Key Takeaways
- The Ethereum Layer 2 community Optimism is launching a token and new governance mannequin.
- The Optimism workforce has introduced that the token will probably be distributed through a sequence of airdrops, and that new customers can nonetheless become involved.
- Optimism is certainly one of a number of Layer 2 options hoping to assist Ethereum obtain scalability.
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Optimism’s new OP token will probably be distributed to Optimism customers throughout “a whole season of airdrops.” The workforce revealed its token as half of a bigger transfer towards a decentralized governance construction referred to as the Optimism Collective.
Optimism Launches Token
Ethereum energy customers are getting one other airdrop—a sequence of them, actually.
Optimism, certainly one of Ethereum’s high Layer 2 scaling tasks, has introduced that it is going to be issuing a governance token underneath the ticker OP. The Optimism workforce revealed the information in a blog post Tuesday. The workforce additionally shared a list of criteria for airdrop eligibility, which incorporates objects so simple as being an Optimism person to extra superior standards corresponding to being a DAO voter or multisig signer.
The token airdrop would be the first in a sequence of airdrops to be launched within the coming months. Whereas the workforce didn’t present a precise date for the primary airdrop, it took care to warn customers that it isn’t reside but, and any try and persuade customers in any other case is a rip-off.
The token drop is an element of a bigger transfer to a extra decentralized governance construction. The Optimism Collective, as it is going to be referred to as of at the moment’s announcement, will characteristic a bicameral “home” system that divides governance roles amongst a Token Home and a Residents’ Home. The Token Home will probably be comprised of recipients of OP throughout the first airdrop; Optimism will add customers to the Residents’ Home later by means of issuing “soulbound” NFTs that can not be purchased or bought. Collectively, the bicameral system in supposed to mitigate the attainable plutocratic tendencies of purely token-based governance.
Optimism leverages a type of cryptographic know-how known as Optimistic Rollups to assist Ethereum scale. By operating its personal community on high of the bottom chain, it will possibly course of transactions at the next pace and decrease price than Ethereum mainnet whereas leveraging the safety of the community. Optimism has a bridge that connects Ethereum mainnet to its Layer 2 community. Since launching in 2021, the community has welcomed key DeFi tasks like Synthetix and Uniswap. In launching a token, Optimism will probably be adopting a decentralized governance mannequin akin to many different related DeFi tasks on Ethereum.
The token announcement had been anticipated for a number of days, thanks primarily to an Apr. 19 Mirror post by which Optimism detailed a plan to begin a brand new chapter “pushed by neighborhood possession and governance.” A leaked Coinbase web page additionally appeared to checklist an Optimism token final week.
Layer 2 Race Intensifies
The challenge has seen important progress over the previous few months amid elevated give attention to Ethereum’s Layer 2 scaling options. In line with L2Beat data, the community holds about $662 million in complete worth locked, a sum that’s jumped 15% during the last week for the reason that token rumors began to floor. Notably, though Optimism is presently benefiting from a wave of hype, it’s nonetheless lagging behind its largest competitor, Arbitrum, one other Layer 2 answer of the Optimistic Rollup selection holding $3.57 billion in complete worth locked—greater than half the Ethereum Layer 2 market.
Whereas Optimism and Arbitrum are presently two of Ethereum’s largest scaling weapons, that’s anticipated to alter as soon as ZK-Rollups like StarkWare’s StarkNet achieve important traction. Final week, the early Ethereum DeFi challenge MakerDAO outlined plans to launch on StarkNet commencing with a bridge launch this Thursday as a part of its dedication to serving to the Ethereum ecosystem scale (2022 can also be an enormous yr for the Ethereum protocol and its scaling roadmap, because it’s as a result of launch its extremely anticipated “Merge” to Proof-of-Stake).
With Optimism now dropping a token, different related Layer 2 protocols face a call of whether or not to observe go well with. On this planet of DeFi, it’s not unusual for tasks to launch a token as soon as a competitor does to incentivize utilization and assist bootstrap progress. Both manner, alongside the Merge, the race to construct out Layer 2 is prone to turn out to be a key narrative in Ethereumland over the subsequent few months.
Disclosure: On the time of writing, the creator of this piece was eligible for Optimism’s token airdrop. Additionally they owned ETH, SNX, and had publicity to MKR and UNI in a cryptocurrency index.
