Start Making History
Telos is pushing blockchain governance forward on a number of fronts and in fact, Telos should rightly be seen as the most advanced governance blockchain. And in time, it will be. But we are the “actually do it before you brag about it” types here at Telos. And while that is certainly not the standard that most blockchain projects adhere to, it works for us. Besides, the ongoing stream of governance firsts has already begun and that waiting is likely to pay off.
After a bit of a delayed start this week, the first election of arbitrators has begun. Nominations started at 9:01 UTC on Thursday and will run until the voting period begins, one week later on February 14th. This process is historic in many ways. First because no blockchain has ever had arbitrators elected by the users, and second because once these arbitrators are elected, they will enable users who have lost their account keys or had funds stolen to have recourse and a way to recover control of other accounts. This is exceedingly rare in public blockchains. It has happened in a few rulings on EOS, but the future of that process is in question in part because the EOS Core Arbitration Forum (ECAF) was an appointed body and many EOS users are questioning their authority. EOS block producers are also refusing to execute some of their orders, even in cases of uncontested lost account keys. By having users elect arbitrators on Telos, we hope that they will be accepted as legitimate by more people than the ECAF arbitrators were. So, it is quite likely that when the arbitrator elections are complete on March 15th at 10:01 UTC, that Telos may still be the first public blockchain ever to restore keys to a lost-key account. (Side note: This election starts on Valentine’s Day and ends on the Ides of March. How did this happen? Et tu Cupid?)
The history-making chain of events will continue with our worker proposal system, which is the only functioning system in EOSIO and may be the first in blockchain to be votable by all users instead of by a subset of large node owners. Next week should see new chapters of the Telos Users Guide covering WPS.
-Douglas Horn
Here’s what happened this week:
- Arbitrator nominations have begun!
- Telos is on CoinGecko!
- First distribution of Exchange Token Reserve funds
- EOSphere launches Telos Voter
- EOS Israel meeting features Telos and other EOSIO Sister Chains
- Telos Browsers now list Tokens & Airgrabs
Arbitrator nominations have begun
As mentioned above, the process of electing Telos arbitrators has now begun in full. The one-week nomination period ends on Thursday, February 14th at 9:01 UTC when voting will begin. As of this writing, there is already one candidate for the position. Several more are expected. You can view the candidates with links to their candidacy pages (stored on Telos IPFS!) via Sqrl wallet.
For more information about the arbitrator elections, see:
Telos Arbitrator Election Update
Telos Arbitrator Elections are Coming
Telos Users Guide — Tutorial: Telos Arbitration
Telos User Guide: Understanding Telos Arbitration
Telos is on CoinGecko
The crypto tracking website Coingecko.com has now added TLOS tokens to its listings. This gives anyone interested in cryptocurrency a way to track TLOS and learn more about it. Many web services use the Coingecko API for automatically monitoring coins and tokens. For example transaction volume tracking site Blocktivity.info was using the Coingecko API for all of the chains it tracks except Telos, which caused the TLOS price to sometimes disappear. Now Blocktivity also uses Coingecko for TLOS, simplifying its processes. This is one more example of integrating Telos into the larger crypto world.
There do appear to be a few inaccuracies on the site. For example, TLOS is listed as a token on the EOS blockchain instead of as a distinct blockchain. Some of the other elements of the site also look to be in need of correction. This is pretty standard for new listings on any crypto tracking site and will be addressed in due time.
One nice thing that Coingecko adds is the token widget. The widget is a simple piece of code that can be added to any website to display the market figures about the TLOS token. I expect a number of Telos block producers and others will soon be displaying this on their websites. To get it, go to: https://www.coingecko.com/en/coins/telos/widgets#panel
First distribution of Exchange Token Reserve funds
Telos maintains an Exchange Token Reserve account holding tokens to be distributed to people who held EOS on exchanges or online wallets as of the ERC-20 snapshot, and therefore could not receive TLOS tokens at launch. It’s currently the largest account on Telos and can be monitored on block explorers at exrsrv.tf.
The first disbursement from this fund has now been sent. Exchanges and wallets engage with the Telos Foundation board to submit their requests to receive these funds for their customers. The board members review the applications including information about EOS funds and accounts. The exchanges or accounts need to agree to certain conditions such as returning these funds to their actual owners, and listing TLOS for trade if they are an exchange.
Bitpie.com is a mobile crypto wallet and asset management platform for Android and iOS. On February 5th, the Telos block producers approved a multisig transaction proposed by Telos Foundation board member Josep Rosich of eosbarcelona for the transfer of 406,168.6881 TLOS to Bitpie’s genesis account, which, combined with the 40,000 TLOS it received in the Telos launch restores the value of Bitpie account owners, minus those accounts that were capped at 40,000 tokens.
EOSphere launches Telos Voter
Block Producer EOSphere has released a new online voting portal for Telos called Telos Voter. Telos Voter tracks the voting on all current Telos block producer candidates to facilitate voting. Its minimalistic design is particularly good for tracking on mobile devices.
You can use Telos Voter at: https://telosvoter.eosphere.io/
EOS Israel meeting features Telos and other EOSIO sister chains
On Wednesday, February 6th, EOS Israel hosted a meetup about EOSIO sister chains. I was invited to kick off the presentations with one I call “Telos: The On-ramp to Third-generation Blockchain” about how Telos is the most cost-effective and developer-friendly of all third-generation blockchains and how this should attract developers and apps to EOSIO from Ethereum and other second-generation blockchains.
Representatives from EOSForce, Worbli, and multi-chain block producer EOSphere also gave great presentations. You can watch the event on YouTube at: https://youtu.be/cQJTQpY2yM4
Telos Browsers now list Tokens & Airgrabs
As apps begin deploying and airdropping tokens on Telos, block explorers and other online tools are expanding their features to list them. TelosTracker.io from Telos Madrid — the first independent Telos block explorer — has now added the ability to display token balances. The first tokens listed are VIITA and VIITC from Viitasphere.
Telos Portal from Telos Germany also lists these tokens and also has an Airgrabs page for claiming VIITA tokens in their upcoming airdrop. https://portal.telosgermany.io/airgrab
About the author: Douglas Horn is the Telos architect and whitepaper author, and the founder of GoodBlock, a block producer and app developer for the Telos Blockchain Network.
More about GoodBlock can be found at: www.goodblock.io
Join us on Twitter @GoodBlockio
Vote for GoodBlock on the Telos Blockchain Network @goodblocktls