Epicenter - Learn about Crypto, Blockchain, Ethereum, Bitcoin and Distributed Technologies

What started out as a plan to build prediction markets, Gnosis ended up building crucial Ethereum infrastructure and tooling. Safe is one of its many successes, which originated during the 2017 ICO mania, as a solution for managing the raised capital securely, via a multi-sig. Even back then, the multi-sig model was quickly adopted by the entire industry, as a gold standard for asset security. Smart accounts and ERC-4337 represent the next step towards mass-adoption, through achieving a Web2-like UX. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Lucas Schor on TwitterSafe on TwitterGnosis DAO on TwitterGnosis Chain on TwitterGnosis Pay on TwitterSponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Sebastien Couture.

One of the most important hurdles to mass adoption is represented by blockchain scalability, which also hinders the real-life utility of its numerous applications. While there are different solutions being experimented with, one should not overlook the importance of security and decentralisation. Saga introduces the concept of chainlets, interoperable Cosmos-based sovereign blockchains that share the security of Saga’s mainnet validator set. The majority of their parameters are fully customisable, allowing developers to tweak them towards their own needs. Saga’s main focus is building their very own Web3 gaming ecosystem, providing game devs the scaling needed to unlock their full potential and creativity. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Rebecca Liao on TwitterSaga on TwitterSponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Felix Lutsch.

Classical, monolithic blockchains are inherently limited in their throughput due to their single-thread execution architecture. Modern VMs attempt to solve this issue through parallelisation being implemented from the get-go. Movement Labs employs the Move-VM to build a ZK L2 rollups on Ethereum, thus also deriving its security. Through parallel execution threads, Movement achieves a theoretical TPS of 160,000 while also ensuring sub-cent transaction fees. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Rushi Manche on TwitterMovement Labs on TwitterNebular Podcast 'Ethereum x Cosmos Convergence'Sponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Sebastien Couture & Friederike Ernst.

Market makers help create more efficient markets and liquid order books, by positioning themselves on the receiving end of a trade that other market participants are unwilling to fill. Quantitative analysis is crucial in determining their position and size. Wintermute defines itself as a tech-first company that also became one of the largest spot market making firms in Web3. From angel investing in Web2, to market making in Web3, Yoann Turpin (co-founder of Wintermute) has a vast experience in both tech products & financial markets. He shares what differentiates good traders and how he approaches investing, trading and market making. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Yoann Turpin on TwitterWintermute on TwitterSponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain.

Credit is a widely used term, which could essentially be summarised as “more capital so you can do whatever you want”. In DeFi, there are numerous ways of getting exposure to an asset in a leveraged manner: from looping to perpetuals and margin trading, the possibilities are endless (especially when you also account for synthetic versions). Gearbox Protocol aims to create a universal, composable, on-chain ‘credit layer’, through credit account abstraction. This approach simultaneously addresses three concerns: liquidity, security and, ultimately, user experience (UX). Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Mikael Lazarev on TwitterIvan on TwitterGearbox Protocol on TwitterSponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Meher Roy.

While large language models (LLMs) are rather passive from an economic perspective on their own, AI agents offer a preview of what truly autonomous AI applications can achieve. Fetch.ai aims to create a platform for economic interactions in the AI economy, where participants can provide many different kinds of stake, ranging from purely financial, in the form of cryptocurrency tokens, to utility based, in the form of data sets that LLMs can be trained on. It thus creates a supply chain that links different actors of the AI economy. We were joined by Humayun Sheikh, co-founder & CEO of Fetch.ai, to discuss AI economic models and how LLMs can be integrated by agentic systems as a foundation for autonomous AI apps. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Humayun Sheikh on TwitterFetch.ai on TwitterSponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Friederike Ernst. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/539

As technology progresses, infrastructure should be commoditised, especially in Web3, in order to avoid the creation of bottlenecks and gatekeepers. Blockchains are naturally oblivious to off-chain data, so they need oracles to fetch data. However, given their past technical limitations, oracles have failed to provide a decentralised and permissionless framework for data query. SEDA seeks to change this by creating an intent-based modular data layer, which brings off-chain data on-chain, in order for it to be available to any party, regardless of who requested it first. We were joined by Jasper De Goojier, co-founder of SEDA Protocol, to discuss the oracle landscape and how SEDA aims to decentralise it and make data access permissionless. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Jasper De Goojier on TwitterSEDA Protocol on TwitterSponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/538

Blockchains are, by default, public ledgers containing every transaction recorded by the network. While this ensures transparency, it also violates users’ privacy once an address is linked to an entity. Apart from creating additional risk for self-custody, institutions are also limited by what they can publicly share on a blockchain. As a result, there is great demand and utility for on-chain, compliant privacy, which still requires KYC (& KYT), but protects them through cryptographic constructs. Zero knowledge proofs attest computational integrity, allowing for transactions to be bundled together and their correctness verified, without revealing each individual interaction. We were joined by Anish Mohammed, co-founder & CTO of Panther Protocol, to discuss the importance of compliant privacy for on-chain transactions, powered by zero knowledge technology. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Anish Mohammed on TwitterPanther Protocol on TwitterSponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Meher Roy. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/537

