Zap (ZAP)

From CryptoWiki

Zap
TypeERC20 token
Total supply520,000,000 ZAP
Websitehttps://www.zap.org/

Basics

  • On Ethereum
  • "A marketplace in which any information provider in the world can sell their data in a peer-to-peer and fully liquid market (utilizing bonding curves) to data users, aggregators and speculators."
  • Zap’s ecosystem consists of oracles, subscribers (smart contracts consuming data), and the ZapMarket smart contract that connects and manages payments between the two parties.
  • From their website (12-2019):

"Decentralized bonding curve curation market. Providing access to data providers and other services through algorithmic token generation."

History

Token

Launch

"Zap recently concluded an ICO presale and will be holding the public token sale on October 21st. In total, 520 million Zap tokens will be created with 173 million available for sale in the ICO. The rest of the tokens will be held by the Synapse Foundation (foundation behind the project) as part of a long-term operating budget.

The Zap tokens carry no ownership right or stake in the Synapse Foundation, the legal entity which is creating and selling the tokens and overseeing the development, management and operation of the network and marketplace, or in any other entity. Zap tokens are utility tokens and a consumer product. You have rights as a consumer and participant in the network and marketplace."

Token allocation

  1. Token distribution: 55% software development & maintenance cost, 20% token sale, 10% administration (legal, accounting), 10% operation, 5% contingency fund
  2. Long term budget: 47% long term budget, 33& token sale, 10% team/founders, 10% bug/adoption/bounty program

Utility

"Zap is a token based on Ethereum technology. It is the only mechanism for bonding to oracles in the Zap ecosystem and producing dots."

Token Details

Stablecoin

Tech

Transaction Details

How it works

  • The following comes from an article that did a 'deep dive into Zap:

"An oracle is comprised of: *a realtime datafeed* an Ethereum address registered with the ZapMarket smart contract *an IPFS keypair public key with the ZapMarket contract* a data encryption public key registered with the ZapMarket contract * a quantity of ZAP bonded to the ZapMarket contract

A subscriber is a smart contract that needs data. It’s comprised of: * an Ethereum address registered with the ZapMarket smart contract * an IPFS public key registered with the ZapMarket smart contract * a data encryption public key registered with ZapMarket smart contract * a quantity of ZAP bonded under an existing oracle in the ZapMarket smart contract

When a subscriber requires information from an oracle, it “bonds” ZAP tokens to the oracle through the ZapMarket smart contract. In return, the subscriber gets DOTS which it can use to pay for queries for that oracle. When the subscriber makes a query with a DOT, the ZapMarket smart contract facilitates the exchange of IPFS public keys between the two parties. The two parties then establish a private IPFS pubsub room where the oracle can push data to the subscriber.

Zap provides a very interesting payment model. ZAP tokens are the currency of the Zap oracle marketplace. When a subscriber “bonds” ZAP to the oracle, the subscriber is given DOTS and can use them to query the oracle. One DOT = one query. DOTS are non transferable. This whole process is facilitated by the ZapMarket smart contract.

To become an oracle, a data provider needs to register with the ZapMarket smart contract. On registration, the data provider needs to specify a DOT/ZAP supply curve. This curve determines how many DOTS are given per ZAP bonded to the oracle. An oracle could have a flat, linear curve, meaning DOTS remain at the same price even with demand increasing. A oracle could also specify an ascending curve, meaning DOTS get more expensive with more demand.

This payment model introduces speculators to the market. Speculators are those that bond ZAP to oracles without any interest in spending DOTS (i.e. receiving data). If the oracle has an increasing DOT/ZAP supply cure and the demand for the oracle rises after the speculator bonds ZAP to the oracle, the speculator makes a profit when they convert their DOTS back to ZAP.

The allowance of a speculator in Zap’s oracle market is an intentional design element that aims to act as a market refinement mechanism. Speculators are incentivized to discover good data sources and bond to them early. This helps in getting these good data sources discovered by other market participants that are actually looking for data. This market design utilizes many of the same economic incentives as prediction markets.

Zap’s ecosystem connects a subscriber with a publisher. The publisher will typically become a single source of truth for the subscriber, making the subscriber vulnerable to a bad actor publisher (unless the subscriber has some fancy consensus system involving multiple publishers for the same data).

According to Zap’s whitepaper, the risk of scams is mediated by the fact that each publisher is tied to a unique Ethereum address and new publishers should always be treated with suspicion. On the other hand, long standing or professional data oracles can be afforded more trust. For Zap, blockchain history becomes a sort of trustless reputation system."

Staking

Other Details

  • From a 2019 wrap up:

"We made time-locked smart contracts available using the Zap protocol. These are smart contracts which time lock tokens that are only redeemable by a “special purpose” ERC20 token that is unique to the contract which issues it. With this ability, a company, for example, can time lock tokens and issue the ERC20 tokens to those who work on the project. This incentivizes long term holding and discourages quick conversions of the token into fiat, thus aligning the worker’s interest with the interests of developers, managers and the existing token community. Additional criteria, such as meeting a certain price point, can be applied using our protocols for data oracles."

