Perhaps the most revolutionary aspect of the blockchain is its capacity for decentralization. Yet, running a node requires a great deal of resources and those with access have the advantage — and once again, we’re stuck with the flaws of capitalism. Is there a way to approach PoS that would allow us to tackle verification with significantly less data, without compromising the security of the cryptocurrency?
Evan Shapiro is the co-founder and CEO of Coda, the first cryptocurrency protocol with a constant-sized blockchain. The startup preserves decentralization by keeping verification accessible to everyone. Evan earned his BS in computer science and master’s in robotics at Carnegie Mellon. He worked as a software engineer at Mozilla prior to creating Coda Protocol.
Today, Evan joins us to discuss the immense resources required to verify cryptocurrency and how Coda is tackling the problem. He shares the fundamentals of Coda Protocol and its side project, Snarky, explaining why they use functional programming and how the team is dealing with scalability constraints. Evan walks us through his thinking around improving current protocol versus building your own and the three categories of applications that could be built on top of Coda. Listen in for insight on the most exciting use cases for zk-SNARKs and the lessons Evan has learned in the process of founding a crypto company.
Today’s Topics
[1:00] Evan’s interest in verification and the blockchain size problem
[4:47] The immense resources currently required to verify cryptocurrency
[6:03] How Coda is tackling the problem of PoS
[7:05] The spectrum of ways users can connect to cryptocurrency
[8:55] Evan’s insight around SPV wallets on Bitcoin
[10:20] The fundamentals of Coda and its side project, Snarky
[12:39] zk-SNARKs and how they fit into what Coda does
[15:31] How Coda Protocol produces computationally intensive proofs
[17:15] Coda Protocol’s plans to make transaction history accessible
[18:12] Why Coda uses functional rather than object-oriented programming
[20:10] How Coda is dealing with capacity constraints on scalability
[22:39] The dichotomy between PoW and PoS
[25:05] Working to improve the current protocol vs. building your own thing
[26:48] The recent launch of Coda’s test network
[28:12] How smart contracting capability fits into Evan’s vision for Coda Protocol
[30:00] The value proposition for Coda coins
[32:16] Coda’s goals around widespread distribution
[33:31] The three categories of applications Evan hopes people will build on top of Coda
[34:42] Coda’s edge in attracting developers
[36:15] The new use cases for zk-SNARKs that Evan is excited about
[38:53] How Evan thinks about competition from MimbleWimble/Grin
[40:17] How the Coda team is adapting its strategy to dramatic market shifts
[41:39] The lessons Evan has learned in the process of founding a company
[44:09] Evan’s challenge around understanding future Coda users
[46:22] The open engineering, developer-facing and management roles at Coda
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