The monolithic blockchain era appears to be sunsetting. Among the first to contribute to this paradigm shift was Cosmos, which introduced the idea of specialized sovereign blockchains (appchains), made possible by the Cosmos SDK. Nowadays, the modular thesis employs external data availability and even execution solutions, which enables the creation of countless new chains. Each new blockchains comes with its own ‘specs’, and centralised RPC and node providers have to adapt to each chain’s setting. However, the saying ‘Jack of all trades, master of none’ applies in this scenario too - we have often witnessed RPC failures during high demand periods. Lava Network aims to provide a competitive marketplace for RPC and node providers, which would compete based on their performance and user feedback. We were joined by Gil and Yair to discuss Lava Network’s RPC decentralisation in the modular, multi-chain landscape. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Yair Cleper on LinkedInGil Binder on TwitterLava Network on TwitterSponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Sebastien Couture & Brian Fabian Crain. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/536

Prolonged range bound markets are a hallmark of bearmarkets and they usually end up chopping inexperienced or over leveraged traders. Customised structured products offer a solution for market participants that want to limit their downside, but also the upside, by introducing knock-outs at certain levels or triggers. Such custom options, usually with lower probabilistic chances of occurring, naturally come at a discount. This allows traders to hedge their risk, while also betting on certain outcomes or market scenarios. We were joined by Zhiming Yang, co-founder of Orbit Markets, to discuss crypto derivatives and how TradFi expertise applies to customising structured products for crypto markets. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Zhiming Yang on LinkedInOrbit Markets on TwitterOrbit Markets websiteSponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Meher Roy. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/535

Measuring the social impact of a charitable donation is, oftentimes, an impossible task. Founders Pledge is a non-profit organisation that aims to funnel and streamline donations from successful entrepreneurs in order to maximise their efficiency, based on data and research. Having built a network of nearly 2000 like-minded philanthropists, the vision behind Founders Pledge was to ensure transparency, unbiased assessment, ease of access and incentive alignment for its members. Despite the hurdles of running and scaling a non-profit organisation, Founders Pledge managed to stay true to its values throughout its 10 years of activity. In the end, where there’s a will, there’s a way. We were joined by David Goldberg, founder of Founders Pledge, to discuss the landscape of charitable non-profit organisations and how data can streamline donations and maximise their social impact. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: David Goldberg on TwitterFounders Pledge on TwitterFounders Pledge websitePledge VenturesSponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/534

We are, arguably, still early in the crypto industry, but some people were really…really early. One of them is Lefteris Karapetsas, who joined EthDev in 2014 and contributed to building the Ethereum ecosystem, since before the genesis block. His crypto journey is one for the history books, as after EthDev he joined Slock.it, right around the time of The DAO raise…and hack. Lefteris remained a core supporter of decentralisation and an active member of the Ethereum community, being involved (and delegated) in multiple projects’ governance. More recently, he founded Rotki, an open source portfolio management app that aims to preserve user privacy. We were joined by Lefteris Karapetsas, true Ethereum OG, to discuss his 10-year long journey through the Ethereum ecosystem, from joining EthDev (pre-Devcon 0) to founding Rotki. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Lefteris Karapetsas on TwitterRotki on TwitterSponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Friederike Ernst. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/533

The Autonolas stack aims to address the ‘A’ in DAO (decentralised autonomous organisation), through its Open Autonomy framework, which enables the creation of autonomous, off-chain services for crypto applications. A key component for ensuring the proper operation of these off-chain autonomous economic agents, is the consensus mechanism. The protocol is overseen by the Governatooorr, the world’s first autonomous, AI-powered governor. We were joined by David Minarsch, co-founder of Valory, to discuss the ever-changing landscape of AI agents and how they can be used to automate crypto applications. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: David Minarsch on TwitterAutonolas on TwitterValory on TwitterSponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Friederike Ernst & Meher Roy. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/532

Web2 file storage relies heavily on centralised entities, which have mostly outgrown their competitors, establishing a quasi-monopoly. The reasons for this are twofold: enormous operating costs and seamless user experience (e.g. social logins and account recovery), which, until recently, could only be solved through centralisation. Add to this the reluctance to change platforms as users need to re-upload their files, and you get an ossified user base. However, data leaks and hacks are a constant threat to users’ privacy, and indicate the disruptive potential of decentralised file storage and sharing. We were joined by Andreas Tsamados & Vijay Krishnavanshi, co-founders of Fileverse, to discuss their decentralised file sharing solution and how they plan to disrupt the Web2 quasi-monopoly. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Andreas Tsamados on TwitterVijay Krishnavanshi on TwitterFileverse on TwitterSponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Friederike Ernst. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/531

