By Larry Wright
There are too many cryptocurrencies out there, and the accompanying blockchains have also crossed a static number; quite eccentric, the whole thing is as it used to be, just bitcoin in the beginning. We are no longer limited by the options that are presented to us in terms of blockchain entities such as Bitcoin, Ether, and XRP. There are too many cryptocurrencies out there right now, and most of them have learned from the mistakes that Bitcoin, Ether, and the likes of these made.
Today we will be talking about an incredibly elementary and successful cryptocurrency by the name of Polkadot. It has been claimed by Polkadot that it is not only going to be the next-generation blockchain protocol but would propose a dedicated fix when it comes to scalability issues once and for all.
Introduction to Polkadot
One extremely elementary specialization of Polkadot is that it can connect multiple specialized chains into a universal network. Polkadot has a strong focus on building its infrastructure over Web 3.0 experience. From this statement, one can only assume that Polkadot is going to be supportive of the next generation of technology because the infrastructure that it is building and bringing forward is based on the technologies and principles of web 3.0.
People who want to achieve something and have a particular goal in their minds often settle for less. They always want more; they always want to achieve something that they don’t have. The same analogy applies to the idea of blockchain technology. In the beginning, it was really a concept; it wasn’t believed that it could be real in the future, or it could have real-world use cases or applications. Here we are ten years after the launch of Bitcoin, the flagship cryptocurrency, and the possibilities that blockchain technology and decentralization extend to the world of finance are simply mind-numbing.
We have gone further with the idea of decentralization, and we don’t want it to go back to the conventional world of finance as blockchain technology is better, more efficient, and ultimately more effective than any conventional mode of finance or technology that we have at present. Despite the groundbreaking definition of blockchain technology, there are certain issues that need to be communicated upfront right now so that any kind of tension pertaining to their sub-par performance in the future can be avoided.
The first one is the scalability of the blockchain systems, tending to the performance of particular cryptocurrencies as most of these can’t communicate with each other. A proper solution must be found, or a special piece of the algorithm should be better if communication-related problems are to be solved. Other than that, interoperability has always been a drastic issue that has been cutting the otherwise wide berthed applications of blockchain technology. It is essential for multiple blockchains out there to exchange data between each other and work as a bridge to not only store and validate transactions but do much more than that.
There have been tries on the developer’s end to be able to bridge these issues with blockchain technology in the past, but to no avail. There isn’t any promising piece of technology or its execution present at the moment which could bridge multiple issues and achieve collective decentralization. The present infrastructure along with the foundation of web three, is extremely confident that this is an issue that this blockchain will be able to solve.
Top-Notch Features of Polkadot
Polkadot is an open-source blockchain protocol that is available to everyone, and developers at Polkadot believe that this is the next step that needs to be taken by the crypto community only to further the evolution of blockchain technology but to help consistent growth of the crypto applications. The co-founder of Ether, along with many other notable developers, have worked on Polkadot, and they continue to be a thriving part of the present team, which orchestrates multiple updates and is strengthening the infrastructure of Polkadot now.
The ultimate purpose of Polkadot is to further the security of blocks in-network, tackle the issues with scalability, and introduce innovation within the prospect of blockchain technology at its best. But it is not something that could be executed right then and there; proper infrastructure needs to be set up to support this incoming stream of ideas and concepts that are only good on paper for now but need to be tested extensively before a decision could be made to roll out these features as a new update to the current user base.
Another effort that is being orchestrated by Polkadot at the moment is interoperability; it is confident that in the near future, as the prospects of web three along with the technology of Polkadot continue to evolve, interoperability won’t remain a pressing issue within the crypto world. There are individual blockchains, blockchains that are working in a symbiotic approach, and blockchains that are multi-tethered, as these can handle a plethora of tasks in a single go.
All of them have their own particular use cases, associations, and values when it comes to executing and validating transactions in real-time. An individual blockchain present on the Polkadot network is known as a parachain or, in simpler words, a parallel blockchain. But the main chain on the Polkadot network is known as the relay chain.
The mere idea of executing or mitigating the problems or issues that are prevalent with interoperability is to let these two chains communicate and exchange information with each other at all times. There shouldn’t be any kind of barrier placed between the two that has to authenticate the request made either from the individual blockchains or the primary blockchain to have a look at the information or the data present on the other one.
This is extremely limiting, and it shouldn’t be made part of the ongoing evolutionary phase that Polkadot seems to be going through. The concept is not unique at its core; a similar concept has already been developed and talked about by Ether as it is hoping to implement these relative changes in the Ether 2.0 update that will follow shortly.
The idea is that any enterprise, individual, or company would be able to link their custom parachain with that of a substrate, which is an intricate framework designed to develop cryptocurrencies and decentralized bodies. Once this custom individual blockchain is linked to the Polkadot network, it will suddenly become interoperable with every other individual blockchain present on the network. Now it is something that you need to grasp right now because if you don’t then it is going to become confusing as we move further.
Let’s say you develop a custom blockchain or a parachain, if you will, and you want it to communicate with other blockchain systems such as Ether, Bitcoin, or XRP’s individual blockchain systems. Now you can’t expect to link your individual blockchain to the Polkadot network, and it suddenly becomes interoperable with every other blockchain in the world.
For your blockchain to become interoperable with other blockchain systems, it has to be encoded or encompassed within the Polkadot network; otherwise, it won’t connect. In simpler words, any blockchain media that is present on the Polkadot network would be able to communicate with your custom blockchain, or so is the vision at the moment.
