Andrew Smith

If we’ve learned anything from the numerous layer-1 and layer-2 launches over the last few years, it’s that blockchain technology is undoubtedly important and has been rapidly progressing. But mass adoption has always been a slow burn.&nbsp;



The reason for this is simple, yet continually overlooked.&nbsp;



Nurturing a vibrant developer community is the key to unlocking Web3&#8217;s full potential. Web3 developers, many of whom possess nearly unmatched creativity and entrepreneurship, are the ones who will build the applications that will help bring digital assets and decentralized applications (dapps) to the mainstream.&nbsp;



Users, while important, are only the end goal.&nbsp;



Instead of fixating on “finding the next billion users,” the blockchain industry needs to start focusing on finding the “first million developers.”



It is vital that base layer blockchains provide the necessary tools, resources and support to developers to stimulate innovation and accelerate user adoption.



<h2>Where have all the developers gone?</h2>



The worst kept secret in crypto is that most dapps to date only provide entertainment, largely in the form of gambling on tokens.&nbsp;



Some members of prominent NFT communities will argue that they have found purpose as well, and that&#8217;s likely true to them. Let’s be real, though — the vast majority of users are here for the memes, lolz, and thrills that accompany gambling on memecoins and jpegs, with the hopes of “up only.”&nbsp;



And while I find nothing immoral about this, and personally enjoy the spectacle of the rush into memecoins or a hot NFT mint, this is not a beneficial or sustainable use of decentralized ledger technology and compute technology over the long term.



Today’s blockchains have lost sight of the fact that there exists a significant surplus of brilliant developers who have the creativity and innovative spirit to build incredible dapps. Instead, they’ve committed to attracting short-term users and as a result, Web3 has suffered from a limited developer base. This has hindered our industry’s chances of discovering truly transformative use cases for blockchains and other decentralized technologies.



Simply put, Web3 needs more developers in the mix. Currently, only about 1.5% of the world&#8217;s 30 million developers work part-time in Web3. If blockchains are going to succeed, it’s by focusing almost entirely on attracting sophisticated, forward-thinking developers who can build diverse applications and providing them with the resources necessary to thrive. Empowering developers to innovate will ultimately lead to more attractive and user-friendly dapps, which will, in turn, drive user adoption.&nbsp;



It’s the law of large numbers: a bigger, more diverse developer community will foster a more vibrant ecosystem —&nbsp; with a greater variety of ideas and approaches —&nbsp;leading to revolutionary breakthroughs.



Cultivating the first million developers is no small task. It will require base layers to do away with the rigid constraints and steep learning curves that have deterred many potential developers, and provide accessible, flexible, and versatile platforms to existing developers. By offering adaptable platforms that accommodate developers&#8217; preferred languages and tools, blockchains can lower entry barriers and encourage a more diverse range of developers to explore Web3.



User adoption is key to Web3’s success&nbsp;— but developers are the precursor to this adoption.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>


<div class="wp-block-post-author-biography">Andrew Smith is the founder of VRRB Labs, a decentralized protocol that is developing the VRRB Layer 1 blockchain, an innovative blockchain that will make it easy and financially sustainable for developers to build user-friendly applications. Andrew founded VRRB Labs in 2020 after experiencing the challenges inherent in many blockchains, including a lack of scalability and developer-focused resources. Prior to founding VRRB Labs, Andrew served as co-founder and Chief Data Scientist of OWL ESG, a tech-driven ESG data provider. Andrew began his career as Chief Product Strategist of investment firm New Millennium Macro. He currently resides in Miami, FL.</div>


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Let Developers Walk so Users Can Run

Macauley Peterson

When Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong drafted his not-so-secret “secret master plan” 7 years ago, he divided the company’s mission into four phases, each aiming to onboard ten times the number of people as the one before.



Thus, taking the step from phase 3 to phase 4 involves attracting a billion users, which <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/coinbase" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Coinbase</a> reckons will require a million developers to build all the useful dapps those users will enjoy.



That means bringing a fraction of the 30 million or so Web2 developers worldwide into Web3, which is where Base Camp comes in, according to Jesse Pollak, who leads the protocols team at Coinbase.



Base Camp is an educational platform developed in-house at Coinbase over the past 6 months, which will run on its <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/coinbase-launches-l2">Base optimistic rollup</a> infrastructure.



Base is currently on testnet, and Coinbase expects to continue to roll out updates in the coming weeks as it progresses towards an eventual mainnet version.



Unlike multipurpose learning platforms such as Coursera and edX, Base Camp will include exercises on chain, providing developers with hands-on experience. At each learning milestone, developers will be issued an NFT badge.



“Earn these badges and show to the broader world that you built this competency as an on-chain developer,” Pollak told Blockworks.



