Exploring SocialFi: Solana Actions & Blinks vs. Ethereum Farcaster & Lens
Author: YBB Capital Researcher Ac-Core
TLDR
- Recently, Solana and Dialect jointly introduced the new Solana concept “Actions and Blinks,” enabling one-click functionalities like Swap, voting, donation, and Mint through a browser extension.
- Actions facilitate the efficient execution of various operations and transactions, while Blinks ensure network consensus and consistency through time synchronization and sequential recording. Together, they enable Solana to deliver a high-performance, low-latency blockchain experience.
- The development of Blinks requires support from Web2 applications, which brings issues of trust, compatibility, and cooperation between Web2 and Web3.
- Compared to Farcaster & Lens Protocol, Actions & Blinks rely more on Web2 applications to gain traffic, while the latter relies more on on-chain security.
1. The Working Principles of Actions and Blinks
1.1 Actions (Solana Actions)
According to the official definition: Solana Actions are standardized APIs that return transactions on the Solana blockchain. These transactions can be previewed, signed, and sent in various contexts, including QR codes, buttons + widgets, and websites across the internet.
Actions can be simply understood as transactions waiting to be signed. Expanding on this, within the Solana network, Actions are abstract descriptions of transaction processing mechanisms, encompassing various tasks such as transaction processing, contract execution, and data operations. Users can send transactions through Actions, including token transfers and purchasing digital assets. Developers use Actions to call and execute smart contracts, implementing complex on-chain logic.
- Solana processes these tasks using “Transactions,” each consisting of a series of instructions executed between specific accounts. Through parallel processing and the Gulf Stream protocol, Solana pre-forwards transactions to validators, reducing confirmation delays. With a fine-grained locking mechanism, Solana can simultaneously process numerous non-conflicting transactions, significantly enhancing system throughput.
- Solana uses Runtime to execute transactions and smart contract instructions, ensuring the correctness of transaction inputs, outputs, and states during execution. After initial execution, transactions await block confirmation. Once a block is agreed upon by most validators, the transaction is considered final. Solana can process thousands of transactions per second, with confirmation times as low as 400 milliseconds. Thanks to the Pipeline and Gulf Stream mechanisms, the network’s throughput and performance are further enhanced.
- Actions are not merely tasks or operations; they can be transactions, contract executions, or data processing. These operations are similar to transactions or contract calls in other blockchains, but Solana’s Actions have unique advantages: 1.Efficient Processing: Solana has designed an efficient method to handle Actions, enabling fast execution in a large-scale network. 2. Low Latency: Solana’s high-performance architecture ensures very low processing latency for Actions, supporting high-frequency transactions and applications. 3. Flexibility: Actions can execute various complex operations, including smart contract calls and data storage/retrieval (more details in the extended link).
1.2 Blinks (Blockchain Links)
According to the official definition: Blinks can convert any Solana Action into a shareable, metadata-rich link. Blinks enable Action-supporting clients (browser extension wallets, bots) to display more functionality to users. On websites, Blinks can immediately trigger transaction previews in wallets without redirecting to decentralized applications; in Discord, bots can expand Blinks into a set of interactive buttons. This enables any web interface displaying URLs to achieve on-chain interaction.
In simpler terms, Solana Blinks convert Solana Actions into shareable links (similar to HTTP). By enabling related functions in supporting wallets like Phantom, Backpack, and Solflare, websites, and social media can become venues for on-chain transactions, allowing any website with a URL to directly initiate Solana transactions.
In summary, although Solana Actions and Blinks are permissionless protocols/standards, they still require client applications and wallets to ultimately help users sign transactions, compared to the intent narrative solvers.
The direct goal of Actions & Blinks is to “HTTP-link” Solana’s on-chain operations, analyzing them into Web2 applications like Twitter.
2. Decentralized Social Protocols on Ethereum
2.1 Farcaster Protocol
Farcaster is a decentralized social graph protocol based on Ethereum and Optimism, enabling applications to interconnect through decentralized technologies like blockchain, P2P networks, and distributed ledgers. This allows users to seamlessly migrate and share content across different platforms without relying on a single centralized entity. Its open graph protocol (which automatically extracts content from links posted in social network posts and injects interactive features) allows content shared by users to be automatically extracted and converted into interactive applications.
Decentralized Network: Farcaster relies on a decentralized network, avoiding the single point of failure issues common in traditional social networks with centralized servers. It uses distributed ledger technology to ensure data security and transparency.
Public Key Encryption: Every user on Farcaster has a pair of public and private keys. The public key is used to identify users, while the private key is used to sign their actions. This method ensures the privacy and security of user data.
Data Portability: User data is stored in a decentralized storage system rather than on a single server. This allows users to have complete control over their data and migrate it between different applications.
Verifiable Identity: Through public key encryption technology, Farcaster ensures that each user’s identity is verifiable. Users can prove their control over an account by signing actions.
Decentralized Identifiers (DIDs): Farcaster uses decentralized identifiers (DIDs) to identify users and content. DIDs are based on public key encryption and offer high security and immutability.
Data Consistency: To ensure data consistency across the network, Farcaster uses a consensus mechanism similar to blockchain (with “posts” as nodes). This mechanism ensures that all nodes agree on user data and actions, maintaining data integrity and consistency.
Decentralized Applications: Farcaster provides a development platform that allows developers to build and deploy decentralized applications (DApps). These applications can seamlessly integrate with the Farcaster network, offering various functionalities and services to users.
Security and Privacy: Farcaster emphasizes the privacy and security of user data. All data transmissions and storage are encrypted, and users can choose to make their content public or private.
