Weekly Rollup #69
Modular DA live on OP Stack | RiscZero launches zkVM 1.0 | Aligned Testnet Launch | 2 new Polygon CDK & Optimism Superchain additions | Nodekit's Bazaar | Solana ZK Compression | Week Ending June 21st
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This week’s issue covers:
Modular DA Now Officially Available on the OP Stack ✨
Risc Zero launches zkVM 1.0 🔒
Aligned Network Public Testnet Launch 🟩
Two new Polygon CDK Chains: FOX & Ronin
Two New Optimism Superchain Additions: Camp L2 & GameSwift
Nodekit Launches Bazaar: Bringing Native USDC & TIA to the Nodekit ecosystem
Solana ZK Compression
Modular Raises 💰
More News & Announcements 📣
Discourse & Education 📚
We’d like to thank one of our sponsors for today’s post, AltLayer.
AltLayer is a decentralized protocol that facilitates the launch of native and restaked rollups with both optimistic and zk rollup stacks.
Visit their official website to learn more.
📣 News & Announcements
Modular DA Now Officially Available on the OP Stack ✨
Alt-DA mode for the OP Stack is now live in Beta. This means that when a developer builds their own custom OP Stack chain, they’ll be able to utilize an alternative Data Availability (DA) solution instead of Ethereum, to lower operational costs.
Celestia, Avail, & EigenDA will be the first available alt-DA solutions, however, DA teams can permissionlessly integrate their solution into the OP Stack. Of these three DA solutions, Celestia is the first to have production-ready rollups go live with the OP Stack. In fact, as of today, 15 OP Stack chains are already live with Celestia underneath (we’ll touch on these below).
So why would Ethereum rollups even need alt-DA solutions? Didn’t blobs (EIP-4844) fix this already?
As mentioned here by the Optimism team, blobs can still become congested, leading to increased gas costs for users. “Once it [blob space usage] is >3, it’ll only be a matter of time before blob fees become too high”.
So where is this number at right now?
Well, just hovering around that 3 range.
In fact, calldata is now cheaper than blobs.
This means it’s important for even alt-DA layers to have their own scaling roadmaps, as pointed out for Nick White from Celestia, which is already working on their scaling roadmap to 1 GB blocks.
Isn’t this just a (relatively) short-term issue though?
daninomics.eth makes the case that while blobs may become congested today, there are paths towards solving this, through a hard fork, as mentioned above.
Nonetheless, at the end of the day, builders want the freedom to choose the best solution for their own unique chain/app.
We’ve said this plenty of times already, but again, there will be teams that choose to go the full Ethereum path, and those who choose to adopt more efficient and performant solutions. If i’m building an onchain game, or a social app, maybe I dont need to pay the premium of adopting full Ethereum security but can settle for a more cost efficient alternative, such as Celestia, Avail, EigenDA or NearDA.
Then it becomes a matter of choosing your preferred DA solution, based on parameters such as speed, security, decentralization, cost, & scalability (& scalability roadmap), decentralization, tools (ZK Accounts in the case of Celestia, for example), and the developer ecosystem.
So what are the 15 live OP Stack chains already using Celestia underneath? 👇
Mantle
Manta
Karak
Aevo
Aevo
Lyra
Redstone?
Hypr
Public Goods Network
Ancient8
I was only able to find 11 of the 15, so please comment below if you know of the other four OP Stack rollups with Celestia underneath!
It’s easy to see why the amount of data being posted to Celestia is going up & to the right. +20 GB of data posted already!
Risc Zero Launches zkVM 1.0
Risc Zero announces zkVM 1.0, becoming the first production-ready zkVM (so not EVM specific) to hit the market.
Adding zk-proofs to a chain or dapp will literally be as simple as clicking on a check box, thanks to RaaS providers.
Risc Zero is building a zkVM, but what exactly is that?
With this zkVM, developers will be able to “prove any Rust program and verify them on any chain”.
