Interview with Arweave Core Contributor and everVision CEO: Discussing the Future Roles of Ethereum, Bitcoin, and Arweave
The data that needs permanent storage is essentially any information that requires consensus.
TechFlow: Sunny, Bella & Zolo
everVision: outprog.ar, CEO
"We can consider that Arweave + AO has truly realized a universal computer, which contrasts with Ethereum's limitation of only being able to perform on-chain calculations through EVM."
— outprog.ar, everVision CEO
“The view from nowhere"
This feeling is especially profound after talking with Wei Xiong (@outprog_ar).
The meetups of Web3 builders always dazzle, leaving one feeling as though time is slipping away after attending numerous conferences. Although new friends are made and surrounded by fresh concepts and technologies at various conventions and hackathons, it's challenging to draw constructive conclusions based solely on personal experience. Questions linger about the overall structure of the blockchain industry, and Web3 seems indistinguishable across different public blockchain networks. It appears as if every blockchain is in a homogenized competition, doing the same things.
The recent Ethereum Dencun upgrade has been a hot topic, prompting discussions around "How different is Ethereum from other public blockchains after the Dencun upgrade?" Yet, very few might offer answers close to the truth or the fact.
In the overly-labeled CT (crypto Twitter), there seems to be an illusion: the Bitcoin network can also establish Web3, Ethereum can do it all—from DeFi, AI, social media, Depin, to various applications effortlessly, Near is the abstract layer for all chains, and Doge can also build web "cities” on top of its infrastructure. Often, readers lacking critical thinking skills (including the author) might feel overwhelmed by the plethora of information, leading to immersion in the CT atmosphere without understanding what's happening.
Wei Xiong, an early contributor to Arweave, introduced many concepts within the network, including the "Storage-Based Consensus Paradigm" (SCP theory), based on critical thinking after contemplating the differences between various blockchains.
"We believe, from the perspective of Bitcoin's UTXO model, data must reflect its sequential relationship.
In contrast, Ethereum maintains a global state ledger, allowing us to know the current state of the ledger even without historical records.
In emphasizing decentralization, Arweave focuses more on the process than the outcome itself.
The data that needs permanent storage is essentially any information that requires consensus."
Arweave is a permanent storage platform based on blockchain technology. Perhaps, after reading Xiong's explanation of the differences between Ethereum, Bitcoin, and Arweave, you will have a clearer understanding of the industry. You might better grasp the distinctions in the underlying technology of each network, facilitating the browsing and discernment of information in CT.
everVision, inspired by the technological enlightenment brought by Arweave, will be detailed in the interview's conclusion, including an explanation and introduction of its core products.
Hopefully, after reading, you will have a more critical understanding of the industry we are in.
Below is the conversation between TechFlow and Mr. Wei Xiong (outprog.ar). The content of the conversation has been refined and grammatically improved by GPT, and may slightly differ from the original version.
Joining Arweave and founding everVision: "I realized that the complex systems and work I had been doing in banking could be resolved with just 200 lines of code in Bitcoin or Ethereum."
TechFlow: First, I'd like to learn about your background. Why did you choose to focus on the Arweave community initially instead of other blockchains? Also, as the CEO of everVision, I'm eager to hear about your journey from participating in the Arweave community to founding your own Web3 company.
outprog:
I originally worked in traditional banking for five years, living a very stable life in Tianjin, China. However, around 2017, I discovered blockchain technology, which had a profound impact on me.
I realized that the complex systems and tasks I dealt with in banking could be solved with just 200 lines of code in Bitcoin or Ethereum.
Therefore, I decided to dedicate myself to the blockchain industry, applying to blockchain companies across the country, and eventually joined one, moving to Hangzhou with my family.
My transition was motivated by the innovative opportunities in blockchain as an emerging industry. I joined imToken, where I began to deeply study and research DeFi, possibly being among the first to write articles on Uniswap and Compound. I was so excited about Uniswap's launch that I immediately wrote about its mechanisms. Many people approached me for discussions about startup ideas and developing DeFi applications.
