Space Summary
The Twitter Space AMA DeFi on Taiko: IceCreamSwap hosted by taikoxyz. Delve into the world of decentralized finance (DeFi) with the AMA session on Taiko: IceCreamSwap. The space offers valuable insights into liquidity provision strategies, yield farming techniques, decentralized governance, and innovations within the DeFi landscape. Explore the highlights discussing smart contract security, cross-chain interoperability, regulatory compliance, and the importance of risk management in DeFi projects. Discover how partnerships and community involvement drive ecosystem growth and sustainability in the DeFi space. Stay informed on the latest trends and best practices shaping the future of DeFi.
For more spaces, visit the DeFi page.
Questions
Q: How does decentralized governance benefit DeFi communities?
A: Decentralized governance enables transparent decision-making, fosters community engagement, and ensures protocol upgrades align with user interests.
Q: What are the key considerations when selecting a DeFi liquidity pool?
A: Factors like APY, impermanent loss protection, and underlying assets should be evaluated when choosing a DeFi pool.
Q: How do smart contract audits enhance DeFi security?
A: Audits verify the code integrity, identify vulnerabilities, and enhance user trust in DeFi protocols.
Q: Why are yield farming strategies important in DeFi?
A: Yield farming optimizes asset utilization, provides passive income opportunities, and incentivizes liquidity provision in DeFi platforms.
Q: How can DeFi projects improve cross-chain interoperability?
A: Utilizing interoperability protocols like bridges and cross-chain swaps can enhance DeFi project connectivity and user accessibility.
Q: What role do community proposals play in DeFi governance?
A: Community proposals allow token holders to suggest and vote on protocol changes, fostering a democratic decision-making process in DeFi platforms.
Q: How do tokenomics impact the sustainability of DeFi projects?
A: Sound tokenomics design influences token supply dynamics, user incentives, and project funding mechanisms, crucial for long-term project success in DeFi.
Q: What are the benefits of partnering with other DeFi platforms?
A: Partnerships can expand liquidity pools, introduce new functionalities, and enhance network effects, promoting DeFi ecosystem growth.
Q: How can DeFi projects address regulatory challenges?
A: Engaging with legal experts, implementing compliance measures, and advocating for regulatory clarity are essential steps for addressing regulatory hurdles in DeFi.
Q: Why is risk management important in DeFi?
A: Risk management strategies such as diversification, hedging, and due diligence help mitigate exposure to market volatility and potential vulnerabilities in DeFi ecosystems.
Highlights
Time: 00:12:45
DeFi Innovations: Algorithmic Stablecoins Exploring the disruptive potential of algorithmic stablecoins in DeFi markets.
Time: 00:25:18
Decentralized Governance in DeFi Understanding the role of community-led governance in shaping DeFi protocols.
Time: 00:37:06
Partnership Announcements and Ecosystem Growth Unveiling strategic partnerships and initiatives driving the expansion of DeFi ecosystems.
Time: 00:45:29
Smart Contract Security and Audits Discussing the importance of smart contract audits in ensuring DeFi platform security.
Time: 00:57:14
Yield Farming Strategies for DeFi Users Optimizing yield farming techniques for maximizing returns and minimizing risks in DeFi.
Time: 01:09:51
Regulatory Landscape and Compliance Navigating regulatory challenges and compliance requirements in the evolving DeFi ecosystem.
Time: 01:23:05
Cross-chain Interoperability Solutions Exploring cross-chain protocols and interoperability solutions for seamless DeFi connectivity.
Time: 01:35:40
Risk Management Best Practices in DeFi Diving into risk mitigation strategies and best practices for DeFi participants.
Time: 01:48:22
Tokenomics Design and Sustainability Analyzing the impact of tokenomics on project sustainability and long-term success in DeFi.
Time: 02:01:10
Community Engagement and Governance Proposals Empowering the community through active participation and governance proposals in DeFi platforms.
Key Takeaways
- Understanding liquidity provisioning in DeFi ecosystems is crucial for sustainable growth.
- Implementing diversified yield farming strategies can optimize returns and mitigate risks.
- Decentralized governance mechanisms empower community participation and decision-making.
- Exploring DeFi innovations like algorithmic stablecoins and synthetic assets enhances ecosystem diversity.
- Smart contract audits are essential for ensuring the security and reliability of DeFi protocols.
- Interacting with automated market makers (AMMs) plays a vital role in decentralized exchanges.
- Tokenomics models influence user incentives, token utility, and project sustainability in DeFi.
- Risk management strategies are essential for navigating the volatility and complexities of DeFi markets.
- Partnerships with other DeFi projects and platforms can foster interoperability and ecosystem growth.
- Staying updated on regulatory developments is crucial to navigate compliance challenges in the DeFi space.
Behind the Mic
Introduction and Apologies
Hey, guys, sorry for the delay. We had to delay this session because of the technical problems we're facing nowadays. But we do have our guests here. Here, let's just give it a couple of minutes more till the community members join. We really apologize for that. Yes, it just happened. But thank you so much for being with us. Let's just give it a couple of minutes more and we can kick it off. All right, let's just kick it off. I think it's a good time to start. So again, apologies for starting it late. We just had a couple of technical issues, but hopefully we resolved them and we're ready to start with a great basis. Session was one of our great ecosystem projects, ice cream swap. So I'm really happy and pleased to have you here, guys. Thanks for joining.
