
{"id":44181,"date":"2025-02-13T10:29:26","date_gmt":"2025-02-13T10:29:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/?p=44181"},"modified":"2025-02-13T10:29:26","modified_gmt":"2025-02-13T10:29:26","slug":"flow-network-a-technical-deep-dive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/?p=44181","title":{"rendered":"Flow Network: A Technical Deep Dive"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Disclaimer The information provided in this analysis regarding the Flow Network, its technology, market performance, and future outlook is intended for informational and educational purposes only. It does not constitute financial, investment, or trading\u00a0advice.<\/p>\n<p>Launched in October 2020 by the co-founders of CryptoKitties as an answer to Ethereum structural limitations, Flow is a fast, decentralised and developer friendly Layer 1 blockchain aiming to create the best experience possible for both developers and users. Commonly described as a blockchain designed to foster the development of a new generation of games, apps and digital assets, Flow also unlocks the development of large consumer-facing onchain apps thanks to an innovative pipelined blockchain infrastructure and a vast array of native technical features (VRF, account abstraction,\u00a0\u2026) allowing to simultaneously benefits from high levels of decentralisation, throughput and security.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Protocol Advantages:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Multi-role architecture:<\/strong> Allows the network to scale without sharding to serve billions of users without reducing the network decentralisation<strong>Fast Finality<\/strong>: Median transaction finality under\u00a010s<strong>Low Cost:<\/strong> Extremely scalable architecture enabling low computational costs<strong>Native VRF:<\/strong> On-chain randomness at the protocol level avoiding the reliance on third party providers (Chainlink,\u00a0\u2026)<strong>Seamless consumer onboarding:<\/strong> Built-in payment onramps providing a safe and low-friction path from FIAT to\u00a0crypto<strong>EVM equivalence:<\/strong> Powerful virtual machine similar to a Docker container enabling other VMs to\u00a0run.<\/p>\n<h3>Protocol Architecture<\/h3>\n<h4>Network Design<\/h4>\n<p>Designed as an alternative monolithic layer 1 model aimed at solving the blockchain trilemma, Flow propose a novel type of network design applying pipelining, a well-established processing technique in CPU design and manufacturing to blockchain design. Thus, where most second generation blockchains increase scalability by reducing decentralisation or compromising network security, Flow offers an alternative path dividing into multiple network layers the tasks typically handled by a full node in a monolothitic blockchain.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Collection<\/strong> <strong>layer<\/strong>: Censorship resistant data availability layer, caching transactions for subsequent execution<strong>Consensus<\/strong> <strong>layer<\/strong>\u00a0: Authority layer orchestrating and securing transactions execution.<strong>Execution<\/strong> <strong>layer<\/strong>\u00a0: Computational layer maintaining and producing the network\u00a0state.<strong>Verification<\/strong> <strong>layer<\/strong>: Investigation layer ensuring that transactions are truthfully-executed.<em>Source: Flow\u00a0docs<\/em><\/p>\n<p>As such, instead of distributing the processing of the network state through different shards composed of nodes solely processing transactions corresponding to their network subset, in Flow each node still participates in the validation of all network transactions but solely for its attributed stage. This way, by essentially separating consensus from transaction computation, Flow unlocks a new structural dimension enabling the development of a new type of highly scalable, decentralised and secure network. Indeed, while the executional layer might scale vertically and rely on an increasingly fewer number of hyper-specialised powerful nodes, the decentralisation and security of the overall network insured by light-weight nodes participating in the consensus and validation layers can remain untouched.<\/p>\n<p><em>Legacy blockchain design vs Flow network desig<\/em>n, s<em>ource: Flow\u00a0docs<\/em><\/p>\n<p>By shifting network complexity from duplication to specialisation, Flow enables the network architecture to grow as needed and target the exact needed resources.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Example:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>If the network lacks censorship resistance, the network can onboard additional collection nodes.If the network is lacking security, the network can increase the number of verification nodes.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Observation<\/strong>: <strong><em>It is to say that Flow fully solves the blockchain trilemma?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Well, not quite. Indeed, similarly to other networks such as Cosmos, Flow novel design also fragment the network into smaller security zone making the network as strong as its weakest link which in this case is the verification layer due to the structural centralisation of the executional layer. Additionally, Flow\u2019s multi-role architecture also introduce significant state fragmentation risks in the case where coordination between nodes reveals itself inneficient. As such, while being an indeniable improvement in terms of scalability, we cannot conclude that Flow fully solve the blockchain trilemma.