The platform will form a part of the Base developer experience and live within its documentation, but Pollak stressed that it is a full curriculum for Ethereum developers that is just as applicable to any Ethereum virtual machine (EVM) chain as it is to Base.



The <a href="https://docs.base.org/base-camp/docs/welcome/">program</a> is fully self-guided, so students can pursue it at their own pace, which means it is well suited to current developers who want to hone their skills on nights and weekends.



“The real sweet spot,” Pollak said, is “people who have been engineers and developers, and they haven&#8217;t been doing it on chain — writing smart contacts — but they are curious, and they want to learn more.”



A lack of developer tooling <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/solving-web3s-developer-problem-web2">remains an impediment</a> to Web3 dapp development, but Pollak said there’s also “a mental model step that folks have to kind of go through.”



“How do you start to put the core state and the core logic on-chain and use this kind of open state machine,” he said, referring to the <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/evm">EVM</a>. “That requires just a new way of thinking, which is almost like a light bulb that has to [be] turned on.”



On-chain development allows software engineers to focus on the core application logic and take advantage of built-in functions of the blockchain, Pollak explained.



“If you want to [make] a payment, you just use the <a href="https://www.blockworksresearch.com/glossary#erc-20-token">ERC-20</a> transfer. If you want to know someone&#8217;s identity, you just look at their <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/ens">ENS name</a>. So much of the infrastructure [is] already built on this open platform that the leverage that folks can get when they have that light switch moment, I think, is incredibly powerful.”



The project was originally geared toward training Coinbase’s own engineers, to make use of the many years of experience within the organization.&nbsp;



“We’ve spent many years trying to up the level and transform our talent to be more crypto native with an on-chain engineering skill set, and out the other side came Base Camp, which is going to help us do that, but also help the world do it.”



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Coinbase Builds Base Camp for Web3 Developers

Ben Strack

The share of US-based blockchain developers is shrinking, according to a recent study, though the country has a chance to regain a lead as an upcoming boom of such jobs is expected over the next decade. 



The US has lost 2% of its share of the blockchain developer market per year for the last five years — sinking to 29% market share, venture capital firm Electric Capital found.



Europe is also currently home to 29% of blockchain developers, the data shows, while Asia accounts for 13%.&nbsp;&nbsp;



The number of active open source software engineers grew to 23,343 by the end of 2022, according to Electric Capital, despite crypto prices declining. The <a href="https://www.developerreport.com/developer-report-geography" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">report</a> estimates that ​​one million new blockchain-related open-source developer jobs could be created by 2030, giving the US a chance to catch up. 



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img decoding="async" loading="lazy" width="2400" height="1320" src="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain2.jpg?w=1024&amp;h=1024" alt="" class="wp-image-50544" srcset="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain2.jpg?w=2400 2400w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain2.jpg?w=300 300w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain2.jpg?w=1024 1024w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain2.jpg?w=768 768w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain2.jpg?w=1536 1536w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain2.jpg?w=2048 2048w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain2.jpg?w=428 428w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain2.jpg?w=470 470w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain2.jpg?w=389 389w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain2.jpg?w=80 80w" sizes="(max-width: 2400px) 100vw, 2400px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">The USA&#8217;s blockchain developer share has shrunk 2% per year since 2017, according to Electric Capital</figcaption></figure>



Regulatory clarity could go a long way to attracting a chunk of that talent, though some industry participants have said they aren’t particularly optimistic. In the absence of a comprehensive crypto framework, the SEC and CFTC have launched enforcement actions against crypto companies and executives in recent months, <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/binance-cftc-damning-quotes" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">including Binance</a>.



“Providing clear and supportive regulations for the cryptocurrency and blockchain industries will encourage more innovation and foster growth within the country,” the report states. “This will make the US an attractive destination for both new and established developers.”



Coinbase, an industry player <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/sec-serves-coinbase-in-latest-alleged-crypto-securities-violation" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">the SEC has targeted</a> recently, said in a blog post Wednesday that “regulation by enforcement” in the US was indeed pushing tech innovation to other parts of the world. 



CEO Brian Armstrong said the company would be “happy to go to court” if necessary to offer some clarity to the industry.&nbsp;



“The US is now losing market share to regions with more regulatory clarity and openness to crypto innovation like Europe and Asia, as well as emerging markets like LATAM, India, and Africa,” the crypto exchange’s <a href="https://www.coinbase.com/blog/new-report-shows-1m-tech-jobs-at-stake-in-us-crypto-policy" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">blog</a> post states.



