Filecoin Foundation Digest

Dear Readers, Welcome to the inaugural edition of The Filecoin Ecosystem Digest: All Systems Go - a journey into the transformative power of the decentralized web and its far-reaching implications across various fields. In this issue, we aim to spotlight the intersection of decentralized infrastructure with a number of key emerging trends - from the role of decentralized architectures in AI, to the rise of the space economy, to how sustainability intersects with the future of data centers, and more. The Filecoin community is filled with brilliant innovators - and in this Digest, we aim to assemble many voices to showcase how Filecoin is playing a critical role in the future of technology. First, we have a piece from Molly Mackinlay of the FilOz team highlighting the key focus areas for the Filecoin ecosystem - expanding outside just the domain of storage. Next, we turn to AI with an article from Sofia Yan and Ryan Matthew of the Numbers Protocol team - demonstrating the potential for decentralized technology to bring back trust to media via provenance and openness. Our exploration doesn’t stop at Earth. Dietrich Ayala’s piece centers on the role of decentralized data in the space economy - and the importance of the current moment to embed our technologies into the emerging standards forming in this growing field. We ground ourselves with a piece from Mara McMahon from the DeStor team focused on emerging trends in the enterprise sector. Then, we join Irma Jiang from ND Labs to reflect on how Web3 offers a new paradigm of community-based growth. Lastly, we look ahead to the future of sustainable data centers with Heath Behncke from Holon Investments. We hope this issue sparks your curiosity and inspires you to explore the boundless possibilities that decentralized infrastructure presents. As always, thank you for being a part of our journey. Warm regards,\ Jonathan Victor

Data storage and retrieval are core to how the Internet works. Today’s data infrastructure is dominated by Big Tech. But technologies like the InterPlanetary File System (IPFS) and Filecoin re-architecture that centralized framework to store humanity’s information on a decentralized network of storage providers. Filecoin is the largest decentralized storage network in the world. Since the mainnet launch in 2020, the network has grown to nearly 3,000 storage providers (SPs), collectively storing 1.5 exbibytes of data. This information ranges from experimental physics data from the most prestigious research institutions in the world to historical and cultural archives of entire island nations. As the amount of data we generate grows exponentially and the internet of tools building on it needs to scale accordingly, decentralized storage is emerging as the foundational layer of a new distributed web. The Filecoin network’s design, with a wealth of high-value hardware resources at the ready and a core protocol augmented by new scaling primitives, is poised to revolutionize the way we approach data on the internet –– unlocking decentralized data storage and processing. Mid-way through 2024 and looking ahead to 2025, three major focus areas emerge for the Filecoin network to unlock the true potential of humanity’s data. 1. Filecoin L2s: Powering Compute Over Data, DePIN, and AI In the Filecoin universe, storage units aren’t stand-alone boxes: they are composable building blocks for other use cases and business models. Many customizable data on-ramps are built on that foundation to optimize Filecoin’s offering for different use cases. The Filecoin Virtual Machine (FVM), which enables smart contracts and programmable storage on the network, enhances Filecoin's utility for both DePIN and AI applications, allowing for more sophisticated data handling and processing directly on the storage layer. Complementing FVM, the hyper-tunable InterPlanetary Consensus (IPC) framework facilitates highly scalable subnets. These innovations together empower specialized Layer 2 solutions with customized consensus mechanisms, supporting the launch of new DePIN networks building on Filecoin’s security and infrastructure in 2024, like Fluence's compute L2 and Basin's data L2. This infrastructure is fit for emerging AI use cases. The network's ability to provide seamless data access across different platforms and handle large datasets required for AI training and inference makes it an ideal host for decentralized AI model storage and distribution. L2 solutions like Akave are building specifically for AI data with innovative on-chain data lakes. And Filecoin storage providers have the technological resources to get in on AI advancement, with Bagel’s decentralized compute network aggregator that enables AI developers to train and store their models using the compute and storage power of the Filecoin network. A Layer 1 that provides real utility to Layer 2s can augment the entire Web3 stack –– from storage onboarding platforms to compute marketplaces to AI model infra. 