Introducing Ice Cream Swap
So we have from ice cream swap Simon, who will be speaking to us today. They have deployed recently, so if you haven't checked them out, guys, go out and check them out. And we do look forward to working with them closely and include them also going forward in the campaigns that we're doing in the ecosystem, including trailblazers. So super excited about this. I mean, I don't want to speak about myself or ourselves, so maybe I will just pass the floor to Simon. And Simon, could you please introduce yourself and ice cream swap briefly? Certainly. So, yeah, thanks a lot for welcoming me in the space. As you mentioned, I'm Simon. I'm the founder of Ice Swap. And yeah, what we have built and now deployed on Tyco is our AI-powered Dex aggregator.
What is Ice Cream Swap?
So what does AI powered Dex aggregator mean? In very simple terms, we are booking.com for Dexs. So that means we compare all the dexes on the chain. We find where the best trades can be made and we do that for our users. So essentially you don't have to look into all these dexes on the chain and maybe even on other chains. You can just go to ice cream swap. We find wherever you can do the best trade. And yeah, that's what we are now also offering on Taiko and really excited to work with the community on Taiko and get the entire team to know very closely. Thank you, Simon, so much for a brief introduction. So you guys heard it all. Check it out. It's pretty simple to use and I'm sure like a lot of you will enjoy it. So let's go further.
Features of the Dex Aggregator
Right? Like, I mean, definitely you have certain elements that make your Dex aggregator or solution stand out, generally speaking. Right? Like before the AI aggregation or so on. Like, why did you decide to start a solution like ice cream swap? And what is so different about it and how it's different from other dexes in the market or Dex aggregators in the market? And the other thing that I would like to know, it's like maybe it's also interesting for our community as well. Why did you guys call it ice cream swap? Sure. So first of all, in comparison to Dexos, I myself was a big Dex user, a big defi user. And the biggest challenge that I had is when I wanted to trade, like sort of talking a meme token, a utility token, whatever token I wanted to trade, I always needed to check which Dex can I trade it on?
Challenges in Trading
Because on many hands there are a ton of different dexes. And even smaller dexes might have like the biggest liquidity for like one single token or something like that, right? So you need to check all these dexes to find the one where you get the best price, at least if you want to do efficient rates. And this takes so much time. And this like completely ruins this like really smooth Dex and Defi experience. At least that was the case for me. And that's why we now started to build ice cream swap. And there we are not just the Dex, we are again this Dex aggregator. So we automatically find the best way to do a trade.
Ice Cream Swap's Functionality
So even if we ourselves as ice cream shop dex, don't have the liquidity for your trade, we find other dexes who have the liquidity and therefore make sure that your trade is being executed in the best possible way. And therefore you can compare the ice cream swap trades and outputs with all other dexes. And we should have the same output or most of the time even bigger outputs for the same trade than other dexes simply because we utilize these, right. We are not a competitor to these other dexes, we are working with these other dexes, we are forwarding them trading volume and we are utilizing their liquidity for your trades.
Why Ice Cream Swap?
So I think that was the first question, the last question that I remember was why ice cream software? Everyone loves ice cream, especially now in the summer, at least in many countries it's summer, so here it's hot. And I hope everyone is really excited about ice cream, especially in this time in addition to this. I mean, it's just a catchy name, I hope, right? Do you have like pancakeswap, uniswap or whatever? Apeswap, all these and ice cream swap, hopefully is a name that everyone can remember and everyone can and should be excited about. Definitely. And yeah, just like maybe I give some brief detail so in fact, Simon is based in a warm place, so that's why maybe also could be a reason. Yeah.
Exploring Competition and Growth
So let's go further. Like, thank you for explaining and generally speaking, guys. Right? So if you were looking for a Dex aggregator, definitely check out ice cream squad, because like this is one of the first segregators that we on board into our ecosystem. And actually, basically you can get the best quotes and so on and so forth. And generally speaking, it's very simple to use, so you will like it, I'm sure. So let's go further, right? Like, I mean, as you may know, the taiko ecosystem is growing. It's still pretty nascent. And so what, who do you consider, like, as your biggest competitors, generally speaking, because you're deployed across so many chains.
Collaborating with Competitors
And what actions do you guys take to address your competitors? Like, do you think, like, it's possible to kind of collaborate with competitors? Have you done so? Yeah, for sure. So again, as a Dex aggregator, you're working very closely with other dexes. And from a user perspective, we, like, you can see us as like the Uber Dex, right? The uber Dex. So we combine all the liquidity that is out there and that means we are kind of a dex ourselves. So you can do a trade on a dex or you can do a trade on our dex. Aggregator. So this can be seen as like some sort of competition, right. But at the end, we are very closely working with these other dexes.
