Five Minute Blockchain • TruBlo Newsletter Nr. 38: Acala stablecoin hacked • If Apple would offer banking • Facebook app struggles to stay in top 10 • How much did top companies invest in blockchain ventures? • Interview with Do Kwon of Terra-Luna
August 19, 2022• Issue No. 38
Five Minute Blockchain
Welcome to a new edition of the TruBlo newsletter. We are funding 45 early-stage blockchain ideas to explore new options for "trusted content on future blockchains". A list of all TuBlo projects is here: https://www.trublo.eu/projects/Our main question for selecting news and links below: How is the field .of blockchain, content and trust evolving?
Updates this week:
Estimated reading time: 4 min 10 sec
TRUST
Acala stablecoin falls 99% after bug exploit
"Polkadot-based decentralized finance (DeFi) platform Acala’s native stablecoin, aUSD, depegged on Sunday, plummeting 99% after hackers exploited a bug in a newly deployed liquidity pool to mint 1.28 billion tokens.Acala developers said the bug was caused by a misconfiguration of the iBTC/aUSD liquidity pool shortly after it went live on Sunday (August 14)." Source: Coinbase.
As of Thursday, August 18. no statement or blog post addressed the problem on the Acala website. Instead, the primary communication about the situation was done via Twitter (and potentially other platforms, such as Discourse). Developers from the project tried to trace the on-chain activity to resolve the error and restore the peg to aUSD. On Monday evening, a proposal suggested burning the erroneously minted aUSD tokens.
What would a banking service by Apple look like?
An analysis into why and how Apple could extend its business into banking services. The article provides an exciting view for such a move, whether by Apple or other large tech companies. In addition, you will find several UI/UX illustrations and animations.
CONTENT
Facebook is struggling to stay in the Top 10 Apps on iStore in the US
A recent study concluded that younger audiences switched usage from Facebook to TikTok and YouTube. Additional data indicates that Facebook is gradually losing appeal to larger user groups.
"For a more direct comparison, Facebook’s app fell out of the App Store’s Top 10 apps just six times during the first half of 2021. In the first half of 2022, however, it has dropped out of this grouping a total of 59 times, per data provided to TechCrunch by app intelligence firm Sensor Tower."
"The American Data Privacy and Protection Act Would Be a Bipartisan Triumph—If it Could Pass."
Excellent article about the challenges of a new law on data privacy, with some relevant points for the entire approach - such as the option for companies to make the rules almost impossible to understand by long legal texts, to give an example.
"The laws and regulations Americans rely on to protect their privacy are, in the best light, obsolete. At worst, they perpetuate serious harms by granting major data holders like Amazon and Google enormous latitude to manipulate and violate people’s trust without ever running afoul of the law."
"In a legal sense, companies engaged in shady data practices rarely “deceive” their customers. While privacy policies have become industry standard — a practice maintained by platform gatekeepers like Apple and Google more than any legal mechanism — nothing forbids major data holders from burying their customers in an avalanche of vague and overly technical drivel. This entire scheme revolves around one patently preposterous theory, that the average internet user is someone reasonably capable to begin with of slogging through all this contractual obfuscation."
BLOCKCHAIN
Alphabet, Samsung & Co: An overview of investments in blockchain startups by large tech companies and banks
Alphabet, the parent company of Google, invested around $1,5 billion in various blockchain companies. Similarly, BlackRock, MorganStanley and GoldmanSachs were quite active. A visual overview provides a complete list of these top companies. Based on an estimate by BlockData, a research firm, "the top 40 corporations invested approximately $6 billion into blockchain startups between September 2021 and June 2022."
Opinion: No Real-World-Use-Case for cryptocurrencies?
Variety has an interview with Lee Reiners, a Professor at Duke University in the US. Reiners has emerged as a vocal critic of cryptocurrencies. There are a numbrer of relevant critical points views where crypto fails for games and entertainment content and as a means for daily payments. Facing such issues could help blockchain projects to evolve, too. Key question: Where is the real value?
Short links
An interview with Do Kwon: "Terra-Luna...was essentially my life". Summary: Blockworks
Bitcoin miners in distress: Lower prices for coins, higher energy costs. Bloomberg ($)
Documentary: What happened to Satoshi? A token-funded film wants to find out. Decrypt
Opinion: What is driving the crypto winter? Blockchain News
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