2. The Hot, Fast Storage Layer for Web3 What if a storage unit could keep your belongings safe, but you didn’t have to drive to a warehouse, unlock a padlock, and haul them away in a truck anytime you wanted to use them? As a complement to the many cooler storage opportunities on the network, Filecoin is now unlocking hot, fast storage offerings –– and the Web3 ecosystem is ready to take advantage. Storage aggregator L2s are facilitating rapid access to Web3 chain state and smart contracts. New hot storage primitives like the upcoming Proof of Data Possession (PDP) are unlocking fast, cache-level storage of temporary data with highly efficient SPs and rising storage onboarding L2s, like Storacha. This transformation positions Filecoin as the backbone of Web3 data storage, and top ecosystems are already recognizing its utility. Solana is storing its entire, indexed block history on the network thanks to the Triton One and DCENT teams. By leveraging Filecoin's decentralized storage infrastructure, Solana enhances data resilience and also makes its historical data more accessible and usable to explorers and researchers. Filecoin is not only powering L1s but also the next generation of DePIN. Textile’s Basin is integrating data from WeatherXM, a community-powered weather network. Nodle is building a DePIN of smartphone nodes to capture and authenticate digital media, and the platform is integrating Filecoin to decentralize data storage on its Click camera app. Hot storage will onboard a wave of Web3 projects to unlock the full potential of their data –– and provide the proof-of-concept for other web3 sectors needing fast storage and retrieval, like gaming and IoT, to integrate Filecoin into their data architectures. 3. Scaling the Filecoin Economy As the network grows more sophisticated, the economy has evolved to scale with its expanding possibilities, focusing on reducing network-wide operating expenses and enhancing the efficiency of storage providers. The introduction of Distributed Deal Offering in the NV22 upgrade marked a significant milestone, substantially lowering SP deal-making costs. And Direct Data Onboarding enables builders to create smart contracts and new market actors to define the terms of storage agreements, making it easier than ever to close and execute deals. Ongoing efforts to optimize SP costs are coupled with a strengthening pipeline of paying users. Early signals, like FilStor’s recent closure of the first 1 PiB enterprise paid storage deal on the network –– indicate a transition toward a more sustainable economic model alongside increased mainstream adoption for the protocol. The emergence of decentralized exchanges and F3, a finality component designed to bring fast finality to Filecoin, pave the way for new economic opportunities on the network defined by cross-chain interoperability. This unlocks better UX using Filecoin in conjunction with other networks like Ethereum and is critical for the growth of the Filecoin L2 ecosystem. And the wealth of data on Filecoin can also give rise to secondary markets on top of storage. The network is primed for marketplaces for storage clients to monetize their data for enterprise, research, and AI-training use cases. Already, Nuklai, a collaborative data marketplace and infrastructure provider for data ecosystems, has integrated Filecoin via Lighthouse to make the platform’s metadata publicly accessible. Looking Above and Beyond Storage is the bedrock of data’s lifespan on the web, and atop that bedrock, the world can build so much more. The Filecoin ecosystem is laser-focused on tuning the core protocol to optimize scalability, efficiency, and interoperability, giving builders in compute, AI, DePIN, and other data-intensive sectors the breadth of resources to keep their data secure –– while unlocking its full value. With a thriving ecosystem of developers, storage providers, and partners, the network is well-equipped to drive widespread adoption. As we close out 2024 and train our sights on 2025 and beyond, Filecoin is poised to become indispensable for the future of data.

