Weekly Rollup #4

For the week ending March 3rd

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šŸ“£ News and Announcements

Scroll Alpha Testnet Launch

While most of the recent zkEVM talk has been centered around Polygon & zkSync over the past couple of months, thereā€™s been one project quietly building its own zkEVM, Scroll.Ā Ā 

Last Monday, Scroll announced the launch of their zkEVM Alpha testnet on Goerli. This essentially means that any user can add the Scroll zkEVM network to their wallet and start playing around with some of the dapps that have already been deployed.

To recap, a zkEVM adds zero-knowledge cryptography to the Ethereum virtual machine. While ZK tech is mainly used for scaling purposes (viewed as the holy grail for Ethereum scaling), it also allows for privacy capabilities. Privacy is not only important for us individual users, but for businesses that want to keep their company data private.

Today, StarkWare is probably the team best known for its use of ZK technology, as theyā€™ve had a working zkVM for some time now (see StarkEx & StarkNet). However, StarkWare doesnā€™t use the EVM, but rather its own architecture (CairoVM & Cairo programming language), which in turn leads to its own set of tools.

Adding ZK tech to the EVM lets developers add scalability to their dapps, translating to high speeds and low fees for us users, while being able to utilize the Solidity programming language and existing tools like Metamask. This means existing Solidity-based dapps will be able to easily port their code to Scroll.

zkEVMs were expected to be years away. However, we now have three different projects expected to release a permissionless version of their zkEVM on mainnet this year (Scroll, Polygon & zkSync).

For anyone interested in playing around with Scrollā€™s testnet, simply:

  • Add the Goerli testnet network to your wallet

  • Request testnet ETH from a faucet

  • Add the Scroll zkEVM network to your wallet (make sure itā€™s the correct one!)

  • Head over to Scrollā€™s bridge interface and bridge your testnet ETH from Goerli to the Scroll networkĀ 

  • & thatā€™s it, you can start playing around with some of the dapps currently running on the zkEVM testnet, like Uniswap or Tic-Tac-Toe!

For a complete breakdown of how to onboard to the Scroll network, check out this guide - shoutout to @Gaurangtorvekar for the amazing guides!

This is Scrollā€™s last big milestone before they reach full mainnet launch. Congrats to the entire Scroll team!

ERC-4337

One of the biggest headlines to come out of ETHDenver this past week was the launch of ERC-4337, which means we're a step closer to account abstraction.

Not to get confused with EIPs, which are hard forked into the actual protocol, ERCs are smart contracts that hold standards by which developers follow. The biggest example of an ERC is ERC-20 tokens, which set the standard for how fungible tokens are created on Ethereum.

As mentioned, ERC-4337 introduces Account Abstraction, which ā€œallows users to use smart contract wallets containing arbitrary verification logic instead of EOAs as their primary accountā€. In short, this means we can start adding logic to our individual wallet accounts (2FA, FaceID, etc.).

There are two Account types on Ethereum, Externally Owned Accounts (EOAs), and Contract Accounts. Today, we use EOAs, which are controlled by private keys, however, account abstraction introduces contract accounts, which are accounts controlled by a smart contract rather than a private key.

Because accounts are represented by smart contracts, developers are able to add their own logic, enabling end users to benefit from extra security features. To be a little more specific, there are three major components that go into our accountā€™s security: Authentication, Replay protection, and Payment. With contract accounts, you can abstract away some of the features that go into these three components, whether that means adding a recovery method, adding multiple signers to your account, etc. You can watch this great presentation about ERC-4337 to learn all about this new standard and what exactly is being ā€œabstracted away.ā€

Some account abstraction use cases include:

  • Social recovery: use a separate wallet (the ledger in your vault) to recover access to your lost wallet

  • Session keys: you can have different keys for different purposes within one account. So, you can use one key to interact with a game using your assets, and another to actually sell/trade your game items.

  • Paymasters: allows teams to choose a separate account to take care of gas fees, as opposed to having the end platform users pay (gasless transactions by having the dapp itself pay for fees)

  • Authentication: add 2FA, FaceID, Social log-in, or any other form of authentication mechanism, & much more!

