Arweave, Open Data, and the Social Layer: Arweave as Layer 0 for Onchain Social

@LensProtocol, @useOrbis ,@farcaster_xyz , and others, some of which are already using Arweave, have started gaining more adoption thanks to great interfaces and communities. But one of the questions is — how do you scale?

Author : OnlyArweave

Reviewer : IB

Source : Content Guild News

An “Arweave |In-depth” post:

@LensProtocol, @useOrbis ,@farcaster_xyz , and others, some of which are already using Arweave, have started gaining more adoption thanks to great interfaces and communities. But one of the questions is — how do you scale?

Traditional social media platforms have users in the billions. 100 billion WhatsApp messages are sent each day. Most blockchains are not made for storage. If you wanted to store 100 billion WhatsApp messages on Ethereum or just about any chain for that matter, the cost would be ridiculous.

Arweave: scalability for onchain everything

To handle onchain data at any scale, you need a protocol dedicated to that goal. Meet #Arweave . Arweave is built for decentralized, permanent data. But even more crucially in this aspect — it can scale. This is thanks to bundling. Bundling on Arweave refers to “bundling” transactions together using a service, which is posted as a single transaction on Arweave. Bundles mean theoretically no limit on scalability. Plus there are a number of bundlers with various benefits. Turbo from @ardriveapp makes it super easy to upload to the network with fiat USD.

Another bundlr, @irys_xyz , can handle:

• 50,000+ TPS (180+ already sustained)
• Instant data availability
• File sizes > 50MB

Which are all ideal for web3 social. Instant recognition of posts, can handle image uploads, and settled on Arweave for permanent, onchain data.

This is actually what @heydotxyz and @viamirror already do to store their posts!

In terms of access, thanks to @ar_io_network there are 300+ gateways serving and indexing Arweave content — it’s like a global CDN.

That means super fast content updates AND access.

Friendliness

Arweave is a data layer. No matter what blockchain you’re using, Arweave can integrate!

Settle your transactions elsewhere, use Arweave for entire posts or for image storage, or go full Permaweb and use Arweave’s atomic assets. Whatever works for you, Arweave as a protocol has your back.

Arweave is a friendly chain. Lens is using Polygon and Arweave, Mirror is using Optimism and Arweave, Solana Mobile is storing dApp SDKs on Arweave, and many projects are storing their NFTs permanently. Even some Cardano NFTs are on Arweave. Chains can integrate beautifully.

@KYVENetwork archives and stores chain historical data for @cosmoshub @archwayHQ @axelarnetwork and many more.

That’s not to mention you can build onchain social directly on Arweave with SmartWeave contracts, as atomic assets with real world rights utilizing what’s known as the Universal Data License. See it in action on @OurBazAR .

Whichever approach suits, Arweave is flexible. This is why it can be Layer 0 for all different kinds of onchain social.

Open

Although data on Arweave can be encrypted, it really shines when used for public onchain data. Even if your social platform or protocol shuts down, all of your posts will still be retrievable on Arweave, onchain.

Open data also creates more opportunities such as with @rss3_, who are creating APIs for social media data and have built their own high performance bundle parser for Arweave.

The wave of LLMs shows additional opportunity — Arweave has the UDL (Universal Data License), and work on @fairAIprotocol could make the social landscape a lot better for creators thanks to usage rights and compensation for AI models.

Wrapping up

Arweave is a great fit for onchain social for those looking to permanently store their thoughts and experiences, a “Layer 0”, cc @permaweb_news . Any blockchain or project can integrate with it, scaling is more than just feasible for platforms growing in adoption, and there is instant availability for permanent posts with optimistic caching layers, 300+ gateways, and more CDNs on the way.

With the content landscape changing thanks to AI and LLMs, Arweave remains the place where creators are being empowered with the superpowers of permanent storage.

There are so many reasons and use-cases for Arweave, and onchain social is just one of them. The Permaweb, SmartWeave contracts, the Universal Data License (UDL), atomic assets — Arweave is ready and actively being utilized for all of this and more.

Not financial advice.