THE PROTOCOL: HOLIDAY SPECIAL — Year In Review | Exploring Events, New Technologies, and Industry Trends

We are going back in our archives for this year before this podcast to share some stories that we think are special. 

This episode is sponsored by the Stellar Community Fund

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In this installment of "The Protocol," hosts Brad Keoun, the founding editor of The Protocol Newsletter, and tech journalists Sam Kessler and Margaux Nijkerk, explore the following stories:

TOPIC | Events 

Zuzalu

This invite-only gathering of 200 people in the Mediterranean marina town of Lustica Bay has been taking place since late March and wraps up this week, featuring official sessions on zero-knowledge cryptography, twice-a-day jumps into the Adriatic Sea, and the chance to get face time with Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin.

Curve hack, DeFi existential crisis 

Curve, a leading decentralized exchange on Ethereum, was hacked for more than $70 million in July. Questions continue to linger around the platform's long-term viability and potential contagion risk.

Ethereum Validator Withdrawals

Following last week's milestone Shanghai upgrade, we moved to wind down CoinDesk's Ethereum validator project, but it could be a week before the 32 ETH we staked (about $67,000 worth) hits our wallet. C. Spencer Beggs, our director of engineering, breaks down the technical steps he's taken.

TOPIC | New Technology - Projects 

Account Abstraction was Fire at the start of 2023

Account abstraction – a concept recently embraced by Visa – could make Ethereum wallets significantly more user-friendly.

Worldcoin

World ID has added integrations with Shopify, Minecraft, and Reddit alongside a slew of developer-focused updates that could expand the OpenAI founder's blockchain-based "proof-of-personhood" service to more users.

Bitcoin Ordinals

In the historic auction house's first-ever sale of the Ordinals inscriptions known as "NFTs on Bitcoin," a batch of three pixelated images from a mushroom-themed collection drew about $450,000, or roughly five times the highest estimates.

PROTOCOL VILLAGE SEGMENT  

TOPIC | INDUSTRY TRENDS - BUSINESS SIDE 

Layer2 Mania

Users will be able to bridge their ETH starting Thursday, with the official launch of the main network on Aug. 9.

Crypto Winter / Legal -Regulatory: SBF gets charged | Binance + CZ

The alleged fraudster and ex-FTX CEO acted "in good faith," Bankman-Fried's attorney said in an emotional closing argument.

ZK Teams 

Polygon Labs, a developer of scaling networks for Ethereum, has shifted toward "Polygon CDK," a blockchain-development kit powered by zero-knowledge cryptography. The older "Polygon Edge" was used by Dogechain, in an unofficial effort to build a Dogecoin-oriented smart-contracts network.

EPISODE LINKS |  

Zuzalu Is 2 Months in Montenegro With Crypto Elites, Cold Plunges, Vitalik Selfies

As Curve Averts DeFi Death Spiral, Fiasco Exposes Serious Risks

CoinDesk Winds Down Ethereum Validator ‘Zelda,’ and We Now Wait to Get Money Back

Ethereum Upgrade Could Make It Harder to Lose All Your Crypto 

'Bitcoin NFT' Hysteria Comes to Sotheby's as Super-Mario-Style Mushroom Character Tops $200K

Sam Altman Is Bringing Worldcoin's Controversial Eye-Scanning Orb to Reddit and Microsoft

Coinbase Sets Public Launch of ‘Base’ Layer 2 Blockchain for Next Week 

Sam Bankman-Fried on Verge of Tears as His Lawyer Concludes Defense

Polygon Stops Work on 'Edge,' Used to Build Dogechain, as Focus Turns to ZK 

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