As mentioned, while builders will be able to verify Risc Zero proofs directly from Ethereum, they’ll also have the option of lowering operational costs by verifying these proofs on an L2 like Polygon, Optimism, Arbitrum, or even on a dedicated verification layer like Aligned, someday.
IMO, more chains than not will end up using zk-proofs in the future, whether 100% zk-system or some hybrid model.
So who are the main players today who are working to make fast, cheap zk-proofs accessible for anyone? While several teams are developing along this front, two names stand out the most: Risc Zero, and Succinct.
& in this recent launch, Risc Zero claimed to be the most performant in the market (lower costs & quicker times with proof generation), with benchmark highlights listed in the full blog post, here.
& just like DA solutions have their own scaling roadmaps, so too do proving layers.
This launch of zkVM was the culmination of a 4 phase roadmap, which started in Q1 2024.
To learn more about zkVM you can check out the full blog post, or listen to this recent Twitter Space episode, which featured Risc Zero’s CEO.
Aligned Network Public Testnet Launch 🟩
Aligned Network launches its third testnet, also marking the first time third party operators can join the network.
Teams like Risc Zero & Succinct are working on making zk-proofs accessible to all. & while they’re both working on reducing costs & time for zk-proof generation, that’s only one half of the equation.
Someone still has to verify those zk-proofs - and that’s where Aligned Network comes in. Aligned is a decentralized ZK-proof verification layer (a cheaper alternative).
How does it work?
“Verification is performed in our AVS and the results are submitted to Ethereum once 2/3 or more of the operators sign the results of proofs.”
When someone submits a zk-proof to be verified, it goes through this AVS, which now anyone can participate in.
Today, there are 18 registered operators, verifying zk-proofs:
What can you do today?
Today, anyone can submit their own zk-proofs for verification.
Full demo provided to show how straightforward it is (1.5 minutes long) - some technical ability required
Next for Aligned, before mainnet:
SDK for seamless Aligned integrations
Integrations of more ZK verifiers: Today Aligned network allows for the verification of Succinct’s SP1 zk-proofs, however, Risc Zero proofs verified soon also?
More Aligned news from this past week:
Two New Polygon CDK Chains: FOX & Ronin
It was a big week for the Polygon community, as two new Polygon CDK chains were unveiled:
FOX Chain
FOX Corp, the US media company, will launch “Verify L2”, their own L2 network using Gelato RaaS, and powered by Polygon CDK.
Verify first launched back in January, as a Polygon Proof of Stake (PoS) dapp, however, they will now be transitioning to their own validium network, which as a reminder, posts its data to an external network, as opposed to a rollup, which posts its data directly to Ethereum. In this case, Verify will be posting its data to Polygon - this means 2/3 of Polygon validators will have to sign off on the data posted by Verify.
Two Main Reasons for an L2:
TIME & Fox News were announced as the first external publishing partner on Verify, with plans to use the L2 for two main reasons:
content licensing: As a creator, you should have full control and ownership over your content, meaning you should be able to decide how it gets used - or by who.
verification strategy: As a builder, you want to make sure the content you leverage for data is based on truth - & that is what Verify aims to solve as well. & as a consumer of this content, you & I can be assured that the content we’re reading is truly from who we think it is.
Today, our content is being used to train AI models across a variety of industries - Verify L2 also hopes to work with AI firms to grant usage rights to AI. So rather than TIME’s content being used freely to train AI models, it can set a payment amount, or some other prerequisite.
Actors Involved:
Publishers (TIME, Fox News, Fox Sports, etc.):
A publisher can write and publish content to the Verify network
& can set its licensing rights, or what they want back for being able to sue their content (to train AI models, build an app, use in a website, etc.)
Builders (AI firms, dapp builders, etc.):
Builders can purchase (“Pull”) this uploaded content from the Verify Marketplace, according to the licensing parameters set by the publisher
Consumers (you & I):
A network like Verify would give content consumers like you & me, the freedom of knowing this content came from a legitimate source (or didn’t).