<\/p>\n<h3>Protocol technical infrastructure<\/h3>\n<p>As highlighted above, Flow is a fast, decentralised and developer friendly blockchain leveraging a unique multi-role architecture to enable massive improvements in speed and throughput while preserving a developer-friendly, ACID compliant environment. From a technical standpoint, the network relies on five core network components:<\/p>\n<p>BlocksCollectionsCadenceCore contractsAccounts<\/p>\n<h4>Blocks<\/h4>\n<p>Fundamental units of the Flow blockchain, blocks can generally be understood as data entities containing a list of executed transactions modifying the latest network state. Regarding their data formatting, Flow blocks leverage a three-tier data\u00a0schema.<\/p>\n<p><em>Flow block data schema, source: Flow\u00a0docs<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>Header<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Each block header contains the following fields:<\/p>\n<p><strong>ID<\/strong>: Unique identifier derived from the hashing of the block header included in the payload\u00a0hash.<strong>Parent ID<\/strong>: Link to the previous block ID in the list making up the blockchain<strong>Height<\/strong>: Block sequence number (Block 0 = genesis\u00a0block)<strong>Timestamp<\/strong>: Time at which the block was proposed by the consensus nodes.<strong>Payload hash<\/strong>: Hash result of the aggregation of the Merkle root of collection guarantees, seals, executions receipts and\u00a0results<\/p>\n<p><strong>Payload<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Each block payload contains the following fields:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Collection guarantees<\/strong>: List of a collection IDs with the signatures from the collection nodes that produced the collections.<strong>Block seals<\/strong>: Attestation by verification nodes that the transactions in a previously executed block have been verified enabling the network to reach full finality on the previous block referenced by the block\u00a0ID.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: By acting as a guarantee by collection nodes that transaction data in the collection will be available on the collection node if requested by other nodes, collection guarantees enables the network to not include transaction data into blocks and maintain blocks as small as possible<em>.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>Status<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The block status is not a value stored inside the block itself but represents the lifecycle of a block. Derived from the block inclusion in the Flow blockchain, the block status represents an accurate indicator of the level of finality for changes contained in a block. Technically speaking, the network recognize three\u00a0status:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Proposed<\/strong>: the block is submitted to the network but hasn\u2019t yet gone through the network consensus engine<strong>Finalized<\/strong>: the block is agreed upon by the consensus nodes through the consensus engine process guaranteeing transactions inclusion in the\u00a0block<strong>Sealed<\/strong>: Verification nodes approve the validity and correctness of the execution ensuring full finality of the block transactions.<em>Block Status, source: Flow\u00a0docs<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: Flow is relying on a custom implementation of the Hotstuff consensus algorithm for its consensus engine. For additional technical details please refer to <a href=\"https:\/\/flow.com\/technical-paper\">Flow technical research\u00a0paper<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h4>Collections<\/h4>\n<p>Composed of an ordered lists of one or more hashes of signed transactions, Collections enables the network to optimize the overall network transactional payload.<\/p>\n<p><em>Flow Collections, source: Flow\u00a0docs<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>Observation<\/strong>: By requiring collection nodes to store transaction payload, Flow creates a built-in data availability layer optimizing data transfer speed. Indeed, while on one hand, collections enable lightweight consensus nodes to agree on transactions orders without storing those, it also enable execution nodes to quickly query transactional payload to advance the network\u00a0state.<\/p>\n<h4>Cadence<\/h4>\n<p>Inspired by Libra\u2019s Diem, Cadence is a resource-oriented programming language specifically developed to create secure and scalable smart contracts.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Key features of\u00a0Cadence<\/strong>:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Resource-Oriented programming<\/strong>: Cadence treats digital assets as resources ensuring they cannot be duplicated, lost or access without authorization. Additionally, it ties resources to specific accounts, enforcing ownership rules at the language\u00a0level.<strong>Capacity-based security<\/strong>: Access to resource is controlled through explicitly granted capabilities which act as permissions reducing vulnerabilities from unintended access.<strong>Strong static typing<\/strong>: The language enforces type safety, minimizing runtime errors and improving code reliability.<strong>Developer-friendly design<\/strong>: Inspired by Swift, Kotlin and Rust, Cadence emphasizes readability and ease of use. Additionally, tools like the Flow emulator and Visual Studio Code extensions streamline development.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Advantages over traditional smart contract languages:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Enhanced security<\/strong>: Resources and capabilities prevent common exploits like reentrancy attacks, a significant improvement over Ethereum\u2019s Solidity.