ThreeFold

Empowering Tanzania's Digital Future: The Dunia Yetu Initiative

Dunia Yetu (Our World) is a collaborative and co-owned movement to redefine the digital landscape in Tanzania and East Africa, empower coders spur economic development, and build a self-reliant sovereign digital ecosystem for a better digital future.

Sam Taggart

January 26, 2024

Building Reliability into a Decentralized Internet Infrastructure

Through a combination of technical and strategic advancements, our journey towards a dependable and trustworthy decentralized Internet infrastructure is underway.

In today’s digital landscape, the development of a decentralized open-source Internet infrastructure marks a significant leap forward. However, while the foundational structure of this innovation brings promise, its inherent reliability isn’t guaranteed. After more than five years of building and expanding the open-source ThreeFold Grid, it’s now time we pivot towards commercialization. Ensuring a robust, dependable, and trustworthy offering becomes paramount. In this post, we’ll share the various ways that the ThreeFold Grid is and will become reliable.

🔗Technical Redundancy

Our quantum safe storage ystem, coupled with replication, and web gateways, presents a pathway to achieve technical redundancy already. While these capabilities exist, we admit that at this time it is too complex for a starting user. Making this easier through refined tooling and a strong user experience will be imperative in order to allow a wide audience to take advantage here.

🔗ThreeFold Cloud

Our upcoming commercial offering, TF Cloud, will bolster reliability and trustworthiness. Through TF Cloud, we will need to provide comprehensive service, robust support, service level agreements (SLAs), and streamlined payment methods, including credit card options. The development of user-friendly tooling will significantly simplify and easen the process as well, enabling users to deploy and maintain reliable workloads effortlessly.

🔗Farming Pools

The introduction of farming pools in TF Grid 4.x will play an important role in fostering reliability as well. These pools not only contribute to resource pooling but also offer visibility into the network’s participants. This transparency enhances trust and aids in identifying reliable contributors within a decentralized framework.

🔗Establishing Reputation and Transparency

Building a system that emphasizes reputation and complete visibility regarding service levels and uptimes is pivotal. By offering insights into each participant’s performance metrics, Grid users will be able to more effectively choose a trusted provider.

In essence, through a combination of technical and strategic advancements, our journey towards a dependable and trustworthy decentralized Internet infrastructure is underway, setting the stage for the next phase of ThreeFold.

Sam Taggart

December 6, 2023

Unveiling Farming Pools

Farming Pools mark a significant step towards ensuring reliability, fairness, and robust governance within our ecosystem.

With a long-term focus on version 4.0, and a move towards commercialization, we are embracing several new strategies to ensure more reliability and trust. Farming Pools are an innovative mechanism designed to foster better governance and equitable participation within our network.

Farming Pools represent a shift in our ecosystem. Every version 4.0 Farmer will need to join a Farming Pool, marking a collective commitment to uphold stringent service level agreements. These agreements will encompass crucial aspects like uptime, response time, and available bandwidth. Furthermore, adherence to a service agreement and specific terms and conditions is paramount, ensuring a standardized quality of service across the network.

Empowering our Farmers, the introduction of Farming Pools grants them the authority to set pricing for their offered services. Whether it’s storage, network capabilities, or computing capacity, Farmers hold the reins in determining the value they provide.

In addition, Farmers will now have the option to stake tokens on their farms. This strategic staking mechanism introduces an additional layer of accountability — a ‘slashing’ mechanism. In the event of failing to meet the agreed-upon service level commitments, a proportion of their stake may be forfeited. This not only incentivizes reliability but also fortifies the overall quality and dependability of our network.

Central to the Farming Pools is a regulated approach. It provides a centralized platform facilitating staking, token holding, as well as regulated buying and selling of tokens. This centralized stance ensures oversight and governance while maintaining the decentralized ethos that defines our network.

Farming Pools, therefore, mark a significant step towards ensuring reliability, fairness, and robust governance within our ecosystem. By uniting Farmers under stringent agreements, empowering them to set prices, and introducing accountability through token staking, we fortify the foundation of a network built upon trust, integrity, and collective responsibility.

Sam Taggart

December 5, 2023

A Cooperative Model for Decentralized Governance

Cooperatives represent a tried and tested form of collective organization, emphasizing democratic governance and equitable distribution of benefits among members.

In the next phase of ThreeFold, we are focused on utilization and commercialization. With this comes a requirement for our project to establish reliable and trusted systems that allow anyone to enter the ecosystem with confidence.

One effective mechanism gaining traction for decentralized governance is the cooperative model. Cooperatives represent a tried and tested form of collective organization, emphasizing democratic governance and equitable distribution of benefits among members.

