This weekly educational thread highlights the most exciting SEI news, complete with links to useful threads, incentivized opportunities, and announcements you haven’t even heard yet!

Weekly Update Highlights

Tune in every Thursday night (UTC) for a digest of the biggest Sei stories of the week, including:

• Sei Atlantic-2 testnet updates (🔜 mainnet)

• New projects launching on Sei

• Key announcements from your favorite projects

• DeFi partnerships

• NFT opportunities

• Outstanding threads from the best Sei KOLs

• Important Twitter Space reviews

Weekly Archive

June 22 - SeiStorm, Levana Trading Competition, Sparrowswap OG NFTs, and more

Support Your Sei Community

Have you learned something valuable from my Weekly Updates? You can mint a commemorative NFT for <$3 to show your support!

Who knows… these NFTs might soon be crucial for earning access to exclusive announcement channels 👀

Cheers,

Locke

This article investigates Cega’s inaugural exotic options product, the fixed coupon note, and describes in detail three financial products (or Vaults) that anyone can use to earn reliable USDC yield. We will assess the risk factors of each Cega Vault and use current market information to brainstorm strategies that will prove useful during various macro conditions.

Cega Fixed Coupon Note: An Exotic Option

In essence, Cega’s fixed coupon note (FCN) is a packaged exotic derivative offering based on a basket of underlying assets: notably, ETH, BTC, and SOL.

Put simply, a Cega FGN allows DeFi users who are at least moderately bullish on a 27-day timeframe to invest the stablecoin USDC in one of Cega’s audited Vaults. If the assets underlying each vault do not drop significantly in value to a price below a fixed percentage called a “Knock-In Barrier”, Vault investors receive their entire principal plus significant APY upon the expiry date of their Vault.

Cega FGNs and Vaults enable DeFi users to select a risk profile befitting their personal market bias and generate superior fixed yield (up to 200%+ APY) on 27-day stablecoin deposits, even if they have no understanding of TradFi puts and calls.

More info

Downside Protection

Risk-management is quintessential in the world of financial derivatives.

Cega users are safe to enjoy the revenue yielded from Vaults with significant downside protection against market turns. In the most conservative Cega Vaults, one of the crypto assets underlying the FCN would have to fall more than 90% in 27 days to trigger a knock-in event. Otherwise, the entire principal is protected, as well as the promised yield.

Compounded Returns

At the end of the FCN term (e.g. 27-days), or when the underlying assets knock-out with positive price action, Vault users have the option to reinvest capital into a new Vault structure, thus compounding returns.

In a crab market - macro market conditions without definitive bullish or bearish bias - high-yield opportunities for stablecoin deposits are an effective way to preserve and grow capital in anticipation of future macro trends.

Governance: The $CEGA Token

In accordance with the maxims of DeFi, Cega incentivizes its community of investors, traders, quants, and statisticians to participate in the protocol’s growth. Cega’s roadmap includes implementation of a decentralized governance system with purview over a variety of parameters:

• Voting on product offerings - $CEGA token holders directly influence future asset baskets for vaults, as well as their risk tolerance

• Impact on statistical models - the Cega community is incentivized to learn more about exotic derivatives and influence the pricing capabilities of Cega Vaults

• Education - Cega’s growth plan begins with a set of derivatives experts, but continues with a process of onboarding educated users that will learn to flexibly represent market moves using derivative instruments

Vault Strategies - Pure Options, Bond + Options, and Leveraged Options Vaults

Cega currently offers a suite of three exotic options products for investors. Each Vault strategy defines a unique, varied risk-reward profile befitting of all investment styles.

Pure Options Vaults

Pure Options Vaults trade a version of the traditional FCN without an additional bond element. Without relying on bonds, investors can be assured that no user-deposited capital leaves the Cega smart contract.

The Pure Options Vault is an attractive option for investors who don’t want any exposure to lending risks.

Bond + Options Vaults

Bond + Options Vaults resemble TradFi FCNs: a portion of invested capital is lent to market makers in order to generate additional yield alongside the options premium.

A Bond + Options Vault is a conservative option for moderately- to positively-bullish investors who are willing to assume some small risk associated with lending to market makers.

Leveraged Options Vaults

Leveraged Options Vaults (LOVs) create pure options trading strategies allowing for high investor pay-off without requiring external liquidity used for leverage. Basically, LOVs enter Cega users’ staked USDC into multiple baskets instead of one. Multiple baskets generate magnified yield, but also carry magnified risk.

Using customized leveraged options, Cega LOV users can earn extremely high ROI (20% - 200%+ APY) on 27-day contracts. LOVs carry a higher risk, of course: higher leverage in an LOV makes the knock-in barrier more narrow. In a 5x leverage LOV where the knock-in barrier is 20%, a price dip greater than 20% in any of the underlying assets means that the investor will lose a portion of their capital upon the Vault’s expiry.

LOVs can be an attractive option for investors that are extremely bullish on a basket of assets for a certain timeframe, but should be avoided without extreme conviction.

More info

Risk Assessment for Diverse Vault Structure

Let’s review in detail the types of risks associated with each of Cega’s Vaults:

Credit Risk

Credit risk occurs if a Vault market maker defaults.

This risk is most mitigated for investors using a Pure Options Vault or a Leveraged Options Vault.. A defaulted MM may not pay entirely the yield owed to depositors. However, 100% of deposited capital is collateralized onchain: it is not engaged in lending, and is not subject to credit risk.

Only Bond + Options Vault investors are exposed to credit risk on collateral. It should be noted that Cega is an industry leader in risk management practices, including signing ISDA legal agreements with all MMs, selecting only accredited MMs who pass KYC verification, and using Credora to actively monitor counterplay balance sheets.

Principal at Risk

All Cega vault investors take a moderately bullish perspective during their Vault period. Depending on the risk profile selected upon deposit, a significant market downturn that puts an underlying asset below the knock-in threshold will cause a loss of principal at Vault expiry.

Cega has performed thorough analysis of the past two years of knock-in events. Only 0.3% of Vaults have experienced a knock-in event of 50%. There have been no recorded incidents of knock-in events of 70%+ (e.g. all capital invested in Vaults with 70% or higher knock-in barriers has been returned in entirety).

Smart Contract Risk

Any DeFi user is necessarily exposed to the risk of smart contract vulnerabilities whenever depositing funds on-chain.

To ensure maximal security, Cega engages in DeFi best-practices, enlisting top firms to audit all of its smart contracts, and providing an ongoing retainer for new features.

The Ethereum smart contract was double audited by Ottersec and Zellic.

The Solana smart contract was audited by Ottersec and received security consultation from Zellic throughout the development process.

LOV - Magnified Loss Upon Knock-In

Due to the leveraged position, LOV investors face a higher loss of principal upon Vault expiry if a knock-in event occurs during its time frame. Such loss is magnified by the level of leverage (e.g. 2x or 5x), but cannot exceed the amount of invested capital during the vault deposit. 

Did you deposit $1,000 to a 5x Vault only to see the underlying assets plummet 50%? Rest assured - you only lose your $1,000, and not your mortgage. 

Flexible Investment Strategies

With a realistic understanding of associated risks, we can begin to develop valuable investment strategies that rely on Cega FCNs and Vaults.

As mentioned before, regularly investing in and compounding yield from conservative Vaults is an effective strategy to maintain and grow capital while waiting out market trends. Let’s take it one step further - what if you, an educated investor, has decided that the bear market is almost over, and that BTC ETH and SOL are about to enter a bullish trend for the foreseeable future?

Consider this strategy that I developed, but also recognize that it is not financial advice. DYOR.

Radiant Capital - Investing Borrowed USDC in Cega Vaults

Radiant Capital is a Layer-Zero-powered collateralized lending protocol built on Arbitrum. Users can deposit a variety of assets as collateral and borrow USDC against its value, earning APY for the amount deposited and the amount borrowed. Borrowed capital is at risk of liquidation if the price of the collateral drops and the borrowed amount is not repaid. It is speculated, but not confirmed, that Radiant will retroactively airdrop tokens to wallets that have provided capital and borrowed USDC over time.

Let’s say you think that the market has nearly bottomed out, and you are macro bullish on ETH. You deposit your ETH as collateral on Radiant and withdraw 30% of its value as USDC. Even if ETH rises 10x from here, you can pay off your original borrowed USDC balance to receive 100% of the current value of your ETH. 