Account Abstraction has been highly anticipated for some time now. Over the following year, we should expect existing smart contract wallets like Argent and Braavos expand to multiple chains, as well as Metamask and other traditional Ethereum EVM wallets to add account abstraction support. Plus, what is even more exciting is that weā€™ll probably see other EVM networks like Arbitrum, Optimism, and Polygon add support too!

There are tons of use cases that are enabled by account abstraction, If youā€™d like to dig deeper into the subject, we recommend this amazing paper written by Cami.

AltLayerā€™s 100 Flash Layers Campaign Begins

March 3rd marked the official launch of AltLayerā€™s ā€œ100 Flash layersā€ campaign, where 100 selected developers are able to test the rollup launchpad by each launching their own rollup.

To recap, Altlayer is building a system of disposable, optimistic rollups, or as they refer to them, ā€œFlash Layersā€. Using their dashboard, users will be able to deploy their own custom, no-code rollup in just ten minutes. They currently support rollups on Ethereum and other EVM chains but will expand to other environments in the future.Ā 

From February 10-28th, they allowed anyone to apply for a chance to be among the 100 people/teams to try the rollup launchpad. Now that registrations are out of the way, the 100 chosen experimentoors have until March 10th to launch their own disposable rollup. Those who were chosen for the campaign should have received an email by now.

There are several use cases for disposable, or short lived rollups, mostly revolving around the gaming/NFT space. For example, disposable rollups can be used by individual NFT collections that want to have their mint take place on its own environment, thereby removing congestion, which then removes gas wars. Or by builders who want to launch their own mini or Indie game. The point is to use flash layers for projects that donā€™t need to be running a chain for more than a certain period of time (Yuga launching Dookey Dash on its own short lived rollup for example).

Since the campaign started, there have been several deployed public rollups for users to interact with, including the ā€œDragon Eyesā€ NFT collection launch, and ā€œMother Stakerā€, an ERC-20 token staking platform.

For anyone interested in testing out AltLayer, hereā€™s a complete set of public projects you can start using. To learn more about the campaign you can check out this article.

Rollkit Adds Bitcoin DA to Its Modular Stack

On March 5th, just two days ago, Rollkit announced the addition of Bitcoin as a data availability (DA) layer option for the rollup stack.Ā 

Rollkit is a modular rollup framework that enables developers to choose between different features in order to build their own custom, sovereign rollup, and now, they just gave builders an option to deploy their rollups using Bitcoin as the underlying data availability solution.Ā 

This means that with Rollkit, developers can now build a sovereign CosmWasm, EVM, FuelVM, etc. powered rollup that utilizes Bitcoin DA, thereby connecting these respective communities to Bitcoin. In fact, hereā€™s a demo of the EVM running on Bitcoin as a sovereign rollup! Ā 

As a reminder, there are three layers that go into a blockchain: execution layer, settlement layer, and DA/Consensus layer. A monolithic chain includes these three components into a single layer, whereas modular chains separate them into their own layers.Ā 

Rollkit enables developers to plug in custom execution and data availability layers in order to create the rollup best suited for their own particular dapp. For example, it allows developers to choose their preferred virtual machine (EVM or SVM), gas token (pay gas in ETH, USDC, etc), along with any other features for their execution environment, as well as their own data availability solution. Celestia was the first DA solution to be added to the stack, but just two days ago, Bitcoin was added as another option, enabling developers to start building sovereign rollups on Bitcoin.Ā 

Thereā€™s been a lot of talk & debate going on in crypto Twitter regarding this recent announcement, but regardless of what anyone thinks, at least people are talking about rollups on Bitcoin now. You can check out the complete article to learn more.

Polygon ID

About ten days ago, Polygon released the official docs for Polygon ID docs, an identity solution that relies on zk-proofs, enabling users ā€œprove their identity without the need of exposing their private information.ā€Hereā€™s a quick summary:

Polygon ID relies on verifiable credentials (VCs), which are the actual documents that ā€œrepresent any type of information related to the individual/enterprise/object.ā€ This could be a license, a car title, birth certificate, or anything else you want to have proof of owning, without: A) actually having to carry the physical document, or B) show the actual contents within that document.Ā Of course, weā€™ll be able to use our own individual Polygon ID wallets to hold our VCs.