Enterprises are going modular 🧱✨
Ronin zkEVM
Ronin will be an L2 dedicated for onchain gaming, and according to the team, any team that builds on top of Ronin will have the option of either launching directly on top of the Ronin L2, or as their own rollup (an L3), on top of Ronin.
Ronin is one of the biggest gaming networks in web3, with games like Axie Infinity, Wild Forest, The Machines Arena, & more under their belt. Plus, 1.5M Daily Active User’s (DAU’s), +18M wallet downloads.
You can learn more by checking out their updated whitepaper.
New Superchain Additions: Camp L2 & GameSwift
Camp L2
Camp Network announces that they will be bringing their identity layer to the Optimism Superchain - with Celestia underneath.
So what is Camp L2 exactly?
Camp L2 takes data from web2 social apps like Twitter, TikTok, Youtube, etc, and creates a unique profile for each individual
this user data gets bridged to Camp’s L2 network
data gets verified by Camp L2s validator set, which in this case, will be EigenLayer operators
web3 apps (games, NFT marketplaces, etc.) can pull the data from Camp L2, allowing them to target their correct demographic
So as an example, an artist can check what music their fans listen to on Spotify, or a game developer may check what games you stream on Twitch.
Benefits of Camp L2:
For builders: Web3 apps are able to target their correct demographic, enabling more personalized experiences for their community, driving better engagement
For end-users: As an end-user, you get to own your data, keep it private, and monetize it how you’d like.
You can check out this recent Twitter Space to learn more about Camp L2.
Other news from the week:
Camp L2 partners with commerce app, Henry. This will “provide a tailor-made experience for every shopper”, by using Camp’s social oracles to provide personalized shopping experiences, as an example. - Read
Camp brings Thirdweb’s full-stack development tools to the L2 network. - Read
GameSwift Chain
GameSwift announces that they will launch their own OP Stack chain, becoming the first AI gaming chain to join the Superchain.
Some notes from the announcement:
teams will be able to launch their games as an L3 network on top of this GameSwift chain
the team claims that “over 100 games have already embraced the GameSwift vision”
GameSwift chain testnet to kick-off on June 27th, and will run until mainnet. They will be hosting a “Race to Mainnet” campaign, where participants can engage with missions, online events, and interviews with builders
Games that build on GameSwift will have access to all their tools, including Platform, ID, & Launcher.
gas fees on the network to be paid in $GSWIFT
You can check out the full post to learn more.
Nodekit Unveiles Bazaar: Bringing Native USDC to the Ecosystem
Last week, Nodekit unveiled Bazaar, a sovereign rollup meant to bring native USDC & TIA to Nodekit’s ecosystem of rollups. Bazaar was built using Rollkit’s sovereign rollup framework, and uses Celestia underneath.
Bazaar will leverage Noble to bring this native USDC to Nodekit’s “composable ecosystem”.
Nodekit also shared the first demo of Javelin, their “super builder”, which enables “atomic synchronous composability between rollups”.
We spoke more about Nodekit’s Javelin here, for those interested.
Light Protocol: Solana ZK Compressions
Caught this one a little late, but last week, Solana went ZK. Specifically, Light Protocol announced ZK Compressions, a joint development effort between them and Helius Labs.
Over the past couple of days, you may have seen a lot of talk about Solana’s massive scaling improvements - but wait, wasn’t Solana already scalable?
It’s compute, yes, Data Availability (DA), no.
