The Graph — When The Potential for Web3 Is Unlimited
Introduction
"What Google does for search, The Graph does for blockchain" I saw somebody told this somewhere when I did the research about The Graph. However, in the big picture, I do think that The Graph is significantly bigger than that as this project will definitely play a key role to open a new era of Web3 in the next time. Why am I saying that? Let's find out in the following part!
What Google does for search, The Graph does for blockchain
What Is Web3?
Firstly, let's study about Web3! What is it? What does it differ from Web 2.0? How does it can affect our daily life? Back to the previous versions, we have Web 1.0, which is mainly simple structured web types that interact with low numbers of users and data, providing almost one-way content. However, this is the first generation of the mass Internet and opens many changes for the Information Technology of the world. Next, we got Web 2.0, which is an explosion of social networking sites (Facebook, Youtube), online media, forums that have the ability to link and help users interact with each other. The content can be uploaded by the user and often incorporates many modern technologies to make using and browsing the web easier and more conveniently. However, Web 2.0 have a very critical problem that is users do not control the contents they create on Web 2.0 but the Website they use. Therefore, users have to comply all the rules the platform gives them. In most cases, Website owners are the ones who actually control your contents, more or less. So you may not know when your content may disappear from the platform. That is the main reason why Web3 was created. Web 3.0 (Semantic Web) is the 3rd generation of internet technology aimed at creating intelligent websites and web applications. Web3 focuses more on P2P network like blockchain. Sometimes, Web3 is also referred to dApps, which are built on blockchain network like Ethereum or IPFS. Other technologies such as open APIs, data formats, and open source software can also be used while developing applications. However, there are still some disadvantages of Web3 which are:
· Huge amount of data
· Unclear data
· Security
Why Is The Graph Critical To Web3?
The Graph was born to resolve all the issues mentioned above. Regarding Huge amount of data, as we are all known, there are a lot of blockchain projects was created after the booming time of crypto space in 2017. Many ICOs was held, a large amount of money was raised. That leads to a huge amount of data that need to be indexed if a dApp developers want to query data from some particular smart-contracts and it may takes days, even months for that huge data query. However, that heavy work seems to have been offloaded with The Graph. An illustration of this is that you can have a look at this tweet from @santisiri from @DemocracyEarth.
He only need 1 hour to implement @ensdomains using @graphprotocol, which should take him more time without The Graph. So Huge amount of data? Perfectly solved by The Graph! Talking about Unclear data, there are also many entities in smart-contracts like for examples with Pillar contract, developers will have to spend days or even months to filter and choose the entities they want to query. However, with subgraph that I helped to deploy as a Curator, which you can find here he can easily choose whatever entities he want to query, all in one place, as clearly as it can. Unclear data? Perfectly solved by The Graph! In case of security, when data is easily shared, it also carries a high risk of information security. For example, such information can be forged, it can be replaced in transit, information that carries malicious code, information is not encrypted. All of these concerned will be handled by Indexers who provide indexing and query processing services, Curators who signal what subgraphs are valuable to index. Besides, The Graph protocol is being audited by the most notable auditors such as OpenZeppelin for network contracts and Trail of Bits for off-chain components. Additionally, state channels implementation is audited by Consensys Diligence as well. Security? Perfectly solved by The Graph! Next, we will move to the next part which is the most needed subgraphs for Web3?
Which subgraphs are the most critical for Web3?
In my humble opinion, as a development of Web 2.0, the multimedia content will continue to be the leading in the space since everyone always need some entertainment in their daily life and there will be more and more dApps related to producing video were built. Therefore, subgraph like Livepeer will play a significantly role in the next wave of Web3
About Curator Program and Why I Believe In This Project
I joined this amazing program right after seeing information about it on their Telegram Channel. I signed-up without any hesitations because I want to be part of this unbelievable project, the project I do not think I can find after the launch of Ethereum. And what happens till now proved that my decision was absolutely not wrong since I have learnt a lot of things from the program. I know how a blockchain data provider work, how I can evaluate a subgraph to see if it is quality and complexity or not. I know how to write a schema, mapping, a code, which I have never imagined that I am able to do before. Furthermore, I made new friends who helped me a lot in learning about subgraph. The reason why I strongly believe in the successful of this project and want to be with them in the next steps is that they are providing something unique which no others have done before with the purpose of making crypto more accessible for everyone no matter who you are and what you are doing. The appearance of The Graph is a critical missing piece of this space during the past time. As The Graph on the way to their mainnet launch, I do believe that the participation of Curator will be more important in the network as their role will be exposed more to provide the most quality subgraphs for The Graph consumers. In other words, Curators is the face of The Graph's service. That's why I love this breathtaking project. How about you?