In April 2024, a 30-second video featuring Bollywood star Aamir Khan circulated widely across the Indian internet. Khan was seen criticizing Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi for unfulfilled campaign promises and neglecting critical economic issues during his two terms. The video concludes with the election symbol for Congress, Modi’s rival party, and the slogan: “Vote for Justice, Vote for Congress.” Khan's immense popularity in India and the video's release during the general election period likely contributed to its explosive distribution. The video was entirely artificial and generated by AI, yet a sizeable amount of the electorate deemed it authentic. It was representative of a surge of deepfake content created to mislead the Indian public in the lead-up to the national general election, a concern further intensified as it seemed that the source of disinformation stemmed from the country's major political parties. Disinformation, particularly AI-generated deepfakes, is a growing global crisis in 2024. This year, 40 national elections are scheduled or have already taken place, impacting 41% of the world's population. Counterintelligence agencies and news media in all of these regions are now evaluating measures they can take to mitigate the impact of disinformation on the foundations of their democracies. Disinformation in the age of generative AI Fears of disinformation initiatives are not new. In the aftermath of the 2016 U.S. election, both the Senate Intelligence Committee and the U.S. intelligence community concluded that the Russian government utilized disinformation attacks to denigrate the public’s faith in the democratic process and attempt to influence the outcome of the U.S. Presidential election. What has changed, however, is the complexity, sophistication, and quantity of the attacks. By lowering the costs and increasing the effectiveness of information warfare initiatives, generative artificial intelligence has exacerbated an already serious problem to extremes that counterintelligence agencies were not prepared for. Using Gen AI tools, nefarious actors are not only able to create fake images, voices, and videos that are indiscernible by most from reality, but they can do it at a scale that is difficult for authorities to curb. The consequences of this deluge of disinformation have been not just a significant shift in the political landscape, but also a decimation of public trust in the media. A survey conducted by the American Press Institute and the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research revealed that 42% of Americans harbor anxieties about news outlets employing generative artificial intelligence to fabricate stories. Additionally, 53% of Americans have expressed serious concerns about the possibility of inaccuracies or misinformation being reported by news organizations during elections. In part, the cause of this loss of trust can be attributed to the proliferation of fake news on less reputable sites that lack the rigorous checks or standards of the formal mainstream press. These news sources have managed to convince readers that their unreliable news is equally credible. Once universally trusted media institutions are being put on an equal footing to hobbyist bloggers or sites that have no qualms about publishing glaringly fabricated stories. Why trust is eroding from institutions The breakdown in trust stems from being unable to determine where a piece of media comes from –– a lack of provenance. Provenance refers to the origin and history of a piece of content, a term often used in the context of art or antiques. In terms of digital content, provenance refers to data about the origin and history of a piece of content, including the location, date of creation, and any changes made throughout its existence. By knowing the origin and history of media, one can verify if it was authentically created or artificially generated. A recent study conducted by the Center for an Informed Public (CIP) highlighted the importance of provenance in understanding media accuracy and trust. When users were exposed to provenance information for a piece of media, they were able to better calibrate their trust in the authenticity of the content and their perceptions of its accuracy. For deceptive content, users were able to successfully identify the content as less trustworthy and less accurate when provenance was disclosed. How we can add provenance to digital media One way to add provenance is by watermarking content, such as how C2PA (the Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity) proposes. This method involves inserting a watermark with a unique identifier into the digital content of the image and then recording that unique identifier. However, there are challenges in ensuring that malicious actors do not strip these watermarks (as noted by* MIT Technology Review*). Another approach is to leverage blockchains –– record hashes of content and data on a distributed ledger to create a verifiable log anyone can inspect. Numbers Protocol uses this method in its approach to trust on the web, allowing data to be stored securely while also maintaining its integrity. Content history records on the blockchain are both immutable and exist in perpetuity. The permanent accessibility of these records ensures that the data has not been tampered with, and by the public nature of blockchains, anyone can verify the origin of a piece of content, be it an individual or an