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img decoding="async" loading="lazy" width="2403" height="1335" src="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain3.jpg?w=1024&amp;h=1024" alt="" class="wp-image-50548" srcset="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain3.jpg?w=2403 2403w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain3.jpg?w=300 300w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain3.jpg?w=1024 1024w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain3.jpg?w=768 768w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain3.jpg?w=1536 1536w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain3.jpg?w=2048 2048w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain3.jpg?w=428 428w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain3.jpg?w=470 470w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain3.jpg?w=389 389w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/braindrain3.jpg?w=80 80w" sizes="(max-width: 2403px) 100vw, 2403px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Where will the next million Web3 developers go?</figcaption></figure>



While the US, Europe and Asia have the most blockchain developers, India’s share of such professionals has grown more consistently — from 2% in 2017 to 6% in 2022.



“Still the United States has amazing builders, but then India is another ecosystem that is coming on line in the last couple of months and years in a really really big way,” said Ruben Amenyogbo, head of partnerships for Protocol Labs.



Ukraine has been a standout European country in terms of growth, as its share of blockchain developers rose 2% in the last three years.&nbsp;



Macaulay Peterson contributed reporting. 



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US Losing Ground on Blockchain Developer Share: Study

Shalini Nagarajan

A bipartisan group of US lawmakers are again pushing a bill to keep key crypto infrastructure — such as validators and miners — from being considered brokers once and for all.



House Financial Services Committee Chair Patrick McHenry, Rep. Ritchie Torres, Majority Whip Tom Emmer and other lawmakers have reintroduced the Keep Innovation in America Act, according to a Tuesday <a href="https://emmer.house.gov/press-releases?id=D4FE4ACA-596E-4415-AFF0-7B21D5377D29" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">statement</a>.



It seeks to taper the definition of a broker to “any person who (for consideration) stands ready in the ordinary course of a trade or business to effect sales of digital assets at the direction of their customers.”



The Act, first introduced in 2021 and quickly referred to a House committee, is said to address the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act’s “poorly constructed digital asset reporting requirements.” President Joe Biden signed the infrastructure law in 2021.



“Miners and validators, hardware and software developers, and protocol developers are not actual brokers and do not collect or have reason to collect the information required under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.”



Most brokers must register with the SEC. The lawmakers say that potentially strenuous reporting requirements are threatening to push innovators overseas. They&#8217;ve also raised privacy concerns for regular citizens. 



Clarifying the definition of a broker to ensure that only those in the business of brokering are required to report would help solve the problem, per McHenry.



“The digital asset ecosystem holds tremendous potential to bring more Americans into our financial system and serve as the building blocks of the next generation of the internet,” McHenry said in a statement. “Unfortunately, misguided policy and regulatory overreach threatens to push this dynamic industry — and its potential benefits — overseas.”&nbsp;



<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="550" data-dnt="true">America can either cement our position as the leader of the global financial system, or we can allow this wave of innovation to pass us by. I’m proud to lead this bipartisan legislation to provide desperately needed clarity for innovators and entrepreneurs. <a href="https://t.co/j1W9FckvO2">https://t.co/j1W9FckvO2</a>&mdash; Patrick McHenry (@PatrickMcHenry) <a href="https://twitter.com/PatrickMcHenry/status/1633193073089073152?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 7, 2023</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
</div></figure>



Meanwhile, Rep. Torres said: “This common-sense legislation, which has earned the support of key industry and market participants, brings digital asset reporting requirements in line with the current ecosystem and offers much-needed legal and regulatory clarity to help cement our continued place as the global leader in crypto technology and innovation.”



The bill also states that China’s ban on crypto transactions paves the way for the US to enhance its role as the leading nation in the development of blockchain technology. It’s also not in the interest of American taxpayers to create uncertainty, the bill says.&nbsp;



“The nonsensical digital asset reporting requirements included in the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021 will send crypto innovation and opportunities oversees, leaving the United States far behind in the global race to lead in the next phase of the digital economy,” said House Majority Whip Tom Emmer



The amendment to the bill would be applied to crypto tax filings made after Dec. 31, 2025. That is, if it ever gets to a House and Senate vote — and passes.



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US Lawmakers Try Again: Validators, Miners, Devs Are Not ‘Brokers’

Crypto-focused early-stage VC firm Electric Capital has found that while Ethereum has the most developers in total, a majority of monthly active developers are working on other ecosystems.



Despite a bear crypto market in 2022, developers continued to create and progress towards mass adoption of decentralized applications (dApps). The crypto industry added 5% more developers in 2022 year-on-year, despite a 70% plunge in cryptoasset prices, the <a href="https://www.developerreport.com/developer-report" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">report</a> released on Tuesday showed.&nbsp;&nbsp;



The year was a rocky one for cryptoassets, given the tightening monetary policy and a string of bankruptcies, stirring fears of liquidity due to contagion. Yet, the industry captured over 61,000 first-time developers — an all-time high. Since the creation of Bitcoin in 2009, there are now more than 23,000 developers in the industry.



