Hi from Boston, and welcome to a double-edition of PoW.

I’ve been playing around with a lot of apps recently and I wanted to highlight a few of the particularly compelling ones:

Mixin Messenger. My partner invested in this last year and I never get around to playing with it. The app is quite popular in China—it’s an encrypted messaging app that uses the Signal protocol for end to end encryption, and has a crypto wallet that lets you do things like send red envelopes to friends and do easy p2p transfers. The crypto functionality is built on a federated semi-custodial multisig solution that I frankly don’t quite understand yet (the code is all on Github but I haven’t finished reading through it) but so far I’ve only used it for small amounts of coin and to play around. The toy bots people have built for this are pretty impressive—there’s a Bitcoin faucet bot that gives you 100 satoshis the first time you hit it, and increases the amount by 100 each time you remember to ping the bot, a dice bot that replicates the old SatoshiDice functionality, and a lightning-based instant exchange bot that allows you to swap between any of the coins the messenger supports (most of the top twenty). I’m going to revisit this one in a later newsletter once I have a better understanding of how the underlying distributed multisig part works so that I have a better feel for how secure this is. Coinbase’s new Tezos staking flow in the app. Coinbase hired a bunch of good designers over the past year or so and it clearly paid off. This is honestly one of the best experiences in crypto (the realtime count-up is so cool). The Ironbelly Grin Wallet. Sending Grin is still kind of a hassle because of the interactivity thing but playing with this is just.. fun. I can’t explain it, but I really like it and so does everyone I’ve sent this to.

Bitcoin & Friends

Eric on Bitcoin

Mike Dubrovsky of PowX dropped a “litepaper” (why didn’t they call it a light paper, missed dadjoke opportunity) about a new optical Proof of Work. The aim here is to move the needle way over to the CapEx side of the dial from the current mostly-OpEx situation. This would make cost of electricity less relevant, and potentially lead to more geographically decentralized mining. Lots of potential issues, but super interesting. I’ve put this under the Bitcoin header because the ultimate aim is to integrate it into BTC; whether this is at all likely is unclear at the moment.

Optech on Bitcoin [ed: sign up for their newsletter too! it’s great!]

Upgrade to C-Lightning 0.7.3: this latest release adds support for a PostgreSQL backend, makes it possible to send funds directly to a particular address when closing a channel, and allows you keep your HD wallet seed encrypted when lightningd isn’t running

Experienced users are encouraged to help test the latest release candidates for the upcoming version of Bitcoin Core.

Tony from Kadena

Kadena is building Pact, a formally verifiable smart-contracting language for financial applications, and Chainweb, a PoW blockchain that uses multiple chains in parallel to increase throughput.

Aviv from Spacemesh

Spacemesh is a programmable cryptocurrency powered by a novel proof-of-space-time consensus protocol.

Izaak from Coda

Coda is the first cryptocurrency protocol with a constant-sized blockchain. Coda compresses the entire blockchain into a tiny snapshot the size of a few tweets using recursive zk-SNARKs.

John has been developing the archive node, for those who want to store the entire history of Coda.

Michelle has been working on implementing the delegation and staking flows in the desktop wallet.

Echo fixed a bug which we saw on our last testnet that caused nodes to crash if they connected to a peer that they had "banned" for misbehavior.

Privacy coins

Elena & Zooko from Zcash

Zcash is a digital currency utilizing zk-SNARKs to enable its privacy-protecting properties.

The next DevFund Protocol Hangout is 11/6. The discussion will be hosted by Sonya and you can sign up here.

The ECC live stream has been rescheduled for 11/12 at 10:30 am MST. Hear from company leadership about the dev fund, goals for the coming year, product flight plan and more.

Zecwallet-Lite UI beta 1 is here. Please take some time to try out the wallet and send us feedback.

Don’t miss the Cypherpunk Privacy Reading List put out by Zcash Foundation.

ECC transferred ownership of the Zcash trademark to the Zcash Foundation. Zcash Foundation shared an updated timeline for DevFund proposals. If you missed the Protocol hangout, check out the recording in Zcash Foundation’s weekly newsletter.

The ECC quarterly live stream is on Tuesday 11/12 at 10:30 am MST. Hear from company leadership about the dev fund, goals for the coming year, product flight plan and more.

Make sure to check out our blog for the latest releases. Release 2.1.0 set the mainnet activation of the Blossom network upgrade to an activation height of 653600, which should occur in early December. Release 2.1.0.1 fixes a security issue that we were made aware of this morning. We recommend reading the blog and downloading the updated releases.

