Content editor: Yao Erliu
Content collation: Yao Erliu
What is the social section
The social layer uses the decentralization, transparency and security of blockchain to provide users with a safer, more privacy-protected and fair social experience. These platforms allow users to fully control their own data, participate in decentralized governance, ensure data transparency and tamper-proof, and improve security through decentralized identity authentication.
The social sector is currently divided into four different types: social token platform, decentralized identity authentication, social finance platform and hybrid architecture platform.
Social token platform: It includes the functions of content creation and decentralized storage of user data. The common feature of this type of project is that it uses tokens as incentives to promote data generation by the community and creators, so as to enhance and improve the value of content, user privacy and data controllability.
$CYBER （Cyber Connect）
Mirorr
Identity authentication platform: used to collect user information, record user data and identity while ensuring data security and privacy through network activity and collection of various information, reduce dependence on third-party identity authentication, and be used as real user information of the task platform.
$GAL （Galex）
Social finance platform: Combining social and financial functions, users conduct financial transactions and investments through social interactions, creating a new economic model.
$FRIEND （Friend.tech）
$TIP（TipCoin）
Hybrid architecture platform: adopts a hybrid architecture of on-chain and off-chain, user identity and keys are processed on-chain, and content storage and dissemination are carried out off-chain, achieving efficient and secure social interaction.
Farcaster
friend.tech’s popularity in the PWA mobile stack has also been recognized by the market, but there is a problem: not everyone has enough ETH to pay for their favorite KOL.
This year, another attractive crypto social rise is Lens, a web3 social graph protocol focused on data portability, where users can enjoy a range of applications supported by Lens, such as Orb, Hey, Tape, etc.
Farcaster decentralized social platform
Farcaster is a decentralized social network that enables developers to build novel social networks. It is an open protocol that can support many clients, just like email. Users will always be free to move their social identities between applications, and developers will always be free to build applications with new features on the network.
Farcaster account creation is managed on Optimism L2, so the registration fee is very “wallet-friendly.” Like Lens, Farcaster is a protocol that supports decentralized applications, and users can use Farcaster in many different ways.
Of course, this decentralized approach to portability is a cornerstone of Farcaster’s design, as it strengthens user control over their data (in stark contrast to the data silos of web2 platforms) and facilitates permissionless application development (vs. centralized “walled” app stores).
Farcaster Hybrid Architecture
Farcaster has a hybrid architecture that can store identities on-chain and data off-chain, and verify user information data through a hybrid contract architecture on-chain and off-chain. Key information such as user identities and keys are processed on-chain, and storage, verification, and dissemination of content are processed off-chain.
On-chain storage verification
Farcaster's on-chain system is implemented as a contract on the OP mainnet. Operations are performed on the chain only when security and consistency are critical. The use of on-chain operations is kept to a minimum to reduce costs and improve performance.
On-chain data verification and storage are built through Opitmism’s OP STARK, which mainly configures clear agreements:
Identity Registry - Create New Account
Storage Registry - Rent storage space to accounts
Key Registry - Accounts and Deletion Key Registry
ID card registration office
IdRegistry allows users to register, transfer, and recover Farcaster accounts. Accounts are identified by a unique number (fid) which is assigned to an Ethereum address upon registration. An Ethereum address can only have one account at a time, although it can freely transfer it to other accounts. It can also specify a recovery address to which the account can be transferred at any time.
Storage Registry
The Storage Registry allows accounts to rent storage space by paying in Ethereum. Storage prices are set by administrators in USD and converted to ETH using Chainlink oracles. Prices rise or fall based on supply and demand.
Key Registry
The Key Registry allows accounts to issue keys to applications so that they can publish messages on their behalf. Keys can be added or removed at any time. To add a key, an account must submit the public key of an EdDSA key pair along with a requester signature. The requester can be the account itself, or an application that wants to act on its behalf.
Off-chain storage verification
Farcaster's off-chain system is a peer-to-peer server network called Hub that stores user data. Most user operations are performed off-chain.
