ETH position with Maker.
- ETH plays the requiem for a lambo from $882 to $859, at ₿0.10105.
In 2017:
- ShapeShift's Erik Voorhees finds himself holding some extra ETH "to use as payments, since Bitcoin is becoming too expensive/delayed".
- Aragon, a platform for creating companies on top of the Ethereum blockchain, is launched in alpha stage.
- ETH short squeezes $11.3, from ₿0.0111 to ₿0.01139.
In 2016:
- Nick Szabo: "Ethereum can solve any problem a computer can solve: but with far greater reliability and security and far less performance and efficiency."
- ETH tickles the amygdala from $3.9 to $4.4, or ₿0.01043 to ₿0.01163.
Community: u/cheeky-gorilla reports back from the Edelweiss Interop Workshop
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10rigcl/daily_general_discussion_february_2_2023/j6wdzn9/)By now you've probably heard that last week was the Edelweiss Interop Workshop (the successor to the Amphora Interop), where Ethereum's core devs spent a week together in the mountains to work on withdrawals, 4844 (aka proto-danksharding) and EOF.
I was invited to join due to my work on the Protocol Guild, and - even though it still feels like a dream - I wanted to share my experience, especially as someone without a technical background.
Was the workshop a success? Absolutely. To quote a core dev, "we left with a flawless Capella/Shanghai fork", and there was a 4844 testnet with all but one client team! 4844 in July? 👀
I'll admit I was INCREDIBLY nervous going into this event, I couldn't sleep properly for days in advance - I was literally going to meet the majority of my heroes, and I was 100% going to be the dumbest person in the room at all times.
Well, I can happily confirm that "you should never meet your heroes" does NOT apply to Ethereum's core protocol contributors. These are some of the most interesting (and surprisingly funny) people I've ever met, and even though there was a lack of diversity, they came from all over the world, with all sorts of different backgrounds. And despite the fact that the price of ETH is never discussed on ACD calls, I can confirm that Ethereum's core devs are bullish: I heard more than one conversation about ultra sound money, and RatioGang was also strongly represented! I'm an introvert, but everyone was so incredibly welcoming and kind, I never had any issues talking to people.
Overall, the passion these individuals have for Ethereum is genuine and contagious, and I feel more confident than ever in Ethereum's ability to execute its roadmap while staying aligned to its values of decentralization, openness and long-term thinking.
Other highlights included organizing a core dev run one morning, and as a pretty hardcore privacy enthusiast, I even had the pleasure of giving privacy tips to Vitalik! Oh and there was that one time that Danny Ryan wasn't allowed at dinner because he was wearing flip flops 😛
I'll end with one note of encouragement for those who need it: if I can end up at this kind of event, then so can you. To quote Danny Ryan, "doors are wide open at Ethereum". My "door" was the Protocol Guild booth at Devcon Bogota, where I asked Trent and Tim if they needed any operational help with the Guild, and turns out they did! (For the introverts, I passed by the booth 3-4 times before I gathered up the nerve to talk to them - don't let shyness gatekeep your passions!). Now I spend my time coordinating / helping with the Guild's v2 architecture upgrade, fundraising and marketing, all without a technical background.
This comment is already much longer than I expected, so I'll end it here. TLDR: everything good about Ethereum is reflected in its core devs, and the barriers to entry are probably lower than you think!
Ecosystem: u/Canadiens1993 thinks that US tax laws are inhibiting solo staking
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10scsic/daily_general_discussion_february_3_2023/j730mpx/)Unclear Tax Treatment for Staking (USA): Centralization Vector?
Let me explain. Retail has a choice:
- Staking on, say, Coinbase and it prepares and sends you the requisite tax form every year. You forego a small percentage of your staking rewards in exchange for this service, and you must entrust your ETH with a regulated custodian (centralization risk); or
- per current IRS position, solo stakers must record revenue for each attestation (every 6 min), for each block produced (random) and tips/MEV (random). There is a valid legal argument for staking rewards to be taxed when sold (not when received), but the IRS has dismissed it - https://www.proofofstakealliance.org/12423-posa-response-to-irs-stance-on-staking. So what does this mean in practice.
- Taxable income: Setting aside how to deal with Shanghai and managing price volatility given the queue for withdrawals, you'll need to record revenue every 6min for the ETH received as taxable income (currently: 13329 GWei) at the value on the date/time "received"; and then (and this is where I lose my shit);
- Capital Gain/Loss Tax: if and when you sell ETH in the future you will need to record a capital gain/loss using the cost basis above for that petty 13329 GWei received. You will never be selling only 13329 GWei.
If you think I just made the case for LSDs, then you understand the problem. Maybe this can easily fixed with more sophisticated tax software? WE NEED TO LOBBY FOR A CHANGE IN THE IRS's TREATMENT OF STAKING REWARDS FOR SOLO STAKERS.
