Jack Kubinec

This article is part of Blockworks’ Web3 Watch, a weekly roundup of the highlights and lowlights from the culture side of crypto.



The wireless provider NETGEAR is teaming up with SuperRare for its Meural Opus, $800 digital picture frames that can connect to wallets and display NFTs.&nbsp;



NETGEAR acquired Meural and its smart frame technology in 2018 and made its NFT play in force in 2022, partnering with Metamask and <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/netgear-joins-superrare-dao-in-nft-push">joining SuperRare’s DAO</a>.&nbsp;



The launch combines a growing market and a shrinking one. Persistence Market Research <a href="https://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/market-research/digital-photo-frame-market.asp">predicts</a> smart frames to grow by 3.1% annually over the next decade while the <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/nft-market-remains-sluggish">NFT market continues its slide</a>.



And the Opus isn’t a smart frame with NFT functionality tacked on. The Meural Opus <a href="https://www.netgear.com/home/meural-digital-frame/opus-nft/">page</a> on NETGEAR’s website brands the product as a new way to “showcase your <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/nfts">NFTs</a>” and teases the company’s forthcoming crypto culture-inspired NFT drop.



Poppy Simpson, senior product and content manager for NETGEAR’s Meural line, said the company sees a future for NFTs despite this year’s downturn.



“The market adjustment we’re seeing now is just that, an adjustment. The highs we saw for NFTs as they made their way into the popular vernacular were not sustainable,” Simpson said. “Our research suggests that there has been relative stability in terms of price/volume in the ‘art’ segment of the market.”



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">One interesting stat:</h2>



<ul>
<li>Polymarket’s prediction market <a href="https://polymarket.com/event/sbf-sentenced-to-50-years">gives</a> Sam <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/sam-bankman-fried">Bankman-Fried</a> a 35% chance of being sentenced to 50 or more years in prison.</li>
</ul>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Also of note:</h2>



<ul>
<li>SocialScan is hoping to turn a block explorer like Etherscan into a social platform. The <a href="https://socialscan.io/dashboard">platform</a> has similar functionality to other block explorers but gives wallets labels like “Whale” or “Notable NFT Holder” and allows wallet owners to follow and message each other.</li>



<li>The Italian soccer club AC Milan <a href="https://x.com/rodrifernandezt/status/1719796870657048837?s=20">sold</a> one yard by one yard blockchain-based squares on its field. If something notable happens on a holder’s plot of field, the owner of the “block” earns rewards.</li>



<li>After reaching a low in early October, NFT volumes have <a href="https://x.com/punk9059/status/1720431770804371564?s=20">risen</a> for four consecutive weeks.</li>
</ul>



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Web3 Watch: NETGEAR continues its NFT push

Bessie Liu

Ava Labs will sunset its Etherscan-run block explorer and replace it with a new product, dubbed Routescan, on Nov. 30.



Users will be required to back up the information they have included on the block explorer before the deactivation date, including addresses, private name tags and private transaction notes.&nbsp;



According to the Etherscan <a href="https://info.etherscan.com/discontinuation-of-a-block-explorer/">website</a>, the decision to discontinue block explorers is often the result of various factors, including the expiration or non-renewal of a service agreement or lack of team bandwidth.



Luigi D&#8217;Onorio, the head of DeFi and developer relations at Ava Labs, told Blockworks that Snowtrace as a domain will continue to live on, but the Etherscan deployment will be deprecated and replaced with a new product launch from the Avascan team.



“Avascan has been a loyal, native team to the <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/avalanche">Avalanche</a> ecosystem and provides support for Subnets, X-Chain and P-Chain as well as the C-Chain. The Etherscan deployment simply covered the C-Chain. As Avalanche continues to scale with Subnets, it is important that infrastructure partners cover this as well,” D&#8217;Onorio said.



Austin Blackerby, an analytics manager at Flipside Crypto, noted that the costs of pulling data from subnets would be quite high for outside vendors such as Etherscan. It would be much more cost-effective for Ava Labs to bring these resources in-house, he said.



“By bringing this in-house, they can take advantage of internal resources as well as create a seamless experience across the different subnets,” said Blackerby.&nbsp;



There are downsides to this move, however, according to Trevor Wenokur, a senior data analytics engineer at Flipside Crypto. Wenokur noted that in the short term, there will be a loss of shared expertise and tooling across <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/evm">EVM</a>-compatible chains for both users and the team creating the new explorer.



