Fern

Is it irony that the update that transformed Gridcoin from an unsightly execution of a great idea into a shapely foundation for the advancement of that same idea is named after such a monster?

I'm not sure but I, for one, am grateful she exists.

The Skinny

Here are the quick details on actions that EVERYONE must take. If you want the full details check out Jim's post here.

Simple Instructions

1. Update your client by October 3rd
2. Renew and validate your beacon some time between October 6th and October 16th
3. Crunch away

A Bit more Detail

• Mandatory update (everyone must update!)
• Block height trigger at 2053000
  • This will be on or around October 4th
  • If you have not updated by the trigger you will be running your own fork of Gridcoin. This is not good.
• Two week window to renew beacons after trigger
  • EVERY CRUNCHER must renew and validate their beacon within 2 weeks after the block height trigger has passed
  • This will happen on or around October 18th

The Straight

The Fern update is the removal of the team requirement. This is huge.

Moving forward, anyone crunching any network-approved BOINC project will be able to receive GRC for their crunching, regardless of what team they are on.

Fern also removes the 6 month expiration on earned research rewards (ERR). ERR are rewards that a cruncher has earned, but has not yet received. This greatly reduces the stress on individuals who do not have enough GRC to stake often. This should reduce dependency on staking pools while increasing accessibility to individuals entering the crypto space with the recommended dose of skepticism.

The Bell Bottom

Look. At this point everyone acknowledges that distributed computing is going to play a major role in the future of science, data, and society in general. Everyone knows that distributed file systems are necessary to handle the mass volume of data produced by society. Everyone accepts that decentralized namespace and pointing protocols will run these systems. And everyone sees that advances like homomorphic encryption, problems like the disappearance of digital OA journals, and successful namespace and pointing experiments only speed things along.

At the same time, people are realizing that "brrrrrr" is not a viable monetary policy. People are recognizing that perhaps society's long accepted paradigms around incentive, institution, and power are due for a tune-up -- maybe even a full-blown shift. People are opening themselves to the possibility that, every so often, things fall apart and new things must be built.

Welp. Here we are.

Gridcoin was an idea that sustained itself through the violent and volatile initiation of a new technology that incorporates distributed computing, distributed file sharing, decentralized namespaces, alternative and democratized monetary, incentive, and power structures, and open-source-based development and management principles into one fantastically delicious batter.

This, despite a very problematic technical execution.

Gridcoin is now that very same idea, plus some vision, plus some focus, plus some restraint, all built on top of a sound technical execution.

The things Fern enables are very real and can produce a significant impact on the way the world moves forward:

Folding more distributed computing projects into our incentive mechanism; developing game theoretical economic protocols that advance, fund, and support science; working toward true peer-based accreditation and publication systems based on web-of-trust concepts and mass network participation. It's all there. It's all possible. It's all because of Fern, that beautiful monster of a Muppet.

I invite everyone to listen in on discussions among Gridcoin core developers and contributors at gridcoin.science or wherever you get your podcasts (search for "The Gridcoin Fireside"). Everyone is also welcome to join the live recordings of the podcast every Friday at 3:30pm ET on the Gridcoin Discord server.

If that is not your style, I encourage you to participate however the hell you want and let's make this Gridcoin thing a thing.