ApeChain on the Superchain

General
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[Note: this Topic began as an AIP Idea, and has been subsequently withdrawn and moved to the General category at the request of the author.]

PROPOSAL NAME: ApeChain on the Superchain

TEAM DESCRIPTION:

Ben Jones, Co-founder and Chief Scientist, Optimism Foundation

ABSTRACT:

Hi all, Ben from the Optimism Foundation here! The Optimism community is excited about the ApeCoin community’s interest in L2s, given our common goal of growing Ethereum, and shared focus on social and technical decentralization.

From conversations with Yuga Labs and other ApeCoin community members, we understand that the DAO is looking for opportunities to scale its revenue model with the peace of mind that comes from building on battle tested blockspace infrastructure. We feel that an ApeChain built on the Optimism Superchain is an extremely strong fit for these goals.

To summarize the benefits:

  1. Easy deployment and maintenance: Joining the Superchain gives the ApeCoin community access to preferred terms from Optimism ecosystem partners such as RaaS providers, developer tools, wallets, oracles, block explorers, & more that will enable ApeChain to be ready to roll on day one.

  2. A voice on the Optimism platform: Optimism’s bicameral governance system oversees the OP Stack and the Superchain. The ApeCoin DAO will be enabled to play an active role in governance participation, helping to steer the future direction of the Superchain. ApeChain may also be eligible to earn an OP token grant so that ApeChain can have a say in key decisions in Optimism Governance, subject to final discussions with the team building ApeChain.

  3. Revenue stream: Unlike on Ethereum today, an ApeChain on the Superchain would be able to return transaction fees generated by its users to the community, enabling ApeCoin holders to allocate this revenue towards ApeCoin ecosystem growth, DAO maintenance, and other initiatives. The small portion of OP Chain fees shared with Optimism goes towards supporting ecosystem projects that benefit the entire Superchain via avenues like Retroactive Public Goods Funding (RetroPGF).

  4. Access to innovation: Optimism incentivizes the creation of open source and public goods infrastructure through its RetroPGF mechanism, and supports innovation at each layer of the OP Stack in order to make rapid, decentralized progress on the underlying technology. Being part of the Superchain means that ApeChain has access to the new innovations and upgrades enabled by Optimism’s burgeoning contributor ecosystem.

Motivation

The last 12 months of the crypto bear market have been a time for builders to go heads-down. We have spent this time preparing an infrastructure layer adequate to support a new era of the internet. With the goal of scaling Ethereum, the Optimism Collective has grown into a global network of developers, with contributions from teams like OP Labs, Base, Zora, Worldcoin, Risc0, O1 Labs, Lattice, Espresso and others that are ready to bring the next billion builders, creators, and users onchain.

The Ape community is the largest NFT community on Ethereum. With teams like Zora committed to the Superchain, and creator support initiatives like We :heart: the Art, Optimism is fast becoming the home for NFTs on L2. Over the last few months, Optimism contributors have been in conversations with Yuga Labs to guide them on their L2 strategy and more recently with ApeCoin DAO community members that have expressed interest in building on the OP Stack.

We hope to continue engaging with the ApeCoin community to solidify a collaboration between the Superchain and any DAO-approved team building the ApeChain.

BENEFIT TO APECOIN ECOSYSTEM:

As the ApeCoin DAO evaluates the possibility of an ApeChain, we hope it considers the Superchain and the OP Stack. The Superchain vision is founded on the goal of scaling Ethereum by providing a minimal extension to Ethereum which allows it to scale to many decentralized, interconnected L2 chains. Creating a network of interoperable L2s allows for teams to take advantage of having its own chain while benefiting from the composability, liquidity and distribution of every other chain in the network.

Highlights of the Superchain ecosystem include:

Access to the Best Tech, Talent, and Self Sustaining Economics:

All OP Chains benefit from the public goods that receive RetroPGF–and, by joining the Superchain,OP Chains’ ecosystem contributors become eligible to receive RetroPGF. RetroPGF rewards impactful contributions to the ecosystem. Protocol revenues generated from OP Mainnet and other OP Chains go towards supporting the Optimism Collective through this mechanism, ensuring the long-term sustainability of the critical infrastructure and foundational tooling which makes a thriving Superchain possible.