In Farcaster’s new Frames feature (where different Frames integrate with Farcaster and run independently), users can turn “casts” (similar to posts, including text, images, videos, and links) into interactive applications. These contents are stored in a decentralized network, ensuring their permanence and immutability. Each cast has a unique identifier when posted, making it traceable, and user identities are verified through a decentralized identity verification system. As a decentralized social protocol, Farcaster’s clients can seamlessly integrate with Frames.
2.2 Main Principles
The Farcaster protocol is divided into three main layers: Identity Layer, Data Layer — Hubs, and the Application Layer. Each layer has specific functions and roles.
Identity Layer
· Function: Responsible for managing and verifying user identities; provides decentralized identity authentication to ensure the uniqueness and security of user identities. It consists of four registries: ID Registry, Fname, Key Registry, and Storage Registry (detailed in reference link 1).
· Technical Principles: Uses Decentralized Identifiers (DIDs) based on public key encryption technology. Each user has a unique DID used to identify and verify their identity. The use of public and private key pairs ensures that only the user can control and manage their identity information. The Identity Layer ensures seamless migration and identity verification across different applications and services.
Data Layer — Hubs
· Function: Responsible for storing and managing user-generated data, providing a decentralized data storage system that ensures data security, integrity, and accessibility.
· Technical Principles: Hubs are decentralized data storage nodes distributed across the network. Each Hub acts as an independent storage unit responsible for storing and managing a portion of the data. Data is distributed across Hubs and protected using encryption techniques. The Data Layer ensures high availability and scalability of data, allowing users to access and migrate their data at any time.
Application Layer
· Function: Provides a platform for developing and deploying decentralized applications (DApps), supporting various application scenarios such as social networking, content publishing, and messaging.
· Technical Principles: Developers can use the APIs and tools provided by Farcaster to build and deploy decentralized applications. The Application Layer integrates seamlessly with the Identity and Data Layers, ensuring identity verification and data management during application use. Decentralized applications run on the decentralized network, not relying on centralized servers, which enhances application reliability and security.
2.3 Summary of the Above
Solana’s Actions & Blinks aim to bridge the traffic channels of Web2 applications. The direct impact: User Perspective: Simplifies transactions while increasing the risk of fund theft. Solana’s Perspective: Greatly enhances cross-boundary traffic effects but faces compatibility and support challenges under Web2’s censorship regulations. Future developments under Solana’s vast ecosystem, such as Layer2, SVM, and mobile operating systems, may further enhance these capabilities.
On the other hand, Ethereum’s Farcaster protocol, compared to Solana’s strategy, de-emphasizes Web2 traffic integration, enhancing overall censorship resistance and security. The Farcaster+EVM model aligns more closely with the native concepts of Web3.
2.4 Lens Protocol
Lens Protocol is another decentralized social graph protocol designed to give users full control over their social data and content. Through Lens Protocol, users can create, own, and manage their social graphs, which can seamlessly migrate across different applications and platforms. This protocol uses NFTs to represent users’ social graphs and content, ensuring data uniqueness and security. Positioned on Ethereum, Lens Protocol shares some similarities and differences with Farcaster:
Similarities:
- User Control: In both protocols, users have full control over their data and content.
- Identity Verification: Both use decentralized identifiers (DIDs) and encryption technology to ensure user identity security and uniqueness.
Differences:
Technical Architecture:
- Farcaster: Built on Ethereum (L1), it is divided into an Identity Layer to manage user identities, a Data Layer — Hubs for decentralized storage nodes, and an Application Layer to provide a DApps development platform, using offline Hubs for data propagation.
- Lens Protocol: Based on Polygon (L2), it uses NFTs to represent users’ social graphs and content, with all activities stored in users’ wallets, emphasizing data ownership and portability.
Verification and Data Management:
- Farcaster: Uses distributed storage nodes (Hubs) to manage data, ensuring security and high availability, with an annual handle update and consensus via delta graph.
- Lens Protocol: Personal data profile NFTs ensure data uniqueness and security without the need for updates.
Application Ecosystem:
- Farcaster: Provides a comprehensive DApps development platform, seamlessly integrated with its Identity and Data Layers.
- Lens Protocol: Focuses on the portability of users’ social graphs and content, supporting seamless switching between different platforms and applications.
Through this comparison, we can see that Farcaster and Lens Protocol have similarities in user control and identity verification but significant differences in data storage and ecosystems. Farcaster emphasizes a layered structure and decentralized storage, while Lens Protocol highlights the use of NFTs for data portability and ownership.
3. Which of the Three Can Achieve Large-Scale Application First?
Through the above analysis, each of the three protocols has its strengths and challenges. Solana, with its high performance and ability to turn any website or application into a cryptocurrency transaction gateway, has quickly gained traction by leveraging social media platforms and the ease of generating links with Blinks. However, its reliance on Web2 brings the trade-off between traffic and security.
Lens Protocol, established in 2022, leverages its modular design and on-chain storage to provide good scalability and transparency, capturing early market opportunities but potentially facing challenges in cost and scalability as well as market FOMO sentiments.
Farcaster’s advantage lies in its design, which aligns most closely with Web3 principles, offering the highest degree of decentralization. However, this also brings challenges in terms of technological iteration and user management.
About YBB
YBB is a web3 fund dedicating itself to identify Web3-defining projects with a vision to create a better online habitat for all internet residents. Founded by a group of blockchain believers who have been actively participated in this industry since 2013, YBB is always willing to help early-stage projects to evolve from 0 to 1.We value innovation, self-driven passion, and user-oriented products while recognizing the potential of cryptos and blockchain applications.
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