Making Moves! - Newsletter Edition 97

In this week’s edition:

1. Editorial: Movement vibes, pushing ahead with roadmaps, and which creators and their content are moving audiences in April.

2. Top Story - DOT Roadmaps: Catch up on the latest ecosystem developments with roadmaps.

3. Featured Report - April’s WAG: Who wagged well last month.

4. Wag Roundup: News from our Finders Program between May 1st and May 7th.

5. Extras: Credits and anything else.

Editorial

What is up, my friends!

Movementin the Web3 industry continues to make headlines this past week, in and around the plush surroundings at TOKEN2049 Dubai. While the investigations into some moves have raised alarms, one piece of rippling news involves a move that has yet to round out. Then there are those who are tethering on decentralized AI.

It’s sometimes difficult to follow all the news on X these days, however, it can be rewarding to keep up with DOT yaps. Luckily, we have you covered in our top story this week, as we navigate the latest updates, especially with some of those in the Polkadot ecosystem recently announcing 2025 roadmaps.

As we progress into May we will be rounding up how the WagMedia creator economy has been moving audiences last month in our featured report. You might even notice some of our best waggers from the Kaito leaderboard.

Or better yet, join in. In addition to the potential DOT on offer, WagMedia provides valuable feedback as well as the opportunity to strengthen your research and writing foundations.

Dodow, Chief Editor

Top Story of the Week - DOT Roadmaps

Written by yay.oi

What’s mappin’, roadies? While some may argue that protocols are still being shaped by ideas championed years ago, the Web3 space as a whole is generally adaptive and fast-paced. Roadmaps are subject to change as narratives shift, and new opportunities or challenges surface along the way.

Polkadot 2.0, however, is on track for an early delivery. Defined by the Polkadot DAO as the deployment of Agile Coretime, Async Backing, and Elastic Scaling, it may even be achieved by the end of the month.

Still, no rollout is without friction, such as the recent Coretime drama covered in Catchin’ Up. In the dynamic world of Polkadot, that’s nothing a bit of governance can’t fix. Web3 Foundation’s Jonas Gehrlein outlined some potential improvements in AAG #228. For now though, it couldn't hurt to follow Bifrost's lead.

Other Polkadot parachains, in the meantime, have been busy mapping out their plans for 2025. Peaq’s recently renewed roadmap reveals several long-awaited feature rollouts.

Dropping this Q2 will be the DePIN DEX, finally offering decentralized access to Peaq ecosystem tokens. Also slated for Q2, the DePIN launchpad will accelerate the onboarding of new projects, building on a foundation of more than 50 DePINs to date. A glance at last week’s news roundup shows that Peaqosystem growth is far from slowing down.

There’s more to come in Q3, starting with the launch of a Peaq-native stablecoin. This will lay the groundwork for new DeFi use cases through money markets linked to machine RWAs.

With new human and machine users surging, and a continued rise in daily transactions, Peaq is also aiming to improve network performance in Q3. Making full use of the capabilities of Async Backing and Elastic Scaling, it is targeting 65,000 TPS and 0.4s block time on its mainnet.

Building on 2024’s strategic direction, the Moonbeam Wayin its latest roadmap also plans to make use of Elastic Scaling after protocol adjustments scheduled for Q4. Along with other protocol enhancements, and maintaining Ethereum compatibility, 2025 will see the launch of two major features.

Expanding beyond EVM interoperability and a liquidity hub, the integration of StorageHub will bring decentralized storage to the Moonbeam execution layer. This will fill a critical gap in the Polkadot application stack, and it aims to position Moonbeam as an integral component of the Polkadot Web3 Cloud.

Reinforcing its commitment to Kusama, Moonbeam is accelerating development of a native trustless bridge. Targeting an August release, the Moonbeam <> Moonriver bridge will initially support XCM communications and token transfers of MOVR and GLMR.

While there’s plenty more to come on the Moonbeam roadmap, the present-day metrics are already painting an impressive picture. This week, Chainspect recorded Moonbeam’s ATH max TPS per block, while The Kus tracked a massive spike in on-chain events for April, signalling growing momentum.

Meanwhile, Mythical is also making metric touchdowns on the NFT field. In April it overtook Ethereum in the daily sales volume, and recorded a healthy $40M in monthly sales, despite softer market conditions.