You now take your borrowed USDC, bridge it to Solana using Orbiter Finance (also suspected to retrodrop its users), and deposit that USDC into a Cega Vault befitting your appetite for risk. After 27 days, assuming your bullish bias was right, you can then withdraw your Cega investment + yield, or choose to compound it, along with any additional USDC borrowed from Radiant while the price of ETH rises.

You now are now 100% exposed to positive ETH price action during the bull market, earning APY from Radiant on the value of your ETH and the value of your borrowed USDC, earning APY from Cega (up to 200% with LOVs) for the value of your Vault deposit, and you are exposed to possible retrodrops from two leading EVM protocols.

With the flexibility of various Cega vaults, bull market investment opportunities like this are limited only by your imagination (and your appetite for risk).

Cega Community - Get Involved

Hopefully this article has elucidated the flexible use cases of Cega vaults. The Cega saga doesn’t end here - get involved today in preparation for $CEGA governance, and you will have an early role in contributing to the nascent growth of DeFi exotic derivatives!

Follow Cega on Twitter and join the conversation in Discord.

Visit the live Cega dApp to explore and experience DeFi FCNs using a variety of Vaults.

This DeFi deep dive is one of many educational articles published independently for DeFi enthusiasts like myself.

Did you learn something today? Follow me on Twitter and subscribe to my Mirror publication for a continual stream of information as we build the future of finance.

Patrons are always welcome to mint a collectible NFT from each of my articles. Who knows - maybe one day I’ll curate my own retrodrop!

See you out there, degens.

Cheers, Locke

Included in this article are two hidden Zealy campaigns:

     Eclipse - earn your Astronaut role in Discord

     SenSei - get a secret airdrop and earn 10 free testnet SEI

Eclipse Cosmic Essence - Whitelisted Launches

With first-mover’s advantage in the ecosystem, Eclipse Pad is the premier launchpad building on Sei Network.

The SenSei Fi SEN launch marks the third Eclipse launch during testnet. This was the first launch to incorporate the Cosmic Essence ECLIP staking system to whitelist users before the public launch.

It should be noted that there were minor bugs in the whitelist round that prevented some users, even with xx tier and guaranteed allocation, from participating before the public round. Bugs quickly reported by the active Eclipse Ambassador community.** **Eclipse developers promptly responded to bug feedback by developing deterministic functionality to properly record Cosmic Essence users and deliver a smooth whitelisting experience for mainnet.

Disappointed that there is no Blocked mission? Don’t be! There is exponentially lower visibility on this launch, and only loyal Eclipse community members know that it is happening. Check this alpha from the Official Eclipse Space Cadet server:

Eclipse Zealy - Ticket to Ambassador Program

Join the Eclipse Zealy campaign for special rewards. It is the only way to earn the Astronaut Ambassador role - do you have what it takes to work with the Eclipse team?

SenSei Fi - Zero-Loss SEI Rewards

SenSei F is a gamified lossless dApp that gives users a chance to win a massive SEI jackpot. 

Every week a new pool opens, allowing users to deposit SEI to earn tickets for the jackpot draw. More entrants means a smaller chance to win per ticket, but also a larger jackpot. 24 hours after each pool closes, users can check to see if they have won the prize.

The only cost of participation is the small gas fee to mint tickets. Participate as often as possible to jumpstart your SEI portfolio.

Secret Zealy Airdrop

There is a secret SenSei Zealy campaign with fewer than 5,000 users 🤫

Low on testnet SEI? Complete the easiest task, Follow on Twitter, and earn a whopping 10 testnet SEI for free! Join SenSeiFi Discord, too.

Airdrop Alpha Recap

Be sure to participate in the SenSei Fi launch on the Eclipse Pad dApp to maximize your potential profit when ECLIP hits mainnet. Not many users are aware of this opportunity - if there is an airdrop for participation, it will be divided amongst a very small pool of users!

Eclipse Secret Zealy

SenSei Secret Zealy

     Cheers,      Locke

Eclipse Pad

Twitter

Discord

Zealy

SenSei Fi

Twitter

Zealy

Discord

** **

In this article, we will investigate DxSale’s history and its core features, including recent upgrades to protect developers and investors. We will also learn to use simple educational materials that protect investors from scams and allow developers to assure a safe launch environment.

DxSale Through the Years - A Multichain Story

DxSale launched on Ethereum in 2020 as the first DeFi launchpad to offer the Initial DEX Offering - a fundamental improvement on the Initial Coin Offering model. The launchpad integrated decentralized principles of DEXs like Uniswap to protect initial investors using trustless smart contracts.

As a first mover in the IDO space, DxSale has performed some of the most historic launches in DeFi history - IDOs with ATH profit margins from 10,400% - 8,325,000%. Remember SafeMoon? That launched on DxSale.

Over 11,000 project launches later, DxSale is still launching consistent upgrades - most notably multichain functionality. Today, DxSale offers its launchpad products on 21 unique blockchains, including EVM chains, Polygon Matic, and even 3 different testnets. Unlike other long term launchpads, DxSale does not have a staking token gate keeping the public from participation.

In accordance with its decentralized maxims, DxSale is notable for only using organic growth safe practices. It is one of the few launchpads that doesn’t use API scan click-farming tactics. The Anti-Dump feature of DxDAO provides trustless assurance that fees collected from the launchpad cannot be used to dump on launch tokens. 

Additionally product releases like DxMarketing are regularly implemented to help developers products thrive - and what’s more, their team is expanding. Expect to see new DxTeam members soon, alongside a fresh approach to marketing. Interested in a position? The applicant pool is already competitive, so I’ll let you DYOR ;)

DxSale Journey - Key Product Features

Over three years, DxSale has launched an impressive suite of products designed to add value to the DxSale community. Each feature solves a core vulnerability of traditional systems using Skynet-audited smart contracts (don’t worry it’s not the Skynet from T2*).

DxMint

DxMint allows any user to easily create a new token on any chain supported by DxSale. Coding knowledge is not required, but a strong understanding of market conditions and tokenomics is necessary to create anything potentially valuable.

DxLock

DxLock, lauded as the most popular locker dApp in the world, allows users to lock their tokens or liquidity pool using a publicly verifiable contract. The most common reason for a token “rug pull” occurs when scammers launch a token, allow it to trade briefly, and then pull the liquidity, creating a terrifying red candle to 0. DxSale allows tokens to launch with audited assurance against such a scam.

Developer KYC and Audits

DxSale has partnerships with 17 vetted auditing firms. Serious developers can opt for an audit as part of their launchpad, enjoying a hassle-free experience for their team and investors. Launch teams can doxx themselves as part of the audit, providing additional assurance to investors.

DxMarketing

The DxMarketing package is a complete incubation plan for pre-raise and post-raise marketing. Responsible launch projects will consider spending up to 20% of their raise amount on an incubation package. Pre-launch marketing ensures a healthy raise, and post-launch marketing rewards investors with a growing token user base.

DxDrop

What’s a good launch without an airdrop to its loyal community? DxDrop is a simple yet effective tool for launching projects to distribute an airdrop without any hassle on the user-end.

Hopium - NFT Brawlers

NFT Brawlers is a developing project (on hiatus) building an Arena Brawl fighting game. It was designed to allow avatars represented by NFTs minted from collections launched on DxSale fight it out in a Web3 arena. 

This Street Fighter themed gem began development in February 2022, and so suffered the fate of other projects from that era. The bear market put a pin in NFT Brawlers development… but will we see this world warrior rise from the ashes as DxSale continues to expand?

DxSale Educational Guides

Have you ever felt confused while participating in an IDO? DxSale docs include useful walkthroughs for product features and DeFi best practices.

The How to Use simplifies the process of using the dApp on all 21 supported chains.

The DYOR Guide is a quintessential educational guide useful for anything from avoiding scams to identifying valuable launch tokenomics. This is recommended material if you don’t understand how tokenomics, vesting, and initial liquidity affect token price after TGE.

The Launchpad Guide illustrates all key features of the 2023 DxSale v4 update. Notable improvements including FairLaunch and Overflow launch parameters.

