The selected teams will benefit from a comprehensive support package, including technical guidance, funding opportunities, and access to NEAR and Delphi’s expert networks. Each team will also receive $50,000 in compute credits from Aethir, the accelerator program’s premier compute partner. These credits will ensure that every team has the necessary computational resources to develop and deploy resource-intensive AI models—and focus on building without being constrained by infrastructure limitations.

Beginning October 15 and running through early December, NEAR Foundation and Delphi Labs have selected the following cohort teams:

• Hyperspace: Hyperspace is building a decentralized, peer-to-peer AI network. Their mission is to create a unified platform for AI interactions through a “generative browser” serving as a unified interface for AI-powered web interactions.
  • Selection notes: Hyperspace has demonstrated traction with over 7,000 unique nodes in their P2P network and a robust product suite, most recently launching Play, a generative browser agent.
• Almanak: Almanak is an end-to-end platform to build, test, train, optimize, and deploy agents for DeFi. Their mission is to democratize access to sophisticated financial strategies through the use of AI agents.
  • Selection notes: Almanak’s team has spent the last two years building a platform that uses agent-based simulations to optimize on-chain strategies. Their agents are already managing sizable AUM for institutional partners, demonstrating strong traction and expertise in their domain.
• Questflow: Building a next-generation AI agent economy, Questflow is developing a decentralized network that orchestrates multi-agent AI automation. Users can dispatch incentives to both AI and human workers, creating a collaborative environment for autonomous and human-assisted processes.
  • Selection notes: Questflow aims to dominate the AI agentic workflow market, particularly in SEO. Their gamified reward system and strong focus on winning specific verticals make them a standout candidate for advancing AI automation workflows.
• Q Star Labs: Q Star Labs is developing a decentralized generative AI protocol for creating interactive, autonomous AI influencers at scale. Their Reinforcement Learning-based algorithm, Q STAR, is designed for long-term strategic planning to optimize AI content generation and engagement.
  • Selection notes: The Q Star Labs team has a unique blend of expertise in AI, crypto, and finance, launching AI influencers that have organically grown to over 27,000 followers.
• ZettaBlock: ZettaBlock is laying the groundwork for open and trustless AI development through a decentralized platform that provides developers with the infrastructure needed to unify on-chain and off-chain data. By offering modular, adaptable data solutions, ZettaBlock empowers the AI economy with the tools needed to integrate both historical and real-time data from multiple sources.
  • Selection notes: ZettaBlock’s leadership in both AI and data infrastructure makes them a pivotal player in the future of decentralized AI. They’re already supporting major protocols like EigenLayer and Chainlink. Their vision for a unified AI data platform aligns perfectly with NEAR Foundation and Delphi’s mission to foster open and scalable AI infrastructure that developers can rely on.
• Magic: Magic is redefining how private data is used in AI. Their decentralized platform allows companies and developers to train AI models using private data, all while preserving the integrity and privacy of the underlying information. This is achieved through an innovative stack of privacy protocols and decentralized coordination.
  • Selection notes: Magic is tackling one of the toughest challenges in AI—privacy-preserving data access. Their team, with deep roots at Stanford AI Lab, has developed unique methods to keep data secure while enabling AI innovation at scale. Their ability to unlock private data for developers, without compromising security, makes Magic an essential piece of the decentralized AI puzzle.
• dFusion: dFusion is building a platform to solve one of AI’s biggest hurdles: reliable data quality. They’re focused on creating a consensus-driven framework that curates and validates high-quality data, ensuring that AI models are trained on information that is accurate, corroborated, and trustworthy.
  • Selection notes: dFusion’s commitment to consensus-based knowledge curation sets them apart from other players in the data space. By focusing on data integrity and consensus, they’re creating a unique foundation for AI development—one that ensures reliability and transparency. Their work opens up new opportunities for building AI applications that need trustworthy data, which is critical as decentralized AI continues to evolve.
• Peri Labs: Peri Labs is building an open marketplace leveraging underutilized computational resources across billions of consumer devices to power optimized AI models. The Peri Protocol abstracts the complexity of diverse hardware ecosystems, enabling seamless AI model deployment at scale.
  • Selection notes: Peri Labs differentiates itself with a focus on edge compute, uniquely integrating idle resources from consumer-grade devices to run AI models effectively. Their emphasis on model compression, optimization, and decentralized inference positions them as pioneers in making edge AI truly scalable, providing an efficient, privacy-preserving alternative to centralized cloud solutions.

In addition to the resources above, the NEAR x Delphi AI Accelerator Program includes some more unique opportunities for participants:

• Industry-leading speakers: Participants will hear from founders, investors, and experts from AI and Web3, providing insights into current trends and future opportunities. 

• IRL Founder Retreat: An in-person retreat week in New York City for networking, collaboration, and team-building.
• Closing Demo Day: The program will conclude with a Demo Day in early December, showcasing participating teams to our extensive investor network.

NEAR is a leading blockchain platform designed to accelerate the development of decentralized applications with a focus on usability and scalability. Delphi Labs is a research and development firm that specializes in Web3 and DeFi. 

NEAR and Delphi Labs share the common strategic vision of a user-owned AI ecosystem, built on Web3 rails, that provides genuinely better alternatives to developers and users than the prevailing model of centralized AI controlled by big tech companies and governments. The goal is to maximize the benefits of AI for people and communities—and minimize the potential risks—by putting the power of AI where it belongs: in the hands of users. 

The NEAR ecosystem is quickly becoming the go-to home for decentralized, User-Owned AI, and this new AI Accelerator Program with Delphi Labs is a critical step toward integrating projects with significant potential into that ecosystem, setting the stage for the next generation of AI-powered decentralized apps.

