L2 Planet Issue #21
L2 Planet Issue #21
In this Issue of L2 Planet, we focused on the developments regarding L2 Planet, Orbis, Immutable X, Arbitrum, Aztec, Optimism, and StarkNet Ecosystem.
Say Hello to l2planet.xyz
We are happy to introduce l2planet.xyz, a new home for Ethereum and non-Ethereum L2s!
Layer-2 solutions are getting stronger day by day. Everyone knows Ethereum Layer-2s and talks about them. What about non-Ethereum Layer-2s? Do you know that several chains are building Layer-2s, such as Mina, Avalanche, Syscoin, and Tezos? We want to increase awareness of it. Our mission is accelerating Layer-2 adaption, educating users about Layer-2 solutions, and bringing new users to Layer-2s.
L2 Planet is now just an L2 newsletter anymore. We aim to be a one-stop hub for Layer-2s. Want to learn about Layer-2s? You should go to l2planet.xyz. Want to analyze Layer-2 data? You should go to l2planet.xyz. Users are able to learn, discover, and track more than 500 projects on Layer-2s across different chains. Also, you can read the first and the best L2 newsletter in the world, which we have been running for over 1 year. Yes, this is a new start for L2 Planet, but also a goodbye to Substack...
Goodbye Orbis
Orbis is a zkRollup project which aims to increase the capability and scalability of Cardano.
According to the announcement, Orbis Labs decided to shut down the Orbis project due to some reasons. What is the real reason behind it? They announced a partnership with JPG Store for a community private sale of HALO, the native token of Orbis protocol. But things went wrong. The network was halted during the NFT sale, and investors decided to pull out of the project. So, the team decided to shut down the project because of constrained funding and uncertain conditions. But don’t worry, the team sent NFT refunds and transaction costs to participants of the NFT sale.
Goodbye Orbis, the first and the only zkRollup solution on Cardano :(
Offers Live on Immutable X
Immutable X, which is a carbon-neutral gas-free Layer-2 NFT marketplace on Ethereum, has announced that offers are live across marketplaces powered by Immutable X.
Users now make an offer on any asset, and sellers can agree upon a price proposed by a buyer. This new feature will solve the following problems:
Lack of rapid price discovery
The inability for sellers to find an instant price to sell at
A frustrating experience for both buyers and sellers
According to the announcement, the offers are currently in beta, so during this time, the following restrictions apply:
Limited to certain marketplaces
Only applied to listed assets
Limited to within 10% of the asking price
Only allowed in the listed currency
Rate Limited
No seller marketplace fees
Even if it comes with restrictions, we needed the offers on Immutable X. We believe the offers will unlock the real potential of Layer-2 NFTs.
Arbitrum Ecosystem
Arbitrum took a step toward its decentralization progress.
As you know, the network validation and the fraud-proof submitting process should be permissionless on Optimistic Rollups for better decentralization. Currently, only Arbitrum uses fraud proofs for network security. Whitelisted actors can submit fraud-proof if the state is incorrect. In the past, fraud-proof submitting was done by the project itself. Now, they expanded their validator set. Consensys, Ethereum Foundation, L2Beat, Mycelium, P2P, QuickNode, Distributed Ledgers Research Centre and Unit410 became an Arbitrum validator. The team said they would share more information about validator protocol updates and fully permissionless validation.
Well done, Arbitrum! So, what happened in the last two weeks in the Arbitrum ecosystem?
Arbitrum looking to deprecate support for Arbitrum Rinkeby starting next week on December 20th.
TATR, which represents Cougar DAO’s recently purchased farmland, has been minted on Arbitrum One.
Xeenon_XYZ, a web3 live streaming platform, is now live on Arbitrum One.
Trader Joe, the native Avalanche liquidity book AMM, plans to deploy on Arbitrum.
Optimism Ecosystem
Optimism Foundation announced the upcoming RPGF (Retroactive Public Goods Funding) round 2!
So, what is the RPGF? Fund retroactively successful public goods-oriented projects. The core principle behind the concept of retroactive public goods funding is simple: it’s easier to agree on what was useful than what will be useful. For Optimism, well-funded public goods means better developer tooling, widespread user education, safer infrastructure, and industry-leading research. It means Optimism can last and thrive.
This round, Optimism Foundation allocated 10m OP to fund eligible projects. Round 2 consists of three phases. If you think you are eligible for RPFG, don’t forget to follow the process.
So, what happened in the last two weeks in the Optimism ecosystem?
Optimism held a public rehearsal of the migration of Optimism Goerli to Bedrock. This rehearsal is for infra providers and projects running nodes, and it helps ensure a seamless upgrade to Bedrock early next year.
Optimism has been announced AttestationStation, a permissionless primitive that anyone is able to read, add to, and build on top of in order to make blockchains more human-centric.
Optimism has been announced The Optimist NFT, a customizable profile picture that can represent user identity across the Optimism Ecosystem.
Latticexyz published a three-part blog series on building an Autonomous World using MUD, their open-source on-chain game engine.
Aztec Ecosystem
Aztec upgraded its Connect contracts on December 8. This upgrade aimed to implement improved efficiency and test the pause system functionality.
The Connect contracts now have a new gas-saving internal library and a more memory-friendly verification key. These upgrades save ~10k gas total while fixing a minor bug involving single division issue. The upgrade in the pause system adds two roles to the system: a lister and a resumer. The Lister role can list assets and bridges as supported on the rollup. The resume role can unpause the rollup if it has been paused. Aztec team will test the pause system in a future "fire drill" -- quickly pausing and unpausing the contract as a security test. The team explains that this test is a part of Aztec’s security policy. The exact time of the fire drill test was also announced in this hash: 447c3db2dfddaffc460a8e5a3c4342c342f9de2b40bb184b506962f1cc58dae8
Users don’t have to worry about this test. But remember that Aztec thinks the best option is multi-sigs for secure rapidly developed zk systems.
So, what happened in the last two weeks in the Aztec ecosystem?
Aztec Connect contracts has been audited by Arbitrary Execution.
Aztec Connect has crossed 50,000 $ETH shielded since its launch.
Aztec Connect has crossed 500,000 network transactions since its launch.
Aztec partnered with Outlier Ventures on a new accelerator: Zero Knowledge Base Camp.
Aztec announced 3 new grants for enabling private NFTs on Aztec Connect.
Aztec raised $100m in Series B funding round led by a16z.
StarkNet Ecosystem
StarkNet v0.10.3 has been introduced to testnet, which includes increased performance improvements & the removal of deprecated Deploy transactions.
Braavos Hardware Signer has been introduced.
A zero-day vulnerability has been found in Argent-X by the Braavos team.
Sphinx (prev. Stark X), a natively cross-chain order book DEX, has been introduced on testnet.
Carbonable Protocol has been deployed on the StarkNet testnet.
Other News
ZPrize, which aimed at employing private funds to accelerate the advancement of zero-knowledge prover technology, organized a competition last month and announced the winners.
Ethereum has announced the KZG Ceremony Grants Round.
Polygon zkEVM is getting ready for the mainnet launch. The team started security audits for Polygon zkEVM.
Twitter Corner
Spectating Corner
Reading Corner
Research on fast cross-rollup messaging and settlement inside recursive proofs, Kalman Lajko
Safe CEX: We can do better than Proof of Reserves, Liron Hayman
A Light Introduction to ZeroSync, Geometry Research
Plonky2: A Deep Dive, Polygon Team
That’s all from L2 Planet for now, hope to see you in 15 days :)