🔗So, what exactly is a cooperative?

The International Cooperative Alliance defines a cooperative as an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social, and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly-owned and democratically controlled enterprise.

Cooperatives operate under a set of shared principles—voluntary and open membership, democratic member control, economic participation by members, autonomy and independence, education, training, and information, cooperation among cooperatives, and concern for the community. These principles underpin the resilience and effectiveness of cooperatives as governance models.

🔗The ThreeFold Cooperative

In the future, ThreeFold will establish a 100% owned subsidiary of the Cooperative within a chosen jurisdiction to open the doors to innovative mechanisms. Through this subsidiary, the creation of Farming Pools becomes feasible, providing a controlled environment for token transactions aligned with defined governance protocols unique to each Farming Pool.

One crucial aspect is the inclusivity within this cooperative framework. Every farmer contributing resources and every buyer purchasing IT capacity from the network becomes an integral part of this cooperative, fostering a sense of ownership and shared responsibility.

This cooperative structure revolutionizes the way participants interact within a decentralized network. It ensures that governance mechanisms are not only defined but also upheld by all stakeholders, aligning actions with the collective vision.

Embracing a cooperative model introduces a well-established framework for decentralized governance. By leveraging its proven principles and structures, it fosters inclusivity, democratic decision-making, and shared ownership—a recipe for fostering trust, equity, and sustainability within decentralized systems.

As we navigate the complex landscape of decentralized technologies, cooperatives stand as a beacon of collaborative and democratic governance, offering a robust foundation for a truly decentralized future.

Sam Taggart

December 4, 2023

Reflecting on Africa Regenerative Futures Summits : Shaping a better digital future in Africa

In 2023, we had the pleasure of hosting two summits in Zanzibar – Read about the key outcomes.

Sam Taggart

November 21, 2023

How a Decentralized Internet Solves Global Tech Issues

By constructing a decentralized, autonomous internet infrastructure from scratch, we're tackling global tech issues head-on.

Imagine this: two friends in East Africa trying to connect via a video call. Instead of a direct link, their data embarks on a round trip to far-off data centers, consuming resources and adding costs. It’s a snippet of a larger issue—how centralized infrastructure is holding back progress in connectivity.

🔗Breaking the Distance Barrier

In many regions, the internet economy remains anchored in distant lands due to reliance on long cables to Europe, North America, or China, where colossal data centers reside. This scenario keeps data, jobs, and economic benefits outside developing regions. But what if connectivity was local, decentralized, and efficient?

🔗The East Africa Example

Picture our technology in action. Instead of relying on data centers thousands of miles away, our decentralized infrastructure brings the connection closer. Those friends in East Africa can communicate peer-to-peer, reducing bandwidth needs by up to 10 times while boosting security. This isn’t just about video calls; it’s about revolutionizing every digital interaction.

🔗Streamlining Complexity

The tech world often gets tangled in layers of abstraction, favoring integration over innovation. While layers aid compatibility and incremental progress, they hinder true change. Excessive abstraction results in inefficiencies, performance lags, increased costs, and scalability woes.

🔗The Education Gap

Innovation takes a back seat when education leans heavily on commercial technologies. The push for quick-fix solutions neglects long-term innovation. It’s like opting for a painkiller instead of addressing the root cause of the problem.

🔗Local, Secure, Reliable

Our vision? A decentralized internet where compute, storage, and network are local, sovereign, and secure. Storage becomes more reliable with less overhead, doubling up as a global content delivery network. The network stays resilient, routes around issues, encrypts end-to-end, and knows precisely where data originates and ends.

🔗Tackling the Root Issues

By constructing a decentralized, autonomous internet infrastructure from scratch, we’re tackling these issues head-on. Minimizing complexity while solving problems at their core is our mantra. It’s not just about a tech revolution; it’s about reshaping connectivity to be inclusive, efficient, and empowering for everyone, everywhere.

The digital world stands at a crossroads. We can either perpetuate the status quo, or we can pave a new path—one that’s decentralized, efficient, and equitable. The time for a decentralized internet that solves problems at their roots is now. It’s time for connectivity that knows no boundaries.

The power to transform connectivity is in our hands. Let’s reimagine the internet not as a distant entity but as a network that thrives locally, serves globally, and empowers universally. Together, let’s build a decentralized internet that propels us into a future where connectivity is a right, not a privilege.

Sam Taggart

November 12, 2023

ThreeFold's Energy Efficiency Explained

Read how ThreeFold technology results in up-to 90% energy savings depending on workloads.

