Incentivized Testnets: Finding More Long-Term Players for the Blockchain
Incentivized testnet (incentivized testnet) is a term often mentioned in PoS networks recently, and it is increasingly becoming a common practice for project teams before launching the mainnet. Since October, many well-known networks have announced incentivized testnet plans to prepare the technology and community for the transition to the next phase.
The so-called incentives mainly include financial rewards and reputation enhancement. These two most intuitive reasons attract people to participate in the testing process of network operation. Where did the Incentivized Testnet come from? Why is it becoming more and more popular? How to participate? What are the characteristics? Let’s take a look at the progress of the incentivized testnet and explore the above questions one by one.
Original model: Game of Stakes
Where did the Incentivized Testnet come from?
The earliest incentive testnet in the PoS field originated from Cosmos’ Game of Stakes, which is also one of the most widely influential incentive testnets so far.
In June 2018, Chjango Unchained, the head of the Cosmos community, announced the Game of Stakes (GoS), summarizing the overall appearance of the Game of Stakes: within a certain period of time, in an adversarial testnet environment, the person who wins the most "stake" wins . This was set as one of the main considerations in the subsequent incentive testnet.
GoS officially kicked off in mid-to-late December 2018. After a break and 6 rounds of competition, it lasted until the end of February 2019. There were two main winners, Certus One and stake.fish, and 50 participants were issued A total of 300,000 ATOM rewards.
When talking about the expectations for GoS, Zaki, the research director of the Tendermint team, said that although Cosmos has a research foundation for 4 years, it still hopes to use GoS to: 1) accumulate empirical data to verify the effectiveness of PBFT; 2) use financial incentives How will the network respond when seeing an attack caused by a cartel (Cartel, the situation where more than 1/3 or more than 2/3 nodes are controlled in the pBFT network) in a real environment?
At that time, both Cosmos and GoS were called "first of its kind". With the promotion of rewards, the test network better practiced the game of the blockchain network and consolidated the Cosmos main network. In the long preparation process, a group of long-term builders who really understand the network have been retained.
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Why Incentivized Testnets Are Favored
The most direct reason is that it simulates a real "benefit sharing, risk sharing (skin in the game)" environment. Real rewards give the most direct motivation. In order to attract professional infrastructure operators, it is necessary to design sufficient rewards.
The deeper reason is that the project team and professional node operators are looking for participants with long-term interests.
We can also see this need in the new form of token distribution. Livepeer's Merkle Mine requires a certain cost and real participation in order to obtain mainnet tokens; Edgeware's Lockdrop and NuCypher's WorkLock both emphasize the importance of lock-up time for obtaining mainnet tokens, using the opportunity cost of transactions In exchange for network power, there is even a risk of losing tokens if you do not participate in network construction. These are all intended to screen out players who value the long-term interests of the network.
Even more so with incentivized testnets. In the past, although investors were able to "skin in the game", there was no continuous motivation to participate in the network, nor could they ensure that they had the corresponding technical capabilities. It is different for node operators. A verification node devotes time and energy to strive for network rewards, and converts the rewards into power on the main network, accumulates community reputation, gains operational experience, and benefits throughout the network development process, so it is willing to contribute to network construction for a long time .
To sum up, for the project team, the incentive test network can not only simulate the "adversarial" environment to the greatest extent in the short term, but also obtain a group of external technical participants who recognize the value of the network and diversify, and more Broad community base;
For node operators, winning an incentive test network will reflect good technical strength and apply experience to other networks. Many winning teams in the Cosmos Incentive Testnet were successfully retained on the mainnet, and became active on the subsequent PoS network, becoming verification nodes of multiple blockchains. At present, the strength of more than 40 main teams in the PoS network has been tested by practice, and they are safe and have a good reputation. They have cooperated with well-known funds and exchange wallets, and thus become more and more "sought-for".
Participating in Attacks: A Comprehensive Stress Test
When do I need to activate the Incentive Testnet?
Looking back at the table sorted out in the previous chapter, we can continue to understand some characteristics that motivate the development of the testnet.
First of all, from the point of view of time, the incentive test network must appear when it is "ready" to accept some kind of test, mostly on the basis of an open test network, accepting external participants.
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Taking NuCypher as an example, we see that the network has to open a public testnet before incentivizing the testnet. Looking back, the NuCypher network has not only experienced 3 security audits and 1 economic audit, but also conducted internal alliance testnets and 2 non-public testnets that joined external node operators and partners.
Before launching the Quest incentive testnet (staking competition), Oasis Labs also went through stages such as non-public testnet, bug report rewards, and public testnet.
It can be said that the incentive test network is the "stress test phase" after the protocol team has fully prepared, followed by the formal network deployment, and has the dual functions of testing and expanding participation.
What exactly does the expected "confrontational environment" refer to?
There are varying degrees of "adversial environment". For example, in Elrond's Battle of Nodes rule,
The initial "build" phase is relatively routine, including staying online, sending transactions, completing tasks, etc. Increasing confrontation over time:
In the "challenge" stage, send complex transactions, ensure a high online rate, and help with stress testing, etc.;
In the "attack" stage, it starts to try to attack the network and other nodes, run its own nodes at any cost, and maximize node revenue within the scope of the rules.
Modify software, conspire with other players, and censor other players’ ability to participate in consensus and accumulate stake;
Find misconfigured validator settings and try to exploit these to prevent other players from accumulating more stake;
Attack other nodes with fake or spoofed traffic.
Do not use social engineering attacks (social engineering, such as phishing software, etc.) or physical attacks;
The GoS of Cosmos gives some specific methods of attack, such as:
textAnd the more "wild", without "central switch" long-standing real proving ground Kusama, offers more, allowing people to test more possibilities.
At the same time, there are many attacks that are not the proper meaning of the incentive testnet, and some attacks that violate the rules are often specified in the various incentive testnet rules. Take NEAR Protocol’s Stake Wars rules as an example:
It is not allowed to hack into other participants' hosts or destroy corresponding services, and should actively report any related vulnerabilities.
Future trends: more comprehensive coverage and mobilization of more participants
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First of all, the incentive testnet has gradually become a system. Not only has the segmentation of stress testing and attacks become clearer in terms of technology, but it is also motivating wider participation in the community and other aspects.
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Quest (Oasis Labs Incentivized Testnet) Phase 1 Reward Distribution Design
Quest recently released by Oasis Labs is a typical example. Quest encourages testnet participation in many aspects, including not only technical aspects (best attack, most staking, most blocks, participation, etc.), but also lists reward details for community contributions, tool development, and community content output .
Incentivizing the testnet is indeed not only a matter for technical participants. Cardano takes a snapshot of the main network at a certain point in time, and opens the test network based on the account status at that point in time to test the staking in the Shelley stage. excitation. Not only the staking pool, but also any token delegator can participate in the test and get rewards.
We have also seen that after the mainnet is launched, the incentive testnet can still be launched at any time according to demand, so that this tool can serve the network robustness and builder participation to the maximum extent. For example, IRISnet will introduce HTLT and Coin Swap modules into the new version of its mainnet in the near future, so it will open the Nyancat5 incentive testnet and invite developers to verify new functions.
Cosmos is expected to test the highly anticipated IBC with a new "Game" in December. Game of Zones will carry 100,000 ATOM rewards and will conduct a 3-week node competition. It plans to set up more awards and more diverse task to discover more incentivized testnet winners focused on long-term growth for the network.
References:
"Game of Stakes" - Player's Rules of Engagement；
Game of Stakes Closing Ceremonies；