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img decoding="async" loading="lazy" width="1024" height="534" src="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/electric-capital-monthly-active-devs-1024x534.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-44250" srcset="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/electric-capital-monthly-active-devs-1024x534.jpg?w=1024 1024w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/electric-capital-monthly-active-devs-1024x534.jpg?w=300 300w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/electric-capital-monthly-active-devs-1024x534.jpg?w=768 768w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/electric-capital-monthly-active-devs-1024x534.jpg?w=1536 1536w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/electric-capital-monthly-active-devs-1024x534.jpg?w=2048 2048w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/electric-capital-monthly-active-devs-1024x534.jpg?w=428 428w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/electric-capital-monthly-active-devs-1024x534.jpg?w=470 470w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/electric-capital-monthly-active-devs-1024x534.jpg?w=389 389w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/electric-capital-monthly-active-devs-1024x534.jpg?w=80 80w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Total monthly active developers based on crypto ecosystems GitHub; Source: Electric Capital</figcaption></figure>



Core blockchain developers focus on designing the front-end and back-end of a proposed blockchain network, which will then be used as a foundation by others. Even after a blockchain is built, they continue to develop new features and technology to improvise or activate upgrades for better functionality.



Electric Capital found that developer activity in 2022 was far busier than the previous crypto winter of 2018, when <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/bitcoin-first-bearish-engulfing-candle">bitcoin plunged 65%</a>&nbsp;



Since 2018, the number of monthly active developers rose nearly 300% for Bitcoin. For Ethereum, developer count quintupled from 1,084 to 5,819 in that time period.



<h3>Some devs opt for emerging blockchains</h3>



The year of the <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/ethereum-merge">Merge</a> was significant for Ethereum, and its share of new developers for the stands at 16%.



But developers working on the Solana, NEAR and Polygon protocols rose 40% year-on-year, and added more than 500 total monthly active developers combined.



<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="550" data-dnt="true">Comparison to Other Ecosystems: 🔸Ethereum is the largest total (full-time + part-time + one-time)⁰developer ecosystem and is 2.8X larger than the next i.e SOLANA 🔸Solana grew by +83% to 2000+ developers 🔸Polygon grew by +40% to 1100+ developers <a href="https://t.co/kWTkG7pNIu">pic.twitter.com/kWTkG7pNIu</a>&mdash; Shivam Sharma🌱 (@theweb3sharma) <a href="https://twitter.com/theweb3sharma/status/1615592471240802307?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 18, 2023</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
</div></figure>



<a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/sui">Sui</a>, <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/aptos">Aptos</a>, <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/starkware">Starknet</a>, <a href="https://blockworks.co/price/mina">Mina</a>, <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/osmosis">Osmosis</a>, <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/hedera-hashgraph">Hedera</a>, <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/optimism">Optimism</a> and <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/arbitrum">Arbitrum</a> were other blockchains that absorbed developer activity.



Those working on software for non-fungible tokens saw a 300% jump since 2021.



Developer engagement is an “early and leading indicator of value creation,” according to the VC firm. “Developers build killer applications that deliver value to end users, which attracts more customers, which then draws more developers,” it added.



And what about Bitcoin, recently? Although developers working on the OG crypto tripled from 372 to 946 since 2018, year-over-year, the total has flat lined.



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Ethereum Has Most Developers, But These Newer Chains Are Growing Fast

If there’s just one thing that investors want to know about post-Merge Ethereum, it is this: Wen withdrawals?



It has long been known that ether locked on the <a href="https://www.blockworksresearch.com/glossary#beacon-chain">Beacon Chain</a> — now staked on the Ethereum mainnet — would remain stuck until its next upgrade, Shanghai.&nbsp;



And it’s also long been known that Ethereum’s typically vague timelines are <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/weth-fud-is-a-joke">easy fodder for FUD</a>.



Thursday’s All Core Devs (ACD) call — the last in 2022 — made one thing abundantly clear: Staked ether withdrawals are coming, and, by all accounts, they are on schedule.&nbsp;



There’s a simple reason precise roadmaps and concrete schedules are hard to come by on the world’s second most valuable blockchain network. Ethereum development is decentralized.



Periodic developer calls bring together disparate teams to seek consensus on priorities, a process that’s grown organically over the years of Ethereum’s evolution — yet, at times, still feels chaotic.



Tim Beiko, who coordinates the ACD calls, said everyone seems to collectively agree on a common goal: “we want withdrawals to happen relatively quickly on mainnet.”



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote">
“This is clearly the highest priority for everybody,” Beiko said. “Teams are working on it…People seem to generally want a target around March-ish,” he added.
</blockquote>



Any upgrade of this nature, even a simple change focusing on withdrawals alone, will require a carefully coordinated <a href="https://www.blockworksresearch.com/glossary#hard-fork" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">hard fork</a> of the Ethereum mainnet. The testing process needed in advance takes more than a month, which means that a key milestone — so-called “mainnet shadow forks” — will need to be ready by the end of January at the latest.