ZK Compressions fixes this. How much so you ask? Here’s some numbers posted by the team:
I’m still learning about all this myself, but here’s a quick TLDR of what happened:
Before ZK Compression, there were three “Account” types on Solana: native accounts, data accounts, and program accounts
Compressed accounts are the fourth account type added to Solana
only the state root (hash) of these compressed accounts are stored “in the onchain account space”
validity proofs ensure the integrity of the compressed state
Compressed state can interact with regular state, providing that same level of composability users are accustomed to
Some from the Solana community have compared this to Ethereum’s verkle tree roadmap stage. Here’s from Mert 👇
There’s a lot more to ZK Compression, so we highliy recommend you check out the docs for yourself to learn more. We’ll have our own separate article about this coming! 🫡
Modular Raises 💰
Renzo Raises $17M
Renzo will use these funds for continued development of their EigenLayer restaking hub.
Renzo is home to one of the most popular Liquid Restaked Token (LRT) in the market, ezETH.
Other Renzo news from the week:
Particle Raises $25M
As one of the biggest names in the Chain Abstraction space, Particle Network will use these funds to continue on their mission towards a chain abstracted future, while also using these funds to grow their team.
Other Particle Network news from the week:
Phase 2 of the Particle Network testnet is now live! - Read
Particle to bring their universal accounts to:
Sonic Raises $12M
Sonic raises $12M to continue development of their gaming-focused Solana L2.
Some quick notes about the project:
Sonic is being built as “the go-to destination for teams who want to build games on Solana”.
As pointed out by Mert here, an L2 on Solana is not necessarily for increased throughput or scalability but rather, for sovereignty - this means the L2 will be able to set their own rules and blockchain parameters, while still utilizing Solana
In regards to Sonic, this sovereignty allows them to tackle a lack of gaming infra across Solana, particularly in privacy, instant settlements, asset transfer rules, and compliance
Sonic is in devnet, with 5 teams currently building on the network. Other interested builders should make sure to reach out, as the team has also announced an upcoming grants program worth up to $20M.
Sonic has just kicked-off their incentivized testnet campaign, Odyssey, where participants can play games for “rings”, which will convert to some reward in the future.
Mainnet and token expected in Q3
Solana is going modular afterall. 🧱✨
Other Raises from last week:
FarWorld Labs raises $1.75M to speed up their development of farcade.xyz - or to build the “Zynga of Farcaster”, as they put it.
Try it out for yourself directly from the Warpcast social app!
Modular Events 🎭
Modular Summit Free Tickets!
A reminder to get your Modular Summit tickets - they’re free! - Get Tickets
🚨 More News & Announcements
GM Network launches on mainnet: GM Network claims to be the “first consumer AIoT (L2) network”. The rollup was built & launched using AltLayer (RaaS) and uses EigenDA. Check out the full thread to learn about GM’s developer features, network details for those who’d like to experiment with the chain, and application forms for early builders. - Read
Morpho, the borrow & lending protocol, is now live on Base - Read
Radius (a decentralized sequencer) announces its partnership with Vessel Finance: Vessel Finance will be launching a ZK-powered orderbook exchange as an L3 on Scroll, and they will be using Radius to handle sequencing tasks. - Read
New members are added to the OneBalance fellowship, dedicated to developing the Chain Abstraction Stack - Read
Kroma unveils itself as the next gaming chain to join Optimisim’s Superchain - Read
Dymension RollApp news: Crynux launches incentivized testnet. “Run & rent a GPU on Dymension” - Read
Check out the newly unveiled Nexus 1.0 machine - Read
Here’s a first look at MagicBlock, building a Solana L2 - Watch
“Introducing Citrus Swap, the first DEX on the public Citrea Devnet “ - Read
Everclear is offering 95% back on Arbitrum bridging fees. A good time to bridge to the network fr those who have stayed away because of gas fees - Read