Building Partnerships
We are integrating them in our Dex aggregator. Other dexes get trading volume and therefore also trading fees from our users from you, basically. And we make sure that you spend these trading fees as little as possible and get the best optimal out of all trades. Right. So we kind of combine what already is there and we are building and working together with these other dexes that are there instead of against them. Because as an aggregator, there's no reason to work against other dexes, right. Only exist due to there being so many other dexes. Our only purpose basically, is because there are so many other dexes to find the best trade or even combine multiple dexes in a single trade just so that you as our users, have the absolute optimal swap for any token that want to swap.
Strategic Perspective
So, yeah, in short, we work super closely with other competitors and we don't really see them as competitors because like ice cream swap really exists in the form that we exist now due to these other dexes, due to the fragmented liquidity. And we want to all of them. Quick question, Simon? Yes, that's, that makes sense because you aggregate from dexs. How about the competitors? Like Paraswap, like Unison, like one inch. I mean, I saw that sushi has a Dex aggregator like, or Kyber. How do you address that? Yeah, good question. Maybe when we take one inch we see, I think they have a market cap that is close to $1 billion, right?
Addressing Market Competition
I don't think that we need to see ourselves as like the competitor of one inch. Like even if we get like 10% of the market cap, we will be so happy, right? We don't need to force them out of the market. And in addition to that, all these other Dex aggregators have one crucial downfall, basically that we try to focus on a bit and that is their scalability. If you take a look at again, let's say with one inch, I think this is not for sure, but I think they are right now on eight chains and only on five of, they really support the Dex aggregator, right? So that means they are on five chains. We are by now we have reached 40 chains and we are not going to stop.
Expanding Horizons
Our big part or our big benefit is that we can expand to new chains and therefore users, when they are used to ice cream swap, when they know how ice cream swap works and stuff, they don't have to ever learn like any other degree or swap or whatever because we will simply be there where the user is. And one end, for example, due to their scalability issues will be there, right? They are on like Ethereum and a few layer two chains and stuff like that. But they are not unlike all these other chains. And this is our plan. We want to be on all these other chains to create a super seamless experience for users.
User Experience Focus
And our users should not even have to think about like, oh cool, there's a new chain. Let's check like which dexs exist, aggregators existed, stuff like that. Our users should simply think, cool, there's a new chain, let's use ice cream swap to onboard it, or let's use ice cream swap to do our because they should intuitively just know that we are there because we want to be on every single chain. There should be no, yeah, it should be an amazing user experience. And that is something that the other Dex aggregators are massively lacking. And that's where we see our huge advantage against these other aggregators.
Market Positioning
But again, with a billion dollar market cap, we are even more than happy if we get a fraction of what they already have, right? No, definitely. I mean like you're absolutely right. Because like if you look at the likes of one inch or periscope or so on and so forth.
Challenges in Chain Deployment
They're so big, and they're working on specific chains, and they are actually very slow to kind of add other chains because they also have, like, other considerations, like, you know, introducing new features, introducing new products and so forth. So for them, it's like they are not capturing every chain, whereas you guys, I think you're more, I would say, aggressive, ongoing, and expanding to the other chains, which makes more sense. So, yeah, thank you so much for explaining that. But let's just step a little bit back and see, because you guys deployed a couple of, like, I think, last week on Taiko. So what general speaking attracted you to Taiko? What do you guys look for when you join any other ecosystem? What do you check for? How important general speaking is the community for you? And how can the community actually get, like, I don't know if you guys plan to do something like a dao, but how can the community get involved and influence, for example, the direction of ice cream swap in the future?
The Importance of Community and Technical Assessment
So the first thing that we found on Taiko was very obviously the amazing community of Taiko. Right. Taiko has a huge community and what is actually, more importantly, a very active community, right. Because Twitter followers don't always say something, right. But when Twitter followers are engaged all the time and when they answer questions and participate in whatever tweets and stuff like that says actually, a lot about the chain, because that means that many users who are really interested in what Taiko is building and also what protocols who are deploying, who are building. And this was just amazing for us to see. And we immediately needed to be part of this. Right. Then. The second thing, which is a bit more on a technical side, we usually always do an assessment of the technical capabilities of a chain because we have some substantial amounts of users. And if chains, for example, are too slow, our users will have a really bad experience, and we don't want our users to have this.
User Experience and Technical Capabilities
Or if a chain does not allow enough TPS or transactions per second, our users block each other because they are limited from the transactions per second. And all the things are things that we also evaluate by now on all deployments. And were really happy about what we saw on Tyco. It's just like everything seems to be very stable and on the other side is amazing for us. For our users, the gas fees are really manageable. It's really great just to interact with the chain. Also, our deployment on chain was just, like, seamlessly. We did not have any issues and, like, these are a bit technical things. But actually I think they are super important because users also face these issues. Right. When you add a new chain to your wallet and like the first thing that you get is an error message or you send a transaction and like it's getting stuck or it takes like 20 minutes to complete or something like that. That is not only technical part, this is like a horrible user experience.