“Oftentimes, EVM compatible chains share the same (or similar enough) processes and upgrades that things like technical solutions to decoding or new approaches for data type changes, new values etc., can be efficiently solved in one place, then applied everywhere all at once,” Wenokur said.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">The business model of block explorers</h2>



Carlos Mercado, a data scientist at Flipside Crypto, told Blockworks that block explorers often profit from foundations that pay for their services.&nbsp;



“For instance, the Etherscan team runs cloned user interfaces for blockchains including Fantom, <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/polygon">Polygon</a>, <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/optimism">Optimism</a>, <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/arbitrum">Arbitrum</a>, etc,” Mercado said. 



They also sell enterprise API access to their data sets and build a competitive advantage by offering unique data.



“General purpose block explorers can remain at a competitive advantage by integrating off-chain data like contract code or ABIs to decode transactions,” Mercado said, “providing better, faster, cheaper enterprise access to historical data on user interactions with contracts.”



Ultimately, though, D&#8217;Onorio notes that the key to remaining competitive as a block explorer is to have a diverse set of well-funded teams working together on the product.



“Deciding who to work with is really a function of who has the long-term alignment in terms of incentives and focus on your ecosystem and a technically capable team,” D&#8217;Onorio said.



Updated Nov. 2, 2023 at 8:58 am ET: Clarified that Etherscan team runs cloned user interfaces for blockchains including Fantom, etc.



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Etherscan will no longer run Ava Labs’ block explorer

Macauley Peterson

Want to learn about Ethereum smart contract functionality, but have little to no developer experience? There’s a decentralized app for that.



Etherscan, the preeminent block explorer and analytics platform for Ethereum, is beta testing a new feature — called Code Reader —&nbsp;a tool that makes it easy to query OpenAI’s large language model (LLM) to research <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/solidity">solidity</a> smart contracts.



Just as the recent <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/etherscan-advanced-filter-feature">Advanced Filter</a> makes it easier to research transaction information history, Code Reader provides an intuitive way for non-developers to learn about how specific smart contracts function.



Etherscan stresses that the answers are coming from OpenAI’s LLM, not Etherscan itself, and that while the tool is known to have <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-01833-0">useful applications</a> in writing and parsing code, it shouldn’t be relied upon in a vacuum.



Professional auditing firms are already finding it offers a useful productivity boost, such as Michael Lewellen, a security solutions architect at OpenZeppelin.



“I’ve actually found it very useful,” Lewellen told Blockworks. “It’s mostly been a UX improvement, but I’ve very much enjoyed it.”



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Example use cases</h2>



Bearing in mind the caveats, Etherescan says its feature will help developers and other interested parties to better understand code.&nbsp;



“This feature is particularly valuable when interacting with a smart contract for the first time, as it provides a thorough understanding of its operations and functionality,” according to a <a href="https://info.etherscan.com/code-reader/">tutorial</a> on the feature.



By entering a smart contract address, one can quickly get a list of smart contract functions, which, among other uses, can allow one to interact directly with the smart contract on the respective contract address page — an alternative to using a front-end interface.



More experienced developers can use Code Reader to learn how to integrate a given smart contract with their own decentralized apps using natural language.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Is PEPE pointless?</h2>



Code Reader won’t be able to expound upon the utility of a meme or what value any given token has to its “community,” but it can break down what’s in the smart contract code.



For a simple example, let’s see what the token contract for the recently-in-vogue memecoin <a href="https://blockworks.co/price/pepe">PEPE</a> does:



A quick look at the PEPE <a href="https://etherscan.io/token/0x6982508145454ce325ddbe47a25d4ec3d2311933">token page</a>, shows that it has around 121,000 holders and a fully diluted market cap of some $600 million.



In this case, the contract is “ownable,” meaning an account (owner) can be “granted exclusive access to specific functions,” four specifically:



<ol>
<li>A transfer ownership function allows the owner to transfer ownership of the contract to a new account.</li>



<li>The owner can set rules for token transfers.</li>



<li>The owner can add or remove addresses from a blacklist.</li>



<li>A function to renounce ownership of the contract, removing any functionality that is only available to the owner.</li>
</ol>



“Renouncing ownership of a contract means giving up control over the contract and its functionalities,” the Code Reader elaborates. “After renouncing ownership, no one will have the authority to modify contract state or perform administrative actions.”


<div class="wp-block-image">
<figure class="aligncenter"><img decoding="async" src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/v1WXZ6jTCdgca6lA1FCkI7AKFUdF4ugmbTZKBunq8aScB7etr6uxfNQ3TkF8kZf6MWvI2d25XbUhwIlhjcBSubXFlA9caNhGmdxzaXF-3VTUVbu6F7fptDPd5LRg4oyIdHXhcqcIqb7Ul7VrrusOe64" alt=""/></figure></div>


That begs the question, “has ownership of this contract been renounced?” And, OpenAI quickly points out, yes it has.



