Fresh From FF: Mid-February, 2024

Check out the latest updates about what the Filecoin Foundation team has been up to.

Mid-February Highlight

Connect with the Filecoin community at ETHDenver. Join the Filecoin Foundation team February 29 through March 3, at ETHDenver Devtopia, Booth 204, to explore the ecosystem with our team and engage in immersive demonstrations and discussions. On March 1, join us for the Filecoin Orbit Ecosystem Showcase to hear projects across the ecosystem present lightning talks and demos. You can also hear from Filecoin Foundation staff at FIL Dev Summit, which FF is sponsoring. The summit is a gathering of developers, builders, and engaged community members who contribute to the core protocol and network evolution of Filecoin.

Ecosystem

Developer Advocacy

  • Calling all builders! Join us for the first Filecoin hackathons of 2024:

    1. The Data Economy Hackathon is a six-week virtual hackathon beginning on February 18 and focusing on Filecoin and IPC. The hackathon emphasizes projects that harness data value, innovate for scalability, create dApps utilizing Filecoin, and enhance the network.
    2. The Filecoin track at ETHGlobal London, March 15-17, will be an in-person Filecoin hackathon — track details will be announced soon.
  • FF’s developer advocacy team will be on the ground at ETHDenver and FIL Hong Kong. Reach out if you want to set up time to chat with developer advocates at either event.

Storage

  • This month we laid out FF's 2024 priorities for supporting the storage provider community; read more on Filecoin Slack. Some of FF’s 2024 focus areas for supporting storage providers include:

    1. Paid storage: FF is focused on supporting the launch of 6+ software platforms in Q1-Q2 2024 (complete with SP integrations) by supporting testing, design, partnerships, contracts, enablement, community engagement, and amplification. Multiple UIs aimed at supporting deal-making with different target users will help increase network activity.   AI & Filecoin: FF is incubating 3 AI-specific initiatives that use Filecoin as a key part of their value proposition.
    2. AI & Filecoin: FF is incubating 3 AI-specific initiatives that use Filecoin as a key part of their value proposition.
    3. New Entrants: FF is focusing on community recruitment of MSP/VAR/GSIs and improving the underlying health of the ecosystem.
    4. Community Activations: Since December 2023, FF supported five events across the globe to create opportunities to discuss key topics and to drive awareness of capabilities, with more planned throughout 2024.
    5. Creating actionable community content: Weekly Storage Provider Working Group meetings, the Zero To One Program for potential and new ecosystem entrants, a monthly Customer Working Group, and multiple DWeb Decoded episodes on the future of Filecoin/AI/DePiN and other prominent community topics are just some of the ways FF is here to support the storage provider community.

Network Operations

Governance

  • FF’s governance team is finalizing an audit for on-chain voting tooling and refining edits to a public plan to test sentiment analysis tooling.
  • Additional documentation and support work for new Working Groups and FIP0001v2 remains ongoing.
  • Follow the governance GitHub for weekly updates on the latest topics and developments surrounding network FIPs and governance.

Fil Plus

  • Wrapping up the v5 Notary Allocator election process, Filecoin Foundation’s Fil Plus team reviewed and scored 97 allocator applications and selected 85 new allocators. New allocators were announced in the February 6 Governance call. The Fil Plus team provided information to organizations not selected as an allocator on how to update their applications and resubmit during the next cycle, beginning in March.


User Experience Improvement Team (UXIT)

  • The UXIT completed its dogfooding exercise for dashboard.starboard.ventures. Once the team compiles implementation recommendations, it will share feedback with the Starboard team.

  • Following its dogfooding session last year, UXIT is planning to implement usability fixes to CID.Contact.

  • The Fil.org website redesign is underway, focusing on:

    1. Addressing SEO issues arising from subdomains
    2. Working alongside the design team on a site-wide style guide
    3. Analyzing results from usability testing

Comms, Marketing, & Events

Marketing & Comms

  • The Filecoin Sanctuary playlist is available on YouTube! Learn more about the conversations in Davos with the world’s brightest minds across business, government, and technology about Filecoin’s value as a vital piece of infrastructure for the next generation of the web.

Events

  • FF announced its 2024 events calendar! Visit fil.org/events to find the events FF will host, sponsor, and support, and discover how to get involved in some of the best opportunities to learn, build, and network with community members around the globe.

  • Check out the Filecoin at ETHDenver website for all of the ecosystem events happening throughout the week. This site will serve as the place to list all events for the Filecoin community. If you are organizing an event and do not see it listed, please add it via the form on the website.

  • FF and FFDW San Francisco Events

    • 2/27 - Social Impact Summit, sponsored by FFDW, in partnership with Blockchain Law for Social Good Center
    • 2/28 - FFDW Coworking and Collaboration Day
  • FF ETHDenver Events

FFDW

  • FFDW project partner Starling Lab published a Dispatch about the technical work behind its project, "Mom, I See War." The digital museum is a collection of over 10,000 drawings from children in Ukraine, which are stored on IPFS and encrypted archives, with more sensitive metadata stored on Filecoin.
  • FFDW project partner Gray Area opened enrollment for "DWeb for Creators," an 8-week learning experience for artists and activists interested in the decentralized web.
  • FFDW project partner TechSoup hosted its first Maker Studio Sessions Town Hall for people with ideas on how to leverage blockchain, cryptocurrencies, DAOs, and the DWeb in real-world projects. Session recordings are available on the event page after the conclusion of the session.