Over time, I became increasingly aware of the industry's pain points, especially how difficult it was for average users to navigate this field. Thus, I moved from imToken to Arweave, hoping to address these issues by shifting to a different technological paradigm.
My ultimate goal is to make blockchain accessible to everyone, decentralizing the organization of production and consumption relationships.
Another motivation for starting a business came during DeFi Summer, when financial pressures were relatively low. My partner, Jie (nicknamed Xiao Jie), and I began our project, excited about the Arweave model. We coded together and created everPay. Initially, we hadn't planned on fundraising, but after releasing our product and publishing articles on chain news, we caught the attention of investors like IOSG, which made us consider the possibility of fundraising. This encouraged us to commit to long-term development and delve deeper into the Arweave ecosystem.
During my three years at imToken, I noticed many users struggled with blockchain usability.
One major barrier was the management of mnemonic phrases and keys, with many users losing them and being unable to recover their assets.
Another obstacle was Ethereum's high fees, where users could end up paying $5 in fees to swap $10 worth of assets on our DEX product, a situation many found confusing and unacceptable. Hence, my experience at a blockchain wallet company made it clear these issues were far from user-friendly for the average person.
In July 2020, during DeFi Summer, I was introduced to Arweave through a friend and met Zeng Mi and Miao Shu at Hangzhou's SparkPool, who were senior employees and early members of the Etherfans community. Through them, I became interested in the Arweave project. As a storage blockchain, Arweave's storage costs were not high compared to Ethereum.
Thus, we began considering using Arweave as a storage device for computer hard drives or future applications.
Our computations didn't necessarily need to be on-chain; they could be off-chain. However, because Arweave's disk is immutable and traceable, even off-chain computations could achieve a form of consensus and verifiability.
From this perspective, we believed that if there were storage-based blockchains like Arweave, the future application experience could closely resemble that of Web2.
Since July 2020, I have been deeply studying Arweave and exploring whether we could develop products on it to lower the barrier for users. Our product, everPay, aimed to solve complex wallet operations and achieve 0 gas fees using Arweave. We also hoped to eliminate the need for mnemonics in the future, allowing users to operate with Web2 standard keys like FIDO. Our core goal was to make blockchain easily accessible to the average user.
everPay can be understood as a service similar to Alipay but offers an experience close to Alipay, with all ledger records stored on Arweave in a decentralized manner. While this form of Alipay is somewhat centralized, the public ledger allows everyone to verify the records, which is sufficient for users.
Over the past year, I proposed a theory called SCP (Storage-based Consensus Paradigm).
The core idea of this theory is that as long as storage is immutable and traceable, the computations performed on it are trustworthy and decentralized.
In October 2020, I left imToken and founded everVision in November. Since then, we have been committed to developing the payment network product everPay based on Arweave.
Arweave to AO: The OG of Modular Blockchain
TechFlow: When you mentioned that Arweave's decentralization was not complete, were you referring to the process of off-chain computations not being transparent and widely known?
outprog:
Actually, the reason we couldn't achieve complete decentralization at the time was due to our roll-up mechanism, namely the Sequencer. In everPay, the Sequencer was actually unique, meaning all transactions had to go through our gateway before being uploaded to Arweave. This was the reason for the incomplete decentralization at the time.
Of course, this issue has now been resolved by Arweave AO.
TechFlow: Can you introduce AO to us?
outprog:
After I proposed SCP (Storage Consensus Paradigm), in fact, all applications on Arweave adopted this model for development. Whether developing smart contracts, network hard drives, or building gateways to provide storage services, everyone provided computing resources off-chain and used Arweave merely as a network hard drive. During these two years of development, many applications based on SCP were born.
However, one challenge we faced was that communication between applications was very difficult, especially when we wanted different applications to achieve interoperability, making communication particularly challenging. I would also like to add that SCP, similar to Ordinals, actually appeared earlier than Bitcoin inscriptions. The difference between them is that we write data into Arweave, while inscriptions are written into Bitcoin. Whether for inscriptions or SCP applications, communication between them is very difficult. To verify the data of another node, I need to run all the data of the entire node to achieve interoperability and communication.