NEAR’s first AI x Web3 incubator cohort, which ran from June to August 2024, saw participants achieve significant early milestones while contributing essential pieces to the growing User-Owned AI stack. These milestones include: Hyperbolic hosting the latest open source AI models, including Llama 3.1 405B; Mizu launching their beta platform and attracting 20K users in the first week; and Pond launching their first GNN model for wallet predictions and achieving a 20% prediction rate. The teams have built on the momentum from the incubator to attract serious seed funding interest, collectively raising $26M, with Hyperbolic successfully closing a $7M round.

Stay tuned for details on the cohort’s Demo Day, which will take place on December 14. Teams with a strong vision for decentralized AI applications and infrastructure are encouraged to apply for the next accelerator program cohort to take place early next year.

The post NEAR Foundation and Delphi Labs Partner to Launch New AI Accelerator appeared first on NEAR Protocol.

A New Stage in NEAR Ecosystem Decentralization

As the NEAR ecosystem continues its journey towards full decentralization, the IC invites experienced infrastructure vendors, whether already within or new to the NEAR ecosystem, to participate in maintaining and enhancing essential services. This initiative not only ensures that critical infrastructure remains operational, but also opens up funding opportunities for providers who can bring innovative solutions and cost-effective strategies to the table.

Available RFPs:

1. NEAR Lake Maintenance and Development: Oversee the continued operation and improvement of NEAR Lake, the data availability layer crucial for developers and applications.
2. Kit Wallet API Support: Manage and enhance the API services that power Kit Wallet, facilitating seamless transactions and user interactions.
3. BigQuery Data Services: Maintain and optimize the BigQuery datasets, enabling efficient data analysis and insights for developers and stakeholders.
4. NEAR.org RPC Services: Ensure the reliability and performance of the Remote Procedure Call (RPC) services vital for communication between clients and the NEAR blockchain.

Note: The first three RFPs are interconnected, as Kit Wallet API and BigQuery depend on NEAR Lake. Providers are encouraged to consider bidding on these together to ensure seamless integration and service continuity.

Access all RFPs and submission details on the NEAR Infrastructure Committee Portal.

Why This Matters

• For NEAR Ecosystem: Maintaining critical infrastructure is essential for the NEAR network’s reliability and growth. This initiative ensures that these services remain uninterrupted and continue to support the ecosystem effectively.
• For Infrastructure Providers: An open bidding process offers a fair opportunity to secure funding and contribute significantly to NEAR infrastructure, leveraging your expertise to drive innovation.
• For Developers and Users: A robust and decentralized infrastructure means better performance, reliability, and new opportunities for engagement within the NEAR ecosystem.

About the Infrastructure Committee and the Proposal Process

The NEAR Infrastructure Committee is committed to transparency and decentralization in funding. The proposal process is conducted openly through the IC’s on-chain portal, ensuring fair evaluation and selection of candidates. Here’s how it works:

1. Submission: Interested providers submit their proposals via the IC’s on-chain portal. Applications will be open for a two-week period starting September 24 and ending on October 8.
2. Evaluation: The IC reviews proposals based on technical expertise, proposed budgets, and cost-reduction strategies aligned with current usage statistics. Evaluations will be completed within one week after the submission period ends.
3. Selection: Successful candidates will be awarded contracts to manage and develop critical infrastructure components.

Please note: The IC expects vendors to propose reasonable budgets rather than posting expected budgets up front. It is up to the infrastructure partners to calculate funding based on usage and pricing. Accurate pricing will help determine viable candidates. While the committee  may have potential providers in mind, this is an open bidding process that will fairly consider all qualified applicants.

Stay Connected and Informed

For updates and more information about the Infrastructure Committee and the RFP process, explore the following resources:

• Pagoda Wind-Down and Spin-Out: Ecosystem Update
• Future of Pagoda Services: Read More
• About the Infrastructure Committee: NEAR Blog
• NEAR Infrastructure Committee Portal: Proposals and RFPs

Call to Action: Make a Bid

If you are an infrastructure provider with the expertise to manage and enhance critical NEAR services, the IC encourages you to review the RFPs and submit your proposal. This is your opportunity to contribute to the future of decentralized infrastructure on NEAR.

Submit your proposal today via the NEAR Infrastructure Committee Portal.

Help the IC spread the word! Share this announcement with any stakeholders or organizations that might be interested in this opportunity.

The post RFPs Now Open to Maintain Critical Infrastructure on NEAR appeared first on NEAR Protocol.

The launch of stateless validation in August 2024 marks an important milestone for NEAR Protocol, but it is by no means the end state of the protocol. There is still a lot of ambitious work to be done.

In less than four years since launching mainnet, the NEAR network has over 110 million users – a great achievement for the ecosystem. But the goal for NEAR is to onboard a billion people to the User-Owned Internet. Achieving such widespread usage will require an even more scalable, performant, secure, and fast protocol. The Near One team is already working to make improvements to Nightshade 2.0 and has started planning the next round of advancements. In this post, we describe what the protocol roadmap looks like for the rest of 2024 and into next year.

