Around the Block, Issue Nº13: GAMES featuring tradable zombies
A number of novel vulnerabilities have come to light in the past week, ranging from the subtle and hypothetical to the practical exploitation of port 8545 to directly steal Ether.
This has not stopped Loom Network from announcing the first serious digital trading card game for blockchain on Kickstarter. It’s an interesting experiment both from a valuation and technology perspective. I happened to write an article dedicated to blockchain games ahead of the launch, which may be interesting to some of you thinking about the ramifications.
This week I’m also launching a quarterly user survey to see how you’re using the newsletter and what you would change. This will only take 1 minute of your time. You can access the Typeform here.
💵 Bitcoin
Leaf-Node weakness in Bitcoin Merkle Tree Design
Single Payment Verification (SPV) Wallets allow users to run light bitcoin nodes to verify individual payments without downloading the whole chain. A vulnerability is described that could be used to trick a user to recognize a fake payment. The cost of the attack would be USD ~3M, which could be fixed with a simple patch.
💎 Ethereum
Simon de la Rouviere recommends incentivising token forking
A system is described that would allow person to move from token A to a fork, token B with increased rewards for early leavers to ensure an incentive to leave token A. This will also be valuable to those who stay with token A, signaling increased loyalty.
Embiggen launch unique Airdrop using 0x protocol
An airdrop is a free distribution to tokens to wallets. Traditionally, airdrops send money to addresses directly without confirmation. OpenRelay have used 0x protocol to create open orders for every address on Ethereum. As a user, you can fill the order using the 0x protocol to confirm receipt of the airdropped tokens.
📚 Blockchain Science
Tony Sheng claims not all fees are rents
Rent seeking is wealth-transfer that does not result in wealth creation. An example of rent seeking in crypto is the creation of an unneeded token purely for profit purposes. A common mistake in crypto is to attribute rent-seeking to any fees. For example transaction fees in proof of work chains are not rent-seeking, because proof of work secures the network. Both web2 companies like Facebook and Google and many token networks are creating value and thus not rent-seeking.
⚡️ Protocols and DApps
Loom Network Launch a Trading Card Game Zombie Battleground
Loom Network are launching a digital trading card game with provably scarce assets. Here are a few interesting elements and claims Loom Network are making about the game: 1) the game is mobile-first 2) it’s launching on Kickstarter 3) transparent card circulation is cited as the key value proposition 4) cheating is impossible 5) the game will be fast-paced.
From the editor: Massively Compatible Decentralized Games
I wrote a post about valuing game assets on the blockchain and the direction of travel for blockchain gaming in virtual worlds. This will be a helpful lens for anyone evaluating an investment in a set of cards for Zombie Battleground.
😅 Misc
- Distributed Hardware literature review by FOAM protocol
- Zaki Manian talks about how to become a Cosmos validator
- Jimmy Song tells the truth about smart contracts
- Nathaniel Whittemore writes a tweet-thread about EOS
- $20 M stolen from misconfigured Ethereum nodes
🚀 Releases
🙏 Feedback
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