A Fast, Affordable, and Efficient Platform

The Superchain provides developers a fast, affordable, and efficient platform to build on. Through things like the Superchain Faucet, preferred pricing on ecosystem tools, best-in-class developer tools, and a myriad of other solutions, the Superchain prioritizes developer experience.

The OP Stack is an MIT-licensed, open source codebase, designed to be extensible and modular. One benefit of this is that although the OP Stack relies today on optimistic rollups, it’s designed to be configurable and can benefit from zk-rollups in the future. Today, two high quality teams–RISC Zero and O(1) Labs– are making rapid progress towards bringing zk proofs to the Superchain.

Governed by a Non-Plutocratic and Human-Centric System

With the Optimism Superchain, builders can enjoy peace of mind, knowing that it will be governed by a non-plutocratic and human-centric governance model. Optimism Governance, a bicameral governance system, oversees the OP Stack, OP Mainnet, and the Superchain. It is guided by the Law of Chains, a framework designed to prioritize the welfare of all stakeholders over the interests of a select few.

KEY TERMS:

  1. Commitment to the Law of Chains: The Law of Chains ensures that the Superchain remains an open, neutral ecosystem. A commitment to the Law of Chains, alongside the likes of Base, protects shared standards for all Superchain participants.

  2. Funding Public Goods: All OP Chains commit to contribute 2.5% of sequencing revenue or 15% of sequencing profit (L2 profit minus L1 data costs) to the Optimism Collective to allocate to RetroPGF and other ecosystem projects. RetroPGF supports public goods, enabling the development of the open source OP Stack and the broader Superchain ecosystem.

  3. Optimism Governance Participation: We hope ApeChain will be an active participant in Optimism governance and contribute to decisions such as technical upgrades that impact the Superchain. Optimism can enable this by providing a milestone based token grant to the ApeChain team, subject to final discussions with the team.

  4. Strategic Partnership Alignment: Projects who join the Superchain are long term, strategic collaborators in the Optimism ecosystem. Working together, both the ApeCoin DAO and the Optimism Collective should expect a mutual, close relationship in terms of product feedback and go to market efforts.

PLATFORMS & TECHNOLOGIES:

To learn more about the specs, design, and vision behind the OP Stack please check out our docs:

Superchain Explainer
OP Stack and Design Principles
Bedrock Explainer (latest upgrade to the protocol)
Security Model

OVERALL COST

From prior experience in the launch of OP Chains like Base, Zora, etc., there are several types of costs to take into consideration for a successful ecosystem chain:

  • Cost of submitting data to L1

  • Ecosystem tools and infra (block explorer, dev tools, oracles, wallets, etc.)

  • Sequencer infra and operations (either via RaaS partner or in-house)

  • Human resources (BD, Marketing, DevRel, Dev teams)

Optimism contributors can help advise and provide a more detailed breakdown of the costs and alternatives for each category to the ApeChain team.

On behalf of the entire Optimism Collective, I’d like to extend my thanks to the ApeCoin and community members for considering Optimism and the Superchain. We’re looking forward to keeping the discussions open as the thinking progresses, and to a bright, optimistic future together.

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Hey, @ben-chain !

We are glad to hear You here and You’re more than welcome here!

What’s the buzz on collaborating with Optimism and the Superchain? It seems like a pretty exciting opportunity with promises of easy deployment, active governance participation, and access to top-notch tech and talent. What are your thoughts on this potential partnership?

Also, the very big question is: what unique new utility will be implemented? How we can make Web3 $APE-oriented community to use ApeChain?

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Great to see an AIP by OP!! As a community member in both APE and OP, I was too impatient so I launched an ApeChain Testnet (OP Stack) via Conduit. If any apes wanna try out OP Stack, you can try it here (or launch your own OP Stack testnet)!