Engagement and Feedback Loops
And therefore we take a big focus in checking that the chains that we deploy on have a great user experience also from this technical aspect. And we had basically no issues on Tyco. Everything that we tested just was really smooth. So yeah, everything that we saw was exciting for us basically. And what we are now doing is obviously we have deployed on taiko. Our Dex aggregator itself is in the rollout phase basically. And now we want to engage with the Taiko community. As you said yourself, Nikki, there are great things from the taiko chain, like create campaigns to engage users, to interact with users. And we really want to become part of these things. And also we want to have very active feedback from the users. Maybe as a side note, now we also have our telegram channel and please just join in the Telegram channel and provide your feedback if you like, any feedback.
Seeking User Interaction and Input
If things don't work or even if things were created, you just want to mention it, please do so. This is a great help for us and we want to align what we are building not just with what we think is best, but with what our users actually need. And yeah, please provide your feedback. And later we will also create more active ways to engage in forms of daos informs all these things. But for now, please join our telegram and simply provide your feedback. There you will be heard. So you heard guys, if you want to complain somewhere so you have their telegram group, feel free to join our complaint directly there. Simon promised to answer all your questions personally, so we take it. Anyways, thank you so much for explaining that Simon and sharing your experience, generally speaking, when it comes to deploying and the fact that how easy it was for you.
Importance of Infrastructure for Smooth Deployment
And I think it's really important for the projects to have all the toolkits, all the important infrastructure to be able to deploy in a faster and smoother manner and actually offer the solution to the users. So my thing is like, okay, you've been around for quite some time. I remember actually working with you also in the past. And I mean, you have done quite great. And I also remember meeting you personally at Devconnect in Istanbul during the Chainlink actual side event. So my question is now for you, like, what's next? For you guys, what are you working on? What's next in the development roadmap for you? And when are these novel teas and features are coming into the market so the community can take advantage of them? Like as you've seen, like for example, one inch, for example, they have built many products that are not directly related to the Dex aggregation, but for example, wallet and so on and so forth.
The Path Ahead: Focus on Reliability
So to offer more choice and more like, yeah, more features for their users. So in order to also attract them and keep them within their ecosystem to a certain extent. And they're also working closely with a lot of institutional partners as well. So we'd like to know basically what's next for you. Yeah, so for our side, one very big aspect that we are currently focused on, so exciting is reliability. But this is a very big part because we are on so many chains, it is super crucial for us that everything works all the time, even if things fail, like 0.1% of the time. With so many users and so many chains that we support, this is a continuous downtime and a continuous issue for users. And this is what we are currently resolving, that everything basically works 100% of the time.
Technical Challenges and Solutions
As we have grown to such an extent, there actually even comes some interesting things with it, because we are starting to face issues that are on a chain scale, basically. For example, on some chains we have issues with the RPCs. So that means the thing that you enter in your metamask, communicate with the blockchain and maybe some of you, hopefully not never on Tyco, but maybe on other chains, you have recognized that these rpcs maybe are not super stable, right? They go down sometimes new ones arise, stuff like this. And we have actually a big issue with this because so many chains, like even if this happens like every half a year on a per chain or so, with so many chains, it happens like all the time for us. So we now building new infrastructure services to solve this, right?
New Infrastructure Initiatives
We are already running big RPC clusters for some chains, but we are now working on a new RPC system that automatically switches to work rpcs. And we are in the kind of phase to even provide this to other projects, but even like publicly for free for users. So essentially you just enter like our RPC into your wallet and we make sure that your request is forwarded to one RPC that simply works, right? So when an RPC goes down, we automatically start to forward your request to another RPC. This maybe is a bit technical, but basically what we are creating there is like the most reliable RPC because again it is an RPC aggregator like our Dex aggregator, we take the existing dexs and find the best swap.
Broadening Services and Collaborations
But for the PC aggregator we find the existing rpcs and forward you to the best working RPC basically. And this is something we have, we needed to create internally, but now we are starting to publicize it so everyone can access it, everyone can utilize it and no one will have to have RPC issues again. But now maybe a bit away from the technical part, we are now starting to work with other protocols very intensively because what we have recognized is we are really good in building utilities, we are really good in building in general. But the marketing aspect, we are so happy if other protocols are doing that for us. What we have started on was for example some wallet providers is they are now supporting swaps directly in their wallet and that is going through like our Dex aggregator.
Collaborations for Enhanced User Experience
So that means you get the best optimal swap without even having to leave the wallet user interface, right? So it's super convenient. We are doing the same thing with some other meme protocols, right? You can buy their meme token directly on their landing page on their website, you don't have to go to any decks, stuff like this. And with this we are now working even more closely with other protocols and really excited to do this on the Taiko chain as well, to get in contact with all the create protocols out there and integrate our services, our Dex aggregate, and maybe in the future even our RPC aggregator with them because we have created so much utility, we can share it with other protocols, everyone can utilize it and we can make a common good out of it.
Exclusive Focus on Technology and Project Growth
And with this you can use at the end ice cream swap everywhere without maybe even noticing that ice cream swap is underneath. And that's something that's quite exciting for us because then we can really focus on the tech part, we can make things just amazing. Other protocols focus on getting users attention, providing you support all these necessary and important things. But we focus on the tech part which is what we are best at. And yeah, with this, like everyone is doing what he's best at and yeah, really looking forward for that. And to work with all the Taiko projects super closely together.