<strong>Upgradeable contracts<\/strong>: Flow allows smart contracts to enter a \u00ab\u00a0beta state\u00a0\u00bb enabling updates before finalization a rare feature in blockchain ecosystems.<\/p>\n<h4>Core Contracts<\/h4>\n<p>All network core functionalities in Flow are implemented through a suite of dedicated Cadence smart contracts called core contracts:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Fungible token<\/strong>: Implements the Flow fungible token standard.<strong>Flow token:<\/strong> Defines the $FLOW\u00a0token<strong>Flow Fees:<\/strong> Act as treasury vault for all network collected fees<strong>Service account:<\/strong> Tracks transactions fees, deployment permissions and provides convenient tooling for $FLOW token operations.<strong>Staking table:<\/strong> Manage staked nodes, delegation and\u00a0rewards.<strong>Epoch contract:<\/strong> Manage epoch phases and emitting service\u00a0events.<\/p>\n<h4>Accounts<\/h4>\n<p>A Flow account can be conceptualise as a record in the chain state holding the following information:<\/p>\n<p>AddressBalanceCodeStorage<\/p>\n<p><strong>Address<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Unlike Bitcoin and Ethereum, Flow addresses are not derived from cryptographic public keys. Instead, each Flow address is assigned by the Flow protocol using an on-chain deterministic sequence.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: This decoupling is a unique advantage of Flow, allowing for multiple public keys to be associated with one account or for a single public key to be used across several accounts.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Balance<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Each Flow account created on Mainnet own by default a Flow vault holding a balance satisfying the FungibleToken standard. This balance is also used to pay for transaction and storage\u00a0fees.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: A minimum account reservation of 0.001 $FLOW must be held into any accounts at all times to cover the storage cost of the account (~100kB of data) and ensure that most account won\u2019t run out of storage capacity if anyone deposits anything like an NFT to the\u00a0account.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Contracts<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>An account can optionally store multiple Cadence contracts. The code is stored as human-readable UTF-8 encoded string which makes it easy for anyone to inspect\u00a0it.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Storage<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Each Flow account has an associated storage capacity. The account storage used is the byte size of all the data stored in the account\u2019s storage.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: An account storage capacity is directly tied to the balance of Flow tokens of the\u00a0account.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Account Keys<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Flow accounts can be configured with multiple public keys that are used to control access. During the account creation, public keys can be provided to interact later on with the account. Additionally, account keys can be added, removed or revoked by sending a transaction which is radically different from blockchains like Ethereum where each account is tied to a single public\/private key\u00a0pair.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: Upon account creation, each account key is being assigned a weight knowing that a transaction has to exhibit a total signature weight greater than or equal to 1000 to be\u00a0valid.<\/p>\n<p>Flow key account schema, source: Flow\u00a0docs<\/p>\n<p><strong>Observation<\/strong>: Through this account key design, Flow is implementing a built-in multi-sig functionallity for each\u00a0account.<\/p>\n<h3>Transaction processing<\/h3>\n<h4>Transaction status<\/h4>\n<p>Similarly to block status, the transaction status represents the state of a transaction on the Flow blockchain and usually follows the below timeline:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Unkown<\/strong>: the transaction has not yet been seen by the section of the network the user is communicating with through the Access node\u00a0API.<strong>Pending<\/strong>: The transaction has been received by a collection node but has not yet been finalised in a\u00a0block<strong>Finalised<\/strong>: The consensus nodes have included the transaction in a block but it has not been executed by execution nodes.<strong>Executed<\/strong>: Execution nodes have produced a result for the transaction<strong>Sealed<\/strong>: The verification nodes have verified and agreed on the result of the transaction and the consensus node has included the seal in the latest\u00a0block.<strong>Expired<\/strong>: The transaction was submitted past its expiration block\u00a0height.Flow transaction status, source: Flow\u00a0docs<\/p>\n<h4>Transaction finality<\/h4>\n<p>In the dominant PoS environment, there are three key finality\u00a0stages:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Preliminary result:<\/strong> Initial answer from the network not ensuring and not linked to any economic penalties (i.e. slashing) if the information provided is\u00a0false.<strong>Soft economic finality:<\/strong> The answer provided is backed by cryptographic proof. Additionally, if the informant is deceptive, this latter is facing severe economic repercussion or slashing.<strong>Hard economic finality:<\/strong> The provided answer either holds true or the entire blockchain require a\u00a0restart.<\/p>\n<p>On its end, thanks to its novel network design, Flow is able to fully bypass the preliminary stage to directly reach soft finality in less than 6 seconds and hard finality in about 14\u00a0seconds.