Privacy Method being used

Oracle Method being used

Their Other Projects

TokenDotFactory

  • From a 2019 wrap up:

"One of our first major steps in 2019 was expanding the Zap protocol to offer the ability to create and issue a new erc20 token with a custom bonding curve using our “TokenDotFactory” smart contracts. This feature was the first step in progressing towards more development capabilities, such as the ability to create decentralized autonomous organizations, token distribution events, and entire platforms built using the algorithmic continuous liquidity of a bonding curve market. These cryptographic tokens are also automatically available for use and exchange outside the Zap marketplace, meaning new crypto token creators can build and offer tokens on top of Zap instead of, for example, Ethereum."

Bonding Curve DAO

  • From a 2019 wrap up:

"Our “Bonding Curve DAO” template allows a decentralized community to control the direction of a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO). The project would simply propose, for example, Plans A, B, and C and whichever proposal has the most bonded to it by a specific date will receive all the capital bonded by having it sent to a designated beneficiary address."

Governance

DAO

Upgrades

Roadmap

  • Can be found here (22-5-2018).
  • From a 2019 wrap up talking about the future in 2020:

"The first is the ability to use any erc20 token to access certain services available with the Zap protocol. Additionally, we are developing a “master bonding curve” that anyone can bond to with their Zap token. The amount staked results in proportional payouts derived from transaction fees."

Audits

Bugs

Usage

Projects that use or built on it

  • From a 2019 wrap up:

"The Zap protocol was used as the back end to yield BitUnits, an asset-specific tokenization use-case for property and real estate investment. Certain jurisdictions (such as the States of Delaware and Wyoming in the United States) recognize corporation or entity ownership ledgers maintained on a blockchain. The issuance of fractional ownership via tokens and transactions made on the blockchain are recognized in these jurisdictions, as well. By meeting certain suitability requirements (such as not residing in certain other jurisdictions) tokens representing fractional interest of property and real estate can be traded."

Pros and Cons

Pros

Cons

Competition

ZAP compared to Chainlink

  • The following comes again from the article that did a 'deep dive into Zap:

"ChainLink is another prominent oracle service in development right now. While both Zap and ChainLink are products in the oracle space, Zap is focused on building a simple-to-use marketplace where smart contracts can connect to oracles through one intuitive interface and ChainLink is focused on building trustful oracle data streams through decentralization.

ChainLink aims to build its own data aggregator service that takes data from a bunch of data streams and returns the majority result. Although this will create highly reliable data streams for the blockchain, there is also tremendous overhead and complexity.

ChainLink data will be more expensive and take longer to deliver, something that is not necessary for highly trusted oracles, such as those from professional or long-standing data providers. ChainLink is excellent for enterprise dApps where data integrity is crucial but not so much for “lower-tier” dApps.

Ultimately, Zap and ChainLink are not necessarily competitors. ChainLink oracles can serve as purchasable oracle services in the Zap marketplace."

Coin Distribution

"The top 100 holders collectively own 93.45% tokens of Zap. Tokens total supply: 520,000,000 | Holders: 1,887"

Team, Funding, Partnerships, etc.

Team

  • Spanos, Nick; director, organizer Bitcoin Center New York. has a history of business ventures, several of which are related to cryptocurrencies. He cofounded the Bitcoin Center NYC in 2013, a physical coworking space next to the NYSE. also founded Blockchain Technologies Corp in 2011. BTC is a startup accelerator for blockchain-related ventures and it currently manages a portfolio of blockchain technology companies.
  • Before dabbling in blockchain, Spanos founded getaroom.com and was the CEO of the company for 11 years. He sold it to Hotels.com in 2010.
  • Young, Ben; creative director, former Bitcoin Center New York
  • St Laurent, Tom;technical director,  former Bitcoin Center New York
  • Geros, Steve; lead blockchain architect, former Bitcoin Center New York
  • Beckwith, Dean James; Cryptoeconomist, former Bitcoin Center NYC
  • Akbari, Kumail; deputy technical director, former Bitcoin Center NYC
  • Daniel; dev, former Bitcoin Center NYC
  • Wang, Harry; UI/UX designer; Bitcoin ATM’s (DAVE)
  • Leelike, John; blockchain strategist, Bitcoin ATM’s (DAVE)
  • Scappaticci, Sean; technical lead, Bitcoin ATM’s (DAVE)
  • Proferes, Marc; editorial director, Bitcoin ATM’s (DAVE)
  • Kanchi; developer, former Bitcoin Center NYC
  • Baala; developer, former Bitcoin Center NYC

Advisors:

Funding

Partners 

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