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Yuga Labs Keeps up the Promise: Failed ‘Otherdeed’ Transaction Users Receive Gas Fees

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Yuga Labs reported in a Wednesday Twitter thread that everyone who failed to mint an “Otherdeed” non-fungible token (NFT) before April 30 had received their gas fees back.

Yuga Labs stated in the thread, “We have reimbursed gas prices to everyone who performed a transaction that failed due to network constraints created by the mint.” “The fees were refunded to the wallets that were used for the initial transaction.”

According to statistics from Etherscan, Yuga Labs spent a total of 90.57 ETH (approximately US$265,000) on 640 refunds. The most significant individual return was 2.6 ETH (about $7,500), and the company spent 0.26 ETH (around $783) in gas expenses to send out all of the reimbursements.

Yuga Labs faced the repercussions of the failed mint

Yuga Labs, which owns Bored Ape Yacht Club, one of the most costly collections of nonfungible tokens (NFTs), started selling its latest digital products on April 30.

The costs were just too exorbitant for many consumers. Some people paid transaction fees that were more than five times the amount of the item they bought.

The auction was part of Yuga Labs’ ambition to develop Otherside, a crypto-based metaverse featuring the Bored Ape characters.

Like other crypto-based platforms such as Decentraland and Upland, Otherside will partition the geography into patches of virtual land called Otherdeeds, which will be sold to players as NFTs.

While the auction raised $253 million, the increased demand overloaded the Ethereum network, causing transaction costs known as gas fees to rise. Many consumers who spent less than $10 for an NFT were forced to pay tens of thousands of dollars in petrol costs. An unknown buyer paid $45,000 in transaction costs for a $5,800 NFT.

Yuga had announced the refund days in advance and cautioned consumers about possible phishing schemes imitating the company, which had been common in recent days.

Yuga used MultiSender to disperse the payments to decrease the possibility of fraud on the refund’s back end. Before receiving money, MultiSender does not need wallets to engage with or confirm a contract.

Gucci to Accept Crypto Payments at Select Stores

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Gucci, the iconic fashion house, will start accepting cryptocurrencies in certain U.S. outlets later this month, with plans to expand the service to additional North American locations this summer.

According to Vogue Business, in-store purchases will be performed using a QR code that consumers will get through email and scan with their crypto wallet. The businesses will take Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, Ethereum, Litecoin, Dogecoin, and Shiba Inu, among other digital currencies.

Wooster Street in New York, Rodeo Drive in Los Angeles, Miami Design District, Phipps Plaza in Atlanta, and The Shops at Crystals in Las Vegas are among the first to accept cryptocurrency.

Other high-end businesses, including Off-White, have already begun to take cryptocurrency.

Spend your crypto in Gucci style

Gucci’s latest step into Web3 is accepting bitcoin payments in-store. Gucci made its metaverse debut earlier this year when it paid an unknown sum for virtual land in the decentralized blockchain game The Sandbox, which it intends to use to create a virtual “Gucci Vault” for Gucci-themed NFTs.

The fashion icon is one of several well-known fashion and clothing brands that have entered Web3 to assert a position in the digital realm.

Dolce & Gabbana, Adidas, Nike, Vans, and Balenciaga are among the brands that have joined Gucci in this new world. These firms will also face off against crypto-native fashion houses like Digitalax, Blanksoles, DRESSX, and Red DAO, which have already established online communities around their brands.

The brand said it would give bitcoin and NFT education and training to its employees in advance of the program’s debut.

Gucci’s president and CEO, Marco Bizzarri, tells Vogue Business, “Our team is constantly eager to adopt new technologies when they can create a better experience for our clients.”

“Now that we have the ability to integrate cryptocurrencies into our payment system, it is a logical progression for those clients who want this choice.”

A one-of-a-kind art film sold for $25,000 in June makes it the first premium company to release an NFT. In addition to its Sandbox investment, it has published two more NFT projects and launched a Discord channel since then.

Stay Hydrated as Gatorade Is Coming to the Metaverse

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Stokely-Van Camp, the beverage business that has the rights to sell and manufacture Gatorade, might be looking at launching virtual sports beverages in the metaverse.

Stokely-Van Camp filed two applications for the word Gatorade and the sports drink’s “G”-shaped orange, black, and white logo to be used in connection with “virtual beverage products” and nonfungible tokens, or NFTs, according to records submitted to the United States Patent and Trademark Office, or USPTO, on Wednesday.

According to the documents, Gatorade is prepared to launch its branded items in the metaverse.