First of all, while the stateless validation launch is a major change to the protocol, it does not immediately improve the performance of mainnet. This is because we intentionally keep the upgrade as simple as possible to avoid adding more complexity into the already humongous upgrade. To fully reap the benefits of the new design, there are a number of improvements on top of the release that we will work on for the rest of 2024 following the August launch:

• Optimization of state witness size. In the current implementation, state witness size could be quite large, primarily due to the size of contract code included in a state witness. Optimization of state witness size will reduce the likelihood of a chunk hitting the size limit, thereby improving transaction throughput.
• Reduce gas cost for storage operations. One of the key benefits of stateless validation is that state accesses (reads and writes) are now fully in memory. It means that the gas cost of state accesses could be significantly reduced, which allows for higher transaction throughput.
• Resharding. The launch of stateless validation means that no validator node needs to track all shards, which enables scaling to potentially many more shards. However, due to the architectural change, the old method of resharding no longer works and a new method needs to be developed and tested. The new method of resharding will be quite fast and will lay the groundwork for dynamic resharding (see more about this development below).
• Node synchronization. While not strictly related to stateless validation, the synchronization time for a mainnet node has been a pain point for many node operators. Work will be done in this area both to improve the speed of synchronization and ensure that the synchronization process does not depend on centralized services.

In addition to the immediate priorities listed above, there are some long-term improvements that we intend to work on starting in early 2025:

• Transaction priority fee. In the stateless validation launch, we introduced congestion control that provides better latency for accepted transactions under congestion conditions. However, users may want to pay more to get to the front of the queue for certain use cases such as trading or arbitrage. Establishing a transaction priority fee mechanism will make NEAR easier to use when there is short-term congestion.
• Dynamic resharding. The holy grail of sharding: the network dynamically adjusts the number of shards based on the load. When a shard is overloaded, it splits itself into two shards. Similarly, when two shards are both underutilized, they get merged back into one shard for the sake of efficiency.
• Runtime performance improvements. There are a number of ideas that we’d like to experiment with to improve runtime performance of NEAR, which includes pipelining contract execution, parallel execution of transactions and receipts, and using an optimizing compiler for wasm.
• Leaderless consensus. The current consensus mechanism degrades in performance when some nodes are offline, which could happen during a protocol upgrade. A leaderless consensus is much less sensitive to a small number of nodes being offline and can also provide higher throughput.
• Sharded smart contracts. Today each smart contract resides on a specific shard. While the more shards there are on mainnet, the better the overall throughput will be, a smart contract per se cannot take full advantage of NEAR’s sharding. Allowing a smart contract to be sharded (exist on all shards simultaneously) could unlock use cases that are not possible today and make it possible to build dapps with hundreds of millions of users on NEAR.

These initiatives will significantly improve the performance and scalability of NEAR and make it possible to support hundreds of millions, even a billion daily transactions. The new level of scalability lays a solid foundation for the different verticals of initiatives in the NEAR ecosystem, such as Chain Abstraction, Modularity, and User-Owned AI. Stay tuned for more on performance and efficiency improvements in the coming months and a more detailed future roadmap update towards the end of the year.

The post Near One Shares Q3 NEAR Protocol Roadmap Update appeared first on NEAR Protocol.

• Introduces stateless validation: an innovative approach to validating state transition, or the process of updating the status of all the data posted to the blockchain. Now, NEAR validators no longer have to maintain the state of a shard locally.
• Scalability, usability improvements: Nightshade 2.0 Improves single-shard performance significantly and adds capacity for more shards: NEAR currently has 6 shards and the plan is to have 10 shards by the end of 2024.
• Advancing towards NEAR vision: Upgrades NEAR’s already high-performance and scalable infrastructure to support the growing number of users and activities in the NEAR ecosystem, including consumer apps, Chain Abstraction, modularity, DeFi, and User-Owned AI, to a billion users and beyond. NEAR saw over 20 million monthly active users in July 2024, with over 110 million accounts overall. 

Nightshade 2.0, the latest advancement in the NEAR Protocol sharding roadmap, is now live on Mainnet. This upgrade introduces stateless validation and improves the scalability, performance, and decentralization of the protocol. Nightshade 2.0 is a major milestone for the NEAR network, marking the biggest change to the protocol since mainnet launched in October 2020. 

Introducing Stateless Validation

Introducing stateless validation to the sharding architecture of NEAR Protocol both improves single-shard performance as well as adds capacity for more shards on the network. The upgrade happens live, without affecting mainnet users and applications. Currently at six shards, NEAR aims to have ten shards by the end of 2024. 

Stateless validation is an innovative approach to validating state transition, or the process of updating the status of all the data posted to the blockchain. Sharding is NEAR’s unique approach to scaling, which partitions the blockchain into multiple parallel “shards.” With Nightshade sharding, both the state and processing are divided among shards. Now, NEAR validators no longer have to maintain the state of a shard locally and can retrieve all the information they need to validate state changes, or “state witness,” from the network. Stateless validation was originally proposed by Vitalik Buterin in 2017 and NEAR is one of the only blockchain networks to implement the approach. 

Unlocking Even Higher Performance & Scalability

In Nightshade 2.0, validators no longer need to track all shards and there are lower hardware requirements and costs for running a validator, potentially allowing more validators to join the ecosystem—which will further decentralize the network and enhance its security over time. 

“Nightshade 2.0 is a fundamental reworking of NEAR sharding and is a major milestone in NEAR’s development roadmap that will greatly increase NEAR’s efficiency and scalability,” said Bowen Wang, Head of Protocol at NEAR One. “In particular, the new sharding implementation paves the way to significantly increase NEAR’s already-fast transaction throughput. It also substantially lowers the cost of operating validators, lowering the barrier to entry for  more people to become validators, which will improve the decentralization of the network. These performance and scalability upgrades will ensure that NEAR remains fast, cost-effective, and efficient even with millions more users.” 