Snap Back to Reality

Despite the tools DxSale has built to protect IDO users, we are seeing a viral trend regression back to the same old scams that plagues ICOs in 2019. Don’t you know that when you send money to an address from meme coin or influencer Tweet you can be 99% sure that #yougetnothing?

As the bear market reverses, we will see projects launching on all fundamental blockchains that provide incredible opportunity to anyone who is paying attention. DxSale, with its ramped-up marketing plan across 21 chains, is one of your best chances to be involved in the next fundamental 100x. With no launchpad token gatekeeping the public from DxSale participation, anyone who does their own research has the potential to ride the moonshot.

Get Involved, Stay Informed

DxSale has just opened a new Discord server with fewer than 1,000 members. OGs here will be happy in the coming months. Join our community and say hi!

Today DxSale launched a new Zealy campaign. I wonder what awards await the early questers.

Have you learned something today? Follow my twitter for educational journalism, community building, and alpha opportunities. Subscribe to my Mirror publication - I have fresh material about Arbitrum, zkSync, Venom, SEI, and more.

Keep building, degens. Meet me on the launchpad. I’ll see you on the moon.

     Cheers,

*     Locke*

     Twitter

DxSale Links

New Zealy Campaign

DxSale Discord

*allegedly

** **

With over $1B in funding and a community approaching 1M, the Dubai-based Venom Foundation is causing a scene during the 2023 bear market. At a glance, one might be surprised that a non-EVM-compatible blockchain is so well funded. However, after investigating key components of the Venom Network architecture and infrastructure, we will understand that instead of conforming to current market trends, the Venom Foundation is building a groundbreaking new paradigm.

As Venom put it, “Our mission is to be the infrastructure for the next generation of digital services and products.”

Architecture - Masterchains, Workchains, and Shardchains

The heterogeneous multi-blockchain architecture of the Venom Network is designed to solve the scalability challenge while reducing transaction fees, all without compromising security. Using principles of dynamic sharding, the layer-0 masterchain utilizes shardchains as parallel processing units while communicating with the workchains that enable users and dApps to communicate with the network.

Official architecture documentation found here. 

Masterchain

The masterchain is a layer-0 chain that facilitates communication between workchains, shardchains, and users. It serves as a high-security backbone for the Venom Network.

The masterchain is only validated by a limited number of validators with the largest VENOM stakes. The rest of the validators with lesser stakes create and validate new shardchain blocks.

Workchains

Workchains are specialized layer-1 blockchains secured by masterchain validators. Perpetual communication witht the masterchain provides total security for workchain blocks while lowering fees for layer-1 transactions.

Each workchain can be customized for the needs of its hosted application, including alternate block structures, virtual machines, and native currencies. This approach enables horizontal scalability for each application on the Venom Network without sacrificing the security of the layer-0 masterchain.

Shardchain

Shardchains each have a unique private memory space for executing a specific set of contrats. Each shardchain is a fraction of a blockchain state responsible only for a subset of accounts defined by a binary prefix. These ranges are validated by a group of shardchain validators responsible only for that shardchain’s range.

As the Venom Network expands and new dApps arise, the initial shardchain will split into two blockchains. As network load rises, each shardchain can split as necessary. When network load decreases, a merge event will recombine two shardchains back to one.

Interoperability and Implications

Venom’s native cross-chain communication protocol, enabled by the masterchain, allows workchains to interact seamlessly without relying on a third-party. Even workchains with different block structures or virtual machines are interoperable with every other workchain on the Venom Network.

This architecture leveraging a hyper-secure, hyper-scalable layer-0 to enable a seamlessly interoperable network of layer-1 workchains is the CVP of the Venom Network. Using cross-chain communication between Venom’s heterogenous chains, the Venom Network can maintain interoperability between public and private networks.

This creates powerful use cases, but I think the biggest implication lies hidden in Venom technical docs.

Venom Network: Linking CBDCs and DeFi

The Central Bank Digital Currency narrative is dominant in regulatory discussion of cryptocurrency. As the US economy continues to decline, speculators increasingly doubt the long term viability of the US dollar as the global reserve currency.

Current global financial systems rely on the fiat system, introduced in the 70s and largely unchanged. Despite recent innovations in the fundamental security of distributed networks, national governments have started little to no innovation in creating a national currency built on the internet.

The Byzantine general problem, historically lauded as the biggest roadblock for digital currencies, was solved in 2009. So why haven’t we seen governments implementing blockchain technology to create new reserve currencies? Previously pandits have cited network security and scalability problems as fundamental roadblocks. Based on what we learned from studying the architecture of Venom Network, could the Venom Foundation be developing the solution?

DeFi enthusiasts are often wary of the advent of CBDCs: Government interaction with financial markets usually means heavy and often unfair regulation. But for once, we find a hopeful solution in the Venom Network. CBDCs built on private-private workchains that are still interoperable with public workchains may be the foundation that enables CBDCs to interact with DeFi networks in international cryptocurrency markets.

VENOM Token: Live on Testnet

The VENOM token, as mentioned before, is the primary PoS cryptocurrency that is used for validation and delegation on the Venom Network. Investors who see the opportunity to enable CBDCs linked to DeFi should get involved today.

According to VENOM tokenomics, 22% of all VENOM tokens will be disbursed as community rewards. Note that this allocation will be vested linearly over 90 months. This is an incredibly long vesting period for a new blockchain’s initial distribution, evidence that the Venom Foundation aims to build a scalable interoperable network designed as the foundation for future financial systems.

Exact requirements to earn your share of this 22% of all VENOM are yet released, but you can be sure that participation in the live Venom Network testnet event will be an important qualifier. Venom testnet went live at the end of April 2023. Start your journey here.

What’s Next for the Venom Network?

Less than half of the NFT rewards for participation in the Venom Testnet are currently active. Venom Testnet users can expect the testnet event to run for many more months - possibly until 2024.

Though CBDCs are probably the most powerful use case for the Venom Network, there are plenty of other use cases, including game fi. Based on recent tweets and hints, testnet users might expect the next ecosystem to enter testnet will be Nuumi, the first anime metaverse project built on the Venom Network.

Step into the world of Numi.

The Venom Foundation is building an innovative blockchain solution seemingly designed to enable secure CBDC infrastructure that communicates with DeFi. Like it or not, CBDCs are a crucial element that might allow cryptocurrency to finally reach a global audience.

Stay informed about the Venom Foundation by following their socials and keeping up to date with testnet events on Discord. Though airdrop hunters may be deterred by the 90 month vesting period of initial Venom, consider your efforts an investment in the future of finance.

If you learned something valuable today, be sure to subscribe to my Mirror publication. Follow my Twitter account for more insights about important projects and opportunities spanning multiple blockchains. 

Though market outlook still looks bleak, now is the time that opportunities arrive. I’ll see you out there in the web3 world as we continue to build the future of finance.

Cheers,

Locke

Unfortunately, it’s more common to see overly centralized launchpads that design unfair systems. Some launchpads perform IDOs for any project that pays an upfront fee, regardless of its fundamental value. Others design tokenomics that favor venture capitalists at the risk of the public.

I had the opportunity to interview the team at Carbonstarter, a developmental launchpad project on Arbitrum. After considering their surprisingly transparent responses to my somewhat abrasive questionnaire, I have concluded that Carbonstarter is capable of building a launchpad completely controlled and moderated by its own decentralized community.

Without a centralized authority, the launchpad can’t operate without users that regularly participate in the DAO governance system. But if enough progressive minds come together to form the Carbonstarter community, this launchpad will continually provide fair investment opportunities for projects that bring value to the entire Artbitrum ecosystem.

Carbonstarter’s Fair IDO (FIDO) System

Carbonstarter is composed of two vertical products - launchpad and DEX. Both are designed with features that incorporate community governance into core functionality.

When a project applies for a launch, its application becomes an onchain proposal submitted to the DAO governance voting area. Users with a stake in the Carbonstarter governance token are eligible to vote on each proposal. Some projects will over incentives that entice voters to spend their limited governance tokens.

Projects that reach a certain threshold of votes move on to the Pooling phase, where users have the opportunity to invest directly in the project. Users who voted in favor of the proposal during the Voting phase are allowed to participate in Pooling first, followed by all other community members.