ECC continued work on updating https://explorer.testnet.z.cash/, https://explorer.z.cash/, and https://faucet.testnet.z.cash/

We’ve added functionality to the iOS SDK so that developers are able to download and trial decrypt blocks in order to find transactions that pertain the the wallet; specifically, we implemented: download blocks, validate blocks, scan blocks, and a block progress indicator.

While iOS is getting up to parity with Android, Android has been refining its code, exploring future-compatibility for next network upgrades, merged in security fixes (https://github.com/zcash/librustzcash/issues/120, https://github.com/zcash/zcash-android-wallet-sdk/issues/30), and merged a threat model for the android SDK.

Full Zcash updates are available here.

Daniel from Grin

Grin is a community-driven implementation of the Mimblewimble protocol that aims to be privacy preserving, scalable, fair, and minimal.

Arnaud from AZTEC Protocol

AZTEC Protocol is an efficient zero-knowledge protocol built on top of Ethereum, making plug-and-play value transmission and asset governance privacy tools for developers and companies.

After 10 days of continuous computation for Ignition (our MPC ceremony) >60 participants from >18 countries have successfully added entropy. The ceremony is on track to hit over 200 participants over the next month. Watch live on https://ignition.aztecprotocol.com

We have been working on better testing for Barretenberg, our ECC library. We’ve added a more thorough build pipeline and building and testing on several architectures and OSs.

We’re continuing work on final deploy tests and integration tests for our mainnet protocol, preparing for our launch later this year.

Smart contracting platforms

Peter from NEAR

NEAR is a sharded proof-of-stake blockchain.

AJ from Tezos

Tezos is a self-amending blockchain that features formally verified smart contracts, on-chain governance, and a proof-of-stake consensus algorithm which enables all token holders to participate in the network.

Topper from Quorum Control

Quorum Control makes Tupelo, a permissionless proof of stake DLT platform purpose-built to model individual objects that enables flexible public or private data models.

The team is finalizing a significant Tupelo core update to enable Tupelo developers to specify “conditions” as part of the transactions they submit. These take the form of lisp like logical conditionals and will allow a range of new functions to be described in greater detail upon release.

Architecture and implementation planning for new HAMT based batched transaction consensus algorithm. This change will provide significantly higher transaction throughput (currently at 250 tx/sec for 21 signers) under load while still maintaining very low latency.

We are hiring for Developer Evangelist and Platform Engineer positions. Submit resumes to info@quorumcontrol.com.

Andrew from Solana

Solana is a scalable blockchain that utilizes proof of history to verify the ordering and passage of time between events. It consists of a network of 200 physically distinct nodes which support a sustained throughput of more than 50,000 TPS.

Last week was a big week for our engineering team. We released solana.0.20 and fixed some of the bugs that was keeping our TPS down. Check the Github.https://github.com/solana-labs

Tour del SOL is racing. TdS is Solana’s validation-client event. Check solana.com/tds for updates.

We hosted four events at our offices in San Francisco and had hundreds of great people come and hang out.

The theme of last week was performance testing and we hit some major benchmarks. SLP1 is on the horizon. Check the Github.https://github.com/solana-labs

Tour del SOL is racing. TdS is Solana’s validation-client event. Check solana.com/tds for updates.

We wrote a post on SFBW and the great projects we worked with: https://medium.com/solana-labs/solana-at-sfbw-showed-that-cooperation-is-key-to-blockchain-growth-d1cab5011b10

We are working to best support developers looking to build on Solana. Experience with onboarding to a new Layer 1? Let us know. andrew@solana.com

We are looking for industry experts to interview for our #nosharding Podcast.

Michael from Loom

Loom Network is a universal layer 2 hub. Developers can deploy and scale their dapps directly on Loom’s mainnet as well as interoperate with other major layer 1 chains such as Ethereum, Binance, Libra, Bitcoin, etc.

Financial Infrastructure

Antonio from dYdX

dYdX is a decentralized exchange for margin trading, borrowing, lending, and eventually derivatives. dYdX allows traders to trustlessly short and get leverage on crypto assets.

Dolomite DEX launching margin trading built on dYdX!

Rolling out new designs for our trade page

Working on: isolated closes on our native markets, price charts using native market data, MCD upgrade plans

Launched isolated position closes on native market

Removed all non-dYdX markets from the site

Launching updated trade page designs this week

dYdX is now running a MakerDAO V2 Oracle reporter

Released multi-collateral DAI upgrade plan

Working on: WebSocket API for orders, replace order API endpoint, pending balance API endpoint, MCD upgrade

Hiring software engineers & product designers full-time in SF!

Vanessa from Celo

Celo’s aim is to empower anyone with a smartphone anywhere in the world to have access to financial services, send money to phone numbers, and pay merchants — all on a decentralized platform that is developed and operated by the community.