“Nightshade 2.0 solves the fundamental bottleneck issue on most L1s of how to scale while preserving both usability and security,” said Illia Polosukhin, Co-Founder of NEAR Protocol and CEO of the NEAR Foundation. “By improving the performance of each shard and adding more shards, while also further decentralizing the network, NEAR sets yet another new technical standard with this upgrade. With Nightshade 2.0, NEAR sharding now enables the network to support hundreds of millions of users with high performance and speeds across consumer apps, modularity, Chain Abstraction, DeFi, and User-Owned AI.”

What’s Next for NEAR Sharding?

How does Nightshade 2.0 fit into the long-term sharding roadmap for the NEAR Protocol? Nightshade 2.0 is a shift in direction from the original Nightshade sharding architecture NEAR launched with in 2020, bypassing some fundamental roadblocks in that protocol design around the implementation of challenges in the initial idea of Phase 2, while also unlocking additional benefits. 

From here, the focus for the remainder of 2024 will be on making further performance improvements and optimizations on top of those unlocked by Nightshade 2.0. These include introducing a new method of resharding, reducing gas costs for storage operations, and optimization of state witness size. Starting in early 2025, planning for the next phase of NEAR scalability and sharding will begin, including on dynamic re-sharding, the holy grail of sharding, where the network dynamically adjusts the number of shards based on the load. The Near One team will share a more detailed roadmap update in the coming days. 

For more information on Nightshade 2.0, watch Bowen Wang and Illia Polosukhin’s Whiteboard Series unpacking the NEAR Protocol. For deep technical details on how NEAR sharding and stateless validation works, read the Nightshade 2.0 whitepaper. 

The post Nightshade 2.0 Launches on NEAR Mainnet, Introducing Stateless Validation and Greater Scalability appeared first on NEAR Protocol.

Chain Signatures utilizes a decentralized multi-party computation (MPC) network enabling NEAR accounts to sign transactions on any blockchain protocol. Chain Signatures are the only MPC solution where smart contracts can sign transactions on any chain and for any number of accounts. This is because accounts are smart contracts by default in the unique NEAR account model. 

Chain Signatures reduce the work of multichain dApp development to a single layer: a smart contract on NEAR that can talk to all other chains. In this way, Chain Signatures abstract away the complexity and hassle of multichain dApps, for developers and users alike, and open up an entirely new design space of applications and user interfaces for Web3. Additionally, while existing bridges or cross-chain messaging protocols cannot support all chains or scale at speed, Chain Signatures can support every blockchain without native integration, whether Ethereum, Bitcoin, the Cosmos ecosystem, or (soon) Solana.

Five applications with more than 6 million active users between them are already using Chain Signatures Mainnet as of launch, with more than fifteen projects actively building. Soon there will be a full ecosystem of Chain Signatures products across this new design space, ranging across wallets, DEXs, lending, trading bots, bridges, and more. 

• Sweat Wallet: 2.5 million active Sweat Wallet users (on NEAR) can bridge assets to and from any chain, starting with BNB and Base, while paying for gas in $SWEAT.
• Allstake: Allstake is now live at Phase 0 with mainnet launch on NEAR, Solana, and Ethereum, supporting top LST and LRT protocols such as LiNEAR Protocol, MetaPool, Marinade, Jito, Renzo, and EtherFi.
• HERE Wallet: Mobile, Web, and Telegram wallet supporting transactions on any chain. Check out this Hot Protocol (by Here Wallet) demo.
• Bitte Wallet: Passkey wallets for any chain, including Bitcoin. Connect to all Ethereum apps with Bitte Wallet using WalletConnect. Watch a demo of how Bitte Wallet is using Chain Signatures here.
• Defuse: Truly multichain spot DEX. Trade between any assets on any chain in seconds. See how NEAR Chain Signatures are transforming DeFi in this demo.

Kendall Cole of Proximity Labs – a contributor to Chain Signatures – said, “Chain Signatures is pivotal to replacing the fragmented Web3 landscape with a single user and developer layer that addresses current interoperability challenges. This innovation simplifies the user experience, enables DeFi for blockchains like Bitcoin that do not traditionally support smart contracts, and empowers developers to support all chains seamlessly. By eliminating the need for bridges, Chain Signatures can significantly expand the liquidity and utility of assets across various blockchains. We’re excited to see Chain Abstraction in the wild, transforming how users and developers interact with decentralized finance and making it more accessible.”

Another key layer of the Chain Signatures stack is the Multichain Gas Relayer. Instead of forcing users to acquire a separate gas token every time they transact on a new chain, the Multichain Gas Relayer performs the gas payment on the destination chain, on the user’s behalf. The user only needs to pay the equivalent amount in an asset they already hold, whether that’s NEAR or other NEAR-native fungible tokens (such as USDC or USDT). The power of Chain Signatures, together with the gas abstraction of the Multichain Gas Relayer, offers a streamlined user experience as exemplified by top dApps like Sweat Wallet. 

Illia Polosukhin, Co-Founder of Near Protocol and CEO of NEAR Foundation, added, “Chain Signatures is a game-changing innovation that brings Chain Abstraction to life. Whereas before we had fragmented liquidity in DeFi, now there will be a single DeFi layer for all chains. There is no more need for dozens of wallets and addresses, manual bridging, and paying gas fees in every token. Instead, all of DeFi is accessible from wherever users already are. It’s all possible because smart contracts can now sign transactions for any blockchain, even Bitcoin. This opens up a whole new design space for financial apps in Web3, benefitting degens and also paving the way for new user bases.” 