At ThreeFold, we believe that everything we do should benefit people and our planet. The emergence of a decentralized Internet grid not only reshapes the digital landscape but helps to pioneer a more sustainable future. At the core of this evolution lies a series of innovative strategies poised to revolutionize the way we perceive and utilize digital infrastructure.

🔗Zero OS

Traditionally, operating systems have been laden with an array of features, consuming substantial hardware resources. However, with Zero OS, our paradigm shifts towards a lightweight, autonomous design. By getting rid of unnecessary complexities, this design not only optimizes hardware space but also fosters an environment conducive to enhanced IT workloads.

🔗Quantum-Safe Storage

One of the most staggering inefficiencies within the industry has been the substantial overhead of storage systems. Our quantum-safe storage system marks a monumental departure from the norm, slashing the overhead from a staggering 400% to a mere fraction, 20%. This unprecedented leap in efficiency heralds a new era of streamlined storage practices, ensuring optimal utilization of resources.

🔗Efficient Node Management

Energy conservation takes center stage with our node management tool, Farmerbot. Embracing the principle of ‘on-demand’ functionality, nodes remain dormant when idle, conserving energy resources. Through the implementation of Farmerbot, these nodes seamlessly power on and off as required, minimizing unnecessary consumption without compromising accessibility.

🔗Automated Autonomy

We’re saying goodbye to human intermediaries and centralized control centers. Our system operates autonomously, governed by smart contracts that orchestrate every facet of its functionality. This automated ecosystem not only eradicates the need for constant human intervention but also ensures streamlined operations, optimizing efficiency at every turn.

🔗Peer-to-Peer Advancement

The conventional route from sender to recipient often travels extensive distances, bouncing through data centers and intermediaries. Our peer-to-peer network revolutionizes this process by forging direct connections, seeking the shortest path between sender and recipient. By circumventing unnecessary detours, this approach minimizes energy expenditure and data latency, elevating both speed and efficiency.

🔗Final Thoughts

The dawn of ThreeFold’s decentralized Internet grid beckons a transformative era in digital infrastructure. Through the combination of a lightweight operating system, quantum-safe storage, energy-conscious node management, automated autonomy, and a peer-to-peer network, the paradigm of efficiency in the digital realm has been redefined. The aggregated result is up-to 90% energy savings depending on workloads. This evolution not only champions sustainability but also propels us towards a future where connectivity thrives in harmony with resource conservation.

Sam Taggart

October 11, 2023

Introducing Mycelium: A Platform for Conscious Decentralization

ThreeFold is implementing a planetary network, aiming to allow efficient, end-to-end encrypted communication with other participants on the network.

Lee is working on a very exciting new project called Mycelium, our own Ipv6 overlay network. Thanks to him for taking the time to create this short write-up on what it is and why it is needed.

As part of the grid, ThreeFold is also implementing a planetary network. This peer 2 peer network implementation aims to allow efficient, end-to-end encrypted communication with other participants on the network. Currently, we are using Yggdrasil as the core technology for this network. This is an open source implementation, and we have been using this since of grid v2.

Over time, some problems have been noticed. We have since spent time looking into these issues, and performed an analysis of the root cause(s).

🔗Yggdrasil’s Limitations

To start, it should be noted that Yggdrasil is an experimental routing protocol (based on DHT’s), which is currently still in an alpha stage. We very much admire the fact that they have been able to create a standalone network with worldwide participants from scratch. Over time, the network has grown, in part due to the grid, but also because a lot of individual participants joined and started running a node.

After investigating, we reached the conclusion that the current architecture has some scalability issues. While we have no doubt that these will eventually be solved, the importance of the planetary network in the grid is unfortunately too big to be able to wait for this. Additionally, Yggdrasil uses a technique called crypto key routing, and uses a tree structure for its routing info. This means data follows the “shortest path” in the tree, rather than the physical shortest path, which might deviate from this. As such, we have decided to implement our own Ipv6 overlay network, Mycelium.

🔗Implementing Mycelium

As previously pointed out, the main goal of our network is to be efficient, and end-to-end encrypted. Every node in the network is identified by a key pair. The address of a node is derived from this key pair, and data traffic between 2 nodes is encrypted using a secret derived from the key pair of both these nodes. As a result, every 2 nodes in the system use a different secret for encryption, and we can verify that the address used by a node is indeed owned by it (i.e. it has the corresponding private key). We have based our initial implementation (loosely) on the babel routing protocol.

Therefore, sending data to a remote node will follow the shortest path in terms of latency (i.e. the fastest route). The network adjusts itself in case nodes disappear or join, and multiple paths to a given destination are possible.

We are also considering implementing more advanced use cases in the future, though this remains to be seen at this stage. We are gearing up for some larger scale testing on the grid in the near future (after all, we do have multiple thousand nodes at our disposal to verify scalability), and will adjust as needed once these are done.