Farcaster Hub is a distributed network of servers used to store and verify Farcaster data. By running specialized software, a computer can become a Farcaster Hub, and these hubs will synchronize on-chain and off-chain data from Ethereum and other hubs. Each hub stores a copy of all Farcaster data and provides data access through an API
The Hub first synchronizes data from the Farcaster contract on the Optimism blockchain.
Farcaster Hub is a distributed server network used to store and verify Farcaster data, supporting reading, writing and storing data, and ensuring the validity and storage order of messages through signature verification and conflict resolution mechanisms. The hub uses gossip protocol and differential synchronization to ensure data consistency between hubs, has eventual consistency characteristics, allows recovery after disconnection, and monitors and scores peer behavior through a peer rating system to ensure the reliability and performance of the hub.
Farcaster data
The launch of Project Frames on Farcaster coincides with significant growth in Farcaster’s daily active users (DAU), underscoring the far-reaching impact of this innovative feature. You can see from this Dune Analytics Dashboard that DAUs skyrocketed to over 10,000 in the days since Frames launched.
The future of Frames is full of promise, and social interactions will become more dynamic and engaging than ever before. With continued innovation and development, we can expect Frames to evolve into an even more immersive and interactive experience within the Farcaster ecosystem. From seamlessly integrated gaming experiences to streamlined shopping and interactive storytelling, Frames is the key to unlocking a new era of social media interactions.
Different from other projects
Farcaster's advantage is that it has attracted and retained a large number of active Crypto native users, forming a high-quality community. Through openness and developability, the platform allows developers and communities to freely create and issue tokens to promote innovation. Farcaster provides users with autonomous control, meets the common needs of creators, developers and ordinary users, and does not rely on complex financial incentive models. These advantages combined make Farcaster a diversified and high-quality decentralized social platform, which promotes high user participation and activity.
Farcaster also launched a function for the community to issue tokens independently, which also brought the unique function of public links in smart contract token issuance into the project. Farcaster not only completed the underlying transformation of social networking, but also provided a new way of issuing assets, which completely changed the attributes of "Fi" in traditional SocialFi. It did not design a complex financial structure for itself, but provided this openness to the community and developers, becoming a launch platform for community tokens, community culture and community ecology.
Investor lineup
Farcaster has completed two financing events since its launch, with a total financing amount of up to US$180 million. At the same time, it obtained a valuation model of up to US$1 billion in the latest round of financing.
The first financing event occurred on July 13, 2022, completing a $30 million seed round of financing led by a16z, with participation from Coinbase Ventures, Multicoin Capital, Standard Crypto, 1confirmation, Archetype, Scalar Capital, Ribbit Capital, Canonical Crypto, Volt Capital, A.Capital, Chapter One, First Round Capital, Offline Ventures, Todd and Rahul's Angel Fund, Haystack, Proof Group, Floodgate, Ansa Capital, Mischief, Balaji Srinivasan, Elad Gil, Punk 6529, and Raymond Tonsing.
The second financing event occurred on May 21, 2024, when it completed a $150 million Series A financing round with a valuation of $1 billion, led by Paradigm, with participating investors including a16z, Union Square Ventures, Standard Crypto, Haun Ventures, and Variant Fund.
Plate environment
Currently in the social sector, the one with the highest market value may be Cyber Connect. Cyber is a 2-layer blockchain designed specifically for graph social networks. It integrates users' data islands with isolated information in the blockchain through infrastructure.
But it is worth noting that there is currently no project in the social sector with a valuation of up to US$1 billion in the current market. Even CYBER, which currently has the highest market value in the social sector, has a diluted market value of only US$890 million. This makes Farcaster very competitive when it goes online.
At the same time, the reason why Farcaster was able to obtain such a high level of financing is, on the one hand, due to its outstanding performance in data. In an era when the autonomous control of accounts is increasingly valued, especially those who have experienced Twitter suspending their accounts, can have a deeper understanding of the meaning of decentralization and autonomous control.
On the other hand, the new gameplay of Farcaster is very "watchable".
The characteristics of social products are usually based on visual elements. Any content (good/junk) will be presented to users very intuitively. Therefore, the negative impact of spam in social is more serious than the spam code on the smart contract network.