Now you got Gatorade in the metaverse

Gatorade’s name and symbol might also be utilized in digital media artwork, text, music, and video, according to Stokely-Van Camp. According to the USPTO’s current status, the application review process might take up to six months.

Gatorade is a popular sports drink that is consumed in more than 80 countries. It is now owned by PepsiCo, a global food conglomerate. In 2021, the corporation allegedly sold $2.6 billion worth of goods in convenience shops across the United States and dominated 46% of the global sports drink industry.

If Gatorade enters the metaverse, it will join several other large food and beverage companies, including Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, and Anheuser-Busch.

How To Make Money With The Metaverse As A Beginner In 2022
Stay Hydrated as Gatorade Is Coming to the Metaverse 2

Gatorade is a sports drink with a massive global market, with over 80 million people drinking it every day. They sold $2.1 billion worth of items at convenience shops across the United States in 2021.

They also have a 46 percent market share in the global sports drink industry. As businesses come to terms with the impact on their income, the metaverse is developing exponentially.

According to a recent Accenture poll, 71 percent of respondents believe the metaverse would have a beneficial influence on organizations.

In addition, 42% believe it will be transformative or groundbreaking for firms. The metaverse is still in its infancy, according to Accenture’s Chief Executive Officer Julie Sweet and Chief Technology Officer Paul Daugherty. As a result, businesses must take action.

Mark Zuckerberg is the founder and CEO of Facebook. He recently said that he intends to spend $10 billion on virtual reality software and hardware.

He feels that since the internet’s inception, the virtual reality world has presented the greatest potential for modern enterprises.

Coinbase Seems to Be the 1st Ever Bitcoin-Backed Loan Acquirer From Goldman Sachs

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The mysterious corporation that took out Wall Street’s first bitcoin-backed loan from Goldman Sachs has been exposed as Coinbase, America’s largest crypto exchange. Goldman Sachs controls $2.5 trillion in assets as of 2021.

Coinbase has taken out a Bitcoin-backed loan from Goldman Sachs, according to Bloomberg, as part of a strategy to strengthen ties between the crypto and trading worlds.

Coinbase Institutional Head Brett Tejpaul said, “Coinbase’s work with Goldman is a first step in the recognition of crypto as collateral, which deepens the bridge between the fiat and crypto economies.”

The loan’s cash amount was not disclosed, but it was backed by a portion of Coinbase’s total holdings of 4,487 Bitcoin, which are presently valued at almost $170 million. The loan includes a 24-hour risk monitoring system, as well as a requirement that Coinbase fills up its BTC collateral if prices fall too low.

Coinbase’s first bitcoin-backed loan

While Bitcoin and other crypto-backed loans are common in the crypto industry, particularly on DeFi protocols, they are uncommon in traditional banking, where crypto is seen as far too risky and unpredictable as collateral.

Asset management firm Arca indicated in a May 2 blog post that potential borrowers are looking for more such opportunities. It claimed that “[this loan] demonstrates institutions’ willingness to utilize new tools with traditional methods.”

Brian Armstrong on free speech

Meanwhile, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong has laid out his vision for decentralized social media networks that allow for free speech.

He told the Milken Institute on May 2 that Twitter, now owned by Elon Musk, had the opportunity to “essentially embrace adopting a decentralized protocol” that the network could function on.

“I believe that freedom in all forms is worth preserving, and a lot of crypto is about economic liberty.” Another version is the right to free speech.”

Armstrong argues that a decentralized social media network would enable content producers to choose their own moderation standards. Access to all material would be democratized rather than algorithmically determined.

This would prevent certain content streams on a platform from being stifled, allowing users to see whatever they want.

Blockchain Development and Its Future

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Blockchain first entered the world as the Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) supporting the earliest Bitcoin transactions; done by Satoshi Nakamoto themselves. 

Almost sixteen years have passed since then and blockchain development has come leaps and bounds, becoming the cornerstones of multiple markets and its own industry in its own right. The rise of blockchain developer companies, seemingly popping up out of every corner, shows the potential of blockchain technology. 

The crypto-sphere is too often focused on hype coins like Shiba Inu or speculative price analysis. However, the real value is being driven into blockchain development by some of the smartest individuals on the planet with trustless, permissionless, and decentralized values at the cornerstone of their coding. 

In this article, we will discuss Layer 1 vs Layer 2 blockchains, the major blockchain development companies, and what we can expect from blockchain in the near future. 

