Tron Ecosystem - Steemit Crypto Academy Season 5 - Homework Post for Task 1
Good day everyone, I am here to fulfill the first and my last homework post in the Academy. Today, we will be talking about the Tron Ecosystem and the different decentralized apps that it is made up of. These are the questions I would be answering in the post as seen below,
What are the different dApps in the Tron ecosystem are you familiar with? What are the uses of DeFi applications like Justswap, JustLend, and Sun.io? How can you optimize mining rewards by staking TRX and other TRC20 tokens in Sun.io? Examples?
I will be taking them one after the other and gradually breaking it down in a bid to make it much easier for everyone to follow.
What are the different dApps in the Tron ecosystem are you familiar with?
Before going to the main stuff, we have to find out what Tron and trx are, then we look at the meaning of decentralized applications.
Tron is an open source, decentralized blockchain which was founded in 2017 by Justin Sun and makes use of the Proof of Stake as it's census mechanism. It has a native token which is known as tronix (trx). In my short time in the Crypto space, I have come across alot of newbies and laymen who call tron by its governing token name and this is wrong as they misuse the two completely different words. Aside from TRX, there are some other tokens built on the tron blockchain which include BitTorrent (BTT), Tether (USDT), Wrapped BitTorrent (WBTT) and so on. Now we shall go on to have a small look at the meaning of decentralization in cryptocurrencies.
Decentralized literally means that there is no central power in control and that the authority is shared between the constituents. Now this is similar to what is being enjoyed in the modern day world of blockchain technology. Now this decentralization allows for buyer and seller interaction without the existence of an intermediary or a central authority to control the transaction. It allows users to make their own decisions and have total power over what is theirs. Today we have decentralized exchanges, apps and even currencies. Let us have a look at the different dApps in the Tron Ecosystem.
Familiar DApps in the Tron Ecosystem
There are currently over 1400 decentralized applications on the tron network but I will only be looking at the ones which I am familiar with.
1. STEEMIT
This is no news to we the users as steemit is a decentralized app on the tron Ecosystem. Steemit is a decentralized social media platform where members can earn steem, trx and steem dollars for posting and curating the contents of other users. It's registration is free and launched in the year 2016. Steemit is a life changing platform as it provides people with a means to bring out their creativity and talent and even learn from others. A variety of things can be done on Steemit like posting poems, pictures, videos and articles, voting for witnesses, commenting and voting (upvoting/downvoting) on the posts of other authors. It is also a means of livelihood to a handful of it's members. It is also no news to us that the people with the higher steem power (powered up steem) have a large influence on the payout of posts on Steemit, they also enjoy the platform the most. Posts payout exactly 7 days from when they are published.
2. FORSAGE
Forsage tron is a high-risk crowd funding pyramid scheme where the higher ups (the earliest members) register new members under them and those new people register more new people under themselves and the pyramid grows. As a new member, you are required to purchase 140-200 trx and pay a percentage to the higher-ups inorder to be part of the pyramid. Inorder to gain from the platform, you must convince people to join under your referral link and they become your downline. The people who register you are your upline so as more people join the scheme the referral fees of the downlines become the spillage fees (profits) for the uplines. It gained popularity during the covid-19 lockdown and I was also part of the people who participated in this pyramid scheme.
3. LUMINOUS
According to dappradar.com, Luminous is the 2nd most used tron dApp after JustSwap. It is a platform for gambling where users could win big prices by playing games with cryptocurrencies and huge prices in crypto could be won. This is link to their site for those who want to see what it is all about. There are currently two games which users can play; Megabit, the first game on the platform where you gamble by paying an amount and predicting bitcoin prices, if your prediction is correct, you win but if it's wrong, you lose what you gambled. The second is Lucky dice, where you bet a certain amount and roll the dice, if you roll the correct number, you win but if you don't get the right number, you lose the amount you bet. The developers claim they have more games coming soon.
What are the uses of DeFi applications like Justswap, JustLend, and Sun.io?
Decentralized apps offer similar services to traditional/centralized apps but the difference is the decentralization as I mentioned earlier. As there is twitter (centralized) we have steemit (decentralized) and they have alot of similarities. In the case of decentralized finance (DeFi), as they have commercial banks (centralized), we have JustSwap, JustLend, Sun.io (decentralized). I shall be looking at the uses of these 3 dApps below.
JustSwap/SunSwap
SunSwap which is the most used tron dApp, formerly known as JustSwap but recently acquired and modified by Sun.io. It is also tron's first decentralized exchange for exchanging TRC tokens. It can be used to swap between litecoin, BTC, ETH, TRX and other trc tokens like USDJ, WBTT, SUN, APENFT etc.
It also has a "pool" feature where users can add liquidity to the pool and earn some fees. There could also be lose when adding liquidity so it's always adviceable to do your own research before adding liquidity to any pool.
JustLend
JustLend as the name implies, gives users the ability to borrow and lend. It is the first tron blockchain dApps to offer borrowing and lending features. Considering the fact that it is decentralized, we can come to a conclusion that the borrowing and lending are done between it's users. You deposit your assets which you would earn interest on and other users can borrow your assets. You can borrow and lend/supply assets like SUN, TRX, USDJ, BTT etc
As someone planning to borrow, you pay collateral for loans on any of the following cryptocurrencies TRX, USDT, USDJ, SUN, WIN, BTC, JST, ETH and WBTT and the lender/supply who lends to you would be paid interest depending on the fluctuations in the market demand and supply. Unlike borrowing through traditional financial institutions, JustLend provides less pressure, less borrowing procedures meaning less stress, immutable and transparent transactions.
Sun.io
Sun.io dApp was founded by Tron C.E.O Justin Sun as I said earlier they just recently acquired JustSwap and modified it SunSwap. SUN is the governing token of SunSwap. SUNSwap will now include TRC tokens swap and swapping stable coins, liquidity mining and staking in a bid to maximize it's functions as a dApp in the Tron Ecosystem.
Those who provide liquidity would also be rewarded with SUN, the governing token. The main way to earn SUN, the governance token is by staking TRX and other trc tokens.
How can you optimize mining rewards by staking TRX and other TRC20 tokens in Sun.io? Examples?
In the SUN whitepaper, aside from genesis mining it was stated that the only way to mine SUN was to stake LP tokens, TRX and other TRC20 (Regular mining).
Genesis mining on the other hand is a situation where we stake Trx into the SUN smart contract, the trx is locked up for a period of time usually 2 weeks and when the mining is complete the funds are returned to the owners and they are rewarded with SUN.
To optimize mining rewards means to make full and effective use of the mining rewards. Follow the steps below to know how to effectively optimize rewards gotten from mining.
- Go to your tronlink pro app. Click on discover (the third icon at the bottom) and click on SUN.
- Go to SUN, Scroll down and click on sun pools. It is supposed to look somewhat like the picture above.
- If you are in possession of any trx, you can stake it so as to get your trx and also earn SUN in return as rewards for staking.
- You can also stake the SUN to get veSUN, that way you are maximizing your rewards optimally. From the picture above, veSUN makes us mine faster so I hope I was able to show us how to maximize our rewards gotten from mining.
Conclusion
From this lesson we learnt what tron and decentralization was about then we had a look at various DApps on the tron ecosystem and some examples of TRC20 tokens. I hope we all enjoyed this lecture. I was able to expand my knowledge far beyond what I knew before. I would love to know what prof. @dilchamo thinks of my assessment of the topic.
In Support of the #club5050 movement, I powered up 100% of my earnings this week and will continue to do so.
#club5050 😀
Yes indeed. Steem to the moon 🌕