Top crypto stories of week 46, 2024
Mon 11 to Sun 17 November 2024
The 20 top stories on Kiwi News from Mon 11 to Sun 17 November 2024, ranked by upvotes, comments and clicks, with 28 comments in total. Most-shared sources: x.com.
Text under a title is an AI summary of the linked article.
- Onboarding the Next 1 Billion vs. The Next 1 Million Users Debate (app.t2.world)
Focusing on the first million users rather than the next billion is presented as the path to sustainable growth and deeper engagement for blockchain projects. Clubhouse's monthly app downloads peaked at 9.6 million in February 2021 and fell below 1 million by April 2021, while TON's daily transactions dropped nearly 73%, from an all-time high of 18.1 million in September 2024 to below 5 million within two months. Uniswap is cited as an example of a project that built a loyal base of crypto traders and enthusiasts before scaling.
- Exclusive | FBI seizes Polymarket CEO’s phone, electronics (nypost.com)
The FBI raided the Manhattan apartment of Polymarket CEO Shayne Coplan early Wednesday and seized his phone and other electronic devices, according to The Post, which cited a source close to the matter. Coplan was not arrested or charged, a Polymarket spokesperson said, and the FBI did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The source suspects political retribution for Polymarket's prediction of a Trump win over Kamala Harris, while a Polymarket spokesperson said the platform is fully transparent and charges no fees.
- Introducing the New Lens (lens.xyz)
Lens presents itself as a new social layer for onchain culture and communities, where one Lens Account works across several apps. Palus is a free, open-source client for Lens activity across every app, and Hey lets users pay to post and earn from social payments. Other listed apps include Mailens for email, Lensie for NFTs, Cantuum for music, Grove Drive for file storage, Soclly as a Web3 social aggregator, 0xfm for onchain radio on Lens Chain, and Rekt for crypto investigations. Lens is part of MaskDAO, which is building onchain products.
- The Great Debate: L1 vs. L2 in Ethereum’s Future (dspyt.com)
The essay argues that a strategic focus on Layer 2 solutions can address Ethereum's scalability issues while preserving decentralization, with PeerDAS cited as a key development that strengthens L2 scalability. It says Ethereum currently handles about 13 transactions per second, with a maximum of 24, and that L2BEAT counts at least 116 rollups scaling a cumulative total of about 337 transactions per second. PeerDAS, introduced through EIP-4844 as part of the March 2024 Deneb-Cancun upgrade, lets nodes download an estimated 12.5% to 18.75% of blob data instead of the full amount, which the text says lowers bandwidth requirements for node operators.
- The 4 Rollup Architectures and the Future of Gnosis Chain (research.auditless.com)
Martin Köppelmann of Gnosis defended Gnosis Chain's existence as an alternative L1 in a debate with Vitalik Buterin at DevConflict, arguing that it carries less bridge risk because it relies less on code. The author argues that apps and their requirements should be considered before choosing a rollup architecture, and that Gnosis should reevaluate its choice once Ethereum L2 security levels advance. Vitalik countered that trust does not improve over time as code does, though he agreed that multisigs are pragmatic in the short term. The debate touched on apps only briefly, mentioning Gnosis Pay's isolation from blob market volatility.
- Guardian will no longer post on Elon Musk’s X from its official accounts (theguardian.com)
The Guardian has announced it will no longer post content from its official editorial accounts on Elon Musk's platform X, saying the platform's benefits are now outweighed by its negatives. The news organisation cited "often disturbing content," including far-right conspiracy theories and racism, and said X's coverage of the US presidential election had crystallised the decision. The Guardian, which has more than 80 accounts on X with about 27 million followers, said X users can still share its articles and that individual reporters may keep using the platform for newsgathering. Musk responded by calling the Guardian "irrelevant" and a "laboriously vile propaganda machine."
- Introducing Family (x.com)
- Mini Apps 2.0: Full-Screen Mode, Home Screen Icons, Geolocation, etc. (telegram.org)
Telegram launched what it calls the largest update in the history of mini apps, adding full-screen mode, subscription plans, home screen shortcuts, gifts, geolocation access, motion tracking, and emoji statuses. Mini apps can now use the entire screen in portrait or landscape orientation, and they can receive device motion data for game controls or VR experiences. Subscriptions are offered through Telegram Stars, and location access is disabled by default, so users must grant permission to each mini app individually. Early versions of some features are already available in apps including @playdeckbot, @tverse and @major.