Coulter from MakerDAO

Maker is comprised of a decentralized stablecoin, collateral loans, and community governance.

Layer two and interoperability

Tieshun from Namebase

Namebase is the easiest way to buy, sell, and use Handshake.

Many Handshake contributors are at the ICANN66 meetup this week in Montreal. The Handshake panel will be at 1:30-3pm est on Tuesday.

Boyma from Purse.io gave a presentation on Handshake at the ICANN66 meetup in Montreal. Here is the recording.

Shayan Eskandari helped host the first ever Handshake meetup in Montreal! Over 20 crypto enthusiasts showed up to hear presentations from Boyma, Mark Tyneway, Matthew Zipkin, and Tieshun Roquerre. Here are some pictures from the meetup:

Alexandra from Polkadot

Polkadot empowers blockchain networks to work together under the protection of shared security.

Matt from 0x

0x is an open protocol that enables the peer-to-peer exchange of assets on the Ethereum blockchain.

We just announced the upcoming vote for 0x v3! Introducing 0x v3 is an exciting new chapter for our protocol and community, as this upgrade includes ZRX staking and a powerful set of bridge contracts that aggregate liquidity from 0x and other DEX networks like Kyber, Uniswap, and MakerDAO's Oasis. Learn more about the v3 upgrade here.

We introduced a new initiative OpenZKP, an open-source zk-STARK implementation. Check out our documentation and examples.

The 0x Core Team is hiring across a variety of roles. Join us and do the most impactful work of your life.

Dong Mo from Celer

Celer Network is a layer-2 scaling platform that enables fast, easy and secure off-chain transactions for not only payment transactions, but also generalized off-chain smart contracts.

We finished the social feed for the home screen and the new landing page UI.

We improved the matching UI.

We finished integrating the FIAT on-ramp and off-ramp APIs on iOS.

On our backend side, we continue implementing Q4 OPS features and enhancements.

We completed the development and testing of the SGN gateway.

We provided support for Celer events during SF Blockchain week.

We completed the fiat onramp functionality.

We released an internal test version for USD on-ramp and off-ramp features.

We added email verification in cloud backup flow.

We fixed bugs and improved stability.

We continued our development of OSP features for Q4.

We provided support for CelerX campaign and operational improvements.

We implemented SGN penalty feature.

Application infrastructure

Mark from Helium

Helium is a decentralized, open wireless network built on a new blockchain for the physical world. It relies on a novel type of work called Proof of Coverage, and a new consensus algorithm (based on HoneyBadger BFT). The Helium Network is used to route data for long range, lower power devices (often called "IoT" devices).

The Helium Network is built on Hotspots. The Helium Hotspot is a combination LongFi wireless router and Helium blockchain miner built and distributed by Helium, Inc. Hotspots create a long-range wireless network for routing packets to and from Helium LongFi-enabled devices and perform ongoing mining duties to secure the Helium Network. Hotspot operators are rewarded in Helium Token (HNT), a new cryptocurrency native to the Helium blockchain.



The Helium Network went live in Austin, TX in August 2019 and has already grown to over 1250 Hotspots deployed across hundreds of cities in the United States.

helium.com

Live coverage map, block explorer, and consensus viewer -> network.helium.com

Blockchain and network statistics -> dashboard.helium.com

Developer Docs -> developer.helium.com

Blockchain and Proof of Coverage Docs -> developer.helium.com/blockchain/overview

Helium on GitHub -> helium.com/github

Alexandra from Parity Technologies

Parity Technologies builds core blockchain infrastructure, from Parity Ethereum, an Ethereum client, to Polkadot, an interoperable blockchain network.

Matt from Keep Network

The Keep Network is a privacy layer for public chains, enabling interactivity with private data and interoperability across chains. It does this with keeps, off-chain containers for private data that help smart contracts harness the full power of the public blockchain.

tBTC: Started looking ahead to what v2 of tBTC will look like Plugged the redemption dApp into the tBTC contracts, now working through bugs Progress on planning remaining work through mainnet Random beacon: Group size for random number generation increased to 64 members We are progressing on optimizing the cost of the beacon, including distributed key generation, group selection, and new relay entry submission We are setting up the infrastructure for Ropsten contract deployment For more updates and questions join our Slack and check out the Keep blog.



Doug from Livepeer

Livepeer is a decentralized video infrastructure network, dramatically reducing prices for developers and businesses building video streaming applications at scale.

David from Sia

Sia is a decentralized cloud storage platform leveraging blockchain technology to create a data storage marketplace that is more robust and more affordable than traditional cloud storage providers.