The original intention of AO was actually to solve the problem of communication between applications.
Last July, in Berlin, Germany, as developers of SCP applications, representatives of WARP and I discussed with Sam (Arweave Founder) how to solve the trust issue between our two applications. At that time, we designed a message protocol, which can be seen as the precursor to the AO system. This system aims to solve the communication problem.
By the end of last year, Sam conducted a brand new design, creating the current AO system, and completed its implementation in recent months. We found that AO could not only solve the communication problem between SCP applications but also that it is a global, hybrid, super parallel computer. Our original SCP applications, like our everPay and WARP, will be transformed into a thread or process within this supercomputer, enabling us to achieve mutual communication and trusted computation within this system.
Additionally, although AO was initially designed to solve the communication issue, in reality, it can establish a completely decentralized distributed computing network. In this network, whether users, robots, or other programs, all can request computations from other threads, as if multiple computing units are providing computational power for the program.
Therefore, we can consider that AO has truly realized a universal computer, contrasting with Ethereum's limitation of only being able to perform on-chain calculations through EVM.
Under the AO system, all computing resources are decentralized and global. We can outsource computing tasks to any computing unit or subset of computing units.
The method of data storage determines the future division of labor among Arweave, Bitcoin, and Ethereum in Web3.
TechFlow: From such an explanation, it's clear that Arweave, along with AO, opens up new possibilities for distributed computing, allowing not only for data storage but also for computation. You also mentioned a comparison with Ethereum earlier. I'm curious, on a technical level, what exactly is the difference between Arweave combined with AO and Ethereum?
outprog:
First and foremost, the main difference lies in Ethereum's integration of disk (hard drive) and computation, meaning Ethereum's Virtual Machine (EVM) encompasses both the computing unit (CPU) and storage. Of course, recent upgrades by ConsenSys may have made some cuts to the storage part, but that's a separate topic.
As for Arweave and AO, they were designed to be separate from the outset. From the beginning, Sam did not consider any computational functionality when designing Arweave.
Our goal was solely to create a completely decentralized, global storage hard drive.
AO, on the other hand, is a new system that gradually evolved under the influence of SCP, and the functions of the two systems are completely separate. AO hardly involves any permanent storage or block storage management, and Arweave does not handle any computation tasks.
If described using widely known terminology within the blockchain industry, this model is actually a form of modular blockchain.
Although the concept of modular blockchain might have originated from the Ethereum ecosystem, Arweave did not directly propose modular blockchain. However, starting from the architecture of SCP, our design can be seen as the ultimate form of modular blockchain.
TechFlow: So, what you're implying is that as Ethereum completes its Dencun Upgrade and the sharding of "Ethereum 2.0", it will increasingly move towards the separation of storage and computation. Consequently, its state will gradually become more similar to Arweave, correct?
outprog:
When studying Ethereum in 2020, we noted that Ethereum planned to implement a version 2.0 with 64 shards and a beacon chain, a model that, if developed further, would have a structure somewhat similar to Arweave's model.
However, based on the latest developments, especially considering Ethereum's Danksharding upgrade, it will actually eliminate some historical data.
Therefore, Ethereum might not retain permanent data storage in the future. Looking at this upgrade, Ethereum, along with Arweave, and even Bitcoin, will take completely different paths.
TechFlow: I find your point about Ethereum possibly not retaining data permanently in the future very interesting. As a member of the Arweave development community, how do you view the concept of permanent data storage? Specifically, what kind of data needs to be stored permanently?
outprog:
We believe that, from the perspective of Bitcoin's UTXO model, data must reflect its sequential relationship.
In contrast, Ethereum maintains a global state ledger, allowing us to know the current state of the ledger even without historical records.
In emphasizing decentralization, Arweave focuses more on the process than the outcome itself.