- Maybe Bluesky has “won” (anderegg.ca)
The author argues that Bluesky is not yet federated or decentralized, despite being credited as such, though the team is working toward decentralization. Bluesky runs on the AT Protocol, whose Personal Data Servers can be self-hosted for about $15 a month, but the Relays needed to index them require around 4.5 TB of disk space, and the only App View reading PDSs is the one Bluesky controls. DIDs using the PLC method, and DMs, also remain under Bluesky's control. The author also cites domain-based usernames, composable moderation and starter packs as strengths, and says Bluesky may "win" while staying open to change.
- Securitize Citizenship! (nav.al)
The author proposes giving every US citizen an extra, transferable passport that could be sold to would-be immigrants, with markets setting prices based on how well the country is governed. The idea is that the combined value of all passports would equal the capitalized value of the government, so poor trade or tax policy would lower passport prices and pressure leaders through citizen-shareholders. The post also suggests that unmonetizable policies, such as those on abortion or environmental issues, would gain a visible cost, and in a far-fetched scenario, well-run countries could take over poorly run ones by buying their passports.
- Peter Thiel and the Triumph of the Counter-Elites (podcast) (thefp.com)
This podcast episode from The Free Press argues that the 2024 election and Elon Musk's appointment to lead the Department of Government Efficiency mark the triumph of the counter-elite, with Peter Thiel as its vanguard. The host notes that Thiel was the first prominent figure in Silicon Valley to publicly embrace Trump in 2016, a stance that cost him business at Y Combinator, but that many tech titans, including Bill Ackman, Marc Andreessen, and David Sacks, have since joined Trump. The episode covers Thiel's explanation of why his peers came around to Trump, his view of why Kamala Harris and liberalism lost, and his ideas about World War III.
- Meet the Ethereum Beam Chain (x.com)
Ethereum researcher Justin Drake has proposed Beam Chain, a from-scratch redesign of the Ethereum consensus layer that would use SNARKs to enable 4-second slot times and single-slot finality. According to the article, SNARK-based proofs would let these gains run on standard hardware available to home stakers, and combined with a proposal to cut staking requirements from 32 to 1 ETH, could even improve decentralization. The article also says Beam Chain would eliminate block reorganization-based MEV and make Ethereum quantum-resistant, though it would delay the most significant upgrades until 2029 at the earliest.
- Week in Ethereum News November 16, 2024 (weekinethereumnews.com)
- Anton Bukov on Solana (x.com)
- Péter Szilágyi discusses Beam Chain (x.com)
- Ethereum's ENS Identity System Set to Launch Own Layer-2 Blockchain (coindesk.com)
ENS Labs, the company behind the Ethereum Name Service, plans to build its own layer-2 blockchain called Namechain, which will use zero-knowledge rollups and will likely go live around the end of 2025. Chief operating officer Katherine Wu told CoinDesk that the network will leverage an existing zkEVM-compatible chain, with the team in the final stages of choosing which one to use. The plan is part of ENSv2, a re-architecture of the ENS protocol that ENS Labs proposed in May, and Wu said Namechain will be backward compatible with ENSv1 from launch, with users seeing no front-end difference apart from lower gas fees.
- The Devcon Treasure Hunt Officially Started (twitter.com)
- Open-Source Software is in Crisis (spectrum.ieee.org)
Matt Mullenweg, founder of WordPress, has accused WP Engine of violating WordPress trademarks, and the two are now in a legal battle. Mullenweg says WP Engine should pay a direct licensing fee or make in-kind contributions to the open-source project, since it profits from WordPress without contributing enough. WP Engine responded by suing Mullenweg and Automattic, the company behind WordPress. The article frames the dispute within a broader "maker-taker problem," in which creators of open-source software bear costs while others profit, and it cites Chad Whitacre of Sentry as a leader of the Open Source Pledge, which asks companies to pay at least US $2,000 per full-time developer to maintainers.
- Grant Application Optimism elite OP douchebagerism (x.com)
- Google's Prediction Markets (asteriskmag.com)
Google's first internal prediction market, Prophit, was popular with employees but was shut down in 2011 after its planned external launch stalled, according to the article. Launched internally in April 2005, it drew about 20% of Google employees over three years and was built by Bo Cowgill and Patri Friedman, among others. Google's lobbying effort in 2008 to 2010 for the CFTC to legalize prediction markets, backed with Yahoo! and Microsoft, failed as political support for financial deregulation waned after the 2008 financial crisis and the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act.