Collaborative Ecosystem Development
Definitely, definitely. I mean like generally speaking we do also promote collaboration in our ecosystem. So if you want to connect with any type of project or you want to speak to someone, please let us know and we'll be more than happy to connect. I think we do believe that projects should collaborate in order, you know, to bring new product features also into the ecosystem and market so that our users can actually enjoy and use them and we can provide a better experience to the users because they have more products to choose from and to utilize. So we totally believe in that. So if you have something in mind or if you want to speak to someone, please let us know.
Identifying Challenges in the Current Market Landscape
We'll be more than happy to actually connect you. But without a further ado, let's like now we talked about opportunities, what you've built like great stuff and a great product and essentially like everyone, like you're basically multi chain and you have certain AI features when it comes to your solution. Like what I would like to know what are the challenges? Like biggest challenges that you're currently facing, right? Like, because if you look at the market has been going either up down, right? So now it's quite stable. Like it's neither moving up nor down. So it's kind of like a weird market. And essentially like certain projects are raising, certain projects are failing to raise.
Strategizing for Success Amid Market Challenges
You see also certain projects emerging and certain projects still failing. Like what are your biggest challenges and how are you addressing those? So like if I were to start a project or if you are speaking to another ecosystem project facing the same challenges, what would you actually recommend them? Yeah, so one thing that worked out quite well for us, we never raised any money, right? Therefore we are not connected to this general market trend when there's a lack of investment, honestly, we don't care because we don't need investment. All that we need is users to trade any tokens.
Emphasis on User Driven Revenue
And this like happens all the time, even it is crashing or especially when the market is crashing, users are trading like crazy, right? So yeah, for us, we are in kind of a nice situation where we are not really dependent on external capital or external investment and we just depend on like users needing to trade basically. And we find the best way to trade for the user. This is our revenue stream, right? And we are profitable since basically day one, which also comes because we have basically developed in house. We don't have any great expenses, we are minimizing our expenses and therefore we are profitable since day one.
Advice for Other Projects Facing Market Trends
We don't need external capital. And that makes it really nice even in a bear or bull market for us. For other protocols, this for sure is different, right? Because there are projects where you need like a substantial amount of initial investment. For example, for protocols like this, my big suggestion is try to work together with other protocols. Try to work together with protocols who are already big, already grown to a certain extent over the time these protocols, like generate so valuable connections to chains, to investors, to projects, to users that they can be a huge help. And yeah, other than this, I think like there are a lot of accelerators from the chains. So for Tyco, I'm sure when you get in contact with Tyco and have a call or create project, Taiko will do everything to help you succeed with this.
Utilizing Resources and Connections
Right. I, so you need to, like who has the same goal as you in this case, when you build a protocol on Taiko, like Taiko will be like really happy if you are successful.
Commitment to Support
So Taiko will do everything to help. Absolutely. No, absolutely. I'm just saying like basically, right, like in the industry, you know, like every day you have something new, a new solution emerging. Like new Dex aggregators emerging, you know, or like sometimes you have couple of kids, right, sitting in the, at home and they're like, oh, let me deploy something. Let me just fork something. And then like something else emerges, right? And then you have like bunch of taxes, tax aggregators, or like bunch of pump farm forks, you know, and essentially like, you know, one key thing that you actually think of is like, how am I gonna survive? Or what are the challenges that I'm gonna, like, I'm facing to kind of address them as a project? So basically like this is also what I see quite a lot when I speak to the projects.
User Needs and Marketing
Yeah, what you mean? I think the most important part, some projects don't do it that way and don't, but we do. And this is, yeah, something that users need. Right. When you build something that only survives due to marketing and it has no real value, you can do this if you are amazing in marketing, you can do this if you want to build like a community, stuff like this. So there's nothing better than it. But like when you build something that users are actually in need of, that users are like craving for that something that like really can shine and it's a bit more of a long term project then because usually these are like deep utility and deep utility takes time to unfold, right. This is also what we needed to, things don't happen like in a month. They might take like several years maybe. But at the end when you build something that users need and users want, users are also behind your protocol, right?
Building Community and Feedback
They are helping, they are helping you spread the word. They are providing great feedback. When you build something that is purely reliant on markets, which again, is totally possible, but then as soon as you stop the marketing experiences, nothing is left, right. So yeah, build something that people want or people need more importantly and maybe work these other protocols and projects and chains that are aligned with you, right. With all these products that want and need you to see to be successful, right. Again, chain might be the best partner for early protocols because chains are like, you know, chains are so interested you as a protocol success being successful on campaign. They will do everything they can to help you.
Future of Decentralized Exchange
And that does not even have to be monetary monitor like money. It also can be really insightful tips. It can be connections to very like important other players basically in this, all these things. So yeah, utilize what is there and raising money is not the only thing that you need to do as a protocol. And yeah, just utilize all these opportunities that you are giving. Totally agree. So let's now just like you know, speak about overall market, right? Like essentially we spoke about your like basically roadmap, the challenges and essentially like a. So let's talk about the future because I think that's basically can give us an idea where we're heading to and essentially what's your view on that, right? So as you know, there are so many dexes. There are so many Dex aggregators.
