Because of the existence of mining machines, Filecoin is more durable and brighter than other projects. Because of the huge dividend expectation in the initial stage of mining, countless people want to plunge into it. Where there is demand, there is supply, although Filecoin has never officially announced the launch date of the mainnet, and has repeatedly reminded that the official has never announced the mining configuration.

But it can’t stop the miners who want to hold on to the initial dividends, the investors who are stupid and rich, and the countless mining machine suppliers who sell hope. The suppliers claim to have inside information. Go online immediately, and then get slapped in the face again and again.

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IPFS and Filecoin

First, let’s explain the relationship between IPFS and Filecoin. These are two protocols, but both come from Protocol Labs. The two are complementary protocols, and Filecoin is the incentive layer of IPFS, which motivates participants to provide better storage services.

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IPFS is an Internet transmission protocol designed to surpass the HTTP protocol. It intends to solve the problems faced by the existing HTTP protocol, such as inefficiency, high cost, over-centralization, and insufficient robustness during disasters, and create a better Internet for the world.

Filecoin raised 257 million US dollars in August 2017, setting a financing record at that time. The team is naturally very powerful, Stanford's signboard is still very loud, and the IPFS protocol has been running since 2015.

Regarding the inefficiency and high cost of the HTTP protocol, here is an example from the official website:

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necessary conditions for success

Many people refer to IPFS as distributed storage, but Gu Qianfeng, CTO of BTCMedia Asia-Pacific Region, called IPFS "decentralized storage" in a sharing at the beginning of the year, because distributed storage, that is, single-node large-capacity storage, is It is the method used by the traditional cloud storage market. Using the same method to compete with the giants is tantamount to hitting a stone with a pebble.

This is just another expression to distinguish it from the traditional cloud storage market.

And more importantly, the inability to reduce costs is critical.

The essence of the IPFS approach is, in fact, the essence of the blockchain - although the development has gone a bit off course.

The essence of the blockchain is to achieve a common goal, aggregate countless distributed tiny forces, twist them into a huge force, and finally achieve the goal. This is the original idea of ​​Bitcoin mining, and so is the community and token economy that the blockchain values ​​very much.

Based on this essence, the open, decentralized, and trustless features of the blockchain are derived, and a unique collaboration model is formed.

If you use this to create a business model and subvert a mature business field, the fundamental weapon is low cost, not decentralization, privacy protection and other features. Although these are good, but only relying on these to be used on a large scale, is not enough.

If IPFS wants to be used on a large scale, it must encourage the aggregation of idle resources of idle users, thereby greatly reducing storage costs, and then it is eligible to enter the competition. After all, the giants in the cloud storage market are not vegetarians.

This is the model envisaged by IPFS, which gathers low-cost resources and provides better services to reduce the dimensionality of the cloud storage market. This is exactly what Filecoin is going to do.

Without this foundation, IPFS and Filecoin have no hope of large-scale application.

From this point of view, the current main mode of domestic Filecoin mining is deviated from the direction, but the application of new projects always requires a lot of power, and the power of capital is extremely important.

The possible wealth creation effect of mining will strongly promote the exposure of the project, and it is rumored that the official will also subsidize the storage in the early stage, in order to quickly open up the market and gain more attention and users.

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Will it repeat the mistakes of EOS?

There is no hope of large-scale application, which does not mean that there is no hope of hype.

Filecoin is as popular as EOS. Although it is a bear market, it still gets a lot of attention.

A tutorial when the testnet was launched received more than 800,000 views, and it was more than 500,000 a few days ago. This is the most read article that Brother Qu has seen.

There are also many discussions about IPFS in WeChat groups, circles of friends, and the media, and the miners have even burned the fire of enthusiasm that has been burning for two years.

The expectation of wealth creation generated by mining is even more violent than the profit expectation of the EOS supernode campaign at that time. The competition threshold for supernodes is very high, and the 21 main places are generally not even considered by the teams.

As a star project with many expectations, it will finally be launched after more than two years of polishing. Although Brother Qu is very optimistic about IPFS and Filecoin and trusts in the strength of the team, he still has no confidence in how much it can achieve in the short term.

I still look forward to the fact that Filecoin will bring a different landscape to the storage market after its launch. The cloud storage market is large and growing rapidly, but the monopoly of giants is serious. Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Ali and other giants occupy 90% of the market share.

Moreover, the stored data is clear text for cloud storage operators, and it is troublesome to encrypt by themselves, and cloud storage providers have no incentive to provide encryption services for users.

Filecoin can solve this problem relatively easily. In addition to contributing storage resources for mining, ordinary users do not have to worry about privacy issues when using Filecoin storage. This is an additional benefit, but it still needs to be easy to use. is a problem.

The continuous launch of star projects has brought heat to the blockchain in the cold winter and warmed the investors in the blockchain.

It’s just that every hot spot is a climax, and after the climax, there is only emptiness, as the saying goes:

First there is hype and promotion, and there must be chasing high and smashing the market. Wave after wave, some people make a lot of money and make a fortune, while others leave the market in pain.

The same world, different endings, could be better.

But Brother Qu still has good hopes for IPFS and Filecoin.

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Disclaimer: This article is the author's independent point of view, and does not represent the position of the Blockchain Institute (public account), nor does it constitute any investment opinion or suggestion. The picture comes from the Internet.