Agile Core Fun(d)! (March 3rd to March 9th)

What is up, my friends!

As widely known, the core funding for WagMedia's mission is secured through the Polkadot Treasury, which was determined by our community's vote via OpenGov.

Last week marked the long-awaited return of the WagMedia weekly. In case you missed it, here’s the link to the newsletter, it was packed with engaging stories and updates uncovered through our finders program.

The weekly newsletter has always been a fundamental component of WagMedia, keeping us updated on Polkadot's ecosystem developments, as well as keeping the community informed about WagMedia's activities.

We anticipate our new approach will be a fun way of bonding with the community even more, whilst allowing more voices to be heard through their written contributions.

Our integration of this approach into the finders program offers rewards on multiple levels, allowing contributors to showcase their writing and receive tangible rewards. For instance, rewards for last week's newsletter ranged from approximately 65 to 150 US dollars worth of DOT.

This week we have another jam-packed edition with yet again an astonishing amount of news discovered by our finders. We also feature an events section, useful for catching up on recordings or planning ahead.

Get more insights about the new Bounty hub for content creators in our brief report. And if you're interested in getting involved with this newsletter, don't miss our future piece on life as a finder.

Our top story this week covers significant developments, which we'll delve into next.

Dodow, Chief Editor

Top Story of the Week

Written by yay.oi

GG Polkadot! This week we’ve unlocked a legendary loot-box of epic proportions. A massive vote of confidence from Grayscale Investments, a million-dollar bounty that promises a world of fun, and a blockchain powerup that benefits 1337s and n00bs alike.

First up, Grayscale has launched a game-changing fund, and DOT is a key player. Forget Bitcoin ETFs (although let me remind you that Grayscale’s is the biggest), this fund goes far beyond buy and HODL. Grayscale’s Dynamic Income Fund (GDIF) is its first actively managed fund, and it’s not concerned with capital appreciation at all.

It’s all about those tasty staking yields, thus, naturally, DOT is featured prominently. At 14% it’s the third largest allocation, even bigger than ETH. And big players such as ADA don’t even make an appearance (sorry Charles).

This is a great addition to Grayscale’s existing DOT holdings in the Smart Contract Platform Ex-Ethereum Fund (GSPCPxE) of 45,000 DOT (~USD$450,000). It's also a major win for Polkadot! An allocation of this size not only signals Grayscale’s belief in Polkadot’s potential, it also brings a wave of positive effects to the Polkadot ecosystem.

The exposure will attract new interest and investment, given Grayscale is a serious player, people will notice. It also means a huge number of DOT being actively staked, strengthening the security and stability of the network.

We can all rejoice in knowing that #GrayscaleisDED. With their GDIF and GSPCPxE DOT holdings combined, Grayscale potentially stands to be a significant beneficiary of the DED, and VARCH airdrops. If they’ve been staking with the right parachains (what decent fund manager wouldn’t indulge in a bit of liquid staking), they might get some PINK too.

While Polkadot has been airdropping the fun into investment funds, they’ve also been putting some of their treasury funds into another kind of fun. GAMES! With the passing of OpenGov Medium Spender Referendum #470 this week, Bounty #38 received an allocation of 100,000 DOT (a typical DOT treasury flex calling a million bucks a medium spend).

Bounty #38 will be used to fund indie game development projects. It was proposed by DOT whale and Koala DAO founder Giotto De Filippi, and this week he’s been on a quest to assemble the ultimate curator council utilizing a unique more is more approach.

The basic idea is to get a massive hoard of gamer nerds to battle it out over which games will get funding. It’s a slightly different approach to our WagMedia curatorship.

With a slew of indie game titles about to join the Polkadot ecosystem, the timing couldn’t be better for a new development that lowers barriers to entry. This week it was announced that Agile Coretime will be deployed on Kusama very soon.