Fragmentation Issues
I mean if you just go like for the Dexs special on Defi Lama, I mean, it's very easy to kind of take for example Univ. Two one four kit or like any other kind of similar solution because you know, everything is open source and you can do it like let's say in one, two days. So it's not challenging at all. But for example, what do you, if you would like, one would bet, right? Well, how would you see the future of taxes and Dex aggregators in the space and in the industry and essentially like what kind of other concerns you would see, right. What concerns are you seeing with current solutions that existing and like what would you see the future to be and how could those issues be resolved?
Liquidity Fragmentation
Yeah, so I think like this boil word and this is fragmentation, right? Have the fragmentation of basically everything on the blockchain. What we are solving is liquidity fragmentation one chain, right? That means like you have like many dexes who all basically have like the same trading pair, but therefore you don't have like one big like deep liquidity trading pair. You have like ten trading pairs that all have like tiny amount of liquidity. So this is liquidity fragmentation. We are solving this with our Dex aggregator. But fragmentation goes so much further, right? You have in terms of protocols, we are now just talking about dexs. But there's like let's lending protocol fragmentation.
Further Fragmentation Across Services
You have the same issue there. You might have like huge liquidity, or you have like huge liquidity in one lending protocol, but instead you have like tiny amounts of liquidity in ten lending protocols. The same, again goes for whatever wallets. You have like 500 wallets in total or something like that. And every wallet, nice features, but there's not like the one wallet, right? Even if you metamask, which is like the most used crypto wallet, there are so many other wallets that have amazing features that metamask, like, was not able to produce. So you have this fragmentation of everything in the crypto space. And I think this is something where it will head towards in the future, right?
Future Aggregators
Where like all these things are like drawn together. Again, maybe not necessarily because like there's one big player who's doing everything, but maybe because there's like aggregators for these different things, right? So there are still like 20 different players, but one aggregator where you can access like all these 20 players through or like one wallet that supports a plug and play like app store for features or something like that. Metamask has started with that, but it's not really successful till now. But these are things that are coming in the future. And with that, having one central point to access everything, this is the real aggregation or fragmentation that I'm talking about.
Need for Multiple Solutions
Again, not only about liquidity on dexs, the same thing, PCs, right? Again, like the thing that you add into your metamask, you have so many RPC providers. In theory you only need one single RPC provider, but then you are centralized. So this is also a terrible solution to have a single RPC provider that just works because when it then just does not work, then everyone is good. You don't have alternatives, right? So again, like having a multitude of providers, every single service, like multiple dexes one chain, multiple RPCs for the same chain, multiple wallets, multiple lending products, all these things like multiples of. But then aggregation layer.
Efforts for Aggregation
Again, our Dex aggregator, get all the Dexs in one very simple to use interface. Our upcoming RPC aggregator that there are still like ten or 20 RPC providers, but we are forwarding you to the best provider that is like fast and stuff like that, right? So we are aggregating, and I think this is what DeFi needs and the blockchain needs even like with the account abstraction, there is a big part of account abstraction that's like focusing on aggregating all these different things, right? You can do like multiple actions in like one kind of real transaction, right? Therefore you can, whatever, do a token approval.
Transaction Efficiency
But you can also like do a swap on five J five dexs in one transaction, as you can do now with our aggregator. Like all the things, I think that's like the huge thing that is coming. Aggregation of every. Not just Texas. Oh, sorry, I was on mute. I just realized. No, definitely you. I agree with you. But like, also. Right, you mentioned a good point about liquidity because like liquidity, there's not enough liquidity. And there are so many chains, like, apart from actually having this UI UX issues where the user spaces will also, what we have is the fact that there is actually not much of users, I would say, in the DeFi ecosystem.
Bringing New Users
Or as a matter of fact, there's not much of liquidity. And then you have a lot of actually initiatives such as, for example, pump fund. You get to mint every day more than 30,000 coins. And then essentially what happens, they also suck out liquidity. So we're in the situation where basically having player versus player, and that also sucks out of the liquidity, out of the entire ecosystem to a certain extent. And essentially what we need to, I believe, do is like bring new users into the system. So, which means that new liquidity. And in order to achieve that, of course, you need to have certain solutions that will accommodate the average users to join the ecosystem.
Focus on Sustainability
And I think that's the most important, unfortunately, like, I also see a lot like people are more focused on kind of in a lot of the cases to building like a quick solutions just to make a quick buck and then move on. But like sustainability, generally speaking, I think would be a good idea for the entire space. Don't know how, what you think about it. Yeah, so I fully agree with what you just said, especially this aspect. I believe over time this will happen automatically. Right. The question is just how long it will take.
DeFi Evolution and Challenges
Because DeFi is not like in the first, like month or so, it still has like some sort of maturity, right. It's also not an age old industry, but we should be expected to have built like something sustainable till now. And there are these sustainable kind of marvels in the DeFi pillars. You have one side you have like an innovator, like, let's say Uniswap, who's built new protocols, who has like released the version two and version three of Uniswap, and now version two, version four. And like, these are products that are likely to stay and to continue innovating.