So, what does that mean, precisely?



“New addresses cannot be added to the blacklist after the ownership of the contract has been renounced. The `blacklist` function can only be called by the contract owner, as specified by the `onlyOwner` modifier in the `blacklist` function. Once the ownership has been renounced, there is no contract owner, and therefore, no one can modify the blacklist. Therefore, the contract will not have the ability to limit transfers by adding addresses to the blacklist.”



Well, that’s comforting! So, you can freely send PEPE back and forth without risk of censorship (but not much else).



The feature is still under development and the Etherscan team is actively soliciting feedback. It requires an OpenAI API key — and sufficient credits — to work.



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Let’s learn about PEPE: New Etherscan tool uses OpenAI to read smart contracts

The Ethereum blockchain explorer Etherscan has rolled out a new advanced filtering feature that expands the tool kit available for reading on-chain data.



The new feature, in beta, makes it easier to search for specific information directly on the <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/data-analytics" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">data analytics</a> platform, without needing to run specialized queries in analytics dashboards such as <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/dune-analytics" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Dune Analytics</a>, which require knowledge of SQL.



Etherscan serves as a powerful microscope for the blockchain that empowers researchers to uncover valuable insights into transaction histories.



It has been operating since 2015 as a free and open-source project “with the mission of providing equitable access to blockchain data,” according to its <a href="https://etherscan.io/aboutus" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">About Us</a> page.



The Advanced Filter beta currently supports filtering by various criteria, including transaction type, method, from or to addresses, types and amounts of assets.



<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">Advanced Filter enables you to analyse a variety of transactions within a single view Filter by transaction type, function name, duration, amounts, assets and from &amp; to addresses <a href="https://t.co/6GYbWIxG7q">pic.twitter.com/6GYbWIxG7q</a>&mdash; Etherscan (@etherscan) <a href="https://twitter.com/etherscan/status/1664589461060227072?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 2, 2023</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
</div></figure>



With an Etherscan login, you can save filtered queries for later use.



For instance, you might want to see withdrawals larger than $1 million in USDC from Binance <a href="https://etherscan.io/advanced-filtered?txntype=2&amp;fadd=0x28c6c06298d514db089934071355e5743bf21d60&amp;tadd=&amp;tkn=0xa0b86991c6218b36c1d19d4a2e9eb0ce3606eb48&amp;amt=1M%7eMAX&amp;age=24H" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">over the past 24 hours</a>, to gauge customer reaction to <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/binance-execs-unlicensed-securities-exchange">Monday’s SEC lawsuit</a>.



The tool will be a boon for on-chain sleuths like ZachXBT and MyCrypto founder Taylor Monahan in efforts to track down scammers and thieves and their victims more efficiently.



<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">yeah sex is great an all but have you ever been tracing funds at 4am and suddenly been granted the magical ability to filter up and down a fat list of txns and hop from victim to thief instantly and share a link to it instead of taking yet another unsearchable screenshot 🤤🤤&mdash; Tay 💖 (@tayvano_) <a href="https://twitter.com/tayvano_/status/1664591535374204928?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 2, 2023</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
</div></figure>



Among many use-cases, it should come in handy for tasks like piecing together data for tax filing purposes or more fanciful endeavors like checking the latest <a href="https://etherscan.io/advanced-filtered?fadd=0x47a37ea6b691eb76aaf771d5bdbba2ca68add173&amp;tadd=0x47a37ea6b691eb76aaf771d5bdbba2ca68add173&amp;txntype=0&amp;mtd=0x11dabc93%7eCreate_bid&amp;amt=1-10" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">auction bids</a> for <a href="https://www.thellamas.io/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">The Llamas</a> NFT collection.



The feature is still somewhat limited — you can’t dial in specific amount ranges, or sort and export results, for instance —&nbsp;but the Etherscan team expects to update it with improvements based on user feedback.