Agile Coretime will bring the end of parachain auctions and fixed term leases. Instead, projects will be able to book as little or as much Polkadot core resources as they need. Not only does this facilitate the smooth entry of smaller projects, but it also empowers them to scale up seamlessly at their own pace.

Overall it’s great news, not just for indie game developers who are just getting their feet wet, but also for powerhouses such as newcomer Mythical Games that would be scaling up much faster.

That’s it for agile scalability and fun funds this week, now let’s take a look at all of the other news and updates from the Polka-sphere.

The Bounty Hub

Written by Sanchez

With the plethora of changes at Wagmedia, the Paraverse content guild has concluded its funding for the creation of content on Polkadot and Kusama. The Bounty Hub which is dedicated to targeted bounties, is just one of the new initiatives that will replace the Content guild.

Under the leadership of Goku, leveraging his wealth of extensive experience in content creation, the Bounty Hub will employ a more rigorous method of rewarding content. Once the topic is announced, incentives will depend on the content's quality and level of organic engagement.

It's important to emphasize that Goku and other members of the Wagmedia community are committed to aiding creators in enhancing the content they produce. This support is extended through thorough reviews and suggestions on content creation approaches and by sharing relevant materials and real-world examples for creators to learn from.

Currently, the Bounty Hub boasts five open bounties covering various topics, including Agile coretime on Kusama, crypto-economic-based chains over ZKchains, and more. Seasoned creators within the Wagmedia community have already generated remarkable content on these subjects.

Let's review some of the standouts from the hub:

Pitcoin, a Polkadot content stalwart, created a thread on X on the bounty: 'Polkadot is more than a blockchain,' illustrating the distinct nature of Polkadot by highlighting unique features such as the on-chain treasury, the OpenGov democracy model, Agile coretime, forkless upgrades, and the Polkadot SDK to show that Polkadot is more than a blockchain.

Mikewill takes a different approach to the bounty by describing Polkadot's XCM as the future of blockchain communication. In Mike's view, XCM is the standout feature of Polkadot and will change the approach to blockchain interoperability and communication.

Mr. Kusama focuses on the adoption Polkadot's Software Development Kit (SDK) by industry bigwigs, governance through OpenGov, and the resilience of Polkadot in the face of Inscriptions in the piece titled 'Preach, Bill'.

You can explore these outstanding pieces on the Wagmedia website when it officially launches, or keep posted by following on X. If you are a creator looking to join a vibrant community and boost your content creation skills, we invite you to join us today.