Lee Smet

September 19, 2023

Rethinking Our Relationship with the Digital World

The Internet has always been a canvas for human connection and creativity. Yet, there are cracks in the system and massive trade offs for all of us.

In an ever-expanding and evolving digital world, our relationship with the Internet is generally underdiscussed. We’ve come to rely on platforms that promise connection, information, and entertainment. Yet, there are cracks in the system and massive trade offs for all of us, the “users.” Let’s pause for a moment and consider, is today’s Internet truly serving us?

(tl;dr The answer is “No.”)

🔗The Rise & Fall of Platforms

The world of digital platforms can leave us feeling a bit deflated. We invest time and effort in creating content and building our online presence across platforms, only to see them come and go – either in terms of popularity or existance. Years of efforts can go down the drain in an instant. And the introduction of new platforms means we feel almost pressured to create new profiles yet again. Take Threads, for example, recently released by Meta. I, personally, have not downloaded the app or created a profile myself. Nor do I plan to.

🔗Algorithmic Shifts & Manipulation

Algorithms, like shifting weather, change direction without warning. What used to be familiar suddenly feels like a puzzle we can’t solve. Further, algorithms on social media and other platforms are designed to keep us engaged. They show us content that’s likely to keep us scrolling and clicking. This can lead to addictive behaviors, with us spending more time on platforms than we initially intended.

🔗Platform Redundancy

Why, in this digital age, do we have countless platforms doing essentially the same thing? It’s as if we’re at a party with multiple dance floors, all playing the same music. This fragmented landscape demands our memory’s acrobatics as we juggle passwords, navigate different interfaces, and figure out where our friends are hanging out. A simpler, unified experience seems a distant dream.

🔗Products in a Machine

We pour our creativity and stories into platforms, only to realize we don’t truly own them. Our content, our data, our followers – they belong to the platform. It’s like building a sandcastle at the beach, but it washes away with the tide. The digital space, which once held the promise of empowerment, has subtly transformed us into products within a larger system.

🔗Decentralization: Reclaiming Digital Sovereignty

Imagine a digital world where you’re the true owner of your data and content, where your digital footprint isn’t erased by platform shifts. A space where the power to shape the experience is in your hands, where you’re not a product but a participant in a collaborative journey.

This reimagined Internet isn’t a dream; it’s an evolving reality. Decentralization represents a paradigm shift – a chance to reclaim our digital autonomy. We need to foster an environment where platforms don’t dictate, but rather, serve as tools shaped by the collective. This is a call to action, a reminder that a more inclusive, user-centric Internet is within reach.

The Internet has always been a canvas for human connection and creativity. Let’s paint a picture where we’re not just contributors but true owners, where we’re not lost in a labyrinth but are the architects of our digital landscape. Let’s embrace a decentralized Internet, because we deserve an Internet that truly serves us – the people.

Sam Taggart

July 15, 2023

FEATURED POST

ThreeFold's Roadmap to Web4

December 12, 2024 - Sam Taggart

ThreeFold stories and project info

Empowering Tanzania's Digital Future: The Dunia Yetu Initiative

🔗Vision of Collective Empowerment

🔗Empowering Tanzania’s Youth and Future

🔗Looking Ahead to 2024:

Building Reliability into a Decentralized Internet Infrastructure

🔗Technical Redundancy

🔗ThreeFold Cloud

🔗Farming Pools

🔗Establishing Reputation and Transparency

Unveiling Farming Pools

A Cooperative Model for Decentralized Governance

🔗So, what exactly is a cooperative?

🔗The ThreeFold Cooperative

Reflecting on Africa Regenerative Futures Summits : Shaping a better digital future in Africa

How a Decentralized Internet Solves Global Tech Issues

🔗Breaking the Distance Barrier

🔗The East Africa Example

🔗Streamlining Complexity

🔗The Education Gap

🔗Local, Secure, Reliable

🔗Tackling the Root Issues

ThreeFold's Energy Efficiency Explained

🔗Zero OS

🔗Quantum-Safe Storage

🔗Efficient Node Management

🔗Automated Autonomy

🔗Peer-to-Peer Advancement

🔗Final Thoughts

Introducing Mycelium: A Platform for Conscious Decentralization

🔗Yggdrasil’s Limitations

🔗Implementing Mycelium

Rethinking Our Relationship with the Digital World

🔗The Rise & Fall of Platforms

🔗Algorithmic Shifts & Manipulation

🔗Platform Redundancy

🔗Products in a Machine

🔗Decentralization: Reclaiming Digital Sovereignty

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