As of mainnet launch, Chain Signatures’ MPC network is secured by eight reputable validators: Pagoda, Luganodes, The Lifted Initiative, InfStones, Staking4All, Node.Monster, Black Sand Technologies, and Aurora. The initial audit for the Chain Signatures protocol has been conducted by Kudelski, the final report of which will be published soon on the Chain Signatures GitHub. 

The Chain Signatures development roadmap includes adding EDDSA support before the end of the year, increasing throughput, and increasing the number of nodes. As of mainnet launch, Chain Signatures supports all blockchain protocols based on the ECDSA elliptic curve, which includes most chains such as Ethereum, Bitcoin, Dogecoin, and recently, NEAR. With the additional support for the EDDSA elliptic curve (e.g. Solana, TON), Chain Signatures will be able to sign transactions on every known blockchain by Q4 2024. By the end of the year, Chain Signatures will aim to increase throughput up to 300 transactions/second to match NEAR’s sharded capacity. Finally, the number of validators on the network will gradually increase over time with the aim of achieving 40+ highly independent nodes, which would require 27 for a single signature.

For all app builders in Web3 who want to build multichain experiences from day one, explore these resources and start building:

• Chain Signatures: Getting Started Guide
• Multichain Gas Relayer: Getting Started Guide
• Request support for building with Chain Signatures
• Join the Chain Abstraction Dev Group on Telegram

All the above resources and more can be found on the Chain Signatures landing page: https://near.org/chain-abstraction.

The post Chain Signatures Mainnet Launches: Smart Contracts Can Sign Transactions on Any Blockchain appeared first on NEAR Protocol.

Chain Signatures is a groundbreaking technology built on NEAR that enables NEAR accounts, including smart contracts, to sign and execute transactions across multiple blockchains. This innovation leverages Multi-Party Computation (MPC) and a distributed network of node operators to create joint signatures from arbitrary payloads, allowing NEAR users to control external blockchain accounts. This technology enhances blockchain interoperability, giving ownership of diverse assets, cross-chain accounts, and data to a single NEAR account.

How Does It Work?

Chain Signatures operates through a series of steps to enable seamless cross-chain transactions:

1. Deriving Foreign Addresses:
   • Chain Signatures uses derivation paths to represent accounts on foreign blockchains.
   • The NEAR account’s name and the derivation path are used to mathematically derive a unique address for the user on the foreign blockchain.
2. Creating the Transaction:
   • The client constructs the hash of the transaction to be signed, which varies by the target blockchain.
3. Requesting the Signature:
   • A NEAR account or smart contract calls the sign method of the MPC smart contract (v1.signer) to sign a payload.
4. Relaying the Signature:
   • The client reconstructs the valid transaction using the signature and broadcasts it to the destination blockchain.

This process eliminates the need for traditional bridges and enables developers to build innovative cross-chain DeFi applications with seamless user experiences.

Use Cases

1. DeFi on Bitcoin (and other chain without smart contracts)
   • Chain signatures allow NEAR smart contract to program assets on Bitcoin.
   • Build lending, swaps, runes launchpads, passkey-based Bitcoin wallets, and more.
2. Chain agnostic applications
   • Since chain signatures can sign transactions for all blockchains, developers can support every single chain with just one smart contract.
   • Multichain DEXs, lending protocols, oracles, derivatives, and more.
3. Multichain account abstraction 
   • Users can control assets on all chains with just their NEAR account, and can utilize account abstraction features on any chain including passkeys, key rotation, etc.
   • Using the multichain gas relayer, users can pay for gas fees on any chain using USDC.
4. Privacy
   • Chain signatures can be used to encrypt and decrypt information in a programmatic way.
   • This enables privacy applications, and even decrypting information based on ownership of assets/NFTs.

How to Get Started?

1. Familiarize Yourself with Chain Signatures:
   • Understand the basics of Chain Signatures and how they simplify blockchain interactions.
   • Review the technical explainer.
2. Explore the Use Cases:
   • Review examples of use cases for Chain Signatures, such as Multichain DAO, Multichain NFT Minter, and Bitcoin Runes Airdrop.
3. Access Resources and Documentation:
   • Visit the Chain Signatures documentation for detailed technical information and code snippets.
   • Check out the Linktree for Chain Signatures for various resources, including demos and tutorials.
4. Try the Demos:
   • Use the command-line-based demo to derive accounts and send transactions on Bitcoin, Ethereum, Doge, and Ripple.
   • Check out the web app demo.
5. Engage with the Community:
   • Join the Chain Abstraction developers’ channel on Telegram to connect with other developers and get support.

Where to Learn More?

• Technical Blogs and Deep Dives:
  • Read high-level use cases and technical explainer posts on the NEAR blog.
• Community and Support:
  • Engage with the NEAR community on X and participate in discussions to stay updated on the latest developments.

The post Getting Started with Chain Signatures appeared first on NEAR Protocol.

You may recall that [REDACTED] is a global convergence to shape the future of User-Owned AI and Chain Abstraction—a future where technology belongs to the people, not corporations. 

It’s an IRL movement gathering November 9-11 in Bangkok. It’s a worldwide hackathon kicking off September 5. It’s a defining moment to unify the collective working on these technologies to reclaim our sovereignty.

Are you in?

The IRL movement: speakers announced, apply to attend

[REDACTED] is a whole IRL movement: 1,500+ devs, builders, founders, funders, researchers, regulators, and more gathering in person, November 9-11, at the Avani+ Riverside Hotel Bangkok.