<\/p>\n<p><em>Transaction finality flow, source: Flow\u00a0Docs<\/em><\/p>\n<h4>Chain comparison<\/h4>\n<h4>Transaction result<\/h4>\n<p>Once a transaction, is executed, its result is available onchain, providing users details on its success state or any errors encountered during execution. Additionally it also includes all events the transaction might have\u00a0emitted.<\/p>\n<p><em>Successful transaction schema, source: Flow\u00a0docs<\/em><\/p>\n<h3>Network roles<\/h3>\n<p>Unlike in most other blockchain networks, not all Flow nodes are equals. Indeed, due to the network multi-roles architecture, Flow nodes all specialise and fulfill a specific role in the operation of the\u00a0network.<\/p>\n<p><em>Flow node roles, source: Flow\u00a0docs<\/em><\/p>\n<h4>Collection node<\/h4>\n<p>Collection nodes are bandwidth-optimised nodes divided by the protocol into several cooperating clusters. Their first tasks is to manage the transaction pool and collect well-formed transactions to propose to Consensus nodes. Technically speaking, each nodes cluster collect transactions assigned pseudo-randomly by the network, assemble them into collections and submit a collection guarantee signed by a super-majority of the cluster to the Consensus nodes.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Collection node processing flow:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Step 1<\/strong>: A collection node sees a well-formed transaction<strong>Step 2<\/strong>: The collection node hashes the text of that transaction<strong>Step 3<\/strong>: It signs the transaction to indicate its validity and commit to its storage until its final processing by the\u00a0network.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: Collections nodes are required to stake a minimum of 250,000 $FLOW to be confirmed as active node operators.<\/p>\n<h4>Consensus node<\/h4>\n<p>Consensus nodes form and propose blocks in a manner similar to traditionally-structured proof of stake blockchains, using the Hotstuff consensus algorithm to create a globally consistent chain of blocks. Consensus nodes validate that the signed collection hashes submitted to them by Collection nodes were, in fact, signed by the required majority of Collection nodes before assembling the transactions into blocks and finalise them through voting. As such, Consensus nodes act as checkpoints against Collection nodes and held those accountable by verifying that a critical number of Collection nodes reviewed and signed the transmitted transactions. Currently, Consensus nodes are required to stake a minimum of 500,000 $FLOW tokens to be confirmed as a node operator.<\/p>\n<p><em>The network currently supports approximately 100 active consensus node operators.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: Flow choses the HotStuff algorithm due to its inherent flexibility enabling to add new participants throughout time.<\/p>\n<h4>Execution node<\/h4>\n<p>Most resource-intensive nodes on the Flow network, Execution nodes are responsible for executing transactions and maintaining the execution state as well as responding to any queries related to it. From a technical standpoint, Execution nodes are computing the outputs of the blocks provided by Consensus nodes while also ensuring the bulk of the network improvement in terms of scale and efficiency through hardware optimisation.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Transaction execution flow:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Step 1:<\/strong> An execution node receive a proposed block from the consensus nodes.<strong>Step2:<\/strong> Using the hash of the transaction contained in the transmitted block, the execution node query the transaction payload from Collection nodes<strong>Step 3:<\/strong> The execution node compute the new network state based on the transmitted transactions<strong>Step 4:<\/strong> Once all co-adjacent execution nodes have finished to compute the new network state all execution nodes outputs are revealed to avoid spoofing.<strong>Step 5:<\/strong> Execution nodes are emitting an execution receipt<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: Execution nodes are required to stake a minimum of 1,250,000 FLOW to become confirmed node operators.<\/p>\n<h4>Verification<\/h4>\n<p>Verification nodes are responsible for confirming the correctness of the work done by Execution nodes. Individual Verification nodes only check a small amount of the total computation but collectively check every computation many times in parallel.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Verification Flow:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Step 1:<\/strong> A sortition algorithm assigned a chunk of the execution receipt to each validator<strong>Step 2:<\/strong> Validators verify the deterministic execution process by comparing their compiled state and the one transmitted by execution nodes<strong>Step 3:<\/strong> If everything is valid, Validators issue to the network a result approval enabling the network to seal the block and assert hard finality for those transactions.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note:<\/strong> Verification nodes are required to stake a minimum of 135,000 $FLOW to become a confirmed node operator.<\/p>\n<h4>Access node<\/h4>\n<p>Access nodes act as a proxy to the Flow network. Their main role is to route transactions to the correct Collection nodes or route state queries to Execution nodes.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: Access nodes are required to stake 100 $FLOW to become a confirmed node operator.