Carbon DEX: Flexible Solutions to Attract Initial Liquidity

Without venture funding, projects often struggle to find liquidity using a launchpad’s native DEX. The Carbon DEX provides flexible solutions for each project launch by using funds from the DAO Treasury (30M ARBS tokens, or 30% of total emissions).

Using Carbon DEX, newly-launched projects can comfortably commit their token’s initial liquidity, receiving in exchange liquidity provided by Carbonstarter, its partners, and most importantly the Carbonstarter DAO community. Strategic deployment of DAO Treasury funds immediately ensures healthy liquidity options, allowing for substantial liquidity rewards and deep project liquidity out of the gate.

Most importantly, the Carbon DEX provides an in-house trading platform for the Carbonstarter community. Users can trade natively within a system designed by themselves to benefit everyone involved.

In order to realize this monumental achievement of decentralization, the Carbonstarter team is literally giving 30% of the value of the project to the hands of its DAO users. Only through careful application of this generous allocation will the project market cap flourish. It will require most community members to apply fundamental understanding of the native Carbonstarter tokens: ARBS, veARBS and xARBS.

Carbonstarter ARBS Tokenomics

Complete tokenomics from the ARBS token is already publicly announced. In addition to the aforementioned DAO treasury, there will also be a large vested allocation for public IDO, a fund for staking rewards over time, community incentives for the ARBS airdrop program, initial liquidity, and a fund to reward important early project contributors.

Complete tokenomics and airdrop details are publicly available.

During my interview, the team graciously elucidated core functionality of ARBS and its derivative tokens.

All users have the option to stake the ARBS token for a specific lockup period. Staking ARBS immediately sends a certain ratio of veARBS back to the user: up to a 1:1 ratio of ARBS is staked for the maximum time frame.

veARBS is a scarce governance token used to Vote on proposals. veARBS depreciates a tiny percent every block: near the end of the lockup period, the user will have less veARBS than when they started their stake. This is a measure to prevent whales from manipulating DAO decisions with hoarded votes.

By having veARBS, the user also claims xARBS, which converts back to ARBS at a ratio up to 1:1. Users can choose to convert xARBS to ARBS earlier in the lockup in exchange for less ARBS, or hold until the end of the lockup for a full 1:1 ratio. This deflationary method of returning the tradeable value of voting power over time shares commonalities with the popular ETH LSD incentives. Read more about Liquid Staking Derivatives here.

The Risk of Decentralization

Of course, a decentralized launchpad structure does carry inherent risks compared to its centralized counterpart.

Using the native ARBS token to seed initial liquidity means that it is paramount for the community to prove its inherent value. The success of the early economy depends on users locking a decent portion of initial ARBS supply into the DAO governance system. If too many shortsighted users ignore governance utility and dump ARBS into a pool without  substantial venture funding, it could be catastrophic for the health of the project.

In my research, I noticed confusing  language that resembled a contradictory admission of a seed investment round. I asked the team directly to elaborate how it’s possible for a DAO and Angel Investors to simultaneously own a project. I was humbled by their candid, detailed response:

What I see is a system that initially grants disproportionate power to a small group of users with a lot of skin in the game, then gradually rebalances power toward decentralization. As more users lockup ARBS for governance, spend veARBS on Voting, deflate ARBS supply by exchanging xARBS, and diversify native liquidity pools, true ownership of the protocol will be diffused from the center throughout the network.

Community Growth Begins Now

This content is dense, and comprehension is not so simple. That is why it is crucial for members of the early Carbonstarter community to begin educating themselves and others immediately.

The Carbonstarter team is transparently dedicated to building a financial behemoth that can be wielded by its own community. In the short time that remains before Carbonstarter goes live, it is up to us to become a community worthy of its power.

Carbonstartner clearly understands the importance of mindful community growth: In addition to the 4M ARBS airdrop available to all community participants 10M ARBS tokens - that’s 10% of total supply - is allocated to incentivize outstanding early contributors. These tokens are reserved to reward individuals who make significant contributions to community growth, including community content production, marketing strategies, and open calls (time sensitive bounties for critical tasks like bug bounties and beta testing).

Rewarding community members that go out of their way to strengthen the entire community gives a higher share of initial voting power to users that are more likely to use it wisely. And even before TGE, it incentivizes cooperative behavior. Don’t believe me? I didn’t decide to write this article until I discovered the 10M ARBS Community Incentives fund…

Users that want to maximize their share of this project have to earn it by strengthening the community’s foundations. This cooperative incentive is an excellent strategy to create a community eager to put in the effort required to manage its own treasury. All that remains for us is to show up.

Begin your journey to Fair IDOs and a rich self-contained launchpad governed by its users today by joining Carbonstarter communities and keeping up to date with announcements.

The Discord and Telegram communities already have a reputation system that rewards active users. Soon there will be more social engineering tasks and incentive programs available for attentive users. Giveaways and partnerships are announced daily on Twitter and beyond.

The traditional financial system is characterized by centralized practices that allow selective insiders to profit immensely while outsiders cannot participate. Decentralized Finance introduces radical technology that allows anyone, anywhere to participate in building new financial paradigms.

Have you ever thought that you could create a better financial system than the one we were born into? Join Carbonstarter today and prove it. Let’s work together to build an investment platform we can all be proud of.

See you out there,

Locke          

                                               ~NFT giveaways all weekend~

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The initial phase of the SEI Atlantic-2 testnet program comes to a close this week. With two closed missions that were available only to the most attentive Seilors, Eclipse Pad has proven to be one of the most promising dApps in the ecosystem.** **

What have we learned while testing Eclipse Pad? What can we expect from an upcoming third mission? How can we strategize in preparation for SEI mainnet? All this and more in today’s SEI Deep Dive.

Eclipse Pad - What, Why, and How?

Eclipse Pad is an S-tier launchpad with first mover’s advantage in the SEI ecosystem. The team is doxxed, including a few promising familiar faces from successful projects built on Terra in 2021-2022.

Launchpads help developing projects to launch their token, bootstrap initial community, and disburse token emissions to a dedicated community. Vetted launchpads like Eclipse secure funding for exemplary developers allowing for more intricate and expensive ideas to blossom early in a new ecosystem.

On the macro scale, launchpads play a crucial role for a new L1 blockchain. It is the responsibility of the launchpad to select valuable projects with vetted team members and solid CVPs. Projects that launch early will be the ecosystem’s infrastructural backbone - a primary role model for builders in their Web3 neighborhood.

On the individual scale, launchpads provide exclusive opportunities for informed investors to develop a diversified ecosystem portfolio from the ground up. Successful projects might launch tokens that raise to an ATH of 10x-100x or more in relation to the IDO price for launchpad investors.

Getting involved with a responsible launchpad early is an excellent strategy that synergizes with the airdrop hunting atmosphere developing in the SEI community.

Eclipse Pad SEI Blocked Missions

SEI is currently hosting missions for its early ecosystem developers on the Blocked platform. Users can faucet Atlantic-2 testnet SEI for use in incentivized on chain missions.

There have been two missions for Eclipse test launches. Each mission involves a testnet launch for a real developing project that will eventually launch on SEI mainnet.

Both missions enjoyed high levels of participation and sold out quickly: there is no longer an opportunity to participate. However,  I expect that a third mission is just over the horizon.

Jumanji Finance

Jumanji Finance is a game themed convex platform built on top of Astroport.

This test mission was a basic IDO that allowed anyone to invest up to 200 test USDC until the max raise of $10M was achieved. The Jumanji mission introduced the Eclipse community to basic IDO principals and also vesting contracts after MANJI TGE.

High Noon

High Noon is a cowboy themed gamified perpetual trading platform modeled around high-risk high-reward plays.

In this test mission, all users who participated in the Jumanji IDO were whitelisted for a Private allocation round prior to the DUEL Public sale. Under normal mainnet circumstances, however, whitelist access would be given to wallets with the most Cosmic Essence, a reward for staking tiered amounts of ECLIP.

Syndicate

My prediction is that soon (this week?) Eclipse will launch a third testnet mission. Syndicate is a space-age “Redacted Cartel” themed after bribing space pirates for voting power in protocols.