The content that needs permanent storage is essentially any information that requires consensus. For example, if we develop a decentralized social application, the content users post on the application, or whether those contents can become tradable assets in the future, needs to be permanently saved, as they involve transaction and consensus requirements.
On Ethereum, some content may eventually be lost because Ethereum primarily records the ledger's most recent state.
So, for applications like decentralized finance (DeFi), discarding some data might be feasible because the focus is mainly on the current settlement state.
However, for social, gaming, and other decentralized applications, retaining historical data becomes crucial, as this data may hold value in the future.
By using the Arweave plus AO model, we can make every sentence or every data point tradable.
Similarly, in the field of artificial intelligence, the raw data used to train AI models and the completed work should be permanently preserved so that revenue sharing can be achieved in the future. Without these records, profit sharing is not possible; no records mean that only platforms like TikTok, Facebook, Twitter can benefit. They control the collection of user data and the value generated from it.
To directly benefit users from the value, users must have proof of ownership at the data generation end, which requires consensus and permanent data storage.
TechFlow: In your view, at the application level, Ethereum might primarily serve the DeFi sector, while Arweave supports a broader range of applications, such as AI and social media. As for Bitcoin, with its increasing use for inscription data storage, do you think Bitcoin will surpass its role as a pure store of value?
outprog:
Ordinals are primarily a phenomenon within the Chinese community. In fact, they're not as popular in the West, which is the first point. The second point about inscriptions is that storage on Bitcoin itself is very, very expensive, so it's actually quite difficult to store processes. I think the Bitcoin inscription trend might just be a temporary hype.
And the second thing is that Bitcoin itself doesn't need any functionalities; it's just like gold.
Gold has almost no industrial use except as jewelry. So, the value of Bitcoin is definitely the highest, and it has the strongest consensus. I don't think inscriptions will necessarily bring anything to Bitcoin, but they might attract some attention or create some bubbles with the large consensus around Bitcoin.
TechFlow: Indeed, storing 1 GB of data on Ethereum might cost around 30 million USD, and the cost to store the same amount of data on Bitcoin would be even higher. You previously mentioned on Twitter that Arweave has the potential to be an "Ethereum killer." Our discussion suggests that the division of labor among these three systems could differ: Bitcoin might become the anchor in the digital currency domain, Arweave could become the anchor at the application layer, and Ethereum might serve as the anchor in the future financial domain. If we discuss the notion of a "killer" or competitive relationships, it seems you have a particularly compelling argument.
outprog:
In fact, my statement on Twitter wasn't meant to suggest that Arweave is an "Ethereum killer." What I was referring to is that Ethereum's ultimate form in the computing realm might resemble Arweave's initial design for sharding. The discussion about an "Ethereum killer" actually stemmed from a community event discussion.
Therefore, there's a distinction between the two: my public discussion focused on Ethereum's future development in computing, which is based on technical considerations.
I very much agree with the division of labor among these three platforms, and I believe that Ethereum is undoubtedly the strongest in terms of verifiability and financial applications, especially DeFi. Meanwhile, Arweave is more suited for handling applications like social media and decentralized gaming.
Thus, the talk of a "killer" is more of a label created by the community for promotional purposes, aimed at attracting attention, and not the focal point of my emphasis.
Leveraging Arweave's Evolution with the Storage Consensus Paradigm: Turing Machine, Von Neumann Architecture, and Ethereum Virtual Machine
TechFlow: Let's move away from the overly labeled topics by the media and return to the discussion on SCP (Storage Consensus Paradigm). Given that you are the founder of the SCP concept, could you elaborate more on this concept? I have a deep interest in the background when you proposed this idea, including your personal thoughts, considerations from a humanistic perspective, and technically, what exactly SCP is?
outprog: It might lean a bit towards the technical side. As a graduate of computer science, we all learned the first lesson of computers, which includes the concept of the Turing machine.
The Turing machine is a fundamental computing model that essentially consists of an infinitely long tape and a state machine. The state machine marks the tape, with each mark representing a 0 or 1. As long as the state machine keeps marking, this simple system can perform any computation.