<\/p>\n<h4>Observer node<\/h4>\n<p>An observer node provides locally accessible, continuously updated, verified copy of the block data. It serves the Access API but unlike an access node, an observer node does not need to be staked, and anyone can run it without being added to the approved list of\u00a0nodes.<\/p>\n<h3>Flow Technical Features<\/h3>\n<h4>Account abstraction<\/h4>\n<p>Through its account model, Flow provides native support for key use-cases empowering developers to deliver mainstream-ready user experiences enabled by account abstractions.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Multi-sig transactions<\/strong>: Native support for multi-sig transactions since all accounts are defined as smart contracts.<strong>Sponsored transactions<\/strong>: Built-in 3 roles support for transactions providing a native support for sponsored transactions.<strong>Bundled transactions:<\/strong> Protocol-level support for transaction bundling across multiple contracts into a single transaction thanks to Cadence explicit separation of contracts and transactions.<strong>Account recovery<\/strong>: Native support for account recovery and cycling of keys helping users regain access to account in a secure\u00a0manner.<strong>Multi-factor authentication:<\/strong> Native support for multi-factor authentication as developers can easily implement these security mechanism for their users using\u00a0Cadence.<\/p>\n<h4>Storage<\/h4>\n<p>Flow storage model aims to ensure data availability without continuously charging fees for storage while also preventing abuses that could burden the network\u2019s storage resources. To this end, each Flow account has an associated storage used. The account\u2019s storage used is the byte size of all the data stored in the account\u2019s storage. Accounts also have a storage capacity directly tied to the amount of Flow tokens an account has which can be used without any additional cost.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: Currently, the amount required to store 100MB in an account storage is 1\u00a0$FLOW.<\/p>\n<h4>Scripts<\/h4>\n<p>Flow scripts are executable Cadence code scripts providing a light-weight method to query execution state in a read-only manner. Unlike Flow transactions, a script is not signed and does not require any transaction fees.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: Scripts are currently executed either on Access nodes or directly on Execution nodes depending on Access nodes configurations.<\/p>\n<h4>Flow EVM<\/h4>\n<p>Introduced as part of of the Crescendo upgrade, the Flow EVM allows Ethereum developers to deploy their decentralised applications on the Flow blockchain with minimal code\u00a0changes.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Flow EVM key features:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>EVM equivalence:<\/strong> Flow EVM achieves full EVM equivalence, enabling seamless migration of Ethereum-based projects to\u00a0Flow.<strong>Developer-friendly:<\/strong> Ethereum developers can use familiar tools and languages (like Solidity) without learning a new programming language<strong>Interoperability: <\/strong>The Flow EVM bridge allows for the atomic movement of both fungible and non-fungible tokens between Cadence and EVM environments<strong>Performance:<\/strong> Flow maintains fast block times (as low as 0.8 seconds), even with EVM compatibility, ensuring quick transaction processing<\/p>\n<h4>Native onchain randomness<\/h4>\n<p>Flow\u2019s on-chain randomness delivers immediate random values within smart contracts and bypass the latency and complexity of oracle integrations. Thus, using this feature, developers can easily obtain robust randomness within a single line of Cadence code and streamline the development process of complex decentralised applications.<\/p>\n<p><strong>On-chain randomness use-cases:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Gaming<\/strong>: Integrates fairness and unpredictability into gameplay, enhancing user engagement without\u00a0delays.<strong>NFTs<\/strong>: Facilitates the creation of uniquely randomized traits in NFTs quickly, adding to their rarity and\u00a0value.<strong>Lotteries &amp; Draws<\/strong>: Offers instant and verifiably fair random selection for lotteries, solidifying trust in real-time.<strong>DeFi Protocols<\/strong>: Enables rapid and innovative random reward systems within decentralized finance.<strong>DAOs<\/strong>: Assists in unbiased voting and task assignments through immediate randomness.<\/p>\n<h3>Ecosystem<\/h3>\n<h3>Network State<\/h3>\n<p>Despite a small year on year (YoY) increase in terms of network activity of 6.73%, we can observe that similarly to other alternative layer 1 networks, Flow faced some challenges to attract new users atop its ecosystem throughout Q4.<\/p>\n<p><em>Active network users, source:\u00a0Flowscan<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Regarding development activity, the recent Crescendo upgrade, introducing full EVM compatibility, successfully sparked a significant surge in contract deployment throughout the past quarter. Nonetheless, it remains to be seen, if this initial surge of interest from developers convert into further decentralisation application development due to the rapid decrease of daily contracts deployed towards the end of\u00a0Q4.<\/p>\n<p><em>Daily contracts deployed, source:\u00a0Flowscan<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Network accounts creations on their end, still appear to be mostly reliant on hackathon events implying that overall the ecosystem still lack real user traction and do not benefits from notable ecosystem features like Base that would create significant excitment among crypto-native users.