This time around, I expect that the ECLIP staking Cosmic Essence system will come into play. For now, testers should claim test ECLIP daily at the faucet, gradually building their stake. You can only claim 1,000 test ECLIP per day, meaning the most dedicated users may be the only ones allowed in this test raise.

Preparing for SEI Mainnet and ECLIP TGE

The upcoming testnet mission(s) will bring together all moving parts of Eclipse Pad IDOs. Testnet users will get a glimpse of how wallets with more Cosmic Essence from staking ECLIP are rewarded with greater investment opportunities. Use this time to go to school on Eclipse launches in preparation for mainnet.

Details about ECLIP tokenomics are not yet publicly available. We can speculate that there might be an airdrop that favors loyal community members and testers. But soon, details about a more important event will emerge - the ECLIP IDO.

We can guess that the ECLIP IDO will probably be the very first Eclipse raise on SEI mainnet. As there will be no ECLIP token prior to the IDO, there cannot be a whitelist based on Cosmic Essence.

There will likely be a private/whitelist sale for the ECLIP IDO, though we can only speculate on how to qualify. It’s safe to say that the most active community members and testers have the highest chance to participate in this opportunity.

Join the Discord community and say hi. Follow Twitter with 🔔 on for alpha alerts. Participate daily in Zealy quests to climb the leaderboard. Keep informed with Medium articles and begin your mission to become an Eclipse Pad ambassador.

Looking Forward - Eclipse’s Vision

After core functionality goes live on mainnet is when the innovation begins. Here is a look at a few features planned for Eclipse’s growth phase:

• Modular launch plans - not plain IDOs

  • dynamic launch methods for bootstrapping liquidity and vesting

  • Projects can customize their own launches with lockdrops, auctions, and more

• Community-driven innovation

  • Research bounties and developer grants allow anyone in the Eclipse community to shape future launches

• Decentralization in the growth phase

  • Including community governance, roadmap upgrades, and more

• Top-secret solutions for launch liquidity issues and incentives

• Possible L1

  • wildly speculative

• NFT-Fi Era

  • Utilize tradable NFTs for locked or vested positions

If you’re not already a whale throwing six-figure liquidity around DEXs to earn crazy APR, educating yourself on Eclipse Pad may be your greatest opportunity to become a SEI whale during the bull.

Final Thoughts

SEI mainnet is closer than you realize. With it will come an ecosystem explosion as new apps release their products and tokens. Will you surf atop the waves of change, or sink into Davy Jones’s Locker?

A nascent mainnet can be a turbulent ecosystem - SEI will be no exception. There will be 100x investments, but also failed projects and rug pulls. Aligning your investment plan with a vetted launchpad like Eclipse Pad will be a wise choice.

Eclipse Pad only selects the most promising projects for raise. Get prepared for the ECLIP IDO at the very start of SEI mainnet. One might expect half a dozen or more project raises in the first year of operation.

Investing with Eclipse Pad is your ticket to diversified revenue streams of the hottest native SEI tokens vested over time. Put in the time now to prepare your vestments and you will have a constant stream of revenue to engage with exciting emergent SEI projects.

Fractionalized NFTs? Collateralized lending? Mind-boggling AI projects? SEI no more. Your journey starts today with Eclipse Pad.

Locke

Space Cadet, Eclipse Community

Crew, SEI Community

Educator, Mirror and Twitter

Did you learn something today? Patronize my article by collecting an NFT on Optimism.

Eclipse Pad Links

https://discord.gg/frsgZkyb57

https://zealy.io/c/eclipsepad/invite/kRWfytVrHluHU5trqacdT

https://twitter.com/EclipsePad

https://discord.com/channels/1007550103696965673/1013882964419035208/1080136593895084083

https://t.me/EclipsePad

https://medium.com/@Eclipse_pad

https://www.notion.so/eclipsepad/Introduction-to-Eclipse-Pad-7b254d661bb94facb997ec447c3dc6bf

Behind the scenes, the SEI network is being built by battle-hardened veterans. Recognize Levana Finance or Astroport from Terra? Or maybe you noticed that Kryptonite’s UI is congruent to Anchor Protocol… These vetted builders are about to deliver one of the most powerful new L1 blockchains of the upcoming bullrun, and you still have time to get involved at no cost.

Your SEI journey starts at Blocked. Let’s take a look at the 14 available missions that will get you a free education and airdrop.

Launchpad - Eclipse Pad

While you’re getting immersed in a new ecosystem a launchpad is your best friend. Eclipse Pad evolves any DeFi degen into a private investor. 

As SEI evolves, promising new projects will build valuable dApps that need to launch their own token. The Eclipse Pad team carefully selects well-vetted developers and conducts capital raise IDOs for their TGE (Token Generation Event). By buying and staking ECLIP, SEI users earn tiered access to investment opportunities for each of these tokens at a premium price.

The window of opportunity has passed for testnet interaction with Eclipse Pad. However, SEI mainnet is hinted to be closer than you think. Follow Eclipse on Twitter with [bell] on and regularly check in with their Discord. This is the project you want to invest in as soon as mainnet goes live. 

Thank me later ;)

Decentralized Exchanges (DEXs)

     SeaSwap, SparrowSwap, Astroport, Simba

Decentralized Exchanges allow users on a blockchain to swap native tokens on a blockchain without the need of order books. Rather than trading into buy/sell orders (as on a CEX like Binance or the traditional Stock Exchange), users trade into pools of liquidity provided by a decentralized network of users.

DEXs provide core infrastructure for new chains, but they also enable unique earning opportunities for Liquidity Providers. LP rewards are known to be astronomical at the start of a new chain. Get ready to provide and earn by completing Blocked missions.

Kryptonite

Loaning protocols allow users to provide native assets as collateral, borrow against the value of their collateral, and earn APR for time spent taking out loans. Users of Anchor Protocol on Terra know the drill.

Familiarize yourself with Kryptonite while you can. A terrific investment strategy is to buy volatile native assets at the bottom of a bear market, provide them as collateral, and borrow stablecoins against them as the market turns bullish. Be careful about using borrowed funds to buy more volatile assets!

Play2Earn

     Fable, Questify

Liquidity Provision, collateral, APR - does technical jargon have your head swimming? Play2Earn dApps allow users to earn using a more relaxing QoL.

After completing the blocked testnet tasks for these protocols, don’t hesitate to engage in their playful tasks!

Fable teams are playing a decentralized Pokemon game. Each block, use your staked FABLE to vote on which Gameboy button to press next. Can chaos theory allow our ‘player’ to reach the Elite 4? Fable has hinted that users should log at least 20 txns playing Pokemon to maximize their airdrop.

Levana

Leverage trading allows users with smaller margins to make trades with volume much higher than normally available. Be advised - leverage trading is a great way to make profit when you have a scrupulous trade idea, but it is also extremely easy to lose your entire investment!

As an example, consider 10x leverage trading. If you enter a trade with 500 USDC at 10x leverage, and the asset increases in value by 10%, you will earn 10*10% profit on your trade: $500 profit. Contrariwise, if the asset decreases in value by 10%, you will be liquidated, and lose your entire $500.

Leverage trading is all about risk management. You can win 3 times in a row, compounding your earnings: $500 > $1,000, $1,000 > $2,000, $2,000 > $4,000. In 3 trades you’ve earned an 8x. But if you stay greedy, open another trade with your $4,000, and get liquidated, you can lose all your earnings in a heartbeat. Only make risk-managed trades when you have a clear entry and exit in mind!

Conclusion

You still have time to participate in all 14 SEI missions before this phase of the incentivized testnet ends. Use a wallet like Leap Cosmos, Keplr, or Coin98 to get started. 

Your journey begins when you claim testnet SEI. First, visit SEI Discord and go to the #atlantic-2-faucet. Afterwards, don’t forget to visit the website SEI faucet for a bit more funds. Finally, visit Blocked and complete all available missions.

Not only will you increase your SEI airdrop, but you will walk away with invaluable information and experience pertaining to the earliest SEI builders. Use your time wisely, friend, and start Seiling these salty seas. Booty awaits!

Did you learn something today? Collect an NFT on Optimism, and you will be entered into a raffle. The winner takes a 50% portion of my own SEI airdrop from completing all tasks described in this article.

GLHF!

Subscribe to learn - next article is a deep dive into Eclipse Pad!