Doing so would help you to develop cross-chain applications, services, and products because the transfer of data or ideas would become seamless and could be comprehensible on a large scale. You would still require validators for the sake of validating the data that is being exchanged from one chain to the other. But you don’t require a large number of them because, ultimately, a small number of validators would be able to secure multiple individual blockchains present on the Polkadot network.
Another duty of these miners would be to ensure that all the transactions that are being commenced are made available to the Polkadot network and could be stretched across the entirety of individual blockchains present out there.
Advantages of Polkadot
If you are a developer exploring the crypto space and trying to land your first project that might mean something or, in the aftermath of events, could turn you into a reputable developer, then you ought to check out Polkadot’s ecosystem. Current blockchains are limited in their operation, which is why there are a few issues that can be addressed by Polkadot that including customization, scaling, and interoperability. Current blockchain systems don’t have the infrastructure required to cover all these basic errors that are extremely pressing and could pose a significant risk to the extension or stretch of the blockchain world.
Other than that, governance and upgradeability could also be tackled quite appropriately by the Polkadot blockchain media. If you want to scale your blockchain project, then surely Polkadot should be your ultimate decision because it literally checks out most of the boxes that are required when it comes to choosing a next Gen solution for scalability and interoperability. It can act as a multi-chain discipline that allows various blockchains to exist simultaneously and not only that but to share data and information in real-time that working systems of the present simply can’t. It can communicate with multiple individual chains while keeping its integration intact as a multi-chain network.
This literally takes care of one of the most prominent issues that are tied with the blocking technology, and that is interoperability. It can process transactions in parallel with various other individual blockchains and the primary chain working as the main net. Parallel processing is something that is quite new, and if truth be told, then it is the idea of the Polkadot blocking system, but it can be widely adopted on a global scale because it certainly takes care of a lot of issues and systematic elements for multiple blockchain systems up there.
If you are after customization and you want your blockchain system to perform a specific task that is tailored to your business or investment needs, then you can have that fantasy fulfilled at Polkadot blockchain media. Presently there is no ‘one blockchain rules them all’ infrastructure present because it is such a complicated and intricate subject that it requires research, development, extending the rules of standard computing while embossing thousands and thousands of layers of data and launching systems accompanied with each other while performing at their best.
It doesn’t mean if your blockchain system is going to have a single chain with thousands of individual chains overlapped with each other, you can customize each and everyone for a different function that only that specific chain performs. This will allow you to reach the zenith with functionality and optimization of your entire system whilst remaining completely efficient and accurate no matter the volume of processing that is thrown your way. Interoperability is all about talking and communication.
If multiple branches of the same company or different companies that serve the same niche are not communicating with each other, then the evolution of that particular sector is questionable, and also, if it states that these commissions are not being interoperable at all, there’s something wrong. If nothing else, then the sharing of data and communication of different blockchains with each other at a better note should be conducted. This will certainly resolve many issues that are accustomed to the conventional modes of blockchain systems. Products and services would become more automated to the end-user, along with the overall experience for that particular user heightened to a dynamic level.
Governance would also become quite easier and automated because with the issues of interoperability out of the way and becoming solid truth; feedback could be exchanged in real-time, which would help the governing models to take action against multiple threats and make changes on multiple fronts processing valuable insight gathered from the data which was shared between the blockchain systems.
Staking and Bonding
There exist multiple domains of decentralization and, therefore, blockchain technology. It is not simply tied to the prospect of validating transactions and then subjecting them to particular blocks forming long and linear chains of data that have been validated and cross-referenced so many times that the margin of error is negligible or it doesn’t exist at all. There are other things that could be done with a blockchain network, and that is what Polkadot aims for. Interoperability has not only been suggested by Polkadot but many other blockchain entities out there; so what makes the proposition of Polkadot stronger and better than other blockchain systems?
Because Polkadot believes that interoperability shouldn’t be subjected to or diminished by the mere transfer of data and assets on-chain, it should help to introduce new concepts such as a process where a user who stakes tokens can be incentivized along with the bonding of said tokens. You might have heard before that tokens can be staked over a blockchain network as it is not relatively a new concept but a continuation of no one.
The protocol which is put in charge of the second process is none other than the ‘proof of stake’ consensus algorithm, this model allows users to individually stake their tokens into a particular mining pool, or they can do that in groups of numbers.
Once they have staked a particular amount of tokens into a mining pool, they become eligible to receive rewards on behalf of the network because their tokens are now validating the transactions, and that is why they are receiving the reward for that. This is the limitation of the standard staking process; anyone can stake their tokens into a mining pool and get rewards in return for validating the transactions.
But there exists no possible way to determine if a staking user is actually honest or has a bad intent at heart; it wasn’t possible before, but then came the Polkadot network. Polkadot can differentiate between honest users who stake and bad actors based on the amount of token that has been staked, the original intent that they have along with the scrutiny process, which allows the network to take a deeper dive into the minuscules of data to determine if the original intent of the stake proposed by a user is bad or good.
Other than that, you are also open to experiencing the bonding process that takes place on the Polkadot network. It works by committing a standard amount of tokens to the network for a specific amount of time. Until that moment arises or has passed, you can’t withdraw your tokens, and these will remain locked permanently within that setting.
According to the original contract that you might have received in digital form, when committing your tokens into the network, you would be presented with the fee that you would be accommodated with if your tokens continue to remain committed to a secure allocation.
Although individual chains and projects being committed to the Polkadot network will be removed at once if these are no longer maintained or are no longer appreciable to the current endeavors of the network. What it represents is that you are free to stay or bond your tokens and continue to get rewards in return over the Polkadot network while at the same time using the network to solve scalability, interoperability, and governance-related issues over your own blockchain systems.