<\/p>\n<p><em>Flow daily account creation, souce:\u00a0Flowscan<\/em><\/p>\n<h3>Ecosystem State<\/h3>\n<p>While still remaining relatively low by comparison with other alt-layer 1 networks, Flow TVL shown a record growth of more than 75% mostly led by the mainnet launch of numerous new projects leveraging the recent Crescendo upgrade across multiple categories (AI, Gaming, DeFi, RWA,\u00a0\u2026)<\/p>\n<p><em>Q4 Flow USD TVL, source: DefiLlama<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Additionally, this newly found EVM-based activity on Flow, also represents a new sizeable network revenue source thanks to the exploding transactional activity induced by those new protocols as shows the more than 800% YoY increase in fees perceived by the network over the second half of the\u00a0year.<\/p>\n<p><em>Flow daily network fees, source:\u00a0Flowscan<\/em><\/p>\n<h3>DeFi<\/h3>\n<p>Led by the increasingly favorable environment provided by the network for DeFi traders and the recent increase in ETH-based liquidity following the Crescendo upgrade, Flow DeFi ecosystem significantly expanded both in terms of TVL and available applications over the past\u00a0quarter.<\/p>\n<p>Across Q4 \u201924, numerous new projects launched across multiple categories:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Gaming<\/strong>: Sudocat,\u00a0Capsha<strong>AI<\/strong>: DevDock<strong>Sports<\/strong>: Jump.Trade, AiSports<strong>DeFi<\/strong>: MORE, Kittypunch, Trado, ANKR, Pump.Flow<strong>NFTs<\/strong>: FlowFun,\u00a0Mintify<strong>Real World Assets<\/strong>:\u00a0Beezie<\/p>\n<p>New infrastructures facilitating the onboarding of new-users into Flow ecosystem also went live over the past\u00a0quarter:<\/p>\n<p>Alchemy,MoonpayGelatoThirdweb\u2026<\/p>\n<p>Additionally, Flow also deployed a new community incentive program aimed at supporting its nascent DeFi ecosystem through the unlocking of prizes, giveaways and exclusive offers for active DeFi\u00a0users.<\/p>\n<h3>NFTs<\/h3>\n<p>While several new projects are currently trying to leverage the recent Crescendo upgrade to propose a new type of immersive NFT based experience, the bulk of NFT volume and interest still remain centered around CryptoKitties and a few large NFT sports-based collections backed by US mainstream sport corporations (NBA topshot, NFL All Day\u00a0, UFC Strike,\u00a0\u2026).<\/p>\n<h3>Latest Technical upgrade<\/h3>\n<h4>Crescendo Upgrade<\/h4>\n<p>Deployed to Flow mainnet on Wednesday, September 4th 2024, the Crescendo upgrade introduced full EVM equivalence alongside major stability upgrades and performance improvements:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Key Crescendo benefits:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Full EVM equivalence allowing any Solidity smart contract to be ported over to the Flow\u00a0networkBlock time of less than 1s versus an industry average of\u00a06s.Improved transaction success rate and reduction in memory usage for managing blockchain state<\/p>\n<h3>Recent Developments<\/h3>\n<p>The Flow Rewards Store is now live. Users can earn points for the Flow Rewards Store by interacting with various applications on Flow, and they can spend these points on exclusive experiences, real-life items, and onchain\u00a0items.Over Q4, Flow jumped in developer usage and mindshare. Additionally, the Flow World Tour hosted a record-breaking number of builders, as well as conversations with the co-founders of Ethereum (Vitalik Buterin) and Metamask (Dan\u00a0Finlay).The latest telegram integration built on Flow, CryptoKitties: ALL THE ZEN! reached over 150,000 players last November.<\/p>\n<h3>Tokenomics<\/h3>\n<h4>General metrics (11\/02\/2024)<\/h4>\n<h3>Tokenomic design<\/h3>\n<p>From a tokenomic design standpoint, the network is built around a new Cadence token interface model, called <a href=\"https:\/\/github.com\/onflow\/flow-ft\">Flow fungible Token Interface<\/a>, leveraging the network account model. More specifically, at the protocol level this new token standard is integrated through the $FLOW native token ensuring the following tokenomic utility functions:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Commodity<\/strong>: $FLOW provide a built-in mechanism to exchange and store value while acting as a reserve currency for the overall network ecosystem.<strong>Security<\/strong>: $FLOW enables various value-based security mechanisms (slashing,\u00a0\u2026)<strong>Governance<\/strong>: Token-gated governance model ensuring community alignment on governance votes<\/p>\n<h3>Flow Fee\u00a0model<\/h3>\n<p>Transaction fees are the cost paid in $FLOW by a user or an application for a transaction to be included in the Flow blockchain. Fees are necessary to both ensure the network security and provide monetary incentive for active node operators to run the\u00a0network.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: Similarly to other blockchain, in Flow transaction fees are paid regardless of whether a transaction succeeds or\u00a0fails.<\/p>\n<h4>Fee structure<\/h4>\n<p>Each transaction fee consists of three components:<\/p>\n<p>Execution feeInclusion feeNetwork surge\u00a0factorFee Structure, source: Flow\u00a0docs<\/p>\n<p><strong>Execution Fee<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The execution effort for a transaction is determined by the code path the transaction takes and the actions it does. The actions that have an associated execution effort cost can be separated into four broad\u00a0buckets:<\/p>\n<p>Normal lines of cadence, loops, or function\u00a0callsReading data from storage, charged per byte\u00a0readWriting data to storage, charged per byte\u00a0writtenAccount creation<\/p>\n<p><strong>Inclusion Fee<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The inclusion effort of a transaction represents the work needed\u00a0for:<\/p>\n<p>Including the transaction in a\u00a0blockTransporting the transaction information from node to\u00a0nodeVerifying transaction signatures<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: For now, the inclusion effort is set to 1.0 and the inclusion effort cost is fixed to 0.000001\u00a0$FLOW.