Cheers,

     Locke

The most obvious analogue for the Bitcoin bubble is the dot-com bubble. Both phenomena were accompanied by growing global adoption of revolutionary information technology. What similarities and differences can we ascribe to each different bubble?

What Defines a Bubble?

In the finance space, usually the term “bubble” refers to the inflation of the price of an asset, commodity, or security in relation to its valuation. Market participants drive assets high above their technical valuation until the bubble pops, and the price dumps.

Some analysts ascribe financial market bubbles to behavioral finance. The insane buy-pressure is relative to cognitive bias related to herd behavior. Over-zealous speculative investors see their peers investing in the next new thing, and are eager to participate as well. Other behavioral explanations suggest that bubble behavior is rational, intrinsic, and contagious.

The claim that bubble behavior is rational came from an article dated 1990, of which I can no longer find a copy online. Perhaps this type of macro herd mentality seemed rational at the time, but times have changed. Three decades later, the internet and social media facilitate the transfer of data in speeds that used to be unfathomable. Herd behavior, like meme coin speculation, happens in a matter of hours or days, not over years. Can we still call this kind of macro movement a bubble when it is observed to span months, and even four-year cycles, in the current decade? To approach this question, we must investigate the most obvious analogue to the Bitcoin bubble.

The Dot Com Bubble and Bitcoin

The dot com bubble, or internet bubble, was a stock market bubble caused by excessive stock market speculation of internet companies in the late 90s. Between 1995 and its peak in March 2000, the Nasdaq Composite stock market index rose 400%, but later fell 78% from its peak by October 2002, effectively relinquishing all of its gains during the bubble. Many online shopping companies failed, like pets.com, but others survived, such as amazon.com.

Before the Bubble

The 1993 release of Mosaic software facilitated global access to the world wide web. Between 1990 and 1997 the percentage of households in the United States owning a computer rose over 100%. Simultaneously, the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997, along with other economic factors, allowed people to participate in more speculative investments. Investors, equipped with additional liquid, were more eager to speculate in the nascent field of information technology, regardless of stock valuation. Any internet company, especially those with .com suffixes, were the target of overconfident investment. There was a significant number of individuals who quit their job to speculate in the financial market. On-paper millionaires were made… but most didn’t exit before the bubble burst.

The Bubble Bursts

The year 2000 marked the height of the dot com bubble. AOL merged with Time Warner company. 20% of Super Bowl XXXIV ads were purchased by dot-com companies (most were at least $2M investments). Billions of dollars were spent without much revenue generation outside of the valuation of company stocks. The bubble’s deathknell rang throughout late 2000, when Alan Greenspan, Chair of the Federal Reserved, repeatedly raised market interest rates several times, until… *pop*. All that was left of the bubble was the mess.

How much of the infamous dot com bubble narrative actually applies to Bitcoin? Bitcoin has enjoyed periods of rapid price increase, which empirically have been followed by periods of recession. However, the dumps that proceed the peaks never dipped below price levels leading to the bubble, as in the dot com craze. Bitcoin is no new phenomenon - it has experienced 2 prolonged “crypto winters” since its inception, but every time that people claim “the bubble has burst”, Bitcoin eventually rallies to fresh heights.

It is important to note that the technical functionality of Bitcoin as an asset far exceeds that of stocks. Bitcoin is the representation of blockchain as cutting-edge financial technology, whereas the dot com bubble represented the implementation of old business models on the new network of the internet. If decentralized finance continues on its course, and isn’t slain prematurely by excessive regulation, it will be a *financial revolution*: the great global redistribution of wealth within a new financial paradigm.

The terminology “bubble” applies to some obvious aesthetic similarities between the dot com bubble and Bitcoin, but how similar are the two phenomena, separated by over two decades?

If Bitcoin is a Bubble, then What Type of Bubble Is It?

In my research, I came across a fascinating piece of journalism by Miko Matsumara titled Comparing the Bitcoin Bubble to the Dotcom Bubble. It was written almost at the height of the 2017 bullrun, when Bitcoin was priced at $19,000. Miko argues that of course Bitcoin was a bubble, but so is finance, and so is the universe for that matter. Everything is a bubble. Intrinsically, bubbles, after experiencing an exponential growth curve, are followed by a dump.

In retrospect, Miko’s analysis was impressively sharp mid-term financial (non)advice. He almost called the exact top of the 2017 Bitcoin bullrun. But his analysis goes deeper. Miko compares Bitcoin to gold, calling it the gold standard of cryptocurrency. He also compares Bitcoin to the internet. The internet facilitates the public transfer of data. Bitcoin facilitates the *secure* public transfer of data. Interestingly, he notes that the dot com bubble peaked at $9.6T, while, even as of October 2021, the Bitcoin market cap has never exceeded $2T.

Bitcoin represents the value of cryptocurrency at large. It is the lifeline of all cryptocurrencies, and the scion of decentralized finance. Bitcoin compels financial innovation, especially in regards to the trustless custody of assets: Bitcoin never relies on a third-party during financial transactions. In contrast, the dot com crash made banks and the FDIC the targets of scandalous slander. Companies that were backed by the FDIC siphoned government funds, while the rest were left in the bubble mess. Decentralized finance, as spearheaded by Bitcoin, ensures that the individuals and institutions who speculate in the cryptocurrency market are solely responsible for their successes and failures.

** **

Blockchain is Inevitable; Bitcoin is Not

Bitcoin is the gold standard of crypto: a single asset which represents the lifeline of an entire sector. To quote Miko, 

“The Internet is without a doubt the largest transfer of information (bits) we have ever seen in our lifetimes, whereas the internet of value will be the largest transfer of wealth in our lifetimes. Netflix wants $10 of your bank account every month. Amazon maybe wants $100 of your bank account every month. Bitcoin wants your entire bank account for the rest of time.”

Backed by this, Miko claims that the secure internet of value represented by cryptocurrency has the potential to be *100x larger* than consumerization of the entire internet.

** **

Conclusion: Zoom Out from the Bitcoin Bubble

Subjective labels, like bubbles, incite fear. The word “bubble” itself provokes memories and horror stories of past market failure. Of course there are similarities between historical events like the dot com bubble and the rise of Bitcoin, but as we’ve considered throughout this article, the most obvious similarities are merely superficial. Upon diving deeper and comparing constituent components to historical analogues, we begin to find a universe of features of the Bitcoin bubble that would be anachronistic in the dot com bubble narrative.

It is not realistic to relate macro movements of Bitcoin in 2025 to macro movements of the stock market in 1995. Information travels orders of magnitudes faster than it did in the 90s with the 9-5, 5-day-a-week stock market. Cryptocurrencies trade nonstop, and if you forget to check Twitter tonight, you might already be late to the latest groupthink meme coin tomorrow. Yes, Bitcoin will fly higher, and yes, afterwards it will probably dump, but that dump won’t end in a generational mess that ruins fortunes (for most - play it safe, Degens).

To those who are afraid that this bullrun is the last stand of cryptocurrency, I say: zoom out. Blockchain technology is not going away. Cryptocurrency is arguably the most progressive application of blockchain. Decentralized finance is emerging as a *truly revolutionary* system that flips capitalist maxims topsy-turvy.

At less than two decades old, cryptocurrency is just beginning. The last Bitcoin ever minted will be mined in the year 2140. Until then, we have a lot of building to do.

Imagine blowing a colossal, hyper-viscous bubble. One that will take many subsequent breaths to fully inflate. Envision taking a huge breath, then blowing. The bubble begins to inflate, until you are out of breath. You start to inhale, and the bubble starts to shrink - but it doesn’t disappear. Finally, you blow out again, and look! The bubble grows to a larger size than ever before! But it still has so much room to grow. Each time you take a new breath, the bubble shrinks a bit, but each time you exhale it grows to a size never seen before. The fluid is so viscous that it seems like it will never pop, so you keep breathing, and blowing, and breathing, and blowing. Eventually, probably, the bubble will pop, but who cares? It won’t happen anytime soon, and anyway you’re having fun blowing it up.

Bitcoin is the future. Blow your bubbles accordingly.

Locke

This article was originally published under my previous alias, Demosthenes, as shown by this tweet

**

**

Without a national economy to evaluate the currency, or a national reserve to supply it, how *is* a currency such as Bitcoin created? This article covers the topic of Bitcoin creation, as well as an overview of its systematic introduction into the global economy.