Blockchain Development Leaders 

Although there are dedicated Blockchain development companies making waves in the industry, more traditional technology companies, such as Microsoft, are also active in the space. In September of 2021, it was declared that Microsoft is shutting its Azure blockchain down due to declining interest in the product and Blockchain-as-a-Service (BaaS).

Microsoft gave their existing clients a converting solution through ConSensys. 

One of the leading blockchain companies is Chainalysis, a company focused on building trust in blockchains through data. Their clients are not exclusive to Barclays, Commonwealth Bank, and Bitpay; their services monitor over $400bn worth of crypto assets every month. 

Other blockchain development leaders are quickly finding out the unique problems blockchain technology solves, the efficiencies they create, and the services they care for which we once thought were riddled where middlemen.

For example, short-term decentralized car rental systems have been created on the blockchain, which promotes peer-to-peer rental systems without a middleman. 

Lastly, one of if not the biggest companies embroidering blockchain technology is IBM, aiming to bring hyperledger to their client’s businesses. IBM has invested over $200m in blockchain development and is constantly hiring talented blockchain developers to join their company. 

Looking forward

As blockchain development continues to be the spearhead of the crypto community, many wonder what’s next? Many blockchain development companies will focus on two main aspects:● Blockchain as a service (BaaS)

BaaS is the bread and butter for blockchain developer companies, providing blockchain solutions for others wishing to build or use their own apps or smart contracts. BaaS often consists of basic services which the clients then build on top of; granting them a strong foundation on which they build their concept on. 

For example, companies will utilize BaaS companies to help keep their data safe, immutable, and private by using blockchain technology. It is a win-win solution, as customers are more willing to trust a service, knowing it is built on top of open-source smart contracts, instead of a centralized authority. ● Layer 1s Vs Layer 2 Blockchains (L1 VS L2)

With greater adoption already here and more projected in the future, Layer 1 blockchains, such as Ethereum, are all struggling with the biggest problem: Scalability.

Step in Layer 2 blockchains. Layer 2 protocols or frameworks are built on top of the existing chain to solve scalability and speed issues. A great example is Polygon, built on top of the Ethereum chain. 

Once Layer 2 is adopted, much of the grunt-work can be loaded off Layer 1 whilst keeping the security that comes from the chosen consensus mechanism. Adding a second layer is often called an off-chain solution to the problems faced by major L1s. 

These Layer 2 can now focus on speed and scalability whilst they benefit from the security of the L1. A great example is the Polygon Network aimed at helping the Ethereum blockchain scale. One of the greatest benefits of Polygon is the extremely cheap transaction fees compared to Ethereum, whilst utilizing the safety of Ethereum validations. Polygon transactions are often less than $0.01 compared to Ethereum’s $15 average.

On top of this, Ethereum can manage around 14 transactions per second, compared to Polygon’s ability to handle 65,000 transactions per second. 

Further, in the future, we are likely to see even greater development and adoption of L2 solutions to combat the life-long issues that L1 blockchains have suffered. 

Conclusion

Blockchain development is still in its infancy, with some of the biggest blockchains and blockchain development companies yet to even exist. It is an extremely exciting space; one that we hope continues to flourish. 

Only time will tell whether the promises made by large Blockchain developer companies will come true and mass adoption will occur. 

Here’s how Solana bit more than it could chew to cause an outage

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After an “insane quantity of data” invaded the proof-of-stake chain, pushing validators out of consensus and grinding still block production, Solana stakeholders hurried to put the network back together Saturday night.

Bots flooded Candy Machine, a popular NFT minting tool, earlier Saturday, causing an unusual flood of inbound traffic: four million transaction proposals and 100 gigabits of data per second — a network record, according to one source at the Solana Foundation.

Screenshot 13

This swarm drove validators out of an agreement for unknown reasons. At 4:32 p.m. EST, block production became impossible, and the network fell black. Validators rebooted the cluster at slot 131973970 by 11:00 p.m. EST, coordinating using Solana’s Discord channels and a Google doc generated by one of the validators.

Anatoly Yakovenko, a co-founder who was away for much of the squabble, lauded the validator community for spearheading mainnet recovery. On Saturday, he was chastised on Twitter for reportedly going “MIA” amid a network outage.

Solana outage caused by a spike in transaction volume

Unlike the 17-hour downtime in September, the hard fork restart on Saturday did not result in new-and-improved code filling throughout the validators. They just resumed where the network had left off seven hours before.

Validators debated whether to write code that would temporarily halt Candy Machine transactions as they prepared for the restart. Some in the Discord questioned whether such a move amounted to censorship. Regardless, it would only work if two-thirds of validators agreed to participate. On Saturday night, it appeared that few did.