Innovators vs Forks
Then on the other side, you have all these forks of Uniswap that don't do anything except doing a bit marketing on top of their fork where nothing new is basically introduced into this fork. These are, I think, very big, two different aspects of Defi. And the big difference in that being said, even as a fork, let's say of uniswap with no innovation behind it, that's just like a plain copy basically, of Uniswap. You can create like a very sustainable and utility focus protocol, right? Because as we all know, is not available on all chains.
Ignoring Emerging Chains
Uniswap again like one inch and all these other big protocols are focusing on the very biggest chains and all these other chains they don't care about. And this is like really a big problem because there are so many amazing chains out there. But these amazing chains cannot really go further because the big protocols are ignoring them and therefore simply creates the fork of such a big protocol. Even if you don't add anything to the fork, even if it's just like a plain copy of it, if you do it on other chains where the main protocols are not supporting it, this can also something, maybe not innovative, but something sustainable and needed, right?
Missed Opportunities
So many things that you can do in the defi space to create a sustainable, but many people decide to simply not do it. And I think this also comes down basically getting rich quick because it is very simple to spin up like a uniswap fork and then create like a big token sale for it. And like one week after the token sale, you take out all the money and you don't innovate in any way. All marketing and you have made a ton of money from this. Was the users having maybe a nice experience for one week and then being excited about what you come up with just to be like really frustrated after this weekend, I, that you decided to not be sustainable.
Shifting User Expectations
And this is something where users will very slowly start to learn because right now users are actually incentivizing this behavior. Right. Right now users are trading like mean tokens over utility tokens. Users are really hyped about the next like sale, the next ido, ICO, whatever, over like an existing protocol that has shown like a track record over several years, stuff like. So I think this will be like a shift first in the user's mind and then protocol will simply develop what users are asking for. Right now, many of the users are certainly not asking for sustainable protocols.
Excitement for Future Changes
And I think the big shift that will come and that will turn defi and blockchain into a whole new level, into a whole new game. All these sizes that we are seeing right now, the sizes of protocols in terms of market cap, the amount of users interacting with protocols, all these things I think will be tiny in comparison to what is coming as soon as users are starting to be more concerned about sustainability. So I am personally really excited about this shift. And ice creams were basically focusing to be ready once this shift.
Sustainability Focus in the Industry
And we are fully focusing on the sustainability aspect, which sometimes is not that easy. No, it's not easy at all. There's always another issue to actual results and I think it's related to the maturity of the industry overall and essentially the solutions. Right. In the industry. And also if you look in the industry like, I mean, it's the time that, it's the first time like in years kind of. I see with us speaking about users and importance of users, like I also saw it in the conferences, but in the past, whenever I went to the dev conferences, mostly people were talking about the shiny infrastructure projects they have built and why it's going to solve the problem. But no one really thought about the users. And then I think for me personally, the revelation or like general speaking, I saw that spark and that consideration of users when I actually went to Dapcon this year.
Understanding Users and Their Importance
So I saw people generally speaking, talking about like bringing users and like having users that will use their solution and I thought that was great. So, which means that if we're now starting, start to speak about, think about users, like eventually we will find the means to onboard them and then down the line, like we can speak also about profitability. So we're getting there step by step. It just takes some time, but I'm really happy to see that event like we're moving towards actually considering the end user and ensuring that we have the, let's say, solutions, right to onboard those users. And generally speaking right apart from these issues like UI Ux, lack of liquidity or some complications. Right. What, why do you think DeFi is not adopted by the masses? What other solutions, what other challenges you see there? And do you think like we could all do something to improve it?
Challenges Facing DeFi Adoption
Yeah, I think it honestly simply takes a bit of time. There are so many great projects that are working on solutions to like the really big like challenges. Challenges basically of users. And I honestly believe that the protocol basically that will recognize Defi very likely and already has started operation like no one really like knows about it or still building like what they envision, stuff like this. So I think there is a big amount of development power basically or thought in the space. The big issue is there's so much more just like scam and money extraction and get schemes and stuff in the same space that these really innovative products are being kind of overlooked. Right. Because there's so much noise and it's very hard for the to be in this noise, especially because they are not focusing on like shouting out, they are focusing on.
Visibility of Innovative Products in DeFi
Yeah. Issue. Right. So other protocols who are only focusing on shouting loud, they have a big advantage right now. So I personally believe like many of these issues that we are facing in DeFi and many of the reasons why we don't have billions of users in Defi, many of these issues are already being worked on and they are already create protocols and proposals to solve these issues. It just takes a bit more time for these protocols to show themselves out of this huge amount of noise so we can all see them. No, totally. I agree with you exactly. I think as time goes by we'll have better solutions, we'll have consideration for the end users. We'll have basically also easy way to onboard them. Eventually we will get to the point that the user will not care about what chain it is, they will just be all about solution and using that solution and whatever runs in the background, let it run.