Fully homomorphic encryption, also known as the Holy Grail of cryptography, allows for computation to be performed on encrypted data, without the need for prior decryption. Its blockchain applications would enable programmable, institutional-grade, compliant privacy. With the addition of fhEVM libraries, solidity developers don’t have to worry about the complex cryptography and only decide what layers of the UX should be private. We were joined by Guy Itzhaki & Guy Zyskind, to discuss fully homomorphic encryption and how Fhenix plans to leverage it to build an end-to-end encrypted Ethereum L2 with compliant privacy. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Guy Zyskind on TwitterGuy Itzhaki on TwitterFhenix on TwitterEncryption Day @ ETH Denver (Feb. 28, 2024) registrationSponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Felix Lutsch. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/530

What began as an AI company trying to seek solutions in order to pay remote (unbanked) workers, Near AI became, in 2018, Near Protocol. Its sharded design was inspired by modern database architecture and large language model (LLM) training. Near Protocol aimed to solve the scalability trilemma, through a modular approach, combining data availability sharding with stateless validation. By abstracting away archaic blockchain standards, Near basically enabled decentralised full stack development and, in terms of UX, a distributed custodial solution via chain abstraction and account aggregation. We were joined by Illia Poloshukhin, co-founder of Near Protocol, to discuss Near’s journey, from AI company to high-throughput L1 blockchain, and how LLM training influenced the modular design choice. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Illia Polosukhin on TwitterNear Protocol on TwitterSponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Meher Roy & Felix Lutsch. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/529

As Ethereum ‘merged’ to its current proof-of-stake consensus model, the steep (for retail) minimum stake of 32 ETH created a serious risk of centralisation through staking delegation to centralised entities. Lido DAO was envisioned to preserve staking decentralisation, while also providing additional value for staked ETH in the form of liquid staking tokens (LST). However, as its market share reached the first threshold of 33%, concerns have started to be voiced regarding Lido’s own risk of centralisation. Through its dual governance model where stakers can veto $LDO voters, and the upcoming implementation of distributed validator technology (DVT) and community staking module (CSM), the Lido DAO aims to preserve staking decentralisation. We were joined by Isidoros Passadis, contributor and Master of Validators at Lido DAO, to discuss Ethereum’s current liquid staking landscape, Lido’s governance model and what steps it takes to ensure staking decentralisation. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Isidoros Passadis on TwitterLido on TwitterSponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain & Felix Lutsch. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/528

10 years ago, Adam B Levine, the host of ‘Let’s Talk Bitcoin!’, decided that it was time to encourage other voices to step onto the crypto podcast scene. Among many applicants, Sebastien and Brian were the only 2 Europeans, so Adam suggested that they teamed up in order to record the pilot episode. On December 20th 2013, Sebastien and Brian released ‘Regulation and the Future of Bitcoin’, which marked the beginning of a 10-year (and counting) long journey. The rest is history. On this anniversary episode, our hosts were joined by special guests and friends of Epicenter, to share their favourite moments and fun stories gathered during the 10 years of epicness. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Adam B Levine on TwitterTrent McConaghy on TwitterSebastian Buergel on TwitterGriff Green on TwitterLefteris Karapetsas on TwitterSam Jernigan on TwitterAnna Rose on TwitterJordi Baylina on TwitterRyan Zurrer on TwitterRichard Muirhead on TwitterThis episode is hosted by Sebastien Couture, Brian Fabian Crain, Friederike Ernst, Meher Roy, Felix Lutsch and Sunny Aggarwal. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/527

gnosis.ioUnlike Ethereum ‘programmable money’, Bitcoin lacks native smart contracts by design. In an attempt to expand Bitcoin past its store of value narrative, wrapper contracts provided wBTC on other chains for DeFi applications. However, wBTC does not directly represent the native asset and it is, therefore, subject to potential exploits. DLC Link introduces a novel approach, by allowing entities to self-wrap dlcBTC. We were joined by Aki Balogh, co-founder of DLC Link, to discuss discreet log contracts, their trust assumptions and what they mean for Bitcoin’s use cases and liquidity. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Aki Balogh on TwitterDLC Link on TwitterEpicenter's 10-year anniversary live streamSponsors: gnosis.iochorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Meher Roy. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/526

When it comes to NFTs and blockchain gaming, very few companies can rival with Animoca Brands’ early conviction, investment thesis and time horizon. They understood early on that community building and network effects are the core pillars for a true paradigm shift in gaming. However, culture and narratives transcend the boundaries of gaming, becoming social phenomena. Animoca’s latest undertaking, the Mocaverse, aims to unite communities in a truly open metaverse. We were joined by Yat Siu, chairman of Animoca Brands, to discuss the importance of digital culture in our modern-day lives and how NFT ownership unlocks community building in the open metaverse. Topics covered in this episode: Episode links: Yat Siu on TwitterAnimoca Brands on TwitterSandbox on TwitterAxie Infinity on TwitterThis episode is hosted by Sebastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/525