When I learned about Arweave, I immediately thought of the Turing machine and the concept of computation. If we liken the tape of the Turing machine to Arweave, it implies that our state machine and the computer itself are trustworthy, because every mark recorded on the blockchain is formed through consensus and is immutable.
This model takes us back to the simple principles of the Turing machine from the current more complex computer models, such as the EVM or the computers we use daily that are based on the Von Neumann architecture. The Von Neumann architecture, by adding monitors, input/output devices, hard drives, memory, and CPUs, made computers more suitable for engineering, eventually forming the computer structure we use today.
But at their core, they all rely on the basic combination of tape and state machine.
Therefore, after learning about Arweave, I believed that our blockchain computations don't actually need to depend on the Von Neumann architecture or EVM structure. We only need to view it as a storage unit, while the computing unit could be located on each person's handheld device or personal computer.
In July 2020, when I first learned about Arweave, we envisioned a future: computing devices will merely become computing terminals, all programs might be downloaded from Arweave or other blockchains. All the messages and communications we send will go through storage-type blockchains like Arweave.
Eventually, Arweave will become a global hard drive, and each of our devices, whether it's my Mac or your computer, will become computing terminals for data on this hard drive. This model is very similar to the Turing machine, where all devices only need to read and write data to the blockchain.
In this way, all devices can achieve trustlessness and decentralization, as the storage hard drive itself is decentralized.
In what situations does it make sense to combine AI and blockchain?
TechFlow: Currently, we've seen some AI projects within the Ethereum ecosystem that are compatible with EVM and dedicated to the decentralized allocation of computing resources. How do you view these projects' attempts to decentralize the allocation and coordination of computing resources for AI projects within the Ethereum ecosystem?
outprog:
Firstly, based on our own investment fund experience, we observed a surge of AI projects when OpenAI first appeared, but we didn't invest in any of them. Subsequently, we noticed that the founders of these projects actually shifted their focus to other matters.
This is a matter of experience: we found that many projects focusing on Web3 and AI were actually trying to leverage the hype around AI and cryptocurrencies to promote themselves, hoping to create some hype or build an ecosystem. However, many such visions are actually difficult to realize.
Regarding the AI projects within the Ethereum ecosystem that you mentioned, especially those claiming to be compatible with Ethereum and dedicated to the decentralized allocation of computing resources, and their efforts to optimize the distribution and coordination of computing resources within the Ethereum ecosystem, my view is that most investors, including rational and well-known investors, might be skeptical of such a combination.
Investors like Xiaohu Zhu may have also made some comments on this. From my personal perspective as a technical professional, these are mainly conceptual things that cannot truly be implemented, and there's no necessity to combine AI with cryptocurrencies.
TechFlow: Do you have any methods for assessing successful cases of integration between the field of artificial intelligence and blockchain?
outprog:
I believe that for the application of AI in decentralized areas, the decentralization of the entire industry chain is essential. This includes the whole process from data generation to data consumption.
Currently, many AI projects might use Ethereum or other EVM-compatible blockchains to handle data generation and training distribution, such as allowing 100 or 1000 users to join in on data training and recording some processes on Ethereum. However, these projects often overlook the data consumption aspect, where users cannot consume AI services through Ethereum because the cost of on-chain consumption payments is too high.
This results in a disconnect between production and consumption. Even if consensus data is produced, consumers cannot consume this data in smart contracts, thus failing to realize the value circulation in the upstream and downstream of the industry chain. I see this as a significant challenge. However, if we switch to Arweave or an off-chain computing model, or utilize a permanent storage hard drive, everyone's work and training, including algorithms, can form a consensus on this hard drive. Consumers could directly call these computing units to obtain computation results or AI outputs, thereby achieving seamless integration of the entire industry chain.
Therefore, I believe that to realize such a model, it's not only necessary to move computation off-chain but also to rely on storage like Arweave as the infrastructure for consensus. The correctness and quality of the data AI relies on are crucial, and these high-value data need to be permanently preserved.
