# The life of a blockchain ## Validator role A validator is an entity running one or multiple nodes on a blockchain network. Its role is to ensure that the blockchain works efficiently and with the maximum safety for the users. A validator can be a precious ressource for core developer teams who need trusted entities to operate a blockchain in the most decentralized way possible. Validators can have multiple roles during all the phases of development of a blockchain project which we will highlight below. ### Before the testnet During the development phase, the validator can take an advisory role and provide insight to help the developer team make the right decisions. They can provide some infrastructure to run devnet or early private-testnet to test a first scale increase. Their knowledge and experience with multiple blockchain networks is a precious source of information to avoid mistakes like transaction floods and huge block size. Right before the public testnets, a set of validators will create an offline transaction called `gentx`. This transaction will be integrated to the Genesis block and that will in turn form the Genesis validators. The Genesis validators have the responsability to startup the chain by having all the infrastructure ready before the chain to starts. If too many Genesis validators are missing, the chain will fail to start due to a lack of online voting power. ### During the public testnet During the testnet(s), validators are able to provide valuable performance metrics thanks to fine tuned monitoring of their infrastructure. They are the first users of the features developed and tested by the core development team for many months. They sometimes need to test the features without too much guidance from the code-dev to be able to find how a feature works and maybe find bugs and mistakes. During this period, they will prepare all their infrastructure and monitoring to be able to operate efficiently during the future mainnet. ### For the mainnet and beyond When the chain is well tested and ready to go to mainnet, a new Genesis is prepared with a new Genesis validator set. Often, Genesis validators are chosen during the testnet by the quality of the work they are providing. Being a Genesis validator is a great honor, it is the recognition of quality work and the confidence of a team. The Genesis validator set should not be too important to give the opportunity to other validators to join the network. For the safety of the chain during the early times, Genesis validators receive a good amount of tokens. These tokens will be self-delegated to secure the chain until more users are able to delegate their own tokens to the validator they trust. When a validator joins a blockchain, they take a long term engagment with a community. They provide knowledge and advice to the community. In return, the community provides recognition through its delegations.