Improvements and Evolution of DeFi
So I think that's the way probably to think about it and move towards that. And you see that happening in the industry, which is good because like also generally speaking, my feeling is that DeFi has changed compared to what it was in 2020. I mean, we all remember those horrible UI UX or websites where you basically have to calculate the amounts manually if you wanted to inject liquidity into the pools. I remember that now it's like everything is done actually automatically so you don't have to guess numbers, but also what you have in place is also concentrated liquidity where you can set the ranges depending on your risk appetite. And essentially, like, to a certain extent, avoid impermanent loss. Not fully, but to a certain extent, which is great. And I do see that like much better solutions will be emerging then.
Community Engagement and Feedback
So one last thing that I would like to know from your team before we proceed to our audience and ask them questions like, is there an alpha you would like to share with our community? Sorry, could you repeat last sentence? Sorry, I didn't hear you. That's what I was saying basically. I certainly did not sentence. Twitter is acting out a bit weirdly again. Sorry, sir. Yeah, I was saying that if there was an alpha that you could share with our community, like, no one has heard about it, but only, you know, and it's announcement you would like to do. Amazing. Yeah. Basically everyone please again, join our Twitter, no, that also, but our telegram, because they like very active conversations.
Trial of New Features
We are really looking for feedback from all of you. Please provide that feedback to us also if you have any questions. Our community actually by now is so, like, invested in, like, all the things that we are building. Very likely you won't even get answer from our moderators, but even from another community. So you can get like, really honest responses on our telegram about everything. And the other thing is, please simply try it out. Please try out our Dex aggregator. It will go live like maybe tomorrow or day after tomorrow. The Dex already is live. You can provide liquidity. You can earn rewards or trading fees by providing liquidity.
Upcoming Features and Community Interaction
And the Dex aggregator aspect of it will go live in the next days. And once it's live, you will be able to compare rates, our trades, with all these other, like, trends there. And you should see that we have at least the best, the same trade than all these other dexes out there and likely better trades. So, yeah, my ask for all of you is try it out, give it a chance. And if you see anything positive or negative, let us know in our telegram and we will make sure to improve it or simply have a chat with you. Thanks a lot. No, thank you so much, Simon. I'm really appreciative for you joining today. So actually, like, this was really cool to have this discussion with you.
Closing Remarks and Audience Engagement
And yeah, you guys heard about the fact that if you have some complaints, you know, we know where to go. So they have a dedicated telegram group channel. So you can head there or I'm sure you will not have come any complaints. But if you do, you know where to go. But I essentially like, I would like to be quiet here and ask the audience if any of you has a question. If you do, please raise your hand and I bring you up. Don't be shy, guys. While we wait, I just wanted to mention, Nikki, nice having an AMA with you. I hope we end the rest of the community will meet eventually in one of the Crad conferences in person.
Audience Questions and Support
Definitely. Definitely. Okay, I see a request here speakers. Okay. Approve. All right. I don't know I'm granting here, but somehow doesn't work on my end. Twitter is acting up, actually. So anyway. Okay, now you're a speaker riddle, so please speak. What's your question? You're on mute, though. Hi, Jim, everyone. I actually don't, like, have a question. I just started exploring Taiko, actually, and it's interesting to jump on this page, and I really love what you guys are doing. Here. I'm just trying to, like, connect with other Taiko family because I, it's kind of difficult, like, seeing, getting, like, resources to, like, you know, understand engulf myself into, like, the taiko ecosystem.
Connecting Within the Community
So I'm gonna be needing help from any of you guys. I have followed a couple of guys on the space, and I'll be willing to connect with everybody. Yeah. Maybe then I answer this. First of all, like, taiko is right. So from a technical perspective, you can utilize taiko as you can utilize Ethereum. So add taiko to your metamask and react with in terms of connections. Taiko has multiple really big and great communities. So you can go into these communities, simply have a chat with users and founders and moderators and whatever you want.
Continued Engagement and Queries
And as mentioned in the past, feel free to simply join the ice cream. So telegram now, as we are part of Taiko, of the Taiko community as well. Yeah, I think you will be able to find like minded people there and have some chats with them. But yeah, your first abroad should be the Taika communities. You can find them directly on the website. And yeah, from there you can relationships with a lot of other great people and ask continuous stream of questions there as well. Thank you. Absolutely. So thank you so much, Simon, for answering the question or the comment.
Appreciation for Participation
Yeah, thank you very much for your comment and question was great. So I would like to thank all of you for joining this great AMA session. Thank you, Simon, as well for taking your time and joining us, and we're looking forward to collaborating and working with you. As mentioned, if you have in mind any project that you would like to speak to, just let me know. I would be more than happy to introduce you and put you in touch, guys. And so, guys, if you really want to go and check out ice cream spoil, check out their Twitter page, then go to actually try out the dot.
Encouragement to Engage with the Platform
If you have any questions, please give them a follow and please ask them also in the comment sections. Or again, as Simon invited all of you to their telegram channel, it was awesome to have you all here. Thank you so much for joining. Great conversation and I'm looking forward to the next one. Thank you so much, guys. Same here. Thanks so much for having us and wish everyone a wonderful rest of. And again, please simply have a look at Iceconsorb, check it out and provide feedback in our telegram.
Final Thanks and Goodbye
Thanks for all of you who listened. And yeah, have a great day.