Only by starting from the data layer to finally allowing the consumption side to participate can a complete closed-loop be formed.
TechFlow: For those not very familiar with technology, what exactly is the difference between on-chain computation and off-chain computation on the blockchain?
outprog:
For those unfamiliar with blockchain, they might not understand what on-chain computation is. In fact, computation itself does not distinguish between on-chain and off-chain.
The concept of on-chain computation is primarily introduced by Ethereum or similar models. However, when we move beyond this concept, especially in the context of Arweave or applications for Web 2.0, everyone is a distributor of computing units, and there is no distinction between on-chain and off-chain.
In essence, the operation of nodes always requires an off-chain or real-life physical device to perform computations. Simply put, a truly decentralized server does not exist because all Ethereum nodes are actually running on Amazon Web Services (AWS), and miners still rely on centralized resources.
This decentralization is actually an abstract concept, rather than a physical entity. Therefore, we can't say there are decentralized servers, only decentralized Ethereum and decentralized storage. Decentralized servers, in fact, do not exist. I hope this clearly explains my point.
Indeed, we can talk about decentralized ledger technology, but just like Bitcoin nodes, it doesn't mean there are physically decentralized Bitcoin nodes. Node operations still depend on centralized infrastructure.
Arweave, Filecoin, and attracting users and developers
TechFlow: Regarding Arweave, given its goal to become a global storage hard drive, it might be more appropriate to refer to it not just as a decentralized storage hard drive but as a global storage solution. So, what sets it apart from Filecoin?
outprog:
Filecoin aims to replace traditional AWS or cloud storage services by creating a decentralized market using blockchain technology, similar to an order book, which allows users to trade data storage resources in a decentralized manner. In contrast, Arweave's approach to storage is akin to Bitcoin's philosophy, offering an immutable, undeletable decentralized data storage service. This is the primary difference between them.
Many AI projects, especially those within the Ethereum ecosystem, may utilize Ethereum, EVM, or other blockchain technologies for distributed data production and training. However, these projects often overlook the data consumption aspect due to the high costs associated with consuming data through Ethereum.
In discussions about decentralized social applications, many existing applications on Ethereum are not entirely based on-chain. They may rely on other Layer 2 technologies for support. For example, all data for the Lens protocol is stored on Arweave, allowing many social applications' data to be permanently stored over the past few years.
Ultimately, the full-stack technology solution provided by Arweave and AO enables developers to quickly develop and deploy applications in a decentralized, cost-effective environment. This is highly attractive to developers, and in comparison, developing the same applications on Ethereum could require significant funding and time. We believe that the future will see an explosion of such applications on AO.
TechFlow: Although I am not very familiar with the technical details, from an external perspective, this field seems to be somewhat politicized, requiring a wise choice of stance to attract a sufficiently large ecosystem and enough users. In this regard, how can we empower developers to attract more users?
outprog:
From two perspectives, the external observation of the blockchain ecosystem suggests that it is unlikely for capital to massively purchase Ethereum solely for value storage. Although Ethereum has a large number of developers and users, they are not enough to attract those with capital or so-called "old money" for large-scale investment.
Secondly, for developers, transitioning from Ethereum to the AO ecosystem at this stage may also be quite challenging, as Ethereum has already formed a huge developer community. Over the past few years, we have encountered similar difficulties in promoting SCP and off-chain computing models.
However, some core changes are now occurring, such as Arweave's founder Sam advocating for the importance of the computational layer. Arweave should elevate its position in the supply chain, not just as a storage layer, but also by providing computational functionality. Only when the story of the supply chain is reset or restructured can it attract developers to join.
There are two reasons why developers might join: first, because there is a lot of capital support and ecological support behind the ecosystem, and everyone can see the traffic here. Second, some developers really want to develop applications and find that developing on Ethereum, EVM, or Solana still cannot meet their needs, so they may naturally flow to the Arweave ecosystem.