General News

Written by Sanchez

• The PolkaFrance and PromoTeamPD DAOs join DAO staking on InvArch and Tinkernet Parachains to boost their efforts to grow the Polkadot community.
• Great numbers on InvArch's DAO staking, as 52.9% of the distributed VARCH tokens are staked on the 15+ registered DAOs on InvArch.
• InvArch's Tinkernetwill host a liquidity bootstrapping pool for TNKR on the Osmosis DEX on the Cosmos network, with the cross-chain communication enabled by Picasso through IBC.
• Rob Habermeier, co-founder of Polkadot, released an article on coprocessors, comparing the differences between off-chain zk-coprocessors and crypto-economic coprocessors and making a hypothesis on the market for coprocessors.
• Ingo Rübe, the founder of the Kilt Network, participated in discussions with the Commissioner of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Hester Peirce, and other experts on regulatory approaches in the European Union and the United States.
• Imbue Network, providing a safe and reliable freelance marketplace, has won Kusama auction 131 with a self-funded bid of 60KSM.
• The Polkadot Alpha Program will provide a decentralized and community approach to alpha testing of products for developers looking to launch their projects on Polkadot. This initiative will also aid in increasing the visibility of these projects.
• The Phala Network has been allocated 0.82% of Pink tokens, joining the list of parachains receiving an allocation of Pink tokens.
• Subsocial has migrated Grill.chat and the SUB locking management system to GrillApp.net to appeal to more content and users outside Polkadot.
• The InvArch team has doubled the amount slated for airdrops to DOT stakers from 20 million to 40 million VARCH tokens. Native stakers and liquid stakers staking 50 and greater DOT are eligible for the airdrop.
• DOT has been included amongst nine other cryptocurrencies in a new investment product by Grayscale, the Grayscale Dynamic Income Fund(GDIF), which focuses on generating income from staking rewards.
• Polkassembly now supports the verification of identities on Polkadot, Kusama, and Polkadex using the Polkassembly registrar.
• DOTISDED has announced the winners of their meme competition.
• The Parity data team has included interactive charts on the Polkadot Data Dashboard so users can better understand the data around Polkadot.
• There is a new runtime upgrade on the Krest Network. The upgrade enables the unification of Substrate and EVM addresses on Krest and the upgrade of the assets pallet, which allows the creation of ERC20 tokens on Krest.
• Peaqjoins the $100 MLN Fetch.ai Foundation to unlock AI for DePINs.
• Novawallet has announced that it has hit a new milestone of over 6.7 million DOT staked by over 11,000 users on the Nova Wallet app.
• After a runtime upgrade, Agile Coretime will launch on the Kusama network, deprecating the old system of parachain auction on Kusama and Polkadot.
• InvArchgets an allocation of PINK tokens. InvArch will receive 0.66% of the total supply of PINK tokens.
• InvArch has announced March 31st as the date for the snapshot for the VARCH airdrop. DOT liquid staked on Bifrost, Acala, and HydraDX will qualify for the drop.
• The Polkadot anti-scam team has achieved a new milestone with over 31,000 fake websites blocked.
• Kucoin announces a Polkadot quiz competition with a reward pool of $2000 of DOT.
• Messari has published an in-depth analysis of OpenGov, comparing it with Polkadot Governance V1.

NFT News

Written by Sanchez

• Pinkonomics organized several events for users to earn more PINK points before the launch of the PINK token. Interested users earned Pink points by playing the Shockwaves and participating in the Heroes of Eldarune International Women's Day Tournament.
• Kusama Dragonsare liquidating their treasury, which consists of NFTs of other collections such as the Kusama Kingdom, Kanaria, Buddies, and more.
• Everloothas joined the Mythical X Syctale Academy, a 10-week Web3 gaming project mentorship program featuring diverse gaming projects.
• The minting of Motif NFTs is live on Kodadot. The collection by Repile features a series of string art designs.
• The Unique Networks Learn and Earn campaign on Airlyft has ended. The event is geared at increasing user knowledge on customizable NFTs and DeFi.
• Bajun Network, the canary chain of Ajuna Network, won the 132 parachain auction with a self-funded bid of 25 KSM.

DEFI News

Written by Sanchez

• Beamswapboosts rewards for GLINT stakers in the current epoch with $1000 in rewards.
• The TVL for DOT LSDs on Stellaswaphas crossed over $3.8M. These include LSDs from Bifrost, Acala, and Stellaswap.
• There was a prediction on Zeitgeistfor Bitcoin to reach its all-time high before March 15th. This has now occurred.
• Polkaswapis seeking feedback from the community on trading with their Order Book.
• The trading volume on Polkadexis setting new records. It has surpassed its all-time high for two consecutive days with a trading volume of over $236k.
• Over 7 million vDOT have been minted on Bifrost, making it the liquid staking protocol with the highest number of DOT staked on Polkadot.
• Acalawill also receive an allocation of PINK tokens. 0.74% is allocated to Acala and distributed among ACA Stakers and users.

