The Future of Web3: The Integration of Decentralization in Storage and Computing

The foundation of the next generation of the Internet, Web3, will be built on the three pillars of consensus, storage, and computation. Blockchain technology has initiated a wave of the Decentralization revolution, while Web3 further expands on this concept, aiming to achieve the Decentralization of the entire Internet.

In the field of Decentralization storage, the rise of peer-to-peer networks has created a global, trustless, and tamper-proof data storage system. As a pioneer in this field, a certain storage platform offers cost-effective solutions that ensure the permanence, immutability, and censorship resistance of data, meeting the growing demands of NFTs and decentralized applications.

According to predictions from International Data Corporation, by 2026, the global data generation volume will reach an astonishing 221,000 exabytes (EB). To put this into perspective, it is equivalent to approximately 23.17 billion TB of data. Such a massive scale of data highlights the tremendous market potential of Decentralization storage protocols.

In addition to its advantages in storage, the platform is also actively expanding into the field of Decentralization computing. Its newly launched computing system aims to combine large-scale AI models with smart contract technology, integrating the performance of high-speed blockchain with the verifiability required by Decentralization projects.

The global AI market is expected to experience explosive growth in the next decade, reaching approximately $257.516 billion by 2032, with an annual growth rate of up to 19%. Decentralization AI technology is expected to address the issues of transparency and control present in traditional machine learning, promoting the establishment of a fairer and more open AI ecosystem, while protecting intellectual property and personal privacy. The platform's innovations in decentralized storage and computing make it a leader in the Web3 movement, not only meeting critical industry needs but also greatly expanding its market potential.

Technological Innovation and Protocol Design

The core goal of a certain decentralized storage platform is to achieve permanent data storage through a one-time payment. The system consists of two key components: a distributed storage layer and a human-machine interaction layer.

The distributed storage layer is responsible for handling storage orders and replicating data. It employs an innovative consensus mechanism that requires nodes to provide encrypted access proof to previously uploaded data before accepting new data, ensuring data integrity and availability.

Above the distributed storage layer is the human-computer interaction layer that mimics the World Wide Web. Unlike traditional web pages, once the content on this layer is uploaded, it cannot be changed, ensuring the immutability of websites and decentralized applications.

The platform also supports smart contract functionality. Unlike traditional blockchain networks like Ethereum, its smart contracts compute state only on the local machine that requests execution, which significantly improves efficiency and scalability.

The platform's native token is used to pay for storage fees, which are deposited into a dedicated fund to compensate miners and ensure that long-term storage and network maintenance costs are covered. Users pay a one-time fee when storing files, with most of the fees going into the storage fund. The fund is designed based on a conservative assumption of declining storage costs, aimed at indefinitely covering storage expenses. Historical data shows that the average annual decline rate of storage costs is approximately 30.57%, further supporting the long-term viability of the protocol.

Miners in the network receive rewards in various ways, including transaction fees, inflationary token issuance (where the issuance rate gradually decreases over time), and payments from storage funds.

The platform's token economic model includes an initial issuance of 55 million tokens, as well as 11 million in inflationary issuance. These new issuances will gradually decrease until the total circulation reaches 66 million tokens. It is noteworthy that the protocol does not adopt a token burn mechanism, but maintains a fixed supply.

Network Upgrade and Community Development

At the end of 2023, the platform experienced a significant community event involving a fork proposal concerning an important ecosystem member. This event sparked extensive discussions and reflections within the community, ultimately resolved through communication and clarification, showcasing the self-regulating capability of a decentralized community.

In March 2024, the platform underwent a significant network upgrade, introducing a coordinated mining mechanism that allows multiple nodes to work together, improving the overall efficiency and computing power of the network. This upgrade also added support for mining pools, enabling miners to share resources more effectively. Meanwhile, the protocol changes increased the difficulty of single-block solutions to promote the generation of more complete data copies and introduced new pricing measures. Despite some initial controversies, these changes were ultimately accepted by the community, significantly improving the platform's performance and stability, and also driving up the price of its tokens.