Returning to AI, if Sam himself recognizes the importance of the computational layer and begins to promote it, corresponding capital may also join the collaboration. If this point was not emphasized before, capital may only see Arweave as a storage solution, limiting the scope of its story. It is possible that capital will be able to enter the Arweave ecosystem more effectively in the future, thereby helping developers.
The second point is almost indisputable. Just as developers cannot return to developing smart contracts on Bitcoin on Ethereum, although developers can use Lua or other languages to write smart contracts on Arweave, they will not return to a platform that cannot meet their needs for social applications or games to develop contracts.
everVision: Building Web3 Stripe = everPay and Arweave #1 DEX = PermaSwap
TechFlow: Turning back to your own project, everVision, you mentioned two products: everPay and PermaSwap. You previously described everPay as a service similar to Web3 version of Alipay. Could you please elaborate on the relationship between everPay and Arweave and AO? What are its advantages compared to other payment protocols? What are the specific technological advantages of everPay built on Arweave AO?
outprog:
Indeed, the original intention of everPay is to provide a fundamental payment functionality, which is crucial everywhere. Without the ability to make payments, value exchange cannot be realized. However, conducting payments on platforms like Ethereum or Bitcoin is very costly and has high barriers to entry. Therefore, one of the primary motivations behind creating everPay is to lower the barriers to payment.
Compared to other platforms such as Ethereum, Solana, or BNB Chain, which are extensions based on Ethereum or on-chain computation models, their costs cannot be reduced to the level of our pure algorithm separation model. On everPay, the actual cost of a payment can be reduced to 0.00004 or 0.00005 USD, and this is further decreasing. Although the fees of some second-layer solutions have already been reduced to 0.1 or 0.2 USD, which is quite low, they are still not in the same order of magnitude as applications based on the SCP paradigm. This is precisely where the advantage of the Storage Consensus Paradigm (SCP) lies.
Our core goal, in fact, is because AO itself is like a brand-new supply chain, and we hope PermaSwap can occupy the position of a top Dex in our ecosystem. You can think of PermaSwap as PancakeSwap on Binance Smart Chain or Uniswap on Ethereum, or the largest Dex on other major blockchains. That is our positioning and expectation for PermaSwap.
TechFlow: At present, in the realm of Web3, there are indeed both numerous and relatively few competitors for platforms like everPay, which aims to be the Web3 version of Stripe. So, what unique features does everPay possess that set it apart from its competitors?
outprog:
Firstly, everPay introduces a unique feature known as abstract accounts based on the FIDO standard. Users can easily create a fully decentralized account by using their smartphones along with their email addresses for identity verification. The keys to this account are entirely controlled by the users themselves. This significantly lowers the barrier for users, as they no longer need to manage private keys or remember mnemonic phrases; they simply need to possess their devices.
This feature represents a significant innovation in the Web3 environment because current Web3 platforms often rely on MetaMask and other wallets, which pose challenges for users in managing keys. This is a core advantage of everPay.
Secondly, everPay introduces various basic protocols and payment primitives in the payment realm. For instance, we have implemented bundled transactions, allowing for multiple-to-multiple payment operations in one go. These operations are atomic, meaning that if any transaction within the bundle fails, the entire transaction will fail. In the future, everPay will further expand into more payment scenarios, potentially including payment methods similar to PayPal or features like automatic deductions, all of which will be gradually realized.
Other Questions: RWA and User Engagement
TechFlow: Given that you are building a Web 3.0 version of Stripe, I am curious about your perspective on the future applications of Real World Asset (RWA) tokenization. What are your expectations for 2024? In fact, the concept of RWA tokenization may have been initially popularized by USDC, which introduced the idea by attaching smart contracts to the US dollar. Now, we can see more and more such applications emerging.