Digital Assets Before Bitcoin was Created

Prior to the release of Bitcoin, there were a few underdeveloped attempts at developing digital monetary technologies. Most were issued based on ecashhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecash protocols, developed by David Chaum and Stefan Brands. The idea didn’t catch on, due to systematic networking incapabilities.

The idea of utilizing the solution of computational puzzles to represent value was proposed in 1992 by cryptographers Cynthia Dwork and Moni Naor. Building on this idea, Adam Back developed hashcashhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hashcash, a proof-of-work scheme for spam control, in 1997.

Building further on the hashcash model, b-money and bit gold were the first proposals for digital scarcity-based cryptocurrencies. These early implementations had flaws, but the most fatal flaw was related to the Byzantine generals problem.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byzantine_fault. This is a condition of a distributed computing system where components may fail, but broadcast imperfect information on the verity of failure. The result is that a failed component may simultaneously appear both failed and functioning to internal failure-detection systems. These flaws obviously prevented bit gold and others from becoming a globally distributed financial system. 

Satoshi Nakamoto Created Bitcoin

On August 18th, 2008, the website domain bitcoin.org was registered. On Halloween 2008, a link to a paper authored by one Satoshi Nakomoto titled Bitcoin: a Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System was posted to a popular cryptography mailing list. The Bitcoin whitepaper described using a peer-to-peer network to generate a “system for electronic transactions without relying on trust”. Two months later, Bitcoin was born.

The Bitcoin network was created on January 3rd, 2009 when Satoshi Nakamoto mined the genesis block (block 0) of the blockchain and received the first 50 Bitcoin to enter circulating supply. Embedded on the coinbase (the transaction containing block mining rewards) was the current headline of the New York Times, “The Times Jan/03/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks.” This legendary memo is simultaneously a timestamp and a visionary slight targeting the shortcomings of fractional-reserve banking.

The first open source Bitcoin client, hosted on SourceForge, was released on January 9th, 2009. Hal Finney, a programmer who downloaded the client on its first day, was the recipient of the first Bitcoin transaction: Satoshi Nakamoto sent him 10 Bitcoin on January 12, 2010. Wei Dai and Nick Szabo, creators of b-money and bit gold, were also early supporters of the Bitcoin network.

It is rumoured that, in these early days, creator Satoshi Nakamoto mined up to 1M Bitcoin in block rewards. Thereafter, he pulled a Krakauer, and seemingly vanished into thin air. Satoshi effectively handed over Bitcoin’s reins to Gavin Andersen, who became the lead developer at the Bitcoin Foundation. The Bitcoin Foundation, an anarchic online community, is the closest thing to a public face that Bitcoin has.

Who is Satoshi Nakamoto, Creator of Bitcoin?

The identity of the creator of Bitcoin remains unknown. “Satoshi Nakamoto” is presumed to be a pseudonym, either for an individual or, possibly, an organization.

What Do We Know?

Satoshi Nakamoto is responsible for creating the original official Bitcoin software. Immediately following the launch of the Bitcoin network, an online persona by the name of Satoshi Nakamoto was active in modifying network software and posting technical info in early Bitcoin forums (mostly on bitcoin.org). Otherwise, it is hard to trace any actions of the infamous enigma.

Identity

The obvious initial suspects for the identity of Satoshi Nakamoto were Wei Dai, Nick Szabo, and Hal Finney. All of them have refuted repeated accusations with reasonable evidence. Some evidence seems to suggest the possibility that Satoshi Nakamoto is the name of a computer collective operating within the European financial sector.

Investigation

Myriad organizations have launched investigations about the creator of Bitcoin’s identity. All investigations thus far have been fruitless. In 2012, The New Yorker* launched an investigation that pointed to two possible candidates: Michael Clear and Vili Lehdonvirta. Later, a Fast Company* investigation brought circumstantial evidence against Neal King, Vladimir Oksman, and Charles Bry. The evidence linked a four-word-phrase, “computationally impractical to reverse” from the triumvirate’s patent (#20100042841) to the Bitcoin whitepaper. All investigations were dead ends.

Reporters have pointed fingers, researchers have pursued network transactions to build accusations, and laymen have made claims, but no evidence has ever stuck. It seems that the identity of Satoshi Nakamoto will forever remain a mystery. For all intents and purposes, the creator’s involvement with Bitcoin doesn’t exist past 2010. If Satoshi Nakamoto has moved on, perhaps we should too.

Bitcoin Growth After Creation

Now we have a clear picture of the creation phase of Bitcoin. But how did it grow from one pseudonymous developer’s cryptography pet-project to the awesome decentralized financial institution that it is today? Like many great calls to adventure, our Hero’s Journey began with pizza.

The first transaction involving physical goods in exchange for Bitcoin was paid on the 22nd of May, 2010. Two bitcoin.org forum users negotiated a transaction ahead of time. Two pizzas, delivered by Papa John’s, were exchanged for 10,000 Bitcoin. Word to the wise - don’t try to do the math on how many pizzas 10,000 Bitcoin could buy today. It’s staggering. Regardless, this event solidified the financial viability of transacting using Bitcoin.

Its continuing adoption did not go off without a hitch. On August 6th, 2010, a major vulnerability was identified in the Bitcoin protocol. This allowed exploiters to bypass economic restrictions and create over 184 *billion Bitcoin in one transaction. The erroneous transaction was spotted and corrected in logs, and the network forked to an updated protocol - crisis avoided. Remarkably, this is the *only major security flaw found and exploited in Bitcoin’s history.

More organizations worldwide began to accept bitcoin. In 2011, the Electronic Frontier Foundation began accepting Bitcoin donations, as did WikiLeaks. Bitcoin made its television debut in 2012 on the CBS legal drama The Good Wife*. In September 2012, the Bitcoin Foundation, headed by Gavin Andersen, was launched to accelerate the growth of Bitcoin. Also in 2012, BitPay reported over 1,000 merchants accepting Bitcoin as payment.

In February 2013, the popular onramp Coinbase reported selling $1M worth of Bitcoin. Afterwards, a continual stream of markets and exchanges opened and began trading, resulting in the ecosystem with which cryptocurrency traders are familiar today.

Conclusion - Bitcoin Created Decentralized Finance

Since Bitcoin’s creation, powerful entities have tried to erase it from existence. Countries have outlawed Bitcoin. Banks have demonized all cryptocurrency. Centralized media tells you alternately that Bitcoin is a scam or that it will make you rich. 

Bitcoin is not going away. The network is decentralized - there is no way to destroy it. Over-regulation in one area of the world is usually met by overwhelming acceptance elsewhere. Supply and demand, as we know, make the world go round.

Bitcoin was the first cryptocurrency ever created, but it is not, as maximalists will tell you, the only cryptocurrency worth anything. Bitcoin has created the stage for a financial revolution. Decentralized finance, a system that enables trustless peer-to-peer payments, will revolutionize finance as we know it, and it will do it in a way that allows various cryptocurrencies to hold unique value.

Thousands of new cryptocurrencies are created yearly. Some introduce important new ideas, like Ethereum or Terra. But Bitcoin will always be the first, the OG, and the gold standard of cryptocurrency.

In a decade or more, the term “gold standard” may leave our language entirely. Maybe money will be compared to the “Bitcoin standard”.

Locke

If you learned something today, please consider collecting.

This article was originally published my previous alias, Demosthenes, as proven by this Tweet

mirror.xyz is the premier Web3 DeFi solution to the Web2 product Medium

Projects and writers can create a free publication simply by linking an EVM wallet on Optimism to an email address. When using mirror.xyz, users enjoy all the inherent benefits of Web3:

• Users own their personal data and IP, which is never collected and sold

• Signing in is protected by private keys, reducing bots and hackers

• Monetize payment with crypto - no more fussy anti-fraud payment gateway BS

Monetize your own content

Writers curate monetization for each published article individually. By creating a free NFT collection with custom supply and price, users can invest in their future fan base. Even if the collectibles don’t sell out immediately, their scarcity imbues inherent value when the publisher’s future fan base grows past grassroots, or if the project performs well and goes viral.