Note: I'm not a member of the PoS Alliance and not a tax lawyer or CPA, just a random dude who pays his taxes and truly believes in decentralization and the transformational potential of the Ethereum network.
Ecosystem: u/vvpan quells our expectations on the current state of rollups and their future development timeline
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10t6kdg/daily_general_discussion_february_4_2023/j79lvy8/)I've been known to come off kind of negative about the state of roll-ups. I do think that long-term they are the absolute best way to scale blockchains. Justin Drake the other day blew the minds of all participants of Bankless Bullcase for Ethereum by saying that the synchronous composability between zk rollups is such that different different rollups can combine their liquidity into a single pool and that Danksharding does not break that composability. Yet the key is long-term. Optimism, the oldest optimistic rollup, has not yet gotten to fraud proofs and neither has Arbitrum. And ZK is a much much more complex technology that requires highly skilled mathematically skilled developers to implement and will roll out slower at least because there is much more potential for bugs (although Justin Drake said Ethereum research team recently figured out how to add "training wheels" to a rollup). I think this tweet from Scroll zkEVM account is telling about where we are.
I am not saying this to be a downer, but to say that we have to have realistic expectations. Big announcements for "mainnet" of this or that rollup or some new improvement to one are galore and sometimes I feel like they are borderline disingenuous. I understand their teams - they reach significant personal milestones and they want to share. But a secure decentralized general-puprose rollup of any kind seems to be behind the horizon for now.
Analysis: u/nikola_j shares DeFi Saver's latest features
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10u5d4l/daily_general_discussion_february_5_2023/j7aqft0/)Hey fellas, wanted to share something we put together recently at defi saver - a dedicated page for various leveraged ETH staking options that you can check out at: https://app.defisaver.com/recipes/leveraged-staking
We added support for both Aave v3 and the new WETH-based deployment of Compound v3 in the past two weeks and both offered new interesting options for leveraging LSDs vs ETH for amplified staking yield, so we thought this made sense.
For now you can find different (w)stETH/ETH options across Aave v2, v3 and CompV3-WETH in there, as well as the cbETH/ETH combo available in Compound (which is at net negative yield atm because of high pool utilisation).
Next: we'll have a new Morpho-Aave integration live, and after that we expect to see rETH added to Aave v3 on the mainnet *and* wstETH added to Aave v3 on Optimism. So you can definitely expect to see a growing number of options there in the coming weeks and months.
Btw, if you check it out, we'd love to hear what else we could add, so please don't hesitate. I also posted an alternative rundown on this on twitter / nitter (nitter isn't loading this for me atm, did twitter already kill it? :/)
Random: u/Megroovin shares the good news for Gemini Earn customers
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10uz7x0/daily_general_discussion_february_6_2023/j7i1xqz/)Maybe some hope afterall for us Gemini Earn users. u/jtnichol
Email from Gemini:
Hi there,
Today, Gemini reached an agreement in principle with Genesis Global Capital, LLC (Genesis), Digital Currency Group, Inc. (DCG), and other creditors on a plan that provides a path for Earn users to recover their assets. This agreement was announced in Bankruptcy Court today.
This plan is a critical step forward towards a substantial recovery of assets for all Genesis creditors. In addition, Gemini will be contributing up to $100 million more for Earn users as part of the plan, further demonstrating Gemini’s continued commitment to helping Earn users achieve a full recovery.
We have been working around the clock since November 16, 2022 to reach this milestone. We greatly appreciate your support and patience during this time. It has allowed us to maximize our efforts on your behalf. There is still much work to be done to complete this process, including further due diligence of Genesis financials and judicial approval of this plan, but we are confident that we now have a framework in place to execute on. Thank you for putting your trust in us during this challenging time.
We will continue to update you on how to participate in the recovery, key dates, information, and milestones as they unfold on the Earn status page.
Onward and Upward,
Team Gemini
Ecosystem: u/abcoathup Day in Ethereum Contributor shares Zhejiang testnet upgraded to Shapella
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10vuce8/daily_general_discussion_february_7_2023/j7nvvgs/)Zhejiang testnet upgraded to Shapella, BLS changes and full & partial withdrawals processed
https://twitter.com/BarnabasBusa/status/1622975351520481280
Random: u/maninthecryptosuit Revolut, one of the more popular European neo-banks launches ETH staking
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10vuce8/daily_general_discussion_february_7_2023/j7mktio/)And so it begins: Revolut, one of the more popular European neo-banks launches ETH staking (among other cryptos):
Edit: Neo-bank = Digital bank.
Official link: https://blog.revolut.com/staking/
Thanks!
Random: u/theethmeister The current moment feels like we are caught in a wave of uncertainty
[View on Reddit →](https://reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/10woz0p/daily_general_discussion_february_8_2023/j7omifz/)I hope everyone has a great day. The current moment feels like we are caught in a wave of uncertainty due to economic and political constraints and factors but that does not