However, in the past, attempting to tokenize assets like real estate might have been premature. Nevertheless, this year seems to have seen many projects related to RWA tokenization. As everPay, you may serve many such merchants. What are your predictions for the development in this field this year and in the future?
outprog:
I'm actually not particularly optimistic about the field of Real World Asset (RWA) tokenization. My concerns mainly stem from the challenges of compliance. Although all current technologies can address payment issues, the impact of cryptocurrencies on the traditional world is too significant. Once we can tokenize real-world assets, or simply digitize national currencies or certain assets, it means that these digital assets can be quickly converted into Bitcoin, Ethereum, or other stablecoins. In this case, why would I still hold a centralized RWA with endorsement? This approach seems to somewhat encourage people to engage in cryptocurrency trading.
Therefore, I believe compliance will be a huge obstacle, as it has not yet reached a mature stage. Any attempt to implement RWA projects may turn into a channel for capital outflows. If a country's sovereign currency is not strong enough or faces risks, users may choose to channel funds through this channel. Therefore, the road ahead for RWA development is still long, and handling it is not easy.
TechFlow: As a common user, how to participate in the development of AO?
outprog:
Participation has become quite easy, especially for developers. For example, developers can develop an app similar to Discord in just three days, which is a very simple task. These products created by developers can now be used through existing Arweave wallets, and we are also accelerating the adaptation of everID to AO, so users no longer need another wallet. Users can directly access applications on AO using their phones.
Therefore, the methods of participation are as described above. At this stage, given that AO has only been running for 3 weeks and applications are still in the early stages, we may need to wait for another month or two. In fact, in one or two months, users will be able to start testing or using these applications, which should be a relatively quick process.
Final thoughts: Advice for young people
TechFlow: For young people entering the blockchain industry directly, it may actually be difficult for them to understand the pain points of traditional industries. Can you explain what exactly banking can be frustrating for people?
outprog:
For young people entering the blockchain industry today, they may find it challenging to understand the pain points of traditional industries. In banking or traditional sectors, all accounts are recorded independently, and to reach consensus on these accounts, there are consensus mechanisms in place within traditional industries, but these are achieved through complex systems such as laws, accounting, and auditing.
When banks need to report to financial regulators or supervisory authorities, this process is intended to reach consensus. However, this process is very difficult because data may be manipulated or embellished at every level, from branches to regional offices, when reporting data. This results in national data showing a 5% increase in GDP, for example, while the actual situation may be far from that. The entire system is trying to address issues of data manipulation and, at its worst, even fraud.
This situation is one of the backgrounds for the emergence of Bitcoin. If these underlying processes are transitioned to blockchain, we can imagine that traditional government agencies and financial systems can be rebuilt, primarily reducing contract risks.
Taking Ethereum as an example, although its TPS (transactions per second) is low, its transaction volume may surpass that of many national exchanges because it eliminates counterparty risk, and all transactions are automatically executed through smart contracts. The biggest difference between developed and underdeveloped countries in financial activities may lie in the spirit of contracts. If people default at will, financial activities cannot proceed. Blockchain solves the contract problem through smart contracts, ensuring that people must abide by the contract rules even without the spirit of contracts, without the need for court rulings, greatly improving the efficiency of financial circulation. Therefore, the key is not performance but how to address default and contract issues, which is the real focus of blockchain.
TechFlow: After listening to your insights, I believe that becoming a successful founder indeed requires holding firm convictions. Given the favorable market conditions this year, it may attract many newcomers to this industry. For these young people or developers who have just entered the blockchain field, do you have any advice for them, especially for young people?
outprog:
My advice is that for young people who are just entering this field, you will not go through the experiences typical of traditional industries. In fact, there's no need to force it, because you are growing up in this emerging digital world, as digital natives. Sometimes, when talking to young people, they may think that banks or other traditional institutions can naturally achieve consensus like in the blockchain world, but the actual mechanisms behind it are very complex. I believe that young people should maintain a professional attitude when interacting with the traditional world, and not simply assume that everything is as simple as trust in the blockchain world, because there are many complex issues and pitfalls there. You may not need to delve deeply into those traditional ways of working, as the patterns have completely changed, which means you may no longer need to learn those traditional knowledge.
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