Farcaster and Bitcoin are very different networks but share a parochial approach to problem-solving. Bitcoin lets users store and move money without a trusted third party, while Farcaster does the same for text. Describing Farcaster as a decentralized, public, and text-centric social network would be accurate. Many apps have a "twitter-like" feel, with a text feed generated from a set of "follow" relationships. Developers are starting to push the limits of the current design, with apps focussed on image and video sharing, physical presence, and on-chain ownership. People want Farcaster to act more like Ethereum and less like Bitcoin, allowing more degrees of freedom and creativity. Could Farcaster become a "Turing-complete" protocol allowing different social networks to be built? Or is a unique architecture needed for each? Achieving Completeness Farcaster already has essential building blocks like decentralized identity, text storage, and graph relationships. But building diverse networks like Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, or Whatsapp requires a few more elements: Flexible schemas so that devs can introduce new content and metadata types without a protocol upgrade (e.g., polls) Context separation so that users can keep identities, graphs, and data segregated across networks. Long-term storage so that users don't have to discard older data which is valuable on some networks.
4/28/2023Problem Using a new app may may require an on-chain transaction. For example, signing up for Farcaster requires making a transaction to the Registry to get an fid. Using your primary wallet to make this transaction may be impractical for a few reasons: Your wallet is on your ledger, at home Your wallet is on your desktop, and you’re on your phone Your wallet is available, but you’re having trouble connecting You don’t trust this app, and would prefer not to have it come close to your wallet Solution The app creates a new wallet, uses a paymaster to cover the transaction costs and can charge you in fiat if necessary. The problem is that you now have a wallet for each new app and remembering the recovery phrases is impractical.
4/25/2023With the launch of Hubs now in its final phases, we wanted to recalibrate our priorities as a community. This document is a draft of some goals, problems and a few early solutions and we’re looking for input from casters. Goals Increase the number of people creating useful content on Farcaster. Increase the number of developers building on Farcaster. Achieve credible neutrality. Make money to keep funding protocol development. Stack-Ranked Problems Make sure that Hubs are working as expected
4/13/2023Users sign up for Farcaster by registering an fid using an Ethereum wallet. Apps can be authorized to act on the user's behalf by providing them with a signature from this wallet. Apps & Wallets The default line of thinking is that users should use general-purpose wallets to register, and apps can get signatures via WalletConnect. This is convenient for users who have a wallet and for app devs who don't want to deal with the headache of building a wallet. But in practice, the user experience is bad enough to hinder Farcaster’s adoption. In particular: Users without a wallet must set one up first before using Farcaster. Signing messages is confusing and intimidating to the average user. Wallet Connect does not always reliably establish connections.
4/3/2023