This followed a strong March, which even saw days that sales volume, transactions, and buyers topped the ranks across the board. As on-chain activity ramps up on Mythos, Moonbeam, Peaq, and other parachains, the imminent scaling and performance enhancements of Elastic Scaling could not come at a better time.

By week’s end, the passing of Referendum 519 should see the enactment of runtime 1.5.0 and Elastic Scaling on Kusama. Polkadot will follow shortly after, with the passing of Referendum 1546, and an additional referendum to implement a configuration update.

Along with Elastic Scaling, an array of new assets will soon be available on Kusama. The passing of Referendum 514 registered more than twenty ERC-20 assets on Kusama Asset Hub (KAH). As a result, these assets can now be bridged from Ethereum via a double-hop through Snowbridge and the P<>K Bridge.

In addition, dUSD, a treasury-funded native stablecoin, has been launched on KAH using Brale’s regulated stablecoin infrastructure. Under a revenue-sharing agreement, yields generated from the minting of dUSD on the Brale platform will flow back into the Kusama ecosystem.

This may be eclipsed by an upcoming inflow of 10M DOT from the Web3 Foundation. An ongoing referendum will aid its spending by allowing Kusama OpenGov treasury requests in DOT.

As reported in Rocky Rolls of Chaos, the substantial portion of the funds would likely be allocated to privacy-centric ZK initiatives. Following its record-breaking performance, Kusama is now preparing for the imminent launch of Elastic Scaling and Ethereum compatible smart contracts. It is poised to become a very well-funded cypherpunk playground.

Also dropping imminently will be Mandala Chain’s public testnet, and the mainnet is expected to launch this quarter too. In addition, numerous Indonesian public and enterprise integrations in the pipeline. This marks the start of a bold and likely challenging rollout of Web3 infrastructure, in the world’s fourth most populous nation.

Meanwhile, the Robonomics 2025 roadmap might need some adjustments following the Polkadot DAO’s decision to reject funding for the development of the Polkadot Humanoid Robot SDK. It remains to be seen whether this will lead to a stronger focus on RWA and Hardware for Cyberpunks, or simply result in a delay until funding is secured.

As the Hub testnet rolls out on Westend, and Polkadot continues its iterations (and extensions), the pace shows no signs of slowing. But in the grand scheme of things, how far have we really come?

As reported in DOT Hub, Gavin Wood would like to see a lot fewer hype-driven projects, and a more concerted effort to fulfil the original crypto and Web3 ideals. Expect more on this in the highly-anticipated When Shift Happens podcast.

He’s not wrong. If we measure success by true Web3 ideals, who else beyond Bitcoin, Ethereum and Polkadot deserves a place on crypto’s Mount Rushmore? In the rush for TPS, TVLs, and mindshare, decentralization and resilience are often left behind. Hype may strike first, but rebellions are built on hope, and the force is strong with Polkadot.

Featured Report - April’s WAG

Written by Dodow

The WagMedia creator economy marched on from the previous month with a staggering 110 content submissions in April. Although the month starts off with the celebration of fools, it appears we shouldn’t be too quick to rejoice in the volume and get fooled by the high number.

While the number of 97 submissions receiving awards still seemed impressive, the honest reality is it wasn’t. With a little over 578 DOT distributed, there appears to be a drop in quality as the average came to around 5.3, which is in stark contrast to the previous months’ averages of 15 DOT. Thus, only 7 creators managed to achieve that level this time.

Towards the end of the month, Goku put out an announcement for creators to focus on what they genuinely understand, including what they use and do within the ecosystem. Share your journey, try to be authentic, and perhaps put down the GPT. Even one of the beastliest of Kaito yappers, who isn’t just top of the Polkadot leaderboard, echoes a similar message.

Enough of the rant, let’s move on to April’s highlights, and once again the top Wag creator was Emil. With only three submissions during the month, you’d think he was prioritizing yapping. Though he is certainly entitled to, most of us shouldn’t be April fooled, as top creators tend to avoid spamming. In fact, the focus is on quality, which earns reputation and a smart following.

It’s no surprise all of Emil’s submissions exceeded previous months’ averages. A critique of Solana validators earned 15 DOT, and more valuable was engagement from Gav. Highlighting Polkadot Hub’s appeal to Ethereum devs brought in 36 DOT. And another 35 DOT was received through shifting attention to the fourth largest population, with Mandala Chain launching soon.