Solana, a proof-of-stake blockchain, claimed on Twitter that it successfully completed a cluster restart at around 11 p.m. ET on Saturday, following an approximately seven-hour downtime when the network failed to establish an agreement.

Phantom wallet and decentralized exchange are two services provided by the Solana ecosystem. As RPC node providers plodded back up, Mango Markets battled to get back on its feet.

The interruption caused a bloodbath in SOL markets, which lasted only a few minutes. According to CoinGecko, SOL token hit a 24-hour low of $83.13 roughly three hours into the outage before rebounding back above $89 again.

Engineers were still looking into why the network couldn’t recover from the transaction overload that triggered the outage, according to the Twitter message.

Hydra brings the fun back in app building

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Hydra is a set of technologies meant to help Cardano (ADA), the world’s biggest proof-of-stake (PoS) system and prominent smart contract platform, handle scalability and security challenges.

An unknown Crypto Twitter user asked IOG’s Matthias Benkort (@ KtorZ_) about the intricacies of Hydra’s architecture after the discussion about the newest enhancements to the Cardano (ADA) blockchain and its infrastructure.

Screenshot 12

Mr. Benkort was asked about Cardano’s first-ever L2 solution’s modular design, which allows numerous decentralized applications (dApps) to be deployed to its infrastructure.  This L2 solution will be ready to onboard dApps with various architectures utilizing its different aspects (“Heads”) in a Lego-like way, according to the creator.

In addition, the actual design of Hydra and the timeline for its development will be determined by community demands; several parts of the fundamental “Head” are already entirely up to the community.

Recap on Hydra

Hydra is moving closer to testnet, according to Haskell Dev Matthias Benkort, who tweeted in December 2021. This is a Layer-2 blockchain solution that aims to scale the bigger Cardano blockchain by cutting latency and increasing transaction throughput (TPS).

Now, fast forward to the present, and it appears like a final version will be available soon. With the arrival of this L2 solution, users will have access to a scalable solution that will boost throughput, remove latency, incur low to no costs, and substantially reduce storage requirements.

This will be performed through an isomorphic scaling method, which functions by conducting transactions off the main chain while retaining the main chain as a secure settlement layer.

Isomorphic state channels, or heads, provide access to Cardano features such as native assets, non-fungible tokens (NFTs), and Plutus scripting. As a result, users benefit from the layer-1 blockchain’s benefits and security while functioning within a “sharded head,” of which there will be many. Benkort further stated,

“These are state channels that are capable of expediently reusing the exact state representation of the underlying ledger and, hence, inherit the ledger’s scripting system as is.”

In theory, when more heads are added to the network, it will become faster. At the time of writing, Cardano (ADA) was priced at $0.782133 and had plunged by 3.2% over the last 24 hours.

ApeCoin Is Trading at an All-Time High Ahead of the Metaverse Launch

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ApeCoin, developed by Yuga Labs, is trading at all-time highs ahead of Saturday’s Otherside NFT auction. The NFTs are thought to represent land parcels for the Otherside Metaverse.

The subsequent major development in the universe of the Bored Ape Yacht Club is just around the corner.

Participants can take part in the first mint for Otherside, a new Metaverse being launched by Bored Ape Yacht Club founder Yuga Labs, can join today if they pre-registered on somethingisbrewing.xyz before April 1st. The NFTs represent Otherdeeds, 55k plots of land that will be available for sale.

The Otherside metaverse and apecoin

ApeCoin’s price has shown fluctuations ever since its debut on March 17th. It dropped to an all-time low of $6.21 shortly after its introduction but swiftly recovered. ApeCoin has marked new all-time highs since April 21 and is currently trading at $22.

ApeCoin has recently risen above rival Metaverse coins like Decentraland’s MANA and The Sandbox’s SAND. APE has a market capitalization of about $5.7 billion, making it the 28th most valuable cryptocurrency.

Yuga Labs NFTs are also selling at record values on OpenSea, in addition to ApeCoin’s new highs. The floor price of Bored Apes has risen by 40% in the last 30 days to approximately 140 ETH.

Mutant Apes has suffered a more severe price hike, with the most affordable specimens now costing 37.5 ETH, up 70% from a month ago.

The upcoming Otherside NFT mint is responsible for much of ApeCoin’s recent surge. There is talk that a special NFT marketplace will launch simultaneously as the NFT mint, allowing for exclusive trade of the new NFTs.

