Former CTO, Co-founder of TRON Lucien Chen
In the book The Left Hand of Darkness, Ursula K. Le Guin used the character Istravan to say something that I will never forget, “There is only one genius of me. That is, to know when to move that great wheel of destiny, and to achieve the unity of unity and action.”
Two years ago, when I chose to be a CTO to create TRON with Justin Sun, I firmly believed these words. Today I choose to leave, hoping to rebuild a new TRON, and I still believe that. The reason why I call the project Volume Network is to pay tribute to these words.
During my two years in TRON, I felt the wheel of destiny turning rapidly and I also went forward under the drive of the wheel. At the beginning, Justin was in America when ICOs were banned as the unauthorized illegal financing activity on September 4th, 2017. In my efforts, the formation of the domestic team and the coding all started from scratch, and the currency began to soar from ICO. Until now, looking back on the past, it seems like a dream. There are hundreds of employees in the company. It has gone through the stages of open source, testnet launching, mainnet launching, the acquisition of BTT, ecologicalexpansion of TRON DAPP. We have also witnessed a brand-new project whose market capitalization has surged into the top 10 in just a few months. Thank Justin for providing me with this platform to grow up with TRON. But because of the irreconcilable contradiction between us, TRON is no longer the original TRON. I chose to leave, hoping to regain my original mind and rebuild my new TRON.
The reason for leaving is very simple. As a technical man, I feel very sad that the TRON has departed from the faith of “decentralize the web”.
TRON is no longer decentralized.
In the DPOS and Super Representative node, there is a problem of centralized voting. Some nodes have more than 90% of the votes with only a few voters. Therefore, the vote of ordinary retail investors has completely fallen. The total number of TRX in TRON is 100 billion, while the total number of votes for the super representatives is just less than 8 billion.
TRON is not associated with the Internet.
The technology platform of TRON was built by me. I certainly know that the real Internet applications cannot function in TRON network at all currently. The TRON ecosystem is still far from commercial applicationsthat users can really apply to. Bad money drives out good. Thus, DAPP in TRON is basically the gambling and funding project.
TRON has deviated from the spirit and original intention of the blockchain.
The spirit of the blockchain is decentralized, while TRON project is centralized. Token distribution is centralized, Super Representatives are centralized, code development is centralized. Even the community is organized under centralization. No diverse voices in TRON ecosystem. The whole project has developed into a monetary tool without any “decentralize the web” spirit.
I am deeply sorry to see the project that has grown up in my hands has become like this. The dreams and visions that Justin told me have been ruined. After several months of thinking, I decided to start the Volume Network(VOL) Project. Why should I do the VOL project? What is the VOL project?
Volume Network is a truly decentralized blockchain project. This is the project I dreamed of when I first joined TRON.
I. Realize the true decentralization based on mining
In fact, the DPOS mechanism of TRON is pseudo-decentralized. The top 27 SR nodes (block nodes) have more than 170 million TRX votes, and most of them are controlled by TRON. It’s hard for other latecomers to become the block nodes, so they cannot participate in the process of block production.
I always believe that mining blockchain project is the real spirit of the blockchain. Contribution to the project should be determined based on proof of workload rather than the size of the holding position. The data also illustrate this viewpoint. By the end of the Q1 of 2019, mining- based digital money accounted for more than 70% of the total digital money market.
What I hope to do is to introduce more people into the digital world through the mining method with the lowest threshold to achieve true decentralization. Volume Network can be mined through a hard disk. At present, the high threshold of ASIC and the high price of GPU make many people hesitate to mine. This kind of project, which eliminates subsequent players from entering the market, is unsustainable. I want miners and newcomers to use a new generation of hard drive mining method, and still get a safe and reliable digital currency while storing ‘useful’ files. This is a real sense of energy conservation and environmental protection, meanwhile significantly reducing the participation threshold, the majority of families and ordinary individuals can participate in the blockchain project with computer hard disk.
II. Innovative proof of space and time (PoST) consensus mechanism
At present, the mainstream of digital currency based on POW consensus mechanism in the blockchain is facing many difficulties because of its high energy consumption, centralized calculation and expansion problem. In addition, many digital currencies such as ETH and GRIN based on GPU and FPGA mining, are difficult to become the mainstream choice due to the high cost of GPU.
With the experience in TRON, I think that the PoST based on hard disk capacity is more suitable for the consensus algorithm, which is the proof of space time mechanism of Volume Network. So, what is PoST?
Based on the original proof of space consensus mechanism, PoST introduces the operator of time dimension. By utilizing the characteristics of verifiable delay functions (VDF), miners are required to perform some intensive mathematical operations after obtaining candidate block data, and then to select blocks by combining the two elements of fast verification results and candidate block data. Thus, a blockchain network which can save energy and protect the environment, and reduce user threshold, as well as protection against attacks, has been created. I believe that this will promote the great progress of the blockchain consensus mechanism.
III. Zero private placement and undervalued pure community driven project
Volume Network does not have any private placement and is a pure community driven project from scratch. Only 3% of tokens will be issued for initial exchange offering on BISS.com, and the remaining 97% will be generated by mining. Volume Network is valued at $1 million for the first round and only $30,000 for initial circulation. The reason I did this was to make a pure community project like Satoshi Nakamoto released Bitcoin.
I know that leaving TRON and rebuilding a new TRON is not for money as Justin did, but for returning to the origin of the blockchain project so that the decentralized community can participate in it deeply. Volume Network will reject all investment institutions and adopt such a low valuation. I hope this is a real community project. We take a total value of $1 million and a circulation market value of $30,000 to pilot the community, to feedback users, so that more users and developers can come to a consensus and participate in this project.
This is also a strong vision for me. We hope to rebuild a new TRON returning to the spirit of the blockchain.
I hope that as a new TRON, Volume Network is a truly decentralized, community-based, innovative consensus mechanism, storing useful files, and ultra-low threshold blockchain project that everyone can
participate in. I believe that this is the project that truly conforms to the spirit of the blockchain. This is the significance of our adherence to the industry of the blockchain up to now.
Former CTO, Co-founder of TRON
Founder, CEO of Volume Network
Lucien Chen
Website&White Paper： https://volumenetwork.io
Twitter：https://twitter.com/network_volume
Telegram Group：https://t.me/VolumeNetworkio
WeChat group： VolumeNetwork
