is more resilient and user-controlled that the AWS
Filecoin, a decentralized peer to peer storage service, was relatively unknown at the start of 2021. It had a network capacity that barely made a dent on the digital storage space. The Filecoin team claims that the blockchain now holds more than 10% of Amazon Web Service’s storage capacity, making it the most popular cloud infrastructure service vendor. This includes the storage of approximately 239.03 Terabytes worth of nonfungible tokens, or NFTs. It was used by well-known blockchain companies like OpenSea (Magic Eden) and is estimated to have cost $26.6 billion.
Source: NFT.Storage
Filecoin’s success is a mystery. What motivates Filecoin’s developers to expand the ecosystem? Colin Evran is the ecosystem lead at Protocol Labs and Filecoin’s creator. He says that a major factor in his desire for Filecoin was disillusionment with Web2’s operation.
He said, “It’s still moving in the wrong direction.” “A few companies now control the data of the world,” he said. This level of centralization over many decades doesn’t seem to be going to work for everyday users.
“I believe that if you look 40 years out, it’s not like AWS stores 100% of the data in the world. That’s not good for society, I think. He said that he doesn’t believe that’s what users want.
Evran made some lateral moves on his journey to the blockchain sector. After graduating from Western University’s Ivey Business School in 2006, Evran was first an analyst at McKinsey. Then he ventured into private equity. He then returned to academia to complete his master’s degree at Stanford Business School.
Source: Twitter
Evran, a graduate of the University of Michigan, founded “Yard Club”, a company in the construction technology space. The firm was eventually sold to Caterpillar four years later. Caterpillar is the largest manufacturer of construction equipment in the world.
Evan said that the financial security provided by the deal allowed him to concentrate on a more detailed project. I wanted to work on technology that could potentially impact every person, woman and child in the world, if it was successful. Protocol Labs, who created Filecoin, was recommended to me by a friend.
InterPlanetary File System, or Filecoin’s IPFS, allows users to store and transmit content in a peer–to-peer fashion. It is Filecoin’s heart, and contains three components: content identification via content addressing, content linking via directed acyclic diagrams (DAGs), and content discovery via distributed haveh tables.
Filecoin, which serves as an incentive layer, verifies that all data has been stored using the correct cryptographic proofs. Filecoin storage providers have two main sources of revenue: block rewards and network fee. Block rewards are distributed proportionally according to submitted cryptographic proofs that the data they store.
Currently, Filecoin handles approximately 25,000 transactions per day. There are approximately 127 gigabytes (or 1,125,900 Gigabytes), of data stored on the Filecoin blockchain. Filecoin developers claim that the network currently has around 10% of AWS’ total storage capacity.
Filecoin network metrics | Source: Starboard Ventures
Filecoin storage costs were less than 1% compared to comparable services on AWS at the start of the year. Evran says that storage costs are now in negative territory. However, the average storage cost has fallen to 0.5% for centralized providers.
With such a cost-savings, many small businesses and freelancers around the world can now store data of individuals. He says, “It’s like how Airbnb opened up the possibility for average homeowners to host guest in a hotel-dominated environment.”
Evran sees the Filecoin Virtual Machine as an exciting technological innovation for the ecosystem. “Filecoin is a storage and retrieval marketplace. He said that the FVM could unlock a multibillion dollar DeFi economy on top Filecoin.
Developers can create across both networks with complete compatibility to the Ethereum Virtual Machine. New use cases could be explored, such as on-chain vote, data-based, decentralized autonomous organizations, (DAOs), and decentralized verifiable computing.
Filecoin storage providers currently have around one billion dollars of collateral to store and grow their operations. Further updates will allow you to create DeFi tools that automatically renew tokenholders’ deals, creating what is basically a “perpetual storage network”.
Evran explained that his vision for Protocol Labs and Filecoin is to make decentralized technology a central part of the ecosystem. “We were instrumental in seeding IPFS which is used by all major blockchains, including Polkadot and Ethereum. We also encourage people to join our community to create something transformative that aligns with our Web3 values. Filecoin is still a top player despite the crypto winter. It has a market cap of $1.8 million.
