r/AltStreetBets & Marshall Hayner
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It had been almost two years since Metallicus CEO Marshall Hayner last stepped into the subreddit r/AltStreetBets to hold an AMA, so naturally, we were delighted when the crew invited him back for another.
At Metallicus, we are huge fans of Reddit. We love the communities that are built, the stories that are shared, and the simple enjoyment of hanging out with people who share the same interests.
For those who missed it, we have compiled some of the top questions and answers from last weeks forum for your enjoyment.
r/AltStreetBets x Proton Blockchain LE NFT
We also launched a limited edition r/AltStreetBets NFT for all those who attended. If you missed the AMA, and still want the NFT, head to Twitter, and leave your Proton account address on this tweet. We’ll make sure it’s dropped into your WebAuth Wallet.
Don’t have a WebAuth Wallet? Here’s how to create one!
Marshall Hayner r/AltStreetBets AMA
Question: What did you eat for breakfast today?
Answer: Three shots espresso, finishing my third right now 😅☕️
Question: Hey Marshall, could you explain the difference between Metal and Proton? What happens to Proton once Metal Grows? Also where does First Blockchain Bank come into it all?
Answer: Absolutely — Think of Proton like a Ferrari, a beautiful well engineered car that is more or less the apex blockchain. Now think of Metal like a factory that can pump out the Ferraris and also has an attached show room where banks can come in and select their Ferraris. Jokes aside, Metal blockchain is a layer zero that can host many chains and has its own base layer for trading and lending (A Chain aka the AVM). Proton is inflationary and can be expanded and changed dynamically based upon the community, block producers and consortium. Metal blockchain is hard fixed much like MTL DAO, and is purely deflationary from the outset with a hard cap of 666.666m units.
Question: Will metal dollar have fractured liquidity when launched on multiple chains or is the intent to drive as much of that liquidity to Proton/Metal ?
Answer: The idea is to drive that liquidity directly into Proton and Metal, Metal is for banks and fintechs to launch their own chains and issue their own stablecoins. Liquidity can easily pool cross chain to A Chain (AVM) where it can easily be traded and lent with the DEX and LOAN protocols.
Question: Will other chains use METAL as the validating token?
Answer: Yes, but they can also use the base layer token, take the D Chain for example, a planned layer three (scaling solution) for Dogecoin. You can bridge DOGE over to D Chain and then use DOGE to validate on the D Chain or METAL.
Question: Proton is known for the zero fees and instant transactions. How do you plan on keeping this free and instant? Developers of course pay for the fees for a big part, but how to keep the instant in there?
Answer: When you visit a site on the web like Reddit, we don’t pay to view it. This is how most of Web2 operates, it’s always free to visit a website or download an app, you will always pay for premium features or content of course. The vision is the same for Proton, the companies that are building apps are more or less paying for fees for end users, because it’s cheap and affordable enough to that, and can remain that way forever, unlike a chain like ETH where rising gas cost is inevitable. This of course doesn’t prevent users from paying their own RAM, NET and CPU cost, however in most cases you won’t have to do that unless you are deploying an application. As far as keeping Proton instant, the blockchain is designed for it, when we upgrade to A-Chain (AVM) on Metal, it will be even more instant, moving from 180s finality down to 0.5s
Question: How would you summarise your roadmap in 2 sentences? What is the profit model of proton?
Answer: Proton is building the decentralized payments, trading and lending layer that connects TradFi into DeFi. An exchange, OTC desk, lending platform, and settlement that is online 24/7, instant and never goes down. Proton is a blockchain and doesn’t “profit” perse, but the “revenue” it creates is from resource cost that comes in the form of RAM, NET and CPU, you can check this out at ProtonResources.com, all resources are burned and you can see this in the token.burn account on Protonscan.io
Question: How does Protonchain outperform its competition? What makes it special compared to other similar projects?
Answer: Proton is unique in every way. It’s the only blockchain in the world I’m aware of that you can just sign up and receive a fraction of a penny in USD and send it out without any gas fees, all while using real human readable names. If I was going to onboard someone into crypto, the only blockchain I would even think about doing it with is Proton, there is no better user experience in crypto right now. If you doubt it, compare it side by side with any other wallet/chain. Furthermore, Proton is on the bleeding edge with Web Authentication, you don’t need to leave your browser to sign a transaction, just use Face or Touch ID and turn your phone into a Ledger/Trezor by utilizing the Secure Enclave (SE).
Question: Your website states that the “biggest Obstacle to mass market adoption is Usability.” With the increase in usability of other projects, and more centralized corporate-oriented solutions such as https://todaq.net/. Does this still hold true as the biggest obstacle in your eyes?
Answer: With the move into traditional financial infrastructure, what are your opinions of the fast pace of CBDC projects such as in New York, or digital Euro initiatives in Europe, and what could this mean for a project such as Metallicus?
Question: Hey Marshall! You mentioned in a twitter space that it is going to take the community to help bring attention to metallicus. A part of this is going to require gaining the attention of large social influencers. Like them or not, they do have an audiences and can bring value by introducing people to the apps. Are there any you would like the community to poke and or stay away from? Would be great to get you some interviews with some larger channels such as crypto banter, bitboy, and others. Thanks!
Answer: I think Unchained with Laura Shin is really great, I also think it would be amazing to get some time with Mr. Beast and/or Joe Rogan. People I would like to stay away from, well, I’m not going to pick fights and name names… Suffice to say I don’t like anyone who is not truthful and honest. I like people who are real and not afraid to say what they think or breach the uncomfortable topics.
Question: What’s your stance on crypto regulation and how do you think it will affect Proton and Metallicus? Let’s assume SEC and similar institutions in other countries declare most of cryptocurrencies (those who had ICOs and pre-sales) as securities. What do you see as an outcome after that?