After the collection limit is reached, the collectible can never be minted again. However, sold-out collections are listed automatically on Opensea.io. Royalties from secondary sales provide perpetual value to the publisher (project or writer), collector, and mirror.xyz.

As an added bonus, the project can retroactively design utility for holders of certain mirror.xyz collectibles, incentivizing community members to collect future NFTs before they sell out, and raising the floor price and royalties of Secondary collections.

Why should crypto projects choose mirror.xyz over Medium?

mirror.xyz is a DeFi Web3 messaging board built by and for Web3 DeFi users. Its search and suggest algorithms are more likely to hit potential readers. Have you ever had an article flagged for illegal cryptocurrency content on Medium? That will never happen on mirror.xyz.

Most importantly, the monetization system is far superior to that of Medium. It cuts out the corporate middleman and allows creators to monetize their content on their own terms, without signing away their rights of ownership.

Thankfully, you don’t have to choose one or the other! Let me show you how to publish first on mirror.xyz to preserve ownership on monetization, then cross-publish to Medium.

Too busy to publish 2-3 mirror.xyz articles a week?

That’s too bad. Search algorithms suggest that publishing informative long-form content at this pace optimizes the growth phase of startup social communities. If your project eventually goes viral the money your team left on the table at mirror.xyz will be substantial. And those Medium articles won’t be worth a Satoshi.

Hire a writer to maintain and monetize your project articles

Whether you need a single article, a collection during the project’s prelaunch phase, or a full-time Communications Manager, adding a staff writer to your Team’s arsenal is a prudent and effective idea to keep your community organized and informed.

If everyone on the Team does their job well, the cost of hiring a writer will completely pay for itself, and more. Viral projects tend to sell out the collectibles for every single article published. I’ll let you do the math.

My inbox is open for writing inquiries and project partnerships. In Fall 2021 I cut my teeth as a Staff Writer for Loop Finance on Terra. By February I was made a Marketing Executive. By April I was promoted to the CEO of the launchpad Luna Launcher - the launchpad, ironically never launched because in May…… well, let’s not talk about Terra Luna in May 2022.

Could your project benefit from an experienced Staff Writer? Does my skill set synergize with your mission and vision? Contact me at unlocke.wealth@gmail.com with any inquiries. Let’s design a plan together where both parties win.

Eager to unLocke your project’s viral potential,

Locke

Portfolio Samples

Loop Writer’s Portfolio

Overview of GxyPad on zkSync

Video Tutorial - Liquidity Farms on GemSwap

Contact Me

Twitter

Discord: Demosthenes#8918

E-mail: unlocke.wealth@gmail.com

Note: My former moniker was Demosthenes, but I am currently evolving into my new handle, Locke. Social accounts will update over the next week as I inform old colleagues and friends.

If that Orson Scott Card reference tickles you as it tickles me, let’s be friends :)

Galaxy Pad, or GxyPad, is an innovative and flexible launchpad that supports the expansion of the zkSync blockchain ecosystem. As a launchpad, GxyPad is designed to provide projects with options for raising funds, minting, and locking tokens. Of course, that also means that it provides the average zkSync user with a sleek and seamless interface for investing in presale tokens.

All projects must pass a strict internal platform review before being approved by Galaxy for launch. In this way, GxyPad protects its users while expanding the zkSync ecosystem with projects that benefit the ecosystem as a whole.

Ultimately, GxyPad envisions expanding the core functionality of zkSync dApps that align with the Ethereum vision while providing opportunities for cunning early investors, all wrapped within our favorite zero-knowledge rollup.

The Galaxy Launch Process

GxyPad provides multiple solutions for projects to raise capital, presenting various opportunities for investors of different commitment levels and portfolio sizes. Potential GxyPad investors are wise to stay informed about the four phases that precede each token launch: Whitelist Presale, Public Presale, Private Presale, and Fair Launch.

Whitelist Presale

Members of the Galaxy Club have the opportunity to apply for whitelist spots for each project launch. Membership to Galaxy Club is awarded to community members who participate in official GxyPad community events, and also to users who stake GXY, the Galaxy Pad governance token. The best way to ensure your early admission to the Galaxy Club is to interact with Galaxy communities. Be sure to participate frequently in Discord, Telegram, and Twitter.

Whitelisted Club members have the opportunity to participate in the whitelist presale of each specific launch on GxyPad. The Whitelist Presale phase has a fixed softcap and hardcap, minimum and maximum contributions, and is only available for a limited timeframe. After the Whitelist Presale ends, the public presale begins.

Public Presale

Public Presale resembles Whitelist Presale structurally. It has a softcap and a hardcap, min and max contribution amounts, and a limited timeframe for investment. Be aware that, depending on the project's popularity, these presales may sell out extremely quickly. 

Slow fingers? Don’t fret! The best opportunity for GxyPad launches is the Private Presale, available only to a limited number of Galaxy Club members per launch.

Private

Each project has the option to raise funds through a private sale, offering Galaxy Club members and private investors token allocation at an unbeatable price premium. To earn this elite position, be sure to stay perpetually active in the Galaxy Club communities. Presale allocation is extremely sought-after, and only the most devoted Galaxy Club members are rewarded with this opportunity.

Fair Launch

Once all the presale phases have concluded, the project token is ready to launch into the open market! GxyPad uses a proprietary Fair Launch system to ease hot-off-the-press tokens into stable circulation.

Fair Launches take place within a specific period of time, usually from hours to days.

Each Fair Launch assumes a presale soft-cap of $50,000. When that volume is exceeded, Fair Launch enters its price discovery phase, where each additional purchase incrementally raises the price per token.

The true launch price of the token is determined by the final price per token when the Fair Launch timeframe expires. Every Fair Launch investor user receives tokens at that same price, regardless of how early or late they invested in this final phase.

Galaxy Club - Opportunity Calls

Access to Galaxy Club provides exclusive access to whitelisting and investment opportunities for the most promising new projects on zkSync (and maybe in the whole galaxy)... but the benefits don’t stop there!

Members have the unique ability to vote on important matters during Galaxy Club official meetings, including roadmap development and project presale listing evaluation. Galaxy Club members that are developers receive the additional benefit of curated platform support. GxyPad is ready to provide marketing, consulting, market growth, PR, network security, and venture capital support packages to developers in the Club.

I know what you’re thinking, “where can I sign up?!” The de facto method to earn Club membership will be staking at least $1,000 worth of the GXY token for at least 30 days on the GxyPad dApp. More information about GxyPad’s staking system is coming soon - pay attention to socials!

There will be additional unannounced venues for gaining Club membership. The first token launched on GxyPad will be its own GXY governance token. If you want an exclusive chance to invest in the coin that gives premier investment opportunity for ALL coins launched on Galaxy, get involved today! Join the Discord and Telegram communities, check out our Zealy engagement tasks, and follow us on Twitter (🔔)... you know the drill. 

What Next?

If you’ve made it this far to the end of the article, congratulations. Your attention span surpasses that of most readers. That means you have what it takes to join the elite and exclusive Galaxy Club and earn premium opportunities to invest in the best upstart projects on zkSync.

The Galaxy Team is composed of professionals with experience in DeFi and project launches spanning multiple different chains. Using our exhaustive evaluation criteria, we promise to launch only legitimate and powerful projects and to give our investors a sleek user experience along with continual opportunities for investment and growth.

The GxyPad website is live, but the dApp is not quite yet. We have so much growth ahead of us… and so much progress awaits hidden just beyond the horizon.

Our journey to launch the most innovative projects on zkSync into the Galaxy begins now! Don’t hesitate to get on board while opportunity calls.

Follow us on Twitter (🔔). When you do, don't miss our huge $GXY Whitelist giveaway! In order for your chance at a guaranteed allocation of 4,000 $GXY and WL for the launch, you’ll have to join the Zealy community and start engaging daily.

https://zealy.io/c/gxypad/invite/BhnxXsK0d4KVGQadsNd8o

Join our Discord community and introduce yourself. Check out our Zealy engagement tasks and watch YouTube videos. These contributions may yet seem menial, but very soon skeptics those who balk at this opportunity will be left behind.

Links

Discord Medium Twitter Telegram Channel Telegram Group Galaxy Pad Docs Official Galaxy Website and dApp YouTube Zealy** **

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