OP has a super cool and enthusiastic dev community. Andrew from Conduit has been very helpful and responsive to my questions for the initial setup of the Sepolia L2 testnet. Right after I posted it. SuperBridge folks jumped in to offer help for customizing the testnet L1/L2 bridge UI. Bridging isn’t too complicate and it’s just like using Uniswap. The native OP cross-layer messaging is quite cool for doing things with APE on L1 and interacting with smart contracts on L2 without extra dependency (open source sample). I’ve been using this testnet for my MadeByApes#218 indie game - Another World. More experiments are on the way!

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ApeCoin on Optimism…that would be something.

I’m curious to know what the costs of this would be.

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would APE be the base currency of the chain?
Meaning would gas and validator fees be paid and received in $APE?

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The more utility we bring in our $APE token, it is of great value, turning the economy around and everything works well

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Andrew from Conduit here, we’re the premiere rollups-as-a-service platform behind the major L2 launches like Zora Network, Public Goods Network, Aevo, and more.

We work closely with the Optimism folks on delivering the Superchain.

Appreciate @ben-chain’s and @jackie’s posts here. We’d love to work with the Apechain community to deliver a production-grade, fully-managed rollup on Ethereum.

Our offering includes:

  • High-availability Sequencing, with automatic failover and zero-downtime-deployments
  • Conduit Supernode RPCs, that scale automatically with your usage
  • Block Explorer, Transaciton Tracer, and Bridge UI (powered by Superbridge)
  • Best-in-class security, monitoring, and 24/7 on-call for your deployment
  • A suite of proprietary integrations, like Dune and Tenderly

As @jackie noted, you can spin up a testnet for free on our app here. Mainnet deployments take less than an hour (we spin up dedicated infrastructure just for your chain).

Let me know if you have any questions, my telegram is andrewhuang88!

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What we typically see is excess sequencer revenues can be used to buyback/burn the $APE coin. There are major benefits to having ETH as the native token:

  • Ease of L2 TX pricing, since DA fees are paid in ETH
  • Compatibility with other chains, easier onboarding
  • Better interoperability (see cosmos for why different gas tokens on different chains is so fragmenting).
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I’m intrigued by the concept of #ApeChain, and while I appreciate the current model of having $ape as a dao token, I believe it’s crucial to designate it as a ‘‘gas’’ token as well. Additionally, the incorporation of $ape, bayc, mayc, and bakc for staking purposes is vital for network security. This strategic move would enable a gradual phasing out of LM incentives. I wonder if the integration of these ideas is feasible through the use of ‘‘superchain’’ by optimism? I’ve detailed some of these thoughts and suggestions in greater detail in the following forum post: #ApeChain with bayc/mayc/bakc & $ape validators

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The proposed collaboration between ApeCoin and the Optimism Foundation for developing ApeChain on the Optimism Superchain holds promising potential. The outlined benefits, from easy deployment to active participation in Optimism’s governance, demonstrate how this partnership can facilitate a smooth launch and sustainable growth.

Notably, the emphasis on returning transaction fees to the community and ApeChain’s active role in governance adds depth to the proposal. Integration into the Optimism ecosystem not only promises access to innovations but also provides a robust foundation for ApeCoin ecosystem growth.

The detailed explanation of the Superchain vision, aiming to scale Ethereum through decentralized, interoperable L2 chains, highlights the multifaceted potential of this collaboration. The Superchain ecosystem’s highlights, from access to technology and talent to a fast, cost-effective platform, offer compelling reasons for ApeCoin DAO to explore this option.

Commitments to funding public goods and participation in Optimism Governance contribute to ensuring sustainable and fair development. Key terms like the “Law of Chains” and “Optimism Governance Participation” underscore the commitment to an open and democratic structure.

Lastly, the hope for a long-term strategic partnership emphasizes the potential for mutual benefits between ApeCoin DAO and the Optimism Collective. The willingness for transparent discussions and the involvement of Optimism contributors in cost breakdown underscore a commitment to open and collaborative development.

Overall, the proposal presents a compelling vision for the collaboration between ApeCoin and the Optimism Foundation, with the potential to strengthen not only the ApeCoin community but also the entire Optimism ecosystem.

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a very good question

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Hey ApeCoin fam! Hilmar from Gelato here. Epic to see the community consider creating their own Rollup!