More surprising was that the highest amount for a single submission went to two other creators. Many might have expected Pieky to be one of the recipients of the 45 DOT high. He succeeded with experimental angles, as his take on Cardano’s Midnight was well received. While the approach didn’t work as well with other submissions, it's the feedback that benefits him more.

With eleven submissions, Mark’s hard work was finally recognised as he was the other creator to hit 45 DOT. His timely thread about Polkadot’s adoption of RISC-V, just as Vitalik proposed it for Ethereum, provoked and impressed with its engagement metrics. Let’s just hope he takes on board feedback from elsewhere, like using the new DOT logo and cutting back on hype words.

Rather than hype and buzzwords, it’s more compelling to show and explain data. CMOSH’s use of data stands out with infographics and now breakdowns. His Snowbridge data breakdown thread got plenty of views, along with 32 DOT. Another 22 DOT came from a similar approach on Polkadot’s cross-chain activity.

When it comes to explaining Polkadot’s technical details, Goku noted that tech talk can be brutal. Ravi did well with engagement on his thread about the key technical upgrades for 2025. Perhaps more valuable than the 30 DOT was feedback on not addressing the “so what.” It seems he listened with his XCM v5 explainer, which was later awarded 15 DOT.

Sometimes even seasoned contributors can benefit from constructive feedback. The use of an iconic movie meme along with a visionary book to show how Polkadot gets it was a good setup from gbaci, earning him 24 DOT. Even better, he gets the value of Goku’s comments on how to enhance it, including a spicy suggestion that we might see one day.

Seeing what the European Commission wrote about permissionless blockchains being the new governance paradigm, Jimmy certainly got dot vibes from it. His long post outlining how Polkadot effectively solves the issues in the publication was awarded 20 DOT. Unfortunately, his gigDOT thread hasn’t yielded as he’s yet to adjust the formatting.

Making adjustments from the comments through WagMedia is what will likely help creators in the long run. While rewards for each piece of authentic content can be worth up to $500 worth of DOT, the feedback is arguably worth even more.

Don’t be afraid of taking part in Wagging. The open and transparent approach can be liberating, sharing the values of Web3 where it’s about less trust, more truth!

Wag Roundup (May 1st to May 7th)

News found by the community. Curated by the community. Backed by OpenGov.

DOT Ecosystem News

Written by yay.oi

• The PaperMoon team has successfully run Uniswap V2 on PolkaVM and passed all test cases, confirming full compatibility with complex Solidity contracts designed for EVM.

• Incubation Phase I of the Polkadot Ambassador Fellowship has wrapped up, and Lucy Coulden has published the final report, detailing highlights, initiatives, and strategic gaps. With the Ambassador Fellowship Advisory Board stepping down and returning excess funds to the treasury, stay tuned for updates on the next phase of funding and growth.

• Umanitek has launched the Guardian AI Agent, a tool powered by OriginTrail, that will allow trusted parties to use natural language queries to find matches for flagged harmful content while maintaining privacy and data access on a need-to-know basis. Aylo, the parent company of a major adult content platform, will leverage Guardian to assist law enforcement by allowing them to query 7 million hashes of its verified content.

• Ink! v6.0.0-alpha is now live. Wasm and pallet-contracts have been deprecated in favor of RISC-V, PolkaVM, and pallet-revive, paving the way for the JAM era.

• Devs, your input matters! Fill out the survey now to help shape the direction of the POP CLI Web3 development platform.

• PBA-X, an online course teaching the fundamentals of Polkadot and Web3, is kicking off its third wave on June 23. Registration is now open.

• Snowbridge-wrapped USDC and USDT are now sufficient assets on Polkadot Asset Hub, meaning that users can bridge a minimum of 0.01c to their Polkadot address without requiring an existential deposit of DOT or another compatible asset.

• With its deployment of Async Backing, Polimec has become the latest parachain to enable 6-second blocktimes.

• Think you’ve got what it takes to be a real-world asset to the Xcavate ecosystem? Applications are now open for the Ultra Ambassadorship Program.

• The Graph is now integrated with Peaq, offering DePIN developers streamlined access to blockchain data for building and analytics.

• In just over a month, Acurast has onboarded an additional 10K mobile devices to its decentralized compute network. This brings the total to 60K.

• LATAM and European on/off-ramp Vortex, which utilizes Pendulum infrastructure, is now listed on the Nova Wallet dApp Browser.

