Polygon zkEVM AMA Rewind (Summary)

Exploring the Potential of Rollups and L2 Ecosystems for a Sustainable Web3 Future

Moka, COO at BitKeep and also the host, welcomes the listeners to the AMA session hosted by BitKeep on Twitter Space, discussing the Polygon zkEVM and its benefits. BitKeep is the world’s leading multi-chain crypto wallet and the number one crypto wallet in Asia, offering various features such as DApp explorer, swap, launchpad, NFT marketplace, and OTC trading.

The first guest is David Schwartz, the Co-Founder of Polygon zkEVM and Polygon ID. The topic for today’s discussion is the potential of rollups and L2 Ecosystems in building a sustainable Web3 future for everyone. David will be discussing the notable progress of Polygon over the past year and their future plans moving forward.

The second guest goes to Jesse, COO of Aavegotchi. Aavegotchi is a decentralized gaming platform that uses NFTs and DeFi, allowing players to own and customize their own Aavegotchi. Jesse will be discussing the notable progress of Aavegotchi over the past year, as well as their plans moving forward.

The third guest is Roc Zacharias, Co-Founder of Quickswap, a decentralized exchange built on the Polygon network, offering fast and cheap transactions for users. Roc will be discussing the notable progress of Quickswap over the past year and their future plans moving forward.

Last but not least is Vlad Siurmakov, the BD manager of Cointelegraph. Cointelegraph is a news platform covering cryptocurrency, blockchain, and fintech news. Vlad is listening in and hearing other participants’ comments which will help his future publications.

Question 1: What are your thoughts on how Polygon zkEVM will enable developers to migrate their smart contracts to zk-style scaling without rewriting codes, and what does this mean for builders and users?

David explains that the Polygon zkEVM project was designed to reduce friction in integrating zk-style scaling and Ethereum. The project aims to allow users to deploy smart contracts that can run on Ethereum or Polygon PoS and have the same tooling and wallets. The testnet is currently available for users, and the team is preparing for the main launch with improvements.

Roc expresses excitement for zkEVM and emphasizes the importance of reducing friction in scaling Ethereum. He praises Polygon’s decision to use the EVM to align with Ethereum builders and infrastructure and mentions that other scaling solutions using different languages create much friction. He also acknowledges that implementing a virtual machine on top of rollups has pros and cons.

Question 2: What are the pros and cons of implementing a virtual machine or a virtual machine on top of rollups?

David discusses the complexity of implementing zk execution technology and how it differs from other projects’ approaches. He explains that they aimed for completeness in achieving full equivalence. They had to start with the most challenging part, the prover, to ensure that everything executed in the execution layer could be proven in zk. He mentions their challenges during development and how they had to put in complexity for users but believes it was worth it. He ends by saying that the next challenge is to improve and provide more scalability.

Question 3: Can you elaborate on the acquisition of Mir, which had the best proof of improving technology in the industry, and how much it cost to acquire the technology and the team behind it?

David explains that the zkEVM team at Polygon was the original academic networking team, and they faced several challenges in developing the technology. They received contributions from Mir and the Zero team, which accelerated the zk proofs by 40 times, making the project a combination of forces and a fantastic result.

Question 4: Was it accurate that zkEVM is bringing ZK-rollups forward by a year or two?

David mentions that their collaboration with Polygon began in August 2021, and the project is being shipped in March 2023, a significant achievement. The collaboration between the two companies has resulted in a substantial contribution to the community. They believe that the zk scalability will become a public domain, and more work will be done in the future.

Jesse acknowledges David and his team’s hard work and notes that not enough has been communicated about how they have reached this point. Jesse thinks that it is essential to highlight how they have achieved this feat and congratulate the whole team on their success.

Roc adds that Matic Polygon beat OmiseGO to market with their Plasma PoS solution and eventually pivoted to PoS, still keeping some parts of Plasma. Roc praises Vitalik’s acknowledgment of Polygon and Polygon’s ability to provide a release valve for Ethereum when gas fees went up, capturing that flow. Roc also commends Polygon’s genius in investing the money they made from the Matic PoS chain to become the next generation, skipping stages and going straight to the holy grail.

Question 5: What were the learning opportunities for the Polygon team since the launch of the Polygon zkEVM testnet in October 2022, and what is the developmental roadmap for Polygon zkEVM moving forward?

David discussed the launch of the Polygon zkEVM testnet in October 2022, highlighting that they implemented a complete prover for the solution, ensuring the cryptographic part was trustworthy and thorough and that the team has been focused on improving security since the initial launch. He also mentioned that they focus on improving performance and completing the approval security. The team will move to the mainnet soon but expect some issues since the technology is new. David stated that the security process is an ongoing effort and that the team will work to improve the level of throughput and TPS they can achieve.

Question 6: What is Gotchichain, and why has the Aavegotchi team decided to build it on Polygon?

Jesse discusses their focus on blockchain gaming, particularly emphasizing their recent work with Polygon PoS. They are exploring zkEVM but have recently announced their involvement in a supernet called Gotchichain. Aavegotchi is a game involving taking care of a digital pet with unique, dynamic traits and as an avatar for different gaming experiences. The supernets will offer smooth experiences and allow Aavegotchi to scale to any level. Jesse wants to reach Gen Z and Millennials with a product that has a compelling and unique user experience. They are excited about the future of Aavegotchi and their partnership with Polygon.