Is that doable? The clear consensus on the call was, yes.



Barnabas Busa a DevOps engineer at the Ethereum Foundation said two private testnets are already testing Ethereum consensus layer clients — the part of the network that adds new blocks to the blockchain.



“Full withdrawal is working on both chains,” Busa told the other core developers. “Partial withdrawal is working on both chains.”



Still to come are tests on “mass withdrawals where we just have a big queue and we have a large number of exits,” along with various edge cases — efforts to try to break the process and thereby learn and improve the network’s resiliency.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote">
“We would like to start a public testnet hopefully on the 15th or 16th of December,” Busa added.
</blockquote>



One by one, client teams weighed in: Prysm, Lighthouse, Geth, Erigon, Nethermind, Teku, Besu, Lodestar — all signaled their willingness to commit to a March target for a Shanghai hard fork to include withdrawals of staked ether.



Phil Ngo, representing Lodestar, one of the Ethereum consensus clients, told the group that “we are pretty much good for withdrawals at this point.”



Others either echoed the sentiment, or sounded optimistic that the requisite deadlines could be met to make it happen.



But can developers do even more and, if so, how much?



The definitive answer, whether Shanghai will focus on withdrawals exclusively or add another significant improvement, is slated to come in the next ACD call on Jan. 5, 2023.



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Ethereum Devs Still Want Staking Withdrawals by ‘March-ish’

<div id="highlights-block_6241d462f69f9" class="highlights">
 <ul>
 <li>Wright’s claim to be Satoshi Nakamoto was not at issue in this case</li>
 <li>The judge ruled that developers have no fiduciary duty to bitcoin owners</li>
 </ul>
 
</div>



Craig Wright, who claims to be Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto, suffered a new legal setback as a London court <a href="https://www.bailii.org/cgi-bin/format.cgi?doc=/ew/cases/EWHC/Ch/2022/667.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">ruled</a> developers have no fiduciary responsibility to aid the Australian computer scientist in accessing two wallets containing about $3.9 billion in bitcoins. 



Wright, whose company Tulip Trading Limited (TTL) brought the litigation, said he lost his private keys following a hack, and wants Bitcoin developers to assist him in regaining control of the assets. Judge Sarah Falk of the London High Court turned down that notion Friday.&nbsp;



The 16 defendants are all developers of Bitcoin-related software, and 12 are Bitcoin Core developers, the chain widely regarded as the canonical Bitcoin, or BTC.&nbsp; Wright’s company also laid claim against developers of several forks: Bitcoin Cash, Bitcoin ABC and Bitcoin SV (the fork that Wright himself says is “Satoshi’s Vision”.)



Wright maintains the two Bitcoin wallet addresses are his, via a series of Seychellois and Antiguan shell companies and trusts for which he and his wife Ramona Ang are beneficial owners.



Wright contends he stored the private keys in a password-protected file, with backups on two cloud storage servers, but that both the file and its backups were removed or deleted in a hack prior to Feb. 8, 2020.



The assets have not moved since the time of the alleged hack. Wright wants Bitcoin developers to push through a software update that would restore his access to the wallets. In fact, he offered to pay them to do so.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote">“Apart from their shared interest in digital assets, there is very little common ground between the Claimant and the Defendants,” Judge Falk wrote, adding “a significant level of animosity exists which is much broader than, and the origins of which pre-date, the particular dispute before this court.”</blockquote>



For instance, the judge wrote, Wright’s claim that Bitcoin developers have the power to do what he asks is disputed.



The defendants point that Bitcoin development occurs among “a very large, and shifting, group of contributors without an organisation or structure,” and that even if they could alter the network software, miners and full node operators would just ignore such a change, as it goes against the community’s core values. At most, it would lead to further network forks, but not actually allow Wright to access the value locked in the bitcoins he seeks.



The extent of Bitcoin developers’ actual power bears directly on the key question in the case — whether the role and work of the Bitcoin developers itself creates a fiduciary duty to TTL, assuming Wright was in fact the victim of a fraudulent hack (which the developers also dispute).



“It is very hard to see how TTL&#8217;s case on fiduciary duty is seriously arguable,” Judge Falk wrote.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote">“I do not think that bitcoin owners can realistically be described as entrusting their property to a fluctuating, and unidentified, body of developers of the software, at least in the sense and to the extent claimed by TTL.”</blockquote>



Even assuming TTL could establish the facts that it relies on in the course of a trial, the judge explained, there was no realistic prospect of establishing a breach of fiduciary duty owed by the developers to TTL.