Some have claimed that requiring know-your-customer identification for individuals pre-registered for the NFT drop would only have been essential if users expected to benefit by selling NFTs directly through Yuga Labs’ platform.

The land known as the Otherdeeds will be for sale. For 305 APE per plot, each piece of land will be accessible. For customers who have completed KYC, a total of 55k land plots will be available for purchase.

Instead of going to the Dutch auction, the team chose to sell Otherdeeds for 305 ApeCoin. The researchers predicted that the Dutch auctions would fail to stop the gas wars in these hotly contested mints.

As a result, instead of Dutch auctions, sales will occur in waves. One KYC’d wallet may only mint 2 Otherdeeds in every wave. The crew will begin wave two once the gas price has stabilized.

Optimism is optimistic about new governance structure

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The Ethereum scaling startup Optimism announced on Tuesday that it will transition to a new governance structure that will be fueled in part by a dedicated token.

The information was revealed in a Twitter announcement thread. The Optimism Collective, which is made up of two parts: a “Token House” and a “Citizens House,” is at the centre of the initiative.

Screenshot 9

According to the team’s release, the Citizens’ House will oversee public goods funding, generating a flywheel of protocol development, while the Token House will focus on token development “Upgrades to protocol, project incentives, and more It promotes development.” The Token House’s core is the OP governance token.

Multiple airdrops by Optimism

The Ethereum scaling startup also claimed the following: “There isn’t just one airdrop here. There will be a large number of airdrops.” According to the thread, which includes a post outlining eligibility for the airdrop as well as a link to allocations, the airdrop is “coming in Q2.” The initial airdrop date will be announced soon.

The foundation stated that a portion of the OP allotment will be distributed in successive waves to members of the business and Ethereum communities.

Airdrop #1

The first user airdrop will release 5% of the total supply of OP tokens. This airdrop is intended for those who:

  • Behave in positive-sum ways.
  • Contribute actively to their communities.
  • Have been priced out of Ethereum.

However, it has been stated that the addresses and quantities were selected to both reward blockchain users and encourage core Ethereum users to the OP family.

Future airdrops (#2, 3, …)

Furthermore, a portion of the OP token supply will be retained in reserve for future user airdrops, amounting to 14% of the total supply. Because airdrops can be manipulated, the foundation will be in charge of determining airdrop metrics as fairly as feasible.

However, the airdrops are intended to be distributed to addresses that have a positive impact on the Optimism community.

The news comes only days after social media boffins discovered an Optimism-related price page on cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase, stoking rumors about a token. The Collective’s course will be guided by a freshly founded foundation at first. Two of the founders of Optimism are among the group’s leadership.

Meta Plans to Open Physical Metaverse Store in San Francisco

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Meta, the parent company of social networking giant Facebook, will construct a retail store in the San Francisco Peninsula that will offer virtual reality devices encompassed in its virtual space.

The team said on Monday that a retail location in Burlingame, California, will open on May 9 to provide interactive demos for the company’s hardware products, which include virtual reality headsets, video communications displays, and smart eyewear.

The store, which will be on the company’s campus (the company’s offices are in Menlo Park), will include a wall-to-wall curved LED screen that will show what consumers view when they wear their headsets.

Image of the Meta Store

Meta to provide hands-on experience to its customers

“The Meta Store is going to help people make that connection to how our products can be the gateway to the metaverse in the future. We’re not selling the metaverse in our store, but hopefully people will come in and walk out knowing a little bit more about how our products will help connect them to it.”

Martin Gilliard, Head of Store

The Store features a compact footprint for an engaging experience, at around 1,550 square feet. They also wanted to open the first Store near Reality Labs’ headquarters, where they were working to construct the metaverse.

Martin Gilliard, Store Director also said that having the shop in Burlingame allows them to explore more and maintain the consumer experience at the forefront of their growth. He also said that the key points that they discover at the store will help them to establish a retail strategy in the future.

The final objective with the Store is to demonstrate what is now feasible with their products while also providing a look into the future as the metaverse comes to life – ideally demystifying the notion in the process.

In October 2021, Facebook rebranded, stating that its emphasis was moving beyond social media at the moment and subsequently introducing its Metaverse ambition for linking online social interactions with the actual world.

Despite the fact that software companies such as Apple have physical locations throughout the world, Facebook’s 2.9 billion members have not been able to visit one since the business was created in 2004.

Many companies are buying virtual properties in the virtual world, with electronics giant Samsung opening a metaverse store in the blockchain-powered realm of Decentraland in January.

According to reports, large stores such as Walmart are also planning to enter the realm.