Welcome to the Cardano Newsletter!
Published by the Cardano community team every two weeks, this newsletter will provide you with news, updates and events about the project! If you would like to unsubscribe from the Cardano newsletter, you can do so by clicking “unsubscribe from this list” at the bottom of this email.
Upcoming Shelley Incentivized Testnet Main Snapshot: what to expect?
Over the past few months, we have been rolling out our Shelley testnet. You may have been following our reports about progress on the self-node and networked phases. Now, we are heading into the third and final phase before Shelley goes live on mainnet: an Incentivized Testnet that all ada holders can join to earn real rewards.
This marks a significant milestone in the progress of the Shelley testnet, and in Cardano’s development. During this phase, ada holders will be able to earn real rewards from delegating their stake on the Incentivized Testnet. At the end of the program, they will be able to transfer those rewards back to their mainnet wallet. Rewards will also be available for those operating a stake pool on the Incentivized Testnet.
The Incentivized Testnet is the beginning of Shelley’s rollout, which will culminate in the release of the codebase to the mainnet early next year and, with that, the realization of a secure, decentralized proof-of-stake (PoS) network. Exciting, unprecedented times.
For the latest news on what’s coming up next, sign up for updates here.
*Those that have not been able to follow all the recent developments, we highly encourage you to read IOHK’s latest detailed blog post below.
BALANCE CHECK: What Happened Last Tuesday?
We have recently done the first test snapshot, the balance check, which happened on 12 November 2019. The balance check is a practice run ahead of the official UTXO balance snapshot, currently targeted for later in November. It will let us test key functionality and also allow the community to validate that their mainnet ada balances can be accurately captured ahead of the Incentivized Testnet.
What was the balance check?
The balance check is a practice run we did prior to the official balance snapshot. Participation in the balance check was optional. Users who did not take part in this first snapshot will still be able to join the program later in the month.
Watch Tim Harrison’s video about the successful completion of the Balance Check snapshot last Tuesday.
Main Snapshot: what to expect and look out for?
After the practice run last Tuesday, we are now getting ready for the main snapshot, currently targeted for the end of this month. Once we have checked everything works as expected, we can proceed with the main UTXO snapshot. This snapshot will represent the version of the Cardano blockchain that will be used during the Shelley Incentivized Testnet, where you can earn real ada rewards. These rewards will be remunerable once the Shelley mainnet is live. More details on the mechanics of this at a later stage.
Three additional things to pay extra attention to:
- It is important to note that the amount of ada you are holding in your Daedalus or Yoroi wallet at the time of the main UTXO snapshot (targeted for the end of this month) is the amount that can be used for staking and delegation on the testnet. You must ensure you have access to your seed words. You will need these and recover your balance details within a special Rewards wallet that has been created for the Shelley testnet.
- Please beware of anyone claiming you need to send your ada to them for staking or delegation. This is not the case! You do NOT need to send them anything.
- Also, you do NOT need and MUST NOT send your mainnet ada (the ada in your regular wallet) to the testnet or a testnet address: this is not possible and if tried, will most likely lead to loss of funds.
*You can find a list of supported wallets in the blog post above.
On November 12th Charles Hoskinson sat down for a quick clarification about the balance check 2 ahead of the Incentivized Testnet launch.
Charles Hoskinson’s Latest Surprise AMA - 7 November 2019
Charles Hoskinson sat down on November 7th for a quick AMA. There he discussed the upcoming Balance Check and UTXO snapshot for the Shelley Incentivized Testnet. He also broke down some of the next steps after the completion of the testnet and reminded everyone to verify their keywords so they can successfully redeem their ada on the Incentivized Testnet. Enjoy!
Cardano Foundation’s Nathan Kaiser meets Startups in NYC for Mentoring program at dlab
Cardano Foundation supports startups in New York City. Nathan Kaiser, Chairperson of Cardano Foundation will be joining the mentorship program at dlab next week and meeting with enthusiastic entrepreneurs in this wonderful city. Through this one-day 1on1 mentorship program, Nathan will have a deep-dive consultation session with each company and share technology industry insight.