Introducing the shared security alliance, featuring many prominent teams, including EigenLayer, Near, & several others - Read
Lagrane has added a new upgrade to its ZK CoprocessorEuclid Testnet, which enables anyone to make SQL queries for top NFT projects, including Azuki, Miladys, & more - Read
Here’s Starknet’s updated 2024 roadmap, with the goal of making the chain “faster, cheaper, better UX”, and featuring parallel execution, lower block times, & more. - Read
Initia stats update (great success so far) - View
Caldera x Hypernative - Read
Merlin Chain is high risk, according to a recent Bitcoin Layers review - Read
New rollup added to Celenium, “onchain”, which is an L3 rollup on Base - Read
New proposal for a Aztec explorer - Read
Aztec Labs showcases new website, featuring its mission and opportunities to join the team - Read
An update on MilkyWay’s MILK - Read
Aleph Zero is live, a zk privacy L2 built using Gelato’s RaaS - Read
Lava Network launches its “Volcanic Expedition” campaign: “Over the next few weeks, we will unroll a community initiative that will continue after mainnet and create a centre for creativity and fun within the Lava Network.” (games, roles, bounties, etc.) - Read
Looks like a new social network is coming soon, called Rodeo, which aims at rewarding users for creating content. The app is currently invite-only, but will open to the public soon. - Read
Doodles go based: Popular NFT collection from the 21’ bull run, Doodles, will be launching their consumer app, The Stoodio, on the Ethereum L2, Base. Looks like not only will the top apps build an L2, but top NFT collections too. - Read
New time.fun app, a new social app on Base catching headlines last week - Read
📚 Discourse & Education
More Blogs & Threads 📝
Sacha shares “A vision of Celestia (2030)” - Read
Jon Charb published a new paper: “We’re All Building The Same Thing” - Read
Two new research posts have been published on the Ethereum Research forum:
Ross shares a complete writeup and demo of how he developed and deployed a Bitcoin rollup, using Conduit (RaaS) and Hyperlane (interop) - Read
The Bitcoin Layers team has published a new review, this time diving into BitLayers Labs. TLDR: high-risk chain - Read
Are rollups even fragmented? Emmanuel makes the case that you get your atomic composability by just staying on a preferred L2 ecosystem (whether Arbitrum, Optimism, or whatever). - Read
@samoyedali shares a complete deep dive: “A journey into FHE” - Read
Bankless breaks own OP_Cat, an opcode in Bitcoin’s scripting language - Read
New post titled, “Fork-Choice enforced Inclusion Lists (FOCIL): A simple committee-based inclusion list proposal “ - Read
Audio & Podcasts 🎤
Dino and Stephy from Fluent, join The Empire crew to discuss blended execution - Watch
Jesse Pollak from Base joins the Empire podcast to unpack what it’ll take to bring the world onchain - Watch
EigenDA joined Nadar on his next episode of “Infinite Layers” podcast, to talk new use-cases with high throughput and cheap DA - Watch
Nick White hosts a Celestia technical AMA - Listen
The latest Zero Knowledge Podcast episode, featuring members from Alpen Labs - Listen
pStake Finance had the Babylon team on for a discussion about Bitcoin liquid staking - Listen
ether.fi had members on from the Hydrogen Labs team to talk “AVS payments” - Listen
Dev Bear from Berachain hosted a convo with others from the Cosmos community to break down BeaconKit, “A modular framework for building EVM consensus clients” - Listen
Sofa.org had on other founders/members from the Arbitrum community to discuss “the next wave of defi” - Listen
Mantle hosted a convo with FBTC, Seraphim from Ethena, & JPTHOR from Thorn chain, about why Bitcoin yield even matters - Listen
Susannah from the IBC team hosted a talk with other members from the Cosmos ecosystem to discuss Noble & Provenance: RWAs & TradFi with IBC” - Listen
Babylon hosted a conversation with several others, about ZK Proofs (on Bitcoin) & Bitcoin Staking - Listen
We’d like to thank our other sponsor for today’s post, Fluent.
Fluent is the first blended execution network. Fluent blends Wasm, EVM and SVM apps into a unified execution environment.
Visit Fluent’s website to learn more.
That's all for this week! Thanks for reading 🧱🎬