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Surge Factor<\/strong><br \/>In the future, a network surge factor will be applied when the network is busy due to an increased influx of transactions required to be processed or a decrease in the ability to process transactions. Right now, the network surge is fixed to\u00a01.0.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: Currently, both the inclusion fee and surge factor don\u2019t represent any significant Flow\u00a0fees.<\/p>\n<h3>Rewards Distribution<\/h3>\n<p>The rewards distribution schedule in Flow is designed to ensure there is enough liquid supply of $FLOW available in the ecosystem to empower a wide array of use cases and promote fair and diverse participation in the Flow ecosystem. Technically speaking, the total staking reward amount paid upon is known and fixed per epoch and paid directly to network participants by the central pool gathering all transaction fees paid since the last reward payments.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: If the pool happens to be depleted, the protocol is authorised to mint new tokens to cover its lack of treasury.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Network expected reward\u00a0schedule<\/strong><\/p>\n<h4>Individual Reward Calculation<\/h4>\n<p>Each user gets a percentage of the total rewards during each epoch that is proportional to their percentage of the tokens staked by all participants.<\/p>\n<p>The full reward calculation on a per-user basis is equal\u00a0to:<\/p>\n<p><strong>New Reward(user) = Tr * (Sn \/\u00a0St)<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>where:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Tr<\/strong> = Total staking rewards to be paid out during the current epoch. (See table\u00a0above)<strong>Sn<\/strong> = Amount of FLOW Staked by the target user for the current Epoch. (Different for each\u00a0staker)<strong>St<\/strong> = Sum of all the FLOW staked by all the participants in the network. (Changes every\u00a0epoch)<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: Rewards for delegators are calculated in the exact same way that rewards for node operators are calculated, at the difference that 8% of the calculated reward amount is given to the node operator being delegated to.<\/p>\n<h3>Flow value accrual mechanisms<\/h3>\n<p>In terms of value accrual mechanisms, Flow is showcasing a pretty common set of value accrual mechanisms for active network participants.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Reward Reduction<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Current network penalty for node operators subject to liveness issues, the reward reduction process naturally lead to a lesser network inflation for any given epoch inducing as such a scarcity impact on the expected $FLOW circulating supply potentially benefiting token holders through price appreciation.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Staking<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The important node staking requirements for node operators structurally reduce the amount of $FLOW available on the market for extended period of time leading to price appreciation for existing token holders due to the decrease token velocity inside the network ecosystem.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Network inflation<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>For active participants actively ensuring the network security the network inflation represents another additional form of value accrual mechanism enabling them to accrue interest on their capital at the expense of passive token\u00a0holders.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Slashing [not\u00a0live]<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>While not being currently live on the network, the future slashing mechanism will without a doubt create a significant liquidity sink in the overall network economic model and create additional scarcity pressure on the protocol native token supply if similar to other comparative alternative layer 1 networks, this slashing mechanism is backed by a burning mechanism.<\/p>\n<h3>Initial token distribution<\/h3>\n<p>Upon the genesis block creation in June 2020, 1.25 billion $FLOW were issued and allocated as\u00a0follows:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Large Backers<\/strong>:\u00a011.1%<strong>Small Backers<\/strong>:\u00a08.9%<strong>Community Sales<\/strong>:\u00a010%<strong>Development Team<\/strong>: 18% allocated to the development team through a pool following a vesting unlock of 3\u00a0years.<strong>Dapper Labs<\/strong>: 20% intented to be hold as part of a long-term treasury helping the long-term development of the protocol.