I’m Juan Galt, I’ve been a journalist and researcher in the crypto space for about 4 years now. I’m currently working for The Dollar Vigilante and we’ve decided to cover Maidsafe for our next newsletter.
I’ve gotten in contact with the PR team and we’ll be doing an interview over the next few days, but I wanted to throw some questions at the community here and explore some of these topics. From business development and growth strategy to the tech side of things.
Shall we? Here’s some important questions to start off with.
My understanding of Maidsafe before this round of research was that it aims to use sharded encrypted redundant storage of data to create a secure and decentralized internet. Is this still the case and what is the state of development as far as that kind of data storage?
Maidsafe’s token is currently ontop of OMNI onto of Bitcoin. From what I’ve read, it will be swaped for another one called Safecoin at some point in a future upgrade. Does the team/community have any leads or conclusions as to what blockchain they will use for Safecoin, or do they intend to build their own?
Also, from what I gather, the current Maidsafe network is wholly on testnet. and that’s ok. I understand that ETA’s in software are annoying and problematic. It’ll be ready when it is ready ,yes …
But. I’m curious. What are your predictions or estimates about when Maidsafe will go mainet?
-Last but not least, are there any big news, updates, events or anything exciting coming up in the short term that is news worthy or important to users, investors and speculators?
-[EDIT] Another important questions which I forgot to ask is about the domain resolving process / system. If Maidsafe is decentralized and has no blockchain, how then does this system work?
Are there any network topology maps I can look at? tnx.
Thank you very much for your time. I’ll engage you folk in the comments.
Hi Juan, glad to hear about these plans. I’m sure others will have more elaborate
answers but here are my two cents:
yes, this is still the case. You can watch a video of how this process works here:
MaidSafeCoin will be swapped 1:1 for SafeCoin when the network goes live. The network does not use any blockchain at all, it is a very different animal. To me this is the most appealing aspect actually. Blockchains are slow, don’t scale well and lack anonymity.
Yes, currently testnets and alpha-networks. Beta is not too far away and my (optimistic) guess
is that the full network will launch at the end of this year. You can check the dev roadmap here: https://maidsafe.net/roadmap_dev.html
BambooGarden has done a pretty good job there, so I’ll just chip in for the last couple of questions…
Predictions are never right unless they’re vague, so I’d guess we’ll get testsafecoin before the end of this year. Really hard to even stab at how long it might take to go to real safecoin from there, but testsafecoin would be huge news and would blow all the crypto’s out of the water. Instant, feeless, scalable, no PoW, decentralised farming, private by default (no ledger) and secure. All eyes will be on testsafecoin when it materialises.
RE the final question, yes! The Maidsafe team are currently iterating through Mutable Data APIs which is pretty huge for developers. This data type will enable all kinds of Apps to start launching their test versions. The biggest of the side projects (Project Decorum raised $500k in ICO last year) is a social networking site that is also crammed full of interesting and clever innovations for hosting and managing decentralised conversations. Quite a few of us nerdy anarchist types are very excited to see how the ‘web-of-trust’ works and evolves through decorum test versions (Decorum won’t be the real name, but Harmen wants to keep that secret until he has the SAFE domain locked up). The token decorum burns for endorsements (Clikes) also has lots of interesting properties and could appear before testsafecoin, so that would also be fascinating.
So yeah, basically in the short term it is about to get very interesting, but more for devs and speculators than for users just yet I reckon.
Hey! ty for the response. Could you give me a link to white papers or high level discussions as to what the mutable api is and why it is so interesting? not really sure what is is from the name.
ok, interesting, ill def need to learn more about this, since there’s essential questions like how you control spam and prevent double spends. Could you link me to any discussion on the topic or white papers?
Also, what’s the stage of development of this non payment system?
Another important questions which I forgot to ask is about the domain resolving process / system. If Maidsafe is decentralized and has no blockchain, how then does this system work?
Are there any network topology maps I can look at? tnx.
If you’ve not read it yet, see @JPL’s excellent post which he’s keeping up to date:
Given your blockchain knowledge, try this:
And the Wiki for getting answers to many immediate questions (includes a FAQ) though it is not entirely up to date (eg mutable data is relatively new):
Oh hey. Well, I need official ish sources. I also only half remember our conversations about it. Specially the monetary policy side. Of which I’m getting a lot of new concepts. And organizations pivot. So it needed to be asked.
Hi Juan,
Another source for general data is the SAFE Network Wiki. Could be a bit more up-to-date, but it’s good for getting the feel of the overall design of the network.
And organically start clicking on links whenever you find a specific doubt when you encounter them while you read it.
The project covers many user cases.
Otherwise it can be a daunting task.
Btw, as everyone told you already, I will repeat just in case:
SAFENETWORK (and by extension it’s currency SafeCoin) ARE NOT BASED ON BLOCKCHAIN.
The project is older than Bitcoin and their way of solving the bizantine generals problems and the double spending is completely novel.
It is not even a different animal, taxonomically it is like comparing different biological kingdoms. I would go as far as comparing silicon based life to carbon based life, it is THAT apart from Blockchains.
Btw these articles on MaidSafe published by TechCrunch might give you a broader picture:
There are some videos that explain a bit deeper, but it can be too technical.
Google TechTalks 2006 about MaidSafe:
I’m seeing that your publication is more financial than tech.
The Dollar Vigilante:
“Therefore our analysts can offer the best advice on how to protect your current assets and standard of living. We can also help you grow those assets, too.”
I would like to offer that the Safenet could (when completely developed) very well mitigate the effects of ransomware, and, given the current worldwide attention to the Wannacry virus, any discussions relating to solving this growing problem would undoubtedly turn to those technologies fighting it. Which, IMO, will include and elevate Maidsafe, Safecoin as a viable solution for some and interesting investment for many.
Have a look and join this discussion.
Of course we are all excited to read your newsletter.
I’m curious. What are your predictions or estimates about when Maidsafe will go mainet?
Instant, feeless, scalable, no PoW, decentralised farming, private by default (no ledger) and secure. All eyes will be on testsafecoin when it materialises.