There are three core pieces within Polygon ID:

  • Identity Holder: you, me, or anyone else that holds the VCs within a Polygon ID wallet.

  • Issuer: the person or organization that issues the VCs to users (a DMV issuing your license, your doctor issuing your medical documents, etc.)

  • Verifier: the person who verifies the proof of your VC. This could be a bartender verifying youā€™re over the age of 21 for example, and because Polygon ID uses zk-technology, you wonā€™t even have to show your birth date, just the proof of VC ownership (a QR code)

Now letā€™s look at some of the use cases Polygon ID enables:

  • Lending: A lending protocol could integrate the ID solution to enable uncollatoralized lending.Ā 

  • Ticketing/Events: Enable NFT collectors to start attending token gated events wqithout having to actually carry their wallet that holds their NFTs with them. Yuga could offer VCs for ape ownership, carry that proof (not the JPEG) in your Polygon ID wallet, and use that VC to access the event.Ā 

Polygon ID has been in development for several years now, but it looks like starting this year, weā€™ll start seeing this new tool be used across the Polygon ecosystem. Polygon ID was originally known as the Iden (Identity) protocol, and was founded by the same original team behind Hermez, or what is now referred to as Polygon zkEVM. As a reminder, Polygon acquired Hermez, along with the team and their identity solution about a year ago, in what was part of their $1B effort to expand their zk stack.

Weā€™re excited to see what developers build over time with Polygon ID. For anyone interested in learning more about this, you can check out the complete Polygon ID docs here.Ā 

More News & Updates

šŸ“š Discussions and Education

EigenPaper

EigenLayer broke CT with their whitepaper announcement. This isnā€™t all that surprising, since the project has made waves across the industry for months.

It is well worth a read - but we know how busy everyone was at ETHDenver - so here are our 5 favorite threads about the whitepaper to scroll through while recovering from the week:

  1. Thread by @nuss_eli

  2. Thread by @DeFi_Cheetah

  3. Thread by @saniyamore

  4. Thread by @0xkydo

  5. Thread by @100y_eth

Letā€™s zoom in on Eliā€™s thread. He and the Stratos team did an excellent analysis of EigenLayer, covering everything from the team and revenue projections to a Q&A style breakdown of key risks. It really makes you feel like youā€™re thinking in the trenches with them.

Hereā€™s one of their projections, showing how EigenLayer could become a multi-billion dollar protocol:

Are zkEVMs overrated?

zkEVM hype has largely been around which rollup project was ā€œfirstā€, but Paul Razvan Berg hints at a different question: do zkEVMs deserve the hype to begin with?

He says no - they are overrated - and mostly points to Micah Zoltu's argument that VMs designed to be proven are better. The EVM was definitely not designed to be proven.

Micah makes two main points. He says itā€™ll be hard for zkEVMs to:

No surprise - ZK teams donā€™t agree. Here are some of their responses:

It appears the basis of Micahā€™s argument is outdated, which heā€™s willing to concede.

L1 valuations and sustainability

Vance Spencer claims that many L1s are overvalued and unsustainable. And at first glance it seems obvious that they are - a 230,000x multiple is insane.

But does that mean we should write them off completely?

Not sure. Like any startup, protocols will balance growth vs. monetization. Growth can mean a number of things - mindshare, users, etc. - even if users are temporarily subsidized.

The key word, though, is temporarily. If you want to stick with the corporate analogy, each protocol needs a monetization strategy that eventually gets executed. If you want to think about it in a more nuanced and crypto-native way, check out Jon Charbā€™s recent article.

So which L1s have plausible strategies?

There are arguments to make for some. Cosmos Hub, for example, has interesting demand drivers for both growth and monetization:

If you want to take this exercise a few steps further, Polynya created a pretty comprehensive framework that can be mapped to any protocol:

More Discussions & Education

That's all for this week! Thanks for reading šŸ§±šŸŽ¬

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