Although the relationship between developers and bitcoin owners “generally has a fiduciary quality”, the judge wrote, their duty is not to any particular owner, to the detriment of others.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote">“It is uncontroversial that a fundamental feature of the Networks, at least in their existing form, is that digital assets are transferred through the use of private keys. TTL effectively seeks to bypass that.”</blockquote>



The judge was not persuaded by TTL’s claim that Bitcoin developers owed a “duty of care” that was breached by allowing the network to operate in such a way that the private keys could be lost in the first place. Such a claim, she wrote, was not “realistically arguable.” They would have to have some contractual relationship with Wright or his companies. Otherwise, she noted, “by definition the potential class in this case is unknown and potentially unlimited.”



In other words, it would be ludicrous to open up bitcoin developers to legal jeopardy from anyone whose private keys were ever lost or stolen. The fact that TTL would pay them to try to gain access to the wallets further “underlines the weakness of its case,” Falk wrote.



Last December, following a trial in Florida, Wright <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/verdict-in-craig-wright-civil-trial-100m-award-for-plaintiff-but-no-punitive-damages/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">was found liable</a> for conversion — a form of theft — and ordered to pay $100 million to a company controlled by Ira Kleiman, the brother of Wrights’ former business partner, David Kleiman, with whom Wright once mined bitcoins.



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Bitcoin Developers Do Not Have a Fiduciary Duty to Bitcoin Owners, Judge Rules

Sam Martin

<div id="highlights-block_617725d07bf3f" class="highlights">
 <ul>
 <li>ATOM is up 36% over the past week despite the broader market sell-off</li>
 <li>The Cosmos network is set to thrive in 2022 with increased developer interest and the Theta upgrade</li>
 </ul>
 
</div>



The Cosmos Network is home to nearly 50 protocols representing $151.8 billion of value.



Electric Capital&#8217;s <a href="https://medium.com/electric-capital/electric-capital-developer-report-2021-f37874efea6d" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">annual developer report</a> revealed that monthly active developers on Cosmos grew approximately 70% throughout 2021.



The rise of Osmosis, a DEX built on Cosmos, has driven significant traffic to the Cosmos ecosystem while attracting $1.2 billion of total value locked (TVL).



The Theta upgrade, scheduled tentatively for the first quarter of 2022, is another upcoming catalyst for ATOM and the Cosmos ecosystem as a whole.



Cosmos&#8217; token ATOM market dominance is approaching an all-time high, currently hovering near 0.47%.



<h3>Latest in Macro:</h3>



<ul><li>S&amp;P 500: 4,677, -0.41%</li><li>NASDAQ: 14,935, -0.96%</li><li>Gold: $1,796, +0.26%</li><li>WTI Crude Oil: $78.97, -0.60%</li><li>10-Year Treasury: 1.773%, +0.04%</li></ul>



<h3>Latest in Crypto:</h3>



<ul><li>BTC: $42,017, -3.00%</li><li>ETH: $3,222, -5.90%</li><li>ETH/BTC: 0.0767, -3.04%</li><li>BTC.D: 40.03%, +0.95%</li></ul>



<h3>Cosmos overview</h3>



As previously <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/scrt-osmo-and-atom-rally-as-cosmos-ecosystem-claims-center-stage-markets-wrap/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">covered</a> by Blockworks, <a href="https://v1.cosmos.network/intro" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Cosmos</a>&nbsp;(ATOM) is an ecosystem of blockchains that can scale and interoperate with each other. Historically, blockchains have been unable to interact with one another and had minimal transaction throughput with different programming languages, making it hard to attract developers to new chains.



The Tie released a <a href="https://research.thetie.io/a-journey-through-the-cosmos-atom/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">research article</a> on the Cosmos network in July of 2021 describing the ecosystem&#8217;s vision: &#8220;To make it easy for developers to build blockchains and break the barriers between blockchains by allowing them to transact with each other. This vision is achieved through a set of open source tools such as&nbsp;<a href="https://tendermint.com/core/">Tendermint</a>, the&nbsp;<a href="https://v1.cosmos.network/sdk">Cosmos software development kit (SDK</a>) and inter-blockchain communication (IBC), designed to let people build custom, secure, scalable and interoperable blockchain applications quickly.&#8221;



Cosmos is home to nearly 50 protocols representing $151.8 billion of value. Twenty-eight of these protocols are linked via IBC, a protocol designed for interoperability between arbitrary state machines, according to the project&#8217;s website.