Some things can only happen IRL, and some are just way better. Like:

• Gaining insights from the teams defining the intersection of AI and Web3
• Upskilling and learning how to develop AI x Web3 products and apps
• Forming deep connections to build the user-owned future together

[REDACTED] will feature a wide range of curated sessions, workshops, and discussions led by the people driving AI x Web3 and Chain Abstraction. We can finally share that this includes:

• Illia Polosukhin (NEAR)
• Curtis Spencer (Electric Capital)
• Anand Iyer (Canonical)
• Maartje Bus (Messari)
• Matt Stephenson (Pantera)
• Calanthia Mei (Masa)
• Evrard-Nil Daillet (Google)

And more to come as we get closer to Bangkok.

Tickets to the [REDACTED] IRL movement are totally free—you just have to apply to attend, either as a participant or as a hacker (about which, see below). Visa letters are available to support visa applications.

For the absolute latest on the movement, join the official [REDACTED] Telegram channel.

[REDACTED] Hackathon Registration Is Live

Registration for the [REDACTED] hackathon is OPEN.

The [REDACTED] hackathon sets top problem-solvers to collaborating on the biggest issues in AI x Web3 and Chain Abstraction. Kicking off September 5, it’s eight weeks remote so teams can go deep, and it culminates at the IRL movement in Bangkok, November 9-11. 

Hackers accepted into the hackathon can expect workshops and tutorials on industry-leading tools, interactive discussion and support from category/ecosystem experts, and, oh yeah, a chance at over $500k+ in bounties and prizes.

There will also be travel scholarships so qualifying hackers can be IRL in Bangkok for the awards ceremony—and to participate in the IRL movement.

Get Involved with [REDACTED]

There are a lot of ways [for partners?] to get involved with [REDACTED], from digital marketing exposure and exclusive access to side events to major visibility at the IRL movement. Find what’s right for you.

The post [REDACTED] Speakers Announced, Hackathon Registration Is Live appeared first on NEAR Protocol.

NEAR Foundation is working with D3 to bridge the gap between traditional internet infrastructure and web3. *NEAR Name Tokens are an important step in developing the futureproof, interoperable digital identities that will be key to driving implementation of chain abstraction, and of developing web3 more broadly.

Complementing the NEAR Ecosystem with *NEAR Name Tokens

NEAR already offers a deeply integrated identity solution with named NEAR accounts. These NEAR accounts, however, are limited to use across the NEAR ecosystem.

*NEAR Name Tokens will offer users a comprehensive digital identity solution across the wider web3 ecosystem, while keeping NEAR front and center.

Users will be able to use these name tokens in a variety of ways, including:

• As a simplified wallet address across hundreds of different blockchain networks
• As an infrastructure identifier across hundreds of different blockchain networks
• As a cross-platform username across various different decentralized platforms, including DeFi, GameFi, SocialFi, SportFi and other related applications
• As Verifiable Credentials (VCs) to platforms and services that you interact with
• To gain access to unique benefits and rewards programs for participating in the D3 ecosystem
• As expressions of interest for the eventual .NEAR equivalent domain on the internet

Why *NEAR Instead of .NEAR

*NEAR Name Tokens feature a star, or asterisk (*), between the name and extension—such as you*near—instead of a period (.). In part, this is because NEAR accounts already use a .NEAR extension, and we want to avoid confusion for users.

More importantly, however, we use *NEAR because Name Tokens are unique web3 identifiers, not real domains, and we want to avoid any confusion between these as well. For years, several naming systems across web3 have thrown around the word “domain” quite liberally, without offering any of the actual utility offered by real domains.

Real domains are fully integrated with the Domain Name System, the distributed service that allows users to access websites and email infrastructure with ease. Billions of internet-capable devices—such as computers, tablets, mobile phones, Internet of Things devices, and more—support the DNS and real domains without the need for specialized software or plugins.

Integrating web3 with DNS will be critical in bringing interoperable digital identities to web3. To that end, NEAR Foundation has partnered with D3 to apply for and obtain the .near top-level domain—like the “.org” in near.org—during the upcoming application period for new TLDs, the first in over a decade.

Exclusive Early Access Period to *NEAR Name Tokens for NEAR Account Holders

As part of our initial launch phase later this summer,, existing NEAR account holders will receive exclusive early access to their equivalent *NEAR Name Tokens. For instance, if you already have the name.near NEAR account registered prior to launch, you will receive exclusive access to register name*near for a period of 90 days before names are released for public availability.

Similarly, should a NEAR account be available for any new *NEAR Name Token registrations, D3 will claim it on behalf of users to ensure a uniform experience across the NEAR ecosystem. Users can sign up for early access, and you’ll be  notified you prior to the official launch of *NEAR Name Tokens later this summer

The post Introducing *NEAR Name Tokens – Multichain, Cross-Platform Digital Identities In Web3 appeared first on NEAR Protocol.

TL;DR:

• Demystifies NEAR’s new protocol feature, Chain Signatures, both for developers and end users.
• Compares how multichain Web3 apps work, before and after Chain Signatures.
• Presents two multichain app examples in which Chain Signatures improves DevX and UX: a DAO and NFT minter.
• Describes how Chain Signatures can add a layer of smart contract functionality to non-smart contract chains through a Bitcoin Runes airdrop example.

Multichain Apps Before vs After Chain Signatures

NEAR Chain Signatures introduces a new approach to building multichain Web3 applications that provides a better experience for developers and users. Before, developers would write application layer smart contracts for each chain, possibly in different languages, requiring new smart contracts and audits every time. The re-implementation and re-deployment of application logic introduce several risks for users while switching networks and feature disparity among implementations creates poor user experience (UX). Additionally, users are often required to bridge assets or messages from chain to chain, introducing even more risk and even worse UX.