Governance News

Written by Gigs

• Acala proposed obtaining $18,000 ACA from its treasury to finance the Ambassadors Programme for a period of six months. The community has approved this plan.
• Crust Network submitted a request on OpenGov for the opening of HRMP channels with Polkadot Assethub. This is to enable the distribution of its allocated PINK tokens. Voting will close on March 16.
• Filippo and the Polkassemblyteam introduced a new tool to the platform. This will give users access to detailed information on proposal statistics, including categories of data and stat types: like total votes delegations, support percentage, vote distribution, conviction, etc..
• Amplitudeopened HRMP channels with Picasso.
• Referendums 545 and 354 were submitted on Polkadot and Kusama, respectively, to equip the GRANDPA light client on the Polkadot side of the Polkadot Kusama bridge. Polkassembly introduced the slack bot. This tool enables users to track governance activity, like the Telegram and Discord bots.
• HydraDX published a new incentive proposal to ratify the previous one. This new proposal will deploy HDX incentives to match 40% of the value of 1M DOT (about 172M HDX) as part of the Polkadot hydration campaign.
• A Polkadot treasury proposal was made by Starlay Finance in a bid to recover DOT from the recent exploit. This proposal is on the verge of failure as the issuing account lacks a verified ID as well as no decision deposit.
• Funding for the Paseo-Developer testnet gets approved. An overwhelming 76M DOT was in support of operational and running costs for a 1-year period.
• Bifrost put forward a proposal to adjust the vDOT reward fee from 0.1% to 1%. It’s the first of three phases to get reward fees back to 10%. Vtokens will be a key source of protocol revenue within Bifrost’s tokenomics 2.0, which focuses on sustainability.
• Bounty #38 for indie games development was released during the week. There’s been a slight twist as Referendum #510 which sought approval of the curators' list for the bounty has seen its execution fail.
• Polimec launched a governance model which mimics Polkadot governance v1.
• HydraDX is rebranding to Hydration. If passed, there will be an overhaul with the logo and brand styling.

Events News

Written by Gigs

• An event focusing on Polkadot education and community building was held in the Philippines on March 5 by Open Guild and Bitskwela, it attracted over 100 in attendance.
• LAOS hosted a discord meeting on March 6 to introduce the new DAME feature, which allows permissionless data addition to existing assets across different blockchains.
• In collaboration with Kona Finance, Xcavate, Agro Token, and Valour Cap Group, the Tanssi Network hosted a space on March 6 to discuss the incentivization of real-world assets in various industries.
• SORAheld an AMA on March 6 with Palmatrix, discussing the DEX/CEX bridge, liquidity in CCXT, staking characteristics, and more.
• Filippo Franchini of the Web3 Foundation held an AMA on March 6 with Djhatrang, research lead at Subwallet, discussing Web3 wallets.
• On March 6, RMRK hosted a space with Evrloot, to discuss the use of RMRK standards in the Evrloot game as well as touch on the recent standards and the future.
• Acala hosted an AMA on March 7 with Gorka Irazoqui, VP Tech of Tanssi, to examine the revolution of appchain deployment.
• Peaq Network hosted an AMA with Brainstein on March 8, which focused on how DePIN is supporting the medical industry with autonomous nervous systems for improved health and wellness.
• Original Trail and Neurowebparticipated in a roundtable hosted on March 8 by Mario Nawfal covering AI in web3.
• A PINK AMA was hosted on March 8 covering the latest news and questions about one of the first meme coins to launch on Polkadot.

Upcoming events include:

• Gavin Wood's address at TOKEN2024 Dubai from April 18 to 19.
• Medellin meetup for Polkadot and Parachain ambassadors on March 16.
• XCM NFTS by Daniel Shiposha of the Unique Network at Sub0Asia 2024 on March 12.
• Bjorn Wagner, CEO of Parity, speaks at Proof of Talk, Paris from June 10 to 11.
• Luna Strategy hosts Polkadot Afterwork in Lisbon on March 15.
• Women of Polkadot: Brunch in Bagkok-Sub0 on March 13.

That is all for this week. If you enjoyed the newsletter, please share it. You can subscribe on Substack to receive an email when next week's edition is ready. And if you're participating in creator staking on Subsocial, you can interact to increase your rewards — perhaps a good two-for-one deal by providing feedback or comments.