Roc discusses the evolution of Polygon and its ecosystem of chains. He explains how Aavegotchi built a community early on and utilized the newest technologies that Polygon is building. He talks about the idea of supernets, which are chains that communicate with each other at a fundamental level and can eventually become fully interoperable. The goal is to make cross-chain swaps seamless for users within the app without them even knowing they are using a blockchain. The supernets will likely have liquidity hubs with many DeFi built on them, and users can tap into that liquidity within the video game.

Roc also added more, talking about his vision for the growth of the crypto ecosystem over the next five to ten years. He believes that Bitcoin will become a global value settlement layer with Lightning Network and other layer twos settling their value on top of it. Ethereum will hold the crown for a global smart contract settlement layer where all smart contracts will determine using things like Polygon’s zkEKVM, PoS Plasma chain, Optimism, Arbitrum, and other layer twos. Roc believes that other layer ones will become largely irrelevant unless they find a way to settle to Ethereum, which some are looking at now because Ethereum is difficult to kill.

Question 7: What are the potential weaknesses of ZK-rollups technology, and how can they be improved in the future?

David discusses potential weaknesses in ZK-rollups, including problems with equivalents and compatibility with Ethereum and the cost of proving due to heavy computations on polynomial problems. However, he notes that these issues have been significantly overcome, and the focus now is on improving security. David also further explains that zk technology has two uses, privacy of inputs and verification of correct computation. While zkEVM is not currently private, it has the potential for future extensions. The Polygon ID project is currently working on privacy functionalities.

Jesse is excited about the privacy aspect of zkEVM and believes that blockchain technology can bring back the idea of privacy in transactions, similar to how cash used to function. He is hopeful that zkEVM can unlock behavior like cash for the statement of privacy that should apply to all humans.

Roc believes that ZK-rollups solve the scalability trilemma in blockchain technology by doing computations off-chain and then compressing them into proof that can be stamped onto the chain. This allows for scalability without sacrificing security or decentralization. He explains that ZK-rollups enable large computations, such as those found in video games, to be done off-chain and stamped onto the chain as a compressed proof.

Question 8: Does compress off-chain computations into proof and stamping it on the chain help solve the scalability trilemma by allowing large computations to be done off-chain?

David states that ZK-rollups deploy off-chain computation that runs on-chain smart contracts. He explains how the network is fine-tuned for computation, and data is put on-chain, but other zk scalability models use different chains. He also discusses the proof recursion model and how it avoids the repetition of computation in layer one by proposing a set of transactions with a proof attached. He concludes by saying that layer one verifies proofs, and proofs include much computation verified.

Question 9: What are the pros and cons of various scaling solutions for Ethereum? Is ZK-rollups the best solution, or are there other solutions that are competitive with zkEVM currently available?

David discusses his respect for all projects attempting to scale Ethereum and explains that the differentiation between solutions lies in the trust model and trust assumptions. He believes that his project has a clear path to avoid security issues and that they reserve the right to operate smart contracts, but they also have a three-step trust model to ensure transparency. David emphasizes the importance of understanding the risks involved in decentralization and believes that becoming trustless should be the main focus of the community.

Question 10: What is the panel’s opinion on whether scaling solutions, specifically ZK-rollups technology, are the way forward to onboard the next 1 billion into Web3, considering the high gas fees and slow transaction processing times that new users often complain about?

Jesse discussed using supernets for Aavegotchi and reducing friction for onboarding users. They plan to cover gas costs for initial transactions to make it easier for new users to experience blockchain games. Jesse believes the new cycle is not restricted by the same frictions and issues that plagued the onboarding experience before, and it’s a game-changer.

Roc talked about scaling and how it’s an ongoing process. He compared it to the evolution of the internet and computers, where people thought certain things couldn’t be done but were eventually achieved. Roc believes Web3 needs to be as scalable as Web2, but even Web2 is still scaling, so Web3 needs to be better than Web2 over time. The goal is to have everything on the blockchain eventually, and it’ll be seamless and easy, just like how music is easily accessible and commoditized now. David experienced some technical difficulties and didn’t speak.

Question 11: What kind of technological advancements are the guest speakers most excited about in the industry for the rest of 2023, and why?

Roc discusses making accounts more usable for regular people through social logins, where different parties collaborate to create a multisig account. He explains that this technology will be complicated on the back end but easy for users to operate. Roc suggests that this technology could solve the problem of losing private keys and can be recovered using account recovery systems. He also talks about the Lightning Network for Bitcoin as an incredible scaling technology for payments, with the potential for smart contracts in the future.

Jesse discussed the potential for innovation in the upcoming year, focusing on DAOs. He believes that the next iteration of DAOs will take them to the next level and that much news will surround them in the coming months. Jesse also mentioned Aavegotchi’s involvement with Aragon and how their recent developments have helped level up their DAO. He believes that DAOs will continue to have real-world effects and impact, both on-chain and funding real-world initiatives.

David agrees with Jesse’s perspective on the potential for innovation in the coming year, particularly in the ZK space. He is focused on the technical aspects of scalability. He sees many applications and use cases for ZK, which he believes will be a strong driver for blockchain and app evolution. He mentions Superset, an identity project they are doing in Polygon, and the importance of connecting all parties in the identity ecosystem to issue trust. David is excited about the possibilities for Web3 and hopes to bring many options to the table.

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