NEAR Protocol: Finnish POV 👀
By: Dora The Block Explorer
Tags: Smart Contracts, Near Protocol, Sharding, Staking, Staking Rewards

Last weekend I had a lengthy discussion about crypto adoption with one of my crypto friends. And this one thing stuck with me: “scam tokens” are going to die, while the innovation stays. Built on top of these innovative emerging technologies, there are always some projects riding the hype wave with no long-term goal in mind.

In my previous article I briefly touched upon the crypto debris in this ever changing crypto space. In the past few weeks I have witnessed some attempts at resurrecting one of these crypto zombie projects, but I’m saving that for a separate post.

The Open Web

NEAR exists to enable community-driven innovation to eventually benefit people across the globe. With NEAR, both developers and entrepreneurs are able to create apps “that put users back in control of their data and assets”. This is the recurring topic the Open Web podcast, where Aliaksandr Hudzilin’s engages with interesting people who work with the open internet in one way or another. I’m telling you this, because this is fundamental to everything NEAR related.

Big Brain Man Reviews NEAR

Mikko Ohtamaa, CTO of FirstBlood, reviewing NEAR Protocol

Not so long ago, there was a Twitter thread on “Let’s explore Ethereum killers Tuesday” by a guy named Mikko Ohtamaa. Basically he participated in the Hack the Rainbow hackathon and then posted a review on NEAR of nearly 50 tweets.

Based comment from Mikko

The Technical Stuff

Mikko talks about a lot of technical stuff from his honest POV. For example, he explains how NEAR is the first to shard both state and transactions. You might be thinking now what is this and how can I profit off of this. Well, it’s NEAR’s innovative approach to sharding, so you’d be good knowing that in a few years from now, the network can scale and scale. No NEAR 2.0 and no NEAR killers just yet. If you want to learn more about NEAR’s sharding, go here to learn more about Nightshade.

There’s a lot Mikko talks about, and I do recommend you to go through his chain of tweets to read up on his thoughts.

NEAR has better fundamentals than any of other existing blockchains. But the developer experience is not good and scalability promise does not mean anything at the moment. — Mikko Ohtamaa

The Verdict and What I Think

A 50% chance for NearProtocol to succeed, is Mikko’s final verdict. While I may lack the developer knowledge he possesses, I do agree with some of the points he addressed.

From my perspective, NEAR is very developer-oriented, and that is fine at this point. Without developers and companies building on NEAR, the protocol may end up being another crypto zombie. That being said, I hope to get a glimpse of their business development soon.

Next, being not an “Ethereum Killer”, NEAR seeks to work alongside other networks. The Rainbow Bridge is such an initiative. Once this bridge is properly launched, I think other projects such as FLUX Protocol can live demonstrate the beast that is the Rainbow Bridge.

In addition to the Rainbow Bridge, NEAR even incentivizes developers to build their Smart Contracts on NEAR. Devs can earn themselves a passive income through Contract Rewards. Basically if a transaction goes through your Smart Contract, you collect 30% of transaction fees. Very neat!

The Crypto Side of NEAR

There is more to talk about, but all in all I believe a 50% success rate really is on the low end. NEAR has only just launched and only just trades on Huobi and Binance. The price action has been as expected. Don’t worry, though. These are the times a redistribution takes place. Boomer VC’s dump their $NEAR bags and buy more gold, while you and I being hippie degenerates accumulate more.

Crypto Twitter hasn’t caught wind of $NEAR yet, so these months are perfect for accumulation and staking especially. Though the process is new and a bit rusty, it’s easy to get stake through a validator pool of your choice. You don’t need extensive tech know-how. Staking your $NEAR will get you an APY (Annual Percentage Yield) of 17% (source: Staking Rewards).

Despite prices being volatile, and even more so on the short term, NEAR is a great play for stakers and long-term investors.

To Be Continued

I’ve got a new article on crypto zombies coming up. Got any objections or tips? Let me know on Twitter.

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