Elk Weekly Recap — #14

A new feature article, “Beyond the Bridge,” laid out Elk’s bold vision for our multi-chain future. Read on for more happenings from the past week…

Community Happenings

• A new episode of All Things Crypto, the Elk.Finance podcast, discussed the topic of stablecoins
• Members of the Elk team appeared as guests on The Human & Machine podcast alongside other players in the Avalanche ecosystem
• Winners of the first Trader Joe-Elk.Finance trading competition were announced
• A new feature article, “Beyond the Bridge,” outlined Elk’s forthcoming stablecoin & proxy token releases, along with Elk’s bold vision for the multi-chain future

Network milestones

• 9 million ELK have been transferred over ElkNet
• ElkNet now has over 6,000 unique users

One of the key points in this week’s “Beyond the Bridge” feature is easy to overlook: Elk is a peer-to-peer network. Since users interact with Elk through other networks, people have a tendency to overlook this fact — heck, we even forget it ourselves sometimes. But it’s a crucial distinction, which separates Elk from other bridge and cross-chain protocols that on their face may even appear to utilize the same mechanics.

Since the Elk network is designed to connect existing networks, we sometimes describe it as a “layer 3” solution. Unlike layer 1 blockchains, it doesn’t support tokens and applications natively, and unlike so-called layer 2 chains, its purpose isn’t primarily to support or address scaling issues of layer 1 chains. Instead, it forms a matrix — a kind of mesh network — that pulls together all of these other chains, allowing them to interact and communicate with one another.

Why is it significant that Elk is a peer-to-peer network? For the same reasons that decentralized technology itself is significant. It offers a trustless, immutable ledger of activity through decentralized means. Decentralization is particularly difficult to achieve for cross-chain purposes: if you look into how the majority of other bridge protocols work, you’ll quickly come to realize that they rely on a centralized entity — a single node or server that accepts deposits, or black-box, proprietary software that manages cross-chain transactions. There are other bridge protocols that feature a similar design as Elk (we don’t need to name them here), but which function without an independent blockchain core. For these protocols, you might be surprised to learn, the cross-chain transactions are simply outputted to a regular spreadsheet, with no public record of the transaction.

Decentralization is critical for stability as well as transparency, and blockchain applications are only as “decentralized” as their most centralized element. Decentralization at the margins is ultimately meaningless if there remains a single point of failure or central custodian operating the system. This is one of the reasons that Elk is built as a blockchain, even if many of the things that Elk can do may not require a freestanding blockchain solution to achieve. Of course, by designing Elk as a blockchain, we are also opening up many new use cases, several of which — such as interchain messaging capabilities — are detailed in “Beyond the Bridge,” which you ought to spend some time reading if you haven’t yet.

So, as you compare Elk to other bridge options, now and in the future, please keep in mind: Elk is a peer-to-peer network.

• AMA with YetiSwap (Avalanche) on Elk Discord, Thursday, October 21, 18:00 UTC
• Alpha for ElkNet upgrades and Elk’s new dashboard UI
• Details about Elk’s newly expanded marketing plan & team to be unveiled
• Farming Round #8 begins Saturday, October 23. Changes to farms will be released in advance