Answer: I think regulation is a duel edged sword, we want to be sure to create regulation that protects the public while simultaneously don’t want to over-regulate to hamper innovation. We want to “innovate responsibly” and this is very important. In the past year we saw the consequences of not innovating responsibly and not being transparent. We have a motto at Metallicus “Always act in good faith with full transparency and accountability”, we live by this in everything we do at the company. As far as your last question, I think in that case it would be on the agency to really afford a clear path for the industry to evolve responsibly. We would want to see the first broker-dealers and ATS platforms start trading in digital assets. The outcome would be one of two scenarios, a very gloomy scenario for the future of crypto in the US (I do not believe that will be the case), or a fast track for innovation and agencies like the CFTC working together hand in hand. I believe America can lead the pack, but it will require crypto leaders to speak up and be more active in Washington, DC. We saw this previously when it was applied incorrectly and are witnessing the results, imagine if it was applied correctly. I am looking to re-introduce my Crypto Currency Act 2020 this year with new language and sponsors.
Question: Do you think Proton and Metallicus will push to get listed on additional exchanges like Crypto.com after the recent fallout of FTX? Additional volume is always nice, but does it expose the project to other liabilities?
Answer: I think the most powerful thing Proton can do is become fully autonomous and the DEX becoming the new standard for crypto trading (ProtonDEX.com), an exchange that is lightning fast, non custodial, and never goes down.
Question: As a retail investor with little knowledge about the inner workings of crypto; where would I go to find a reputable list or community of developers for protonchain? I have plans to start an online business utilizing proton but don’t know how to code and I’m not sure where I could find reputable devs to actually make my business into a reality. I believe retail customers are going to be a big part of protons growth and adoption into mainstream alongside the banking aspect.
Answer: Definitely come over to the Proton Developers channel on Telegram (@protondev) join Fishtank.ai (decentralized talent network), also I would post on Snipcoins.com (decentralized social network)… All built on Proton of course. Also post on Reddit in r/Protonchain
Question: Since METAL L0 blockchain is a fork of Avalanche and Avalanche has been very successful eg. partnering with AWS and the International Chess Federation developing on Avalanche. Are there benefits of using METAL L0 blockchain over Avalanche and how is Metallicus going to persuade people to build on METAL?
Answer: Avalanche tends to focus more on bringing dApps to C Chain, whereas Metal is focused on bringing backs to subchains and replicating legacy chains like Bitcoin, Dogecoin, Ethereum. Some of the benefits of the Metal blockchain are of course the AVM (A — Chain) but also the technology we are building like Web Authentication for EVM and Snowman. Coupled with our digital identity standard and focus on compliance, it’s the ideal blockchain for banking and payments.
Question: When Credit Card? Will we see sth. similar to the initial PoPP with $METAL or any other token incorporated into that?
Answer: We are planning on rolling out our Metal credit card this year and of course, the debit cards as well (virtual cards too) and Metal Pay for Business. Rewards in crypto? You know it 🤘🏼
Question: When can we expect to see a block explorer for metal blockchain similar to protonscan? I’m sure the community would love to see metrics like current supply and emission rate as well. Also..if you can say…have any banks or financial institutions inquired about metal blockchain?
Answer: We have Metalscan.io right now which is pretty basic but you can expect massive improvements on it this year, akin to Protonscan.io!
Question: Why did you choose the name Proton for the project?
Answer: Protons are the building blocks of all matter. The etymology of the word comes from the Greek word pratos πρῶτος meaning first. This theme recurs across the entire platform from First Blockchain Bank to Metal Pay (the first currencies being made of metal)
Question:Hello. you refer to deploying Bitcoin, doge and ethereum chains on Metal L0. What is the purpose and what are the benefits of doing this? Is it all for bridging purposes? Thanks.
Answer: The idea is that these are wrapped virtualized chains. In the world of Proton we have wrapped tokens we call xTokens which are custodied by Metallicus and Fireblocks (and other similar analogs can be made). On the Metal blockchain we abstract the idea of a token further by giving it its own blockchain, the result is that a chain that is fully independent with its own smart contracts and notion of inflation or deflation that can mirror the legacy chain. This ultimately eliminates the need for a centralized bridge under Metal when trading these assets on Proton (A — Chain)
Question: With Metal Blockchain you talk about Banks potentially running their own Validator Nodes, can you talk a bit about why they might want to run their own Metal Nodes and why would a bank want their own blockchain in the first place? Also do you imagine a future where major US banks are all running Metal Blockchain subnets and nodes?
Answer: If you think about it, as a bank, you want to have strong controls in all areas, especially if you are going to be issuing a stablecoin. The concept for issuing a stablecoin is simple: attract AUM to your bank and grow the deposits, while attracting fintechs and DeFi protocols. If you are going to issue a stablecoin onto a blockchain, it’s important to be confident that the blockchain will be secure and not hard fork unexpectedly, but also that should the bank want to see certain changes being made, they won’t be waiting for years for their EIP to be approved. Then, you also eventually want to move beyond your own private DLT or semi-private chain to public chains like Bitcoin and Ethereum, and interoperability with stablecoins like USDC, USDP, TUSD, USDT, etc and this is where XMD (Metal Dollar) comes in. Subchains supporting Dogecoin, Bitcoin, Ethereum, Proton make it easy to quickly move between these top assets (and also trade them on A Chain)
Question: Hey Marshall! Any plans for getting ISO 20022 and/or SOC2 Type 2 certified? Congrats on all the hard work you and team do!
Answer: Yes, it’s all part of the plan.
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