Dlab is a startup accelerator and venture studio exploring new topics in decentralization and blockchain technology, powered by SOSV and EMURGO. Dlab’s global mentor network includes over fifty entrepreneurs, investors, and industry experts with diverse backgrounds including technology, business, government, legal, and academia.
Greetings from Gianna, Cardano Foundation Legal Counsel
Cardano Foundation, in line with its international expansion plans – has strengthened its legal department has appointed Gianna Abegg as Legal Counsel last June. Gianna spent the last 4 months busy dealing with legal and compliance issues for the Cardano ecosystem. Recently, she introduced her role and shared a story of her life via a forum post - Greetings from Gianna. In the post, you will learn about what she does and what she likes!
The Cardano Foundation’s COTI collaboration for adaPay solution soon to go live!
Last month on October 23, the Cardano Foundation and COTI, an enterprise-grade fintech platform, is currently developing an ada payment gateway. We would like to share with you once more that the offering is said to go live before the end of this month and will allow merchants to accept ada payments with a near-instant settlement into 35 fiat currencies directly into their bank accounts. Following COTI’s announcement of Cardano’s ‘pay with ada’ gateway for merchants, COTI will soon open up to merchant applications for companies wishing to accept adaPay as a means of payment in their online stores.
If you are interested or want to get more information, please send an email to adapay@coti.io
IOHK Development on Cardano & Cardano Roadmap: what has been updated?
How has Cardano been improving? To get an idea and overview of what is being done, a weekly Cardano development update comes out fresh every Friday! Get the latest lowdown on what IOHK teams have been working on, check it out below!
Check out the Cardano Roadmap here
EMURGO Joins NTT Docomo’s “5G Open Partner Program”
EMURGO - the official commercial arm of Cardano - has joined NTT Docomo’s 5G Open Partner Program, in Japan. Under this program, NTT Docomo is providing a 5G partner workshop to partnered companies and organizations with the mutual strategic objective to share resources about next-generation 5G networks between joined enterprises and explore potentially aligned synergies.
EMURGO Official Merchandise Now Available Online!
You’ve asked and now it’s finally here! EMURGO is excited to announce the long-awaited launch of our official merchandise online. Starting now, global Cardano fans and ada holders will be able to purchase a whole bevy of our new & official EMURGO “merch” at the EMURGO merchandise store on CryptoSupreme - a Cardano merchandise retailer. There’s no better way of proudly showing your support for the drive of global Cardano adoption!
EMURGO Celebrates Yoroi Wallet’s 1st Anniversary!
Last month EMURGO celebrated the 1st anniversary milestone of the launch & release of Yoroi ADA Wallet for the global Cardano community. Yoroi Wallet is the first of EMURGO’s in-house products developed for Cardano in its mission to drive the global adoption of Cardano and aligns synergistically with Seiza Cardano Blockchain Explorer and the recent release of open source codebase Tangata Manu.
Cardano Community Meetups
Upcoming Meetups
RSVP to these events!
19 Nov. Tokyo, Gaming & Blockchain Meetup, by EMURGO
20 Nov 2019 Cardano Meetup in Seoul, Korea by WangJae Lee
21 Nov. Amsterdam, Problems and differences between POW and POS & The automotive on the blockchain
23 Nov 2019 Greek Cryptocurrency Community Meet-up with Cardano in Thessaloniki Greece
7 Dec 2019 Cardano Meetup & Discussion in Tokyo, Japan, by Hideki Takeshi
22 Jan 2020 Cardano: What Does A Next Generation Blockchain Look Like? in London, UK, by Robert Castelo
View all Cardano Community groups here
Nothing in your area ?
See if a group already exists on our meetup.com page and connect with the local organizer!
OR
Start your own Cardano meetup group? Learn more here
Stay safe! We, or any of the Cardano affiliated organizations/personnel, will never ask you to send us Ada or any other asset, nor will we ask for your password or pass phrases. Official partnerships/affiliations will always be announced through official channels. Use caution and do your own research before transferring funds.
More at 'How to Stay Safe Online’.
To receive the newsletter straight to your inbox, subscribe on our website! Go to cardano.org , scroll to the bottom, and fill in the subscription form. It’s that easy!