<strong>Ecosystem Development<\/strong>: 32% aimed at bootstrapping the development of the protocol ecosystem and network\u00a0effectFlow Initial token allocation, source: Flow\u00a0blog<\/p>\n<h3>Protocol Fundings<\/h3>\n<p><strong>Seed round<em> <\/em><\/strong><em>(source: Cryptorank)<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Date: N\/APrice: $0.1Amount raised:\u00a0$13.9M<\/p>\n<p><strong>Private Round <\/strong><em>(source: Cryptorank)<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Date: N\/APrice: $0.1Amount raised:\u00a0$11.10M<\/p>\n<p><strong>ICO<em> <\/em><\/strong><em>(source: Cryptorank)<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Date: 22\/09\/2020\u201302\/10\/2020Price: $0.1Amount raised:\u00a0$9M<\/p>\n<p><strong>Undisclosed round<em> <\/em><\/strong><em>(source: Cryptorank)<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Date: 10\/05\/2022Price: N\/AAmount raised:\u00a0$725MInvestors: a16z, Dapper Labs, DCG, Greenfield Capital<\/p>\n<h3>Team<\/h3>\n<p><strong>Roham Gharegozlou<\/strong>, Co-founder &amp; CEO at Dapper\u00a0Labs<\/p>\n<p>Experienced venture capitalist with more than 10 years of industry experience and several successful venture in the Web3 space among which the widely successful CryptoKitties project.<\/p>\n<p>LinkedIn: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/roham\/?originalSubdomain=ca\">https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/roham\/?originalSubdomain=ca<\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Dieter Shirley<\/strong>, Co-founder &amp; Chief System Architect at Flow Foundation<\/p>\n<p>Seasoned software engineer with more than 20 years of industry experience across a wide array of tech-focused firms (Apple, Atimi Software,\u00a0\u2026)<\/p>\n<p>LinkedIn: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/dieter-shirley-75166434\/\">https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/dieter-shirley-75166434\/<\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Mikhael Naayem<\/strong>, Co-founder &amp; President at Dapper\u00a0Labs<\/p>\n<p>Experience venture capitalist with an extensive experience in gaming IP and mobile gaming sector prior to co-founding Dapper\u00a0Labs.<\/p>\n<p>LinkedIn: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/miknaayem\/\">https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/miknaayem\/<\/a><\/p>\n<h3>Governance<\/h3>\n<p>Flow is a community-owned protocol using an off-chain governance process called Flow Improvement proposals (FLIP) to manage network and technical features development. More specifically, FLIPs, allows any community member to suggest changes to areas such as network parameters, protocol upgrades, ecosystem fund issuance, council member elections or legal\u00a0affairs.<\/p>\n<p>For additional details about Flow latest governance proposals <a href=\"https:\/\/github.com\/onflow\/flips?tab=readme-ov-file#flips-flow-improvement-proposals\">click\u00a0here<\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Protocol governance flow:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Pre-FLIP Ideation<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Check existing proposals in the Flow community forum or Discord to avoid duplicationShare a rough idea for a new proposal in the forum and gather feedback from the community and maintainers<\/p>\n<p><strong>Authoring the\u00a0FLIP<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Develop a detailed draft using the FLIP\u00a0templateRefine the proposal based on the further community and contributor feedback.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Submission &amp;\u00a0Review<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Submit the FLIP as a pull request o the Flow Github repositoryEngage in thorough community discussion and reviews led by a review committee<\/p>\n<p><strong>Voting<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The community votes on the proposal with each FLOW token representing one\u00a0voteProposals must gain majority support to\u00a0proceed<\/p>\n<p><strong>Implementation<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Approved FLIPs are integrated into the network during scheduled upgrades, known as\u00a0Sporks.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: For updates to be \u201cratified\u201d onchain, the majority of the network\u2019s validator nodes must adopt the upgrade without breaking consensus.<\/p>\n<h3>Conclusion<\/h3>\n<p>Overall while not exactly solving the blockchain trilemma, Flow propose an interesting alternative to the legacy monolithic blockchain architecture enabling the development of large consumer decentralised applications in the gaming and DeFi sector. Nonetheless, despite those technical advantages and the recent unlocking of full EVM compatibility, the network still appears to face significant challenges in bootstrapping user adoption beyond its initial market niche centered around NFT projects backed by mainstream entertainment companies with strong IPs (NBA topshots,\u00a0\u2026).<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/medium.com\/coinmonks\/flow-network-a-technical-deep-dive-7f9f30656d48\">Flow Network: A Technical Deep Dive<\/a> was originally published in <a href=\"https:\/\/medium.com\/coinmonks\">Coinmonks<\/a> on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Disclaimer The information provided in this analysis regarding the Flow Network, its technology, market performance, and future outlook is intended for informational and educational purposes only. It does not constitute financial, investment, or trading\u00a0advice. Launched in October 2020 by the co-founders of CryptoKitties as an answer to Ethereum structural limitations, Flow is a fast, decentralised [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-44181","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-interesting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44181"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=44181"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44181\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=44181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=44181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=44181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}