We would love to be the Rollup as a Service (RaaS) partner that makes ApeChain a reality and become part of the Superchain! Our Rollup platform not only enables projects to deploy and host enterprise-grade, fully managed & highly scalable OP Stack Rollups on Ethereum, it also provides an end-to-end web3 infrastructure offering to make Rollups actually useful in the first place.

This end-to-end Rollup infra offering includes:

  • Enterprise-grade OP Stack Rollup infrastructure (Sequencers, RPCs)
  • Account Abstraction (Paymasters, Bundlers & best-in-class AA SDKs) to create a web2-like UX
  • Oracles to create e.g. advanced DeFi applications
  • VRF Randomness to create e.g. raffles or lotteries
  • Smart Contract Automation to automate e.g. staking reward claiming for ApeCoin holders, similar to what Synthetix uses Gelato for.
  • Blockexplorer
  • Transaction Debugging Tools for a better developer UX

About us:

Gelato was founded four years ago and is one of the most widely used web3 infrastructure projects, powering over 400 projects including MakerDAO, Safe, Aave and many more. Even OPLabs uses our Functions to provide testnet ETH for all their OP Chains (tweet).

We now expanded our offering and partnered with the Optimism team to help with the deployments of OP Stack Rollups and with it accelerate the adoption of the Superchain. Feel free to dm me directly on telegram @hilmarx, we would be more than happy to onboard you on our Rollup platform, launch a testnet and guide you through your mainnet deployment process!

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I see it’s a race to scale up the Apecoin ecosystem. I have been following up the op stack and optimism super chain and I think the development is more than welcome.

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Hi @ben-chain,

The community feedback period for your proposal would be ending in less than 24 hours.

  • If you’re content with the feedback received, your next steps are to finalize your proposal using the AIP Draft Template.

  • A moderator will reach out to the author to finalize the AIP Draft. Upon receipt of the final Draft, we will review and provide instructions on the next steps.

  • Are you ready to proceed to the next phase or do you wish to extend community discussion for another 7 days?

We look forward to hearing from you.

-@Facilitators

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What specific innovations and upgrades enabled by Optimism’s contributor ecosystem will ApeChain have access to as part of the Superchain, and how might these contribute to the growth of the ApeCoin ecosystem?

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This topic was automatically closed after 7 days. New replies are no longer allowed.

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Hi @ben-chain,

Thank you for your ideas [and the ApeCoin DAO community for the insightful discussions].

A moderator will reach out to the author to finalize the AIP Draft using the appropriate template.

  • Once the AIP Draft is confirmed by the author and meets all DAO-approved guidelines, it will receive an AIP ID number and move forward for Draft Analysis Review.
  • @ben-chain please see your messages for the next steps.

Follow this Topic as further updates will be posted here in the comments. In accordance with DAO-approved guidelines, if the author does not respond within 30 days, the proposal will be automatically transferred to the Withdrawn category, and the author can re-submit the idea.

-@Facilitators

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Hi ApeCoin DAO Community,

@ben-chain has requested to withdraw their application. As per the author’s request, this AIP will be moved to the General category where it will be open for further community discussion .

Kind Regards,

@Facilitators

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Hi all, moved this to general to continue discussion–posting some followups to the questions and comments we’ve had so far!

On cost:

The OP Stack is cheap af, and only getting cheaper. OP Mainnet is regularly vying for the top spot on L2fees.info, after the Bedrock release of the OP Stack, where we made a concerted effort to get costs as low as possible.

In addition to this, the Collective is making big strides to continue lowering costs dramatically:

  • Span batches, being developed by Test in Prod (one of the Collective’s Core Developer teams, and creators of op-erigon) lower the costs by 10-90% depending on usage levels.
  • op-plasma, being developed by Lattice (the team behind MUD), will allow OP Chains to use alternative data availability layers with minimal safety sacrifices, lowering transaction costs to sub-cent levels.

We are incredibly proud of both of these examples because they are being shipped by our contributor ecosystem, not OP Labs or the Optimism Foundation. These core devs join efforts alongside Base, the Collective’s second Core Developer.