The Shiba Inu (SHIB) meme project remained in headlines for the better part of last week, finding its way atop trending crypto watchlists, thanks to the hype around its upcoming Shibarium blockchain. The dog-themed blockchain ecosystem released its public beta for the network at the end of last week, with technical details coming out earlier today. The buzz around the beta release has since faded following early Thursday reports, drawing attention to the upcoming chain’s codebase.
Allegations of copying an existing chain
A Shiba Inu’s Discord channel member pointed out that the Shibarium beta testnet uses a Chain ID (917) associated with the Rinia blockchain.
“Chain ID is the simplest thing any Blockchain dev looks for first when deploying a Blockchain. As using an ID that already exists is just incompetent as your chain wouldn’t work properly and everyone trying to interact with your chain would instead interact with the other chain,” the user who is part of SHIB’s Growth Team claimed. “Why is it that it looks like shibarium test net has taken rinia testnet genesis file. Changed the name from rinia. But forgot to change the chain ID.”
Other users on the Discord server including network validators, reacted to the concerns of the Shibarium code being stolen, some addressing the issue as inconsequential.
“Code is forked all the time. Moreover, there is no confirmation that it was,” one member wrote. At the same time, another said, “Forking, and building upon already established software, is the core foundation of what FOSS (free and open-source software) stands for.”
The incident led to some questioning not only the origin of the project but also the credibility of those associated with Shiba Inu governance. One sect even demanded proof that unique (up to nine) individuals manage the multi-sig wallet associated with the project. Others tied the drama around the origin of Shibarium as a possible case of hyping up Rinia which is reportedly planning to launch a project soon.
“The Rinia Testnet chain Dev is launching an ICO for Firechain called a Shib Killer on March 31. They could be using this mud in the water to drum up free marketing since the ChainIDs were the same,” he said. “It may be an artifact of copying source code from an open-source project.”
To calm the unsettled Shiba Inu community, some developers offered plausible explanations on Twitter.
“Few chain IDs were picked randomly – 417(Alpha), 517(Staging), 917(pre-pod/beta) and these chains were not registered anywhere at that time; I made a mistake to not recheck when the puppynet network was launched,” one pseudonymous dev remarked about the drama.
The Twitter account associated with the lead developer Shytoshi retweeted the post. The lead dev, in another tweet dismissed the chaos as ‘simply FUD’, which should be ignored.
Shiba Inu’s future and market barely affected
The Thursday morning report triggered mild panic selling in the morning Asian hours, accompanied by a minor positive bounce hours later. In the last 24 hours, the meme coin has dipped 7%, returning to the spotlight this time, however, among the top losers on the day. Markedly, the minor sell-off in reaction to the allegations almost entirely erased last week’s ascent but SHIB has pushed slightly high to offset part of the day’s losses. It remains unclear whether the issue will affect the full launch, which the ecosystem has prepared for by setting up a Shibarium portal.
To learn more about Shiba Inu, check out our Investing in Shiba Inu guide.
VeChain debuts Whitepaper 3.0 with a focus on sustainability
In related blockchain developments preceding last week’s Shibarium public beta release, the VeChain Foundation announced the launch of its Whitepaper 3.0. In collaboration with Boston Consulting Group, the group laid out plans to better the leading enterprise-grade layer one blockchain VeChainThor. Since it launched in 2018, the VeChainThor blockchain has evolved in various stages. In its last whitepaper published in December 2019, VeChain doubled down on efforts to solve real-world economic issues, and towards that goal, it aimed to foster widespread adoption of blockchain technology by businesses.
Unleashing the collective potential for sustainability
Whitepaper 3.0 ushered in a new era of VET 3.0, following previous iterations of VET 1.0 and VET 2.0. This time, the focus is on sustainability in the crypto space, increasingly leaning toward conservation measures. The 72-page publication explained that achieving sustainability requires collaboration and coordination to multiply individual impact and unleash the collective potential of all stakeholders involved. This is often a huge challenge, as it requires long-term cooperation and collective action from every player.
The VeChain Foundation acknowledged there are issues impeding collaborative efforts, such as the lack of visibility into the sustainability of everyday operations, a lack of traceability and brand liability, inadequate or absent proof of authenticity, and an absence of traditional trust mechanisms amongst entities interacting in the current digital world. The Foundation also said prevalent data ownership and privacy challenges resulting from insufficient technological advancement and inadequate tools for gathering and exchanging data also pose a challenge to collaboration. Particularly, in order to work together towards these common goals, individuals and organizations need a secure way to store and share data. If privacy concerns prevent them from sharing sensitive information, this can limit their visibility into each other’s sustainability efforts.
Blockchain solutions to the rescue
To confront the existing challenges, the Foundation presented that it is necessary to integrate innovative technological tools. It sees crypto tokenomics design as key in identifying and capturing value that traditional finance often overlooks, yet structured compensation systems can help motivate individuals and organizations to collaborate effectively, potentially generating a positive reinforcement cycle. Moreover, to successfully incorporate sustainable actions alongside profits, VeChain deemed it crucial to educate markets and users about the concept of value and to establish new standards, metrics, and mechanisms. This will encourage individuals and organizations to take actions that benefit both society and their bottom line.
VeChain’s contribution to sustainable development projects
The Foundation recognized the potential of Web3 technologies in enabling value exchange that goes beyond just economic value but also includes environmental and societal values. By leveraging Web3, VeChain sees it possible to gain a deeper understanding of the value of an action, quantify it and share its impact accordingly. It also plans to broaden its current enterprise partnerships and include strategic, technical, and operational partners and collaborators, including sustainability experts, governments, and NGOs.
“Alongside global channel partners, our technologies have the reach to massively disrupt the global economy & deploy #ESG/#SDG solutions with some of the planet’s largest companies,” VeChain affirmed in a Mar 16 tweet.
The food traceability platform also seeks dedicated partners interested in being involved in the ecosystem as owners rather than just participants. These partners would contribute to building efforts, create dedicated solutions, attract new users, and communicate the ecosystem’s value to the community, all while generating additional value for themselves. VeChain pledged support in grants, accelerator programs, and other similar initiatives to enhance collaboration between start-ups, academia, financing partners, and developer communities. This week, VeChain confirmed in a Mar 15 tweet it filed applications for a patent for innovations falling under the fast-growing Internet of Things (IoT) computing realm.
To learn more about VeChain, check out our Investing in VeChain guide.