<figure class="wp-block-image size-full"><img decoding="async" loading="lazy" width="926" height="718" src="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screen-Shot-2022-01-07-at-11.59.27-AM.png" alt="" class="wp-image-13654" srcset="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screen-Shot-2022-01-07-at-11.59.27-AM.png?w=926 926w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screen-Shot-2022-01-07-at-11.59.27-AM.png?w=300 300w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screen-Shot-2022-01-07-at-11.59.27-AM.png?w=768 768w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screen-Shot-2022-01-07-at-11.59.27-AM.png?w=331 331w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screen-Shot-2022-01-07-at-11.59.27-AM.png?w=337 337w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screen-Shot-2022-01-07-at-11.59.27-AM.png?w=282 282w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screen-Shot-2022-01-07-at-11.59.27-AM.png?w=80 80w" sizes="(max-width: 926px) 100vw, 926px" /><figcaption>Source: cosmos.network</figcaption></figure>



<h3>Developer activity </h3>



Electric Capital&#8217;s <a href="https://medium.com/electric-capital/electric-capital-developer-report-2021-f37874efea6d" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">annual developer report</a> revealed that monthly active developers grew approximately 70% throughout 2021. The Cosmos network is home to over <a href="https://cosmos.network/ecosystem/tokens/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">$151 billion of assets</a>, and the third most active developers in all of crypto, behind only Ethereum and Polkadot.



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="aligncenter size-large"><img decoding="async" loading="lazy" width="1024" height="576" src="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/full-time-devs-since-launch-1024x576.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-13655" srcset="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/full-time-devs-since-launch-1024x576.jpg?w=1024 1024w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/full-time-devs-since-launch-1024x576.jpg?w=300 300w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/full-time-devs-since-launch-1024x576.jpg?w=768 768w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/full-time-devs-since-launch-1024x576.jpg?w=1536 1536w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/full-time-devs-since-launch-1024x576.jpg?w=428 428w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/full-time-devs-since-launch-1024x576.jpg?w=464 464w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/full-time-devs-since-launch-1024x576.jpg?w=389 389w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/full-time-devs-since-launch-1024x576.jpg?w=80 80w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/full-time-devs-since-launch-1024x576.jpg?w=1920 1920w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /><figcaption>Source: Electric Capital</figcaption></figure></div>



<h3>Osmosis: The DEX of IBC</h3>



Osmosis (<a href="https://www.coingecko.com/en/coins/osmosis" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">OSMO</a>) is an advanced automated market maker (AMM) protocol that allows developers to build customized AMMs with sovereign liquidity pools. Built using the Cosmos SDK, Osmosis utilizes IBC to enable cross-chain transactions, according to the <a href="https://docs.osmosis.zone/overview/#what-is-osmosis" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">project&#8217;s website</a>, and has driven significant traffic to the Cosmos ecosystem. 



The protocol aims to extend the use of AMMs within the Cosmos ecosystem beyond traditional token swap-type use cases. &#8220;Through the customizability offered by Osmosis such custom-curve AMMs, dynamic adjustments of swap fees, multi-token liquidity pools, the AMM can offer decentralized formation of token fundraisers, interchain staking, options market, and more for the Cosmos ecosystem,&#8221; reads the <a href="https://docs.osmosis.zone/overview/#what-is-osmosis" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">project&#8217;s documentation</a>.



The Osmosis DEX has logged 1.22 million IBC transfers over the last 30 days, more than double that of Cosmos itself and nearly 10 times more than Terra, according to data from <a href="https://mapofzones.com/?period=720&amp;testnet=false&amp;tableOrderBy=totalIbcTxs&amp;tableOrderSort=desc" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Map of Zones</a>.



Osmosis has grown to $1.2 billion of liquidity and over $100 million in daily trading volume, according to its <a href="https://info.osmosis.zone" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">stats page</a>. Some of the main drivers for growth are:



<ul><li>Incentivized pools paying out very attractive yields to liquidity providers; the ATOM/OSMO pair currently pays out 102.29% APR according to the <a href="https://app.osmosis.zone/pools" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">application</a>;</li><li>High staking rewards on the OSMO token, currently yielding 95.1% rewards the popular <a href="https://wallet.keplr.app/#/dashboard" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Keplr wallet</a>;</li><li><a href="https://twitter.com/0xkrane/status/1478275712444416000?s=20" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Airdrops</a> for LP&#8217;s and stakers of OSMO for up-and-coming projects in the Cosmos ecosystem;</li><li>The upcoming integration of CosmWasm smart contracts and <a href="https://defitimes.io/defi-101/superfluid-staking-simply-explained/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">superfluid staking</a></li></ul>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img decoding="async" loading="lazy" width="1024" height="375" src="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screen-Shot-2022-01-07-at-12.45.21-PM-1024x375.png" alt="" class="wp-image-13662" srcset="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screen-Shot-2022-01-07-at-12.45.21-PM-1024x375.png?w=1024 1024w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screen-Shot-2022-01-07-at-12.45.21-PM-1024x375.png?w=300 300w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screen-Shot-2022-01-07-at-12.45.21-PM-1024x375.png?w=768 768w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screen-Shot-2022-01-07-at-12.45.21-PM-1024x375.png?w=428 428w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screen-Shot-2022-01-07-at-12.45.21-PM-1024x375.png?w=470 470w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screen-Shot-2022-01-07-at-12.45.21-PM-1024x375.png?w=389 389w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screen-Shot-2022-01-07-at-12.45.21-PM-1024x375.png?w=80 80w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screen-Shot-2022-01-07-at-12.45.21-PM-1024x375.png?w=1156 1156w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /><figcaption>Source: Info.osmosis.zone</figcaption></figure>