• The winner of month three of the Acala Meme and DApp contest is Realverse, an RWA marketplace which took home a prize of 1.39M ACA.

• Acala has airdropped 195 ACA to 512 voters in the third round of the Meme and dApp contest. Due to attempted vote manipulation, a minimum voter token threshold was introduced, resulting in 1022 disqualifications.

• There’s no need to trade blindly anymore. Token price charts are now live on SubWallet extension v1.3.33.

• Riding the wave of the GIGADOT launch, minted vDOT on Bifrost has surged past the 10M DOT milestone.

• Hydration has continued its weekly streak of TVL all-time highs, this time passing the 160M mark.

• Say hello to Frosty, Bifrost’s new mascot. Generate your own Frosty meme on the Bifrost Discord by Sunday, May 11th, for a chance to win 200 BNC.

• They’re bringing the fun back to non-fungible. Check out the demo and UI for NFT XCM, a Unique Network initiative for seamless transfers of NFTs across Polkadot parachains.

• More than doubling its March all-time high, N3mus recorded 255K gameplays for the month of April, distributing $33K over 53 tournaments.

• In the first week of play on Olderfall, an NFT warrior battler built on Moonbeam, more than 300 free Fallen NFTs were minted and almost 24,000 battles fought. Weekly tournaments are ongoing on N3mus, each with a $500 prize pool.

• The new Gavun Wud website is live, showcasing live prices, stats, partner integrations, NFT utilities, and more.

• To commemorate its first anniversary, Gavun Wud has released the WUD 1st Year Anniversary NFT Collection. Sale proceeds and royalties will go towards WUD development and token burns, while holders will receive a 10% boost to all NFT drops on Flappy Wud.

• Gavun Wud has partnered with Unique Network for an upcoming dynamic NFT release. Each WUD Universe NFT holder will be granted a unique virtual log cabin that evolves dynamically with on-chain activity. Users will also be able to customize their cabins with earned, bought, and airdropped items.

• On May 1st, DOT, a limited-release generative art collection by Arkain, dropped on Koda and minted out within four hours.

• Quadrivium is requesting 982K USDT for Milestone 4 of its Kagome C++ implementation of the Polkadot Host, which recently became the first alternative client implementation to enter the Polkadot validator set. Funding would cover both retroactive and upcoming updates and audits.

• Volmex is requesting 425K USDT for integration and creation of perpetual markets on Polkadot for its Bitcoin (BVIV) and Ethereum (EVIV) volatility indices, starting with Hydration. Funding would cover roll-out, upgrades and expansions over three years. And with the support of the community and broader market, it would enable the integration of its Prime Rate Indices.

• Boomerang has made an Acala off-chain grant request of 2M ACA to fund audits, incentives, and liquidity bootstrapping of BoomACA, its upcoming ACA liquid staking derivative.

DOT Ecosystem Events

Written by yay.oi

• Polkadot hosted Daniel and Sourabh from the JAM Implementers DAO Decentralized Voices delegation on May 1st to hear about how their technical backgrounds shape voting decisions.
• The Polkadot Ambassador Fellowship held the final Sprint Update livestream on May 1st. It included a panel of Rank III Ambassadors and a discussion on the fellowship’s next phase, including the ambitious 10,000 Popups campaign.
• Satoshi Club hosted Moonbeam on May 1st for a discussion on supporting builders and fostering growth in its gaming ecosystem.
• Polkadot Africa hosted an introductory meetup in Goma, DR Congo, on May 3rd, featuring ambassador Olivier Mwatsimulamo.
• On May 3rd, in Boi Buk, Nigeria, Polkadot Africa hosted Polkadot Networking Eve, where over 130 attendees got an introduction to the ecosystem.
• The Gavun Wud 1st Anniversary X Space was held on May 4th. It featured a lineup including Angie (DotPlay), Jay (The Kus), and the Jamton team, who discuss new NFT integrations, partnerships, and onboarding the Ton community.
• To celebrate the launch of the JAM testnet, the two-day JAM Experience kicked off in Lisbon on May 6th. It featured updates from the implementation teams and keynotes by Gavin Wood.
• Limoverse hosted a panel discussion about the state of Web3 on May 7th, featuring Ajeesh (Polkadex), Pakman (Kylix Finance), and Michael (Mandala).
• On May 8th, Polkadot Africa hosted an educational session on Discord to share its insights on hosting events and growing communities.

Extras

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