Developing multichain Web3 applications before Chain Signatures:

Without Chain Signatures

For developers and users, each additional chain adds application, account, and contract complexity. In this model, bridges are necessary to migrate assets and perform transactions on a new chain. This forces both developers and users through several preparatory steps before they can experience apps on their chain of choice.

Now, Chain Signatures alleviates the burden of maintaining different contracts, deployments, and audits for each chain, by allowing developers to move a majority of the application logic to a single NEAR smart contract. Developers can focus on the UX of their application, instead of maintaining several different contracts on multiple chains. Users also benefit from not bridging assets. Instead, they deposit assets from the chain they wish to use into a Chain Signatures account the application can use. Users interact with the application using a single NEAR account and maintain full custody of their assets, even though they reside on another chain. Chain Signatures enables any NEAR account or smart contract to control and sign for an infinite number of accounts on any chain that exists today and chains that are yet to be launched! This is a major breakthrough for multichain Web3 application development, security, and UX.

Developing multichain Web3 applications with Chain Signatures:

Using Chain Signatures

Application logic is executed in NEAR smart contracts that produce signatures for accounts on any chain, executing transactions and moving assets. Shifting application logic upstream into a single layer of NEAR contracts reduces the developer’s burden of maintaining complex bespoke application smart contracts on each chain. Assets are still deployed as contracts on their respective chains, typically using standards and smart contract templates that are already audited, but application logic no longer needs to be.

With Chain Signatures, application logic can be in one place, one language, and on one layer; and hence only requires one smart contract audit. This facilitates a better developer experience, and in turn, a better and more secure user experience. 

Let’s take a look at some examples of new and exciting applications that can be designed using Chain Signatures to better understand how this tech works.

Examples of Apps Unlocked by Chain Signatures

Multichain DAO

In crypto, users often want to pool funds and have an on-chain process for accepting proposals from the community and distributing those funds transparently. A decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) is generally the chosen approach for communities in Web3 today. Since Ethereum is the most widely accepted chain for popular stablecoins such as USDC, it makes sense to pool DAO funds there. However, running all of the DAO application logic using Ethereum smart contracts and transactions quickly becomes slow and cost-prohibitive, leading to voter apathy and disengagement. 

Using Chain Signatures, one can develop a design that provides a more immediate and better user experience, while lowering fees significantly. In addition, there can be a single DAO application layer that accepts proposals and handles voting that distributes funds on multiple chains!

A Chain Signatures-powered DAO (high-level)

The DAO application logic is executed in a NEAR smart contract. Features such as membership, proposals, and voting are handled in the DAO contract. When a proposal is accepted, the DAO contract automatically calls the NEAR Chain Signatures contract to generate a signature for the derived address and account. This account exists on the chain where the DAO members originally pooled their funds. In the case of Ethereum, or any EVM chain, this can simply be an externally owned account (EOA) and does not require an additional smart contract to be deployed.

Multichain NFT Minter

Let’s imagine there’s a new NFT collection where the total supply is capped at 10,000, with one difference from the typical model: the collection will be minted across multiple chains. Without Chain Signatures, there are a few different ways to go about this.

1. You have the primary sales logic and NFT logic deployed to each chain. This forces you to predetermine the amounts you will allow on each chain.
   1. This creates UX issues for users, who are forced to use a particular chain.
   2. This also imposes limitations on how your collection is minted.
2. You have the primary sales logic on one chain and allow users to mint NFTs through a message-passing bridge to the chain of their choice.
   1. Introduces UX issues; multiple transactions and wallets for users.
   2. Adds bridging risks to the application and for user error.
3. Primary sales logic and NFT mints are done on one chain and the NFTs are bridged after the fact.
   1. This introduces the above UX challenges and bridging risks.
   2. Allowing bridging means less control over the supply of NFTs on any particular chain.

The first approach is too rigid. The second and third require a minimum of 2 transactions from the user with all the complexity and security risks of bridging assets. Depending on your preference, you may or may not want users bridging your NFTs after the primary sale and initial mint. Let’s assume you don’t.

Let’s also assume you want a seamless sale experience, where the user chooses the chain of mint, and the NFT is minted to an existing wallet on an arbitrary chain. Ideally, all of this should occur in a single transaction for the user. Note, the price of gas can be rolled into the primary sale via an oracle.

Here’s how this would work with Chain Signatures:

A Chain Signatures Multichain NFT Mint (high-level)

The NFT Sale contract takes payment. This can be in NEAR, USDC, or any other token on NEAR. The NFT Sale contract calls the Chain Signatures contract with a transaction  payload that mints an NFT on the destination chain selected by the user, and with an account as owner supplied by the user. A signature for the mint is generated, passed back to the user client, and then broadcasted to the selected chain. The NFT is minted on the selected chain’s NFT contract and ownership is given to the user’s account specified in the sale transaction. In a single transaction, an NFT is bought and minted on another chain.

Bitcoin Runes Airdrop

Bitcoin Runes are a new fungible token protocol by Ordinals creator Casey Rodarmor. Improving on BRC-20, Runes aim to produce less clutter and improve the costs of issuing and trading fungible tokens on Bitcoin. One drawback to Bitcoin is restricted programmability, making something like a mass Runes airdrop difficult. With Chain Signatures, NEAR can function as a smart contract layer for Bitcoin through which a mass Bitcoin Runes airdrop could be executed.

