Consensus

Blockchain-Backed Social Media Brings More Choice for Users

As people continue to rethink topics like technology development, economic measures and freedom of speech because of the COVID-19 pandemic, blockchain has now emerged as a solution for many issues. Iva Wisher, co-founder of Ignite, a decentralized microblogging platform, said blockchain may also be a solution against state-sponsored censorship in today’s pandemic-related new normal. During an interview with Cointelegraph, Wisher clarified that in general, freedom of speech means a “possibility to express any opinion, even an unpopular one, unless this opinion is not a call to violence.”The blockchain technology then could

RenVM Guide: A Private and Interopable DeFi Platform

With the objective of solving concerns on privacy, interoperability, and liquidity in decentralized applications, the RenVM ecosystem was established. This is yet another successful DeFi project with cross-chain interoperability, only this time, with better privacy features. The Republic Protocol and its RenVM project were aimed to provide large volume and high-frequency traders the opportunity to execute trades without spooking the market with their calls. With the help of darknodes, they maintained an exchange with a hidden order book. Table of Contents Background Ren began in late 2017 under the Republic

VeChain & Oxford Announce New Framework to Assess Consensus Protocols

Since 2018, VeChain has partnered with the Mathematical Institute at Oxford University to carry out research and provide independent scientific advice. As of August 11, it appears this collaboration is beginning to pay dividends. Yesterday, the VeChain Foundation tweeted, “with the purpose of supporting the #blockchain industry, #VeChain and the University of Oxford releases AlphaBlock – our joint research paper on blockchain consensus”. Source: Oxford University In a blog post, VeChain went on to detail the need for its proposed AlfaBlock framework, “considering the pivotal role of consensus protocols in

Why Chinese Miners Won’t Stage a 51% Attack on Bitcoin

China accounts for more than half of the world’s Bitcoin mining capacity but Jameson Lopp, the co-founder and CTO of Casa, has hosed down fears that Chinese miners are a threat to Bitcoin in a blog post on Aug. 9.Although many people have raised concerns over the concentration of such much hashpower being located in China, Loop pointed out that even in the event of a 51% attack on Bitcoin, attackers are limited in what they can actually do. He explained that attackers can't steal people's Bitcoin arbitrarily, nor change the consensus

Building on Taproot: Payment Pools Could Be Bitcoin’s Next Layer Two Protocol

This article is about a technological concept based on the proposed Taproot protocol upgrade. If you’re not yet familiar with the basics of how Taproot works, it’s recommended that you first read this explainer.Taproot, a potential upgrade to the Bitcoin protocol first proposed by Bitcoin Core contributor Gregory Maxwell, is in its late stages of development. The technology consists of a clever combination of crypto-tricks that would let users hide complex smart contracts inside regular-looking transactions — the complexity is only ever revealed if parties to a contract are uncooperative.Leveraging

Ethereum 2.0 Testnet Performing Well, 1 Million ‘ETH’ Staked

It’s been almost a week since the launch of the ETH 2.0 final public testnet, which has been performing as intended by most accounts. As many as one million ETH have been staked on the Beacon Chain simulation, reviving hopes of a mainnet launch later this year. The Medalla ETH 2.0 testnet has been running for six days which has given developers a chance to monitor early progress. Launched on Aug 4, Medalla is the fifth and final testnet for the long-awaited upgrade to an Ethereum proof-of-stake consensus. Phase 0

What is Wrapped Bitcoin? A Guide to WBTC

WBTC is a way for Bitcoin to run on the Ethereum blockchain. Performing quick and affordable transactions using Bitcoin (BTC) has long been a problem of the community ever since it became more popular. This is why there have been many developments planning to address this issue.  But what if we can make our BTC coins functional on the Ethereum (ETH) blockchain? Would there be a difference? Wrapped BTC (WBTC) is a multi-institution project that aims to solve common BTC problems by creating its ERC-20 token counterpart. And in the

Celebrating The History And Spirit Of Bitcoin Independence Day

This article originally appeared in our Weekly Bits newsletter. If you want our news and analysis before anyone else, make sure you subscribe now! In my view, Bitcoin Independence Day is a holiday that says a lot about the BTC community. Its origins are highly technical and difficult to understand, the “independence” it celebrates refers to the developer community overcoming interests from industrialized miners and, ultimately, it’s a chance for Bitcoiners to reflect on the young history of the technology and engage in debate. To celebrate, Bitcoin Magazine hosted a day

What is Serum? A DeFi Derivatives DEX Guide

DeFi-based exchanges have seen wild success in 2020 thanks to yield farming, which has incentivized hundreds of thousands of users to provide liquidity to these platforms. With that being said, DEXs are still a far-cry from centralized exchanges in both UI and UX. Serum is here to change all that. Serum is a protocol that claims to be “pure DeFi” as they have managed to address a lot of issues the space is facing. Most of the users in DeFi today are not traders but yield farmers. Yield farmers are

South Korea’s ICON Reveals new Consensus Algorithm

ICON, the largest public blockchain network of South Korea, has recently announced its new consensus algorithm. On the 8th of April 2020, ICON revealed the Loop Fault Tolerance 2.0, or LFT 2.0, consensus algorithm.A New Innovation For Korea’s Blockchain SpaceIt’s claimed that this new algorithm is capable of improving the network bandwidth and overall scalability of the ever-popular Practical Byzantine Fault Tolerance consensus types, or PBFT. According to ICON, this algorithm can achieve this without compromising the security through doing so.The white paper for LFT 2.0 was published today, having

Interchain Data Hosting Project Combines Edge Computing With DLT

Interchain decentralized data hosting project Bluzelle (BLZ) announced the launch of its mainnet which aims to combine the advantages of edge computing with distributed ledger technology (DLT).According to an announcement shared with Cointelegraph on April 9, Bluezelle will host a network stress test dubbed “Swarm of Duty” which will be incentivized with $30,000 worth of tokens for developers, token holders and validators. The company says that this test is “the last step before Bluzelle’s mainnet launches” and is meant to ensure that the network can manage real-world usage.Bluzelle’s team claims that