<h3>Theta upgrade</h3>



The Theta upgrade, scheduled tentatively for the first quarter of 2022, is another upcoming catalyst for ATOM and the Cosmos ecosystem as a whole. Highlights of the upcoming upgrade, <a href="https://hub.cosmos.network/main/roadmap/cosmos-hub-roadmap-2.0.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">per the project&#8217;s documentation</a>, include:



<ul><li>Cosmos SDK v0.45<ul><li>Groups module: Enables higher-level multisig permissioned accounts, e.g., weight-based voting policies</li><li>Meta-Transactions: Allows transactions to be submitted by separate accounts that receive tips</li><li>Governance module improvements: Execution of arbitraty transactions instead of just governance proposals and will enables much more expressive governance module</li></ul></li><li>NFT module<ul><li>Enable simple management of NFT identifiers, their owners, and associated data, such as URIs, content, and provenance.</li><li>An extensible base module for extensions including collectibles, custody, provenance, and marketplaces.</li></ul></li><li>Tendermint v0.35 — the Cosmos consensus engine</li><li>Interchain accounts<ul><li>A requirement in order to manage accounts across multiple blockchains.</li><li>Aims to provide locking/unlocking mechanisms across IBC-enabled blockchains.</li><li>Allows custody providers to service any IBC connected blockchain through a common interface on the Hub.</li></ul></li><li>Liquid staking<ul><li>Frees secure and low-risk delegations for use in other parts of the Cosmos ecosystem</li><li>Features include enabling transfer of rewards and voting rights</li></ul></li><li>Other potential upgrades still being discussed such as a Cosmos-to-Ethereum gravity bridge as well as budget and farming modules.</li></ul>



<h3>ATOM dominance</h3>



ATOM is nearing all-time highs in terms of market dominance over the total cryptocurrency market. It currently accounts for 0.47% of the entire crypto market capitalization, according to data from <a href="https://www.tradingview.com/chart/5GPs0hRQ/?symbol=CRYPTOCAP%3AATOM.D" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Trading View</a>.



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="aligncenter size-full"><img decoding="async" loading="lazy" width="1000" height="683" src="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/ATOM.D_2022-01-07_14-04-28.png" alt="" class="wp-image-13666" srcset="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/ATOM.D_2022-01-07_14-04-28.png?w=1000 1000w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/ATOM.D_2022-01-07_14-04-28.png?w=300 300w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/ATOM.D_2022-01-07_14-04-28.png?w=768 768w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/ATOM.D_2022-01-07_14-04-28.png?w=376 376w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/ATOM.D_2022-01-07_14-04-28.png?w=382 382w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/ATOM.D_2022-01-07_14-04-28.png?w=321 321w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/ATOM.D_2022-01-07_14-04-28.png?w=80 80w" sizes="(max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" /><figcaption>Source: Trading View</figcaption></figure></div>



ATOM was last trading near $41.50, up 36.3% over the past seven days, with a market cap of $11.76 billion, according to data from <a href="https://www.coingecko.com/en" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">CoinGecko</a>. 



For more information on what else is coming to Cosmos in 2022, refer to their recent <a href="https://blog.cosmos.network/whats-coming-to-cosmos-in-2022-ce8e48d383ab" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">blog post</a>.



<h3>NFTs</h3>



Trading data from <a href="https://opensea.io/rankings" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">OpenSea</a> and <a href="https://solanalysis.com" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Solanalysis</a> of some of the top Solana and Ethereum projects can be found below:



<figure class="wp-block-image size-full"><img decoding="async" loading="lazy" width="854" height="662" src="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-08-at-00.20.31.png" alt="Top Ethereum and Solana projects" class="wp-image-13682" srcset="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-08-at-00.20.31.png?w=854 854w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-08-at-00.20.31.png?w=300 300w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-08-at-00.20.31.png?w=768 768w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-08-at-00.20.31.png?w=332 332w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-08-at-00.20.31.png?w=337 337w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-08-at-00.20.31.png?w=283 283w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-08-at-00.20.31.png?w=80 80w" sizes="(max-width: 854px) 100vw, 854px" /></figure>



If you made it this far, thanks for reading! I am looking forward to catching up on Monday.



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