<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">This is a Beta release, some limitations include: &#8211; Poor reputation tokens, ignore list tokens, and failed transactions displayed with no option to hide them &#8211; From and To addresses are only joined by OR operator Let us know what you&#39;d like us to add or improve! 🙏&mdash; Etherscan (@etherscan) <a href="https://twitter.com/etherscan/status/1664589479917813761?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 2, 2023</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
</div></figure>



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Etherscan Advanced Filter Feature Helps On-chain Sleuths

Casey Wagner

Etherscan will now be hiding zero-value token transfers by default to protect investors, the platform announced Monday.&nbsp;



In a tweet, Etherscan said the update was designed to alleviate concerns about &#8216;address poisoning&#8217; attacks, which &#8220;have phished unsuspecting users and spammed everybody else.&#8221;



<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">Update: Zero-value token transfers are now hidden by default In recent times, &#39;address poisoning&#39; attacks have phished unsuspecting users and spammed everybody else. With this update you won’t have to see these transfers anymore! Before ➡️ After <a href="https://t.co/F93pWDUJ7a">pic.twitter.com/F93pWDUJ7a</a>&mdash; Etherscan (@etherscan) <a href="https://twitter.com/etherscan/status/1645406189692526593?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 10, 2023</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
</div></figure>



Address poisoning attacks occur when scammers send a very small (or zero-value) amount of crypto to an address they wish to exploit. Once the transaction is recorded, fraudsters hope that the wallet owner will accidentally copy the wrong address and send funds to their scam account by mistake.&nbsp;



Wallet addresses used in these attacks often begin and end with the same values as the address used in the owner’s most recent legitimate transaction. These phishing scams do not compromise a user’s assets or private keys, wallet provider Trezor <a href="https://trezor.io/support/a/address-poisoning-attacks">notes</a> in a warning about this type of attack.&nbsp;



The new feature is optional and can be disabled, Etherscan added, noting that transparency is a primary concern.&nbsp;



The platform, launched in 2015, said it is open to public feedback about the updates.



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Etherscan Hides Zero-value Token Transfers

Jacquelyn Melinek

<div id="highlights-block_6181ee7956aa8" class="highlights">
 <ul>
 <li>The owner of the wallet with $5 billion in Shiba Inu coins has begun transferring the funds to different wallets</li>
 <li>By the time all 40.004 trillion tokens were transferred, the owner had moved about $2,760,000,027.60 worth of Shiba Inu</li>
 </ul>
 
</div>



An investor who bought $8,000 worth of Shiba Inu cryptocurrency in August 2020 has transferred over 40 trillion tokens from their wallet — about $2.76 billion, according to their Etherscan <a href="https://etherscan.io/tokentxns?a=0x1406899696adb2fa7a95ea68e80d4f9c82fcdedd&amp;p=1">account</a>.&nbsp;



The transfer sent approximately 10,000,000,100,000 Shiba Inu tokens to four different wallet addresses over four transactions. All four of the addresses the tokens were sent to have no prior token transfers.&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">Remember when everyone was wondering if the guy who turned 8k$ into 5 billion actually lost access to his wallet? Turns out he didn&#39;t and just started moving some of his <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%24SHIB&amp;src=ctag&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">$SHIB</a> Address:<a href="https://t.co/Pok4lH0AUv">https://t.co/Pok4lH0AUv</a> <a href="https://t.co/yyzb3OXcPm">pic.twitter.com/yyzb3OXcPm</a>&mdash; Devchart 👨🏻‍💻 (@devchart) <a href="https://twitter.com/devchart/status/1455692819281158152?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 3, 2021</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
</div></figure>



Since the transfers, the token price has dropped 1.91%, a small amount in relation to typical market volatility.



The transactions occurred between 6:20 pm and 6:45 pm ET Tuesday. Each transfer was roughly $600 million, or about 10 trillion tokens. At the time, Shiba Inu was at $0.000069 per token.&nbsp;



By the time all 40.004 trillion tokens were transferred, the owner had moved about $2,760,000,027.60 worth of Shiba Inu.&nbsp;



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img decoding="async" loading="lazy" width="1024" height="271" src="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-25-1024x271.png" alt="" class="wp-image-10349" srcset="https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-25-1024x271.png?w=1024 1024w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-25-1024x271.png?w=300 300w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-25-1024x271.png?w=768 768w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-25-1024x271.png?w=1536 1536w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-25-1024x271.png?w=428 428w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-25-1024x271.png?w=470 470w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-25-1024x271.png?w=389 389w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-25-1024x271.png?w=80 80w, https://blockworks-co.imgix.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/image-25-1024x271.png?w=1783 1783w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /><figcaption>SHIB token balance over time for the address of this investor; Source: Nansen</figcaption></figure>



The transactions come one day after Shiba surpassed Dogecoin and became the tenth most valuable digital asset by market value of $40 billion. The cryptocurrency saw its biggest rally in late October when it surged 66% in one day.&nbsp;



The so-called meme coin is up 103.2 million percent over the past 12 months. Its price is still up <a href="https://www.coinbase.com/price/shiba-inu">42.26%</a> on the week and 760.93% on the month, according to Coinbase data.



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