The Rise of Innovative Computing Platforms

The innovative computing system recently launched by the platform combines the security of blockchain with the efficiency and scalability of traditional cloud computing platforms, creating a new computing paradigm. By leveraging powerful storage infrastructure, this system addresses the challenges of scalability and efficiency in zero-knowledge machine learning (zkML), providing a transparent and verifiable computing environment.

The system employs parallel processing technology, allowing multiple programs to run simultaneously on a large scale, greatly optimizing resource allocation efficiency. Its open data protocol provides a flexible and modular design, facilitating system upgrades and component replacements.

As the core of the system, a decentralized operating system allows developers to run command-line processes similar to smart contracts. It combines the convenience of traditional cloud server operations with the advantages of decentralized processing. The system uses the Lua programming language and supports the creation of blockchain applications compatible with various virtual machines.

The uniqueness of this innovative platform lies in its ability to autonomously execute smart contracts at predetermined times without user triggering, paving the way for truly autonomous blockchain applications. This feature enables data-intensive applications, such as gamified token systems or AI chatbots, to efficiently exchange data with the underlying storage layer.

Market Competition and Performance Comparison

In the field of decentralized storage, the platform faces competition from other projects. One of its main competitors focuses on disrupting the traditional storage market through low-cost temporary storage, while the platform is dedicated to creating an entirely new permanent storage market. It will be interesting to observe how this competition with different strategies evolves in the coming years.

In terms of blockchain performance, the platform has recently made significant progress. As of late February 2024, its transaction processing capacity has reached over 600 transactions per second, making it one of the highest throughput permissionless blockchains. This achievement is particularly noteworthy considering that the newly launched computing system is still in its early stages, with its transactions per second (TPS) already surpassing some well-known blockchain projects.

Team Background and Financing History

The project was co-founded by two researchers pursuing their PhDs at the University of Kent in the UK. Their inspiration came from a hiking trip in Scotland, combining technological insights and innovative vision, which ultimately led to the birth of this blockchain-based permanent data storage platform.

The project successfully raised a substantial amount of funds through multiple rounds of financing, including pre-seed, seed, two community token sales, and a private placement round. Notable investment institutions such as the venture capital division of a major cryptocurrency exchange and a well-known technology investment firm participated in this. The public token issuance in 2020 further solidified the project's financial foundation.

It is worth noting that the project adopts a DAO governance model, ensuring the community's dominant position in the decision-making and voting processes.

Ecosystem Development

The platform has become a vibrant component of the Web3 ecosystem. As of the third quarter of 2023, its ecosystem includes over 130 projects based on the platform. The network has processed over 1 billion on-chain transactions, fully demonstrating its growing adoption rate and strong infrastructure support.

Development Prospects Analysis

Positive Factors

1. The launch of the new computing system has enhanced the platform's significance in the field of AI.
2. The ultra-parallel architecture facilitates the efficient training and deployment of AI models.
3. Modular design provides an ideal environment for developing DeFi applications.
4. The community has high expectations for potential early adopter airdrops.
5. The new computing system addresses the scalability and efficiency challenges of zkML.
6. The volume of online transactions significantly increased in 2023, processing approximately 100 million transactions per month.
7. It is expected that the trading volume will further increase in 2024, and the new system will transition from the testing phase to full operation.

Potential Risks

1. The testing phase of the new system may expose technical issues, including security vulnerabilities and network access problems.
2. The new system's capability to effectively scale AI models on-chain has not yet been fully validated.
3. The integration of old and new tokens may face challenges, bringing additional uncertainty.
4. Despite the latest developments, the platform may still face challenges in terms of scalability.
5. The new computing system and its integration with the existing storage network are still in the early stages, and unexpected technical and operational issues may arise.
6. Speculation about potential airdrops and changes in token economics may lead to significant fluctuations in token value.

Overall, the platform's innovations in Decentralization storage and computing open up broad prospects for its future development, but it also faces challenges in technical implementation and market acceptance. As the project continues to develop and improve, its importance in the Web3 ecosystem is expected to further increase.