One can use a NEAR contract to maintain an “allow list” for the airdrop, utilizing a BTC light client contract. Assuming all the Runes are premined and residing in the Chain Signatures address derived from the NEAR Airdrop smart contract, the first step for the user is to fund this BTC address with the necessary BTC transaction fees to transfer the Runes to themselves. Once this is done, they can submit this transaction hash and their BTC address to the NEAR Airdrop contract, which will call the Chain Signatures contract with a transaction payload that will transfer the Runes.

Here’s what this would look like:

A Runes Airdrop using Chain Signatures (high-level)

The user funds the BTC address with the fees needed to transfer Runes to their account (1). They submit the transaction hash and their BTC address to the NEAR Airdrop contract (2). The NEAR Airdrop contract checks the user’s BTC address against the allow list. Then the contract calls the BTC Light Client to verify the fees have been paid (3). Finally, the NEAR Airdrop contract can generate a transaction to transfer the Runes to the user’s destination address. A cross-contract call is made to the Chain Signatures contract to sign the transaction. The signature is returned to the client and broadcasted to the Bitcoin network where the Runes are transferred (4).

Summary

NEAR Chain Signatures introduces a new way to design multichain Web3 applications for a range of use cases, such as DAOs, NFT minting, and airdrops. Chain Signatures brings rich smart contract functionality to non-smart contract chains like BTC and XRP. Building with Chain Signatures provides a better experience for developers and users. Developers have to write less smart contract code, submit fewer audits, and maintain fewer smart contract deployments across multiple chains. Users don’t have to bridge assets or perform several transactions in order to use the chains they feel most comfortable with. All in all, Chain Signatures is a massive step forward for multichain Web3 applications and towards mainstream adoption for new and existing crypto users.

NEAR Chain Signatures is live on testnet and will soon be available on mainnet. For further resources on Chain Signatures, see here. To get support for building with Chain Signatures, for any of the examples above or another idea, reach us here.

Disclosures: Proximity Labs holds $NEAR and other tokens or investments that may be associated with protocols or projects mentioned in this article.  This article’s content does not constitute financial advice or a recommendation to buy, sell, or use any token or protocol. This article also contains forward-looking statements about third-party projects that the authors have no control over and, as such, actual future developments may be substantially different from the expectations described in the forward-looking statements for a number of reasons, including those that are not under the control of the authors. The content of this article reflects the opinions of its authors and is presented for informational purposes only. This is not and should not be construed to be investment advice.

The post Unlocking Multichain Web3 with NEAR Chain Signatures appeared first on NEAR Protocol.

Over the last six months, NEAR has experienced a significant increase in users and transactions. NEAR has 3 of the top ten dapps in Web3 by users with KAI-CHING and HOT Wallet both reaching millions of daily active users in April 2024.

Chart from Pikespeak

• Total Transactions: 1.16B 
• Daily Unique Active Accounts: 1.3M

NEAR has 3 of the top ten dapps in Web3 by users according to dappradar with KAI-CHING and HOT Wallet both reaching millions of daily active users in April 2024.

All of this demand led to some congestion on one of the shards, so Bowen Wang, Director of Protocol, and the Protocol team worked on further optimizations that rolled out within days to address it. Over the course of 2 weeks, they added 2 more shards to NEAR – for a total of 6 live shards. This increased the network’s capacity by 50%. 

At the end of Q2, stateless validation is expected to  launch on Mainnet – this upgrade is projected to improve throughput for each shard by 5x and grow the total number of shards available for the network.

One of the most remarkable aspects of this upgrade is that it was implemented live—there was no need to take the blockchain offline. There was no break in user transactions.

What is sharding on a blockchain? Let’s simplify using an analogy.

Imagine you have a library that’s become too large and crowded. To manage this, you divide your books into several smaller sections and place them in different rooms. Each room now holds part of the entire collection, making finding and managing books easier. Most importantly, the separate collections will minimize congestion when the library is busy.

Now, think of the NEAR blockchain like that crowded library. Sharding is like dividing this big blockchain into smaller, manageable pieces called “shards.” Each shard is like one of those rooms, with only the contract interactions within that shard. When someone needs information, they go directly to the room (shard) where it’s stored instead of waiting for the whole chain. This way, sharding helps handle more data and serve more users efficiently without affecting users of the entire chain every time.

In NEAR’s case, the blockchain is split into multiple shards, akin to these rooms, where each shard processes transactions and maintains the state independently. This division allows for parallel processing, significantly boosting the network’s capacity and speed.

What sets NEAR apart is how these shards interact and synchronize. A developer doesn’t have to worry about which shard a specific contract might be on. This approach maintains high security and interconnectivity while allowing the network to scale effectively. As the network grows and demands increase, more shards can be added, like expanding the library with more rooms, to ensure that  NEAR can adapt to increasing usage and more complex applications.

NEAR is focusing on future-proofing the protocol to handle even more growth and usage. This proactive approach aims to minimize disruptions and maintain a consistent developer and user experience, no matter how much the demand grows.

This further validates NEAR’s thesis that sharding is the best scaling approach given what is currently  happening across the whole Web3 space. Many non-sharded chain/rollups are getting congested with transactions and have been forced to raise fees, while NEAR was able to expand capacity by adding more shards and keeping fees stable.

Homogeneous Sharding isn’t just a tech tweak; it’s a critical evolution in the blockchain that keeps transactions flowing. And it takes a team of superheroes for NEAR Protocol to be a top blockchain in Web3. The ultimate goal? To ensure that users never notice the complexity behind their seamless digital experience.

Claim your Proof of Legends of NEAR NFT

The post Legends of NEAR: Expansion from 4 to 6 Shards appeared first on NEAR Protocol.