Web3 on Fire: The Bitcoin NFT debate

GM, frens! Lots of stuff has happened last week and while it's impossible to cover everything, here are some of the highlights. Today we'll talk about BTC maxis fighting over NFTs on their blockspace, news that Moody's is working on a scoring system for stables, North Korea stealing crypto to fund their missile research, BNB Greenfield and copytrading. Let's get right down to it:

Crypto space is debating over Bitcoin NFTs

Bitcoin NFTs? Some holders consider it a complete farce, while others are more accepting. Since the launch of the Ordinals protocol earlier this month, there has been a heated debate regarding the usage of Bitcoin to store non-fungible tokens (NFTs).

Ordinals is a protocol created by a core BTC dev Casey Rodarmor, which enables users to store content on the blockchain. Through this protocol, a user can add arbitrary content such as text or images to sequentially numbered sats in the Bitcoin network. This creates unique digital artifacts that can be stored, transferred, and tracked on the blockchain.

Critics of this protocol state that it will mess with the transactions by congesting blocks and elevating transaction costs.

Rodarmor however disagrees with the suggestion, claiming that the fee market pricing mechanism will handle everything. He argues that the fee market will ensure that transactions are processed in a timely and efficient manner, while also keeping fees at an optimal level.

Bitcoiners don't seem to be entirely against the idea of NFTs, but they indeed have some reservations about how they should be implemented. Some argue that storing such complex data on the blockchain will require a dedicated layer-2 solution. Others point out that you can't just put anything on the chain and that you need to be careful about what's being stored.

It remains to be seen how NFTs will fare on the BTC network but at least we can't say that the space is entirely closed off to new ideas. As long as we can debate and come to a consensus on how best to implement them, then new tech developments can still move crypto forward.

Moody's is working on a scoring system for crypto stablecoins

According to reports, Moody's Corporation is developing the scoring system to assess the quality of the reserve attestation for up to 20 stablecoins. This scoring system will not serve as an official credit rating, however it will provide a measure in which market participants can assess these digital assets and determine their worth.

Stablecoins are popular within the crypto space due to their ability to maintain their value over time, hence why they are often pegged to a national fiat currency or another financial instrument like gold.

Moody's is a credit rating agency that is well known for its assessments of debt instruments such as stocks, bonds and other financial products. This move signals a shift in the way traditional financial institutions view digital assets and their use cases. It also indicates that more companies may begin to adopt cryptocurrency as an investment vehicle or form of payment in the near future, also it might mean that regulation authorities take an increasingly active role in the market.

This move could be a positive step forward for the cryptocurrency industry and help provide more security and legitimacy to the industry, which could ultimately lead to increased adoption of digital assets among more institutional investors. 

North Korea is stealing crypto to fund nuclear weapons research

According to a recent White House announcement, North Korean hackers were able to exploit vulnerabilities in the crypto industry and steal more than one billion dollars in two years. This money was apparently used to fund North Korea's missile program.

According to the White House, these hackers were able to exploit poor security protocols within the crypto industry and this enabled them to access funds and gain access to sensitive information. The White House implied that the industry was not doing enough to protect its users from malicious actors. It is clear that strong security protocols and measures need to be implemented within the crypto industry if it is to remain secure for its users.

The Deputy White House Deputy Advisor for Cyber ​​and New Technologies, Anne Neuberger, was also quoted saying that North Korea was sending a third of their stolen crypto assets directly to fund their missile program. This shows just how dangerous and far-reaching cybercrime is becoming in today’s digital age. So it's either we strengthen our security protocols or we risk having to face the consequences.

So make sure you keep your crypto safe, of course if you're not planning to fund any missile research programs any time soon.

BNB Greenfield - BNB chain devs unveil a new data storage platform

The core dev team of BNB Chain (formerly known as Binance Smart Chain) has published a whitepaper for BNB Greenfield, a blockchain-based Web3 data storage platform. Users can use this platform to store data on a distributed network and access or monetize it using smart contracts on the BNB Chain.

The devs are saying this will create "new themes for the ownership and utility of data" that can be used to help individuals and businesses. Greenfield will be the third product in the BNB's ecosystem alongside the BNB Chain and BNB Beacon Chain. BNB Chain is focused on smart contract development and BNB Beacon Chain focuses on BNB governance and security.

According to the whitepaper, Greenfield will use Proof-of-Stake consensus based on Tendermint for its own security. Blocks will be created every two seconds by validators, who are incentivized with BNB rewards.

The initial BNB will be locked on BSC and re-minted on the Greenfield blockchain. BNB and data operation primitives can move between the two networks, allowing users to access data on either network while still maintaining total circulation of BNB.

The team is currently actively developing Greenfield, and they plan to launch a testnet soon. We'll see if it's going to revolutionize anything once it goes live but for now it's looking like a promising development.

Research corner: Copytrading and how to scale your portfolio from $1k to $100k (Spoiler alert: it's not that easy)

One crypto Twitter account that goes by @dotta had recently posted some great content about followtrading. They said it was one of the fastest and easiest paths to grow your account from $1k to $100k. The concept is simple but requires some knowledge, a plan, and determination.

The first step would be to mark the wallets that you are interested in following. A great tool to use for this is Etherscan’s “Name Tags” feature.

To find people worthy of copying he's suggesting you look at the hottest pairs on Dextools, what’s trending on OpenSea, and just generally seeing what everyone is tweeting about. Then he suggest we look at the chart, pick the moment just before the pump and look at the date to find out who bought it right before it pumped.

To find out who bought OpenSea NFTs on that day, he suggests we look at the “Activity” tab on OpenSea. But for better results, he suggests we use Etherscan again and look at the wallets associated with the OpenSea platform.

Another way of finding whales and good traders is to use Nansen.ai. With Nansen, you can easily see which wallet has made the most profit from a token without having to grind it out on Etherscan. Nansen also provides data on where they’ve invested, the timescale of their investments, and the wallets of other whales that have made similar investments.

TLDR: give the twitter thread a read if you've ever planned to try that. Copy trading can be an easy way to grow your account but it's important to remember that unless you can read someone's mind through the blockchain it's going to be mostly based on luck and chance rather than skill.

The fun page: our weekly meme collection

That's all for now, frens.

We hope that in this uncertain time you'll take away something from these, something that will allow you to make well-informed decisions. Thank you and see you next week. Cheers!

Yours, The 🔥 Team

Brought to you by Ambire: The Web3 Wallet That Speaks Human