organization. Case study: 2024 Taiwan presidential election The adoption of blockchains to solve these problems isn’t a distant future –– it’s already happening. Before the Taiwanese Presidential Election, in January 2024, there was widespread societal concern regarding the threat of disinformation campaigns. Due to Taiwan’s difficult political situation, attacks primed with creating confusion and sowing distrust were expected. Numbers Protocol collaborated with the Starling Lab, Taiwanese news outlets, and journalists to show how decentralized technologies can be utilized to rebuild media trust. We launched a pilot study using the Capture Cam App, which allows content recorded by partnered media and civil society groups to be marked and logged as having been authenticated by those groups. The media captured by users was registered on the blockchain, generating a traceable and secure record of the election's vital moments. One example was a civic society member who used Capture Cam to record the election counting process at the polling station to counter disinformation that there was widespread vote counting fraud. This provided a permanent record of the counting process on the blockchain. The Numbers Protocol created a digital provenance trail, and all of the metadata and assets were stored securely on the Filecoin Network, with multiple copies distributed globally and cryptographic proofs being submitted continually to show the ongoing integrity of the data. Conclusion The key to regaining trust lies in empowering audiences to authenticate and verify the genuineness of their news. In terms of provenance, blockchain outperforms other watermark technologies due to its immutability, which can effectively show whether content has been tampered with. Provenance provides a root of trust by allowing readers to verify that what they read is authentic and dependable. They can, with certainty, know that this is an article written by someone on a specific date and time, rather than just generated by AI. This is the foundation needed to regain public trust in media as a reliable fourth estate required for a functioning democracy.

The vision of Filecoin is of verifiably robust storage of data scaling to meet the needs of humanity over centuries. In order to achieve this vision we need to literally aim for the stars. We’re at a turning point in the intersection of space communications technology and the development of the internet itself. We are seeing a massive increase in satellites and space networks, and multiple industries priming for the changes that will bring. Back on the ground, the terrestrial internet is beyond human (with many non-humans on the way!) capacity and also constantly under threat from both climate disasters and war. For Filecoin to be successful, one key step along that path is helping the world understand the importance of open and cryptographically verifiable systems. How we consume, share and store data will change radically over the next few years –– which presents an opportunity to set a course for open, interoperable communications standards with these primitives at their core. Open Source, Open Standards, and Uncle Sam Space is increasingly recognized as an important frontier. While headlines are dominated by a handful of companies, the substance of the industry is driven by government contracts, both civilian and military. The lunar economy is growing, with no end in sight. Investment continues to grow, and missions being planned today are sometimes targeting well into the 2030s. The chart shows the total investment in billions of dollars on the left vertical axis, ranging from $0 to $15 billion, and the number of deals on the right vertical axis, ranging from 0 to 300. The horizontal axis lists the years from 2012 to 2021. (Prometheus Space, 2022) A stacked bar chart with a line graph showing annual investment sources from 2014 to 2023. Investment types include Other, Corporate, Venture Capital, and Angel/Individual. Both total investment and the number of rounds generally increased, peaking around 2021. (ARS Technica, 2024) As is renewed activity from the public sector (e.g. the Artemis mission). In recognition of this, the government has been pushing heavily towards open modular systems at all layers of the stack. This is a stark departure from expensive, proprietary, long-term vendor contracts of old: a change now enshrined in law. This is critical as the industry is legally mandated to work towards open and interoperable standards –– which naturally dovetails with the technologies that have been developed in the broader Web3 community. If we want to help shape the direction of this industry, we need to be a part of the conversation. Why IPFS Two words: Cryptographically verifiable. Wait, two more words: Transport agnostic. Hm, actually those four words unlock 1.5 more words: Locationlessness. Five and half good words which, in the end, describe characteristics of IPFS that combine to form a powerful set of capabilities in the context of the harsh conditions of vacuum, radiation, latency, and everything that can go wrong under the sol. IPFS was designed for when things go wrong. To unpack how each of these properties are critically useful in space: Cryptographically Verifiable One scenario that's been discussed as a good illustration of what IPFS brings to the table is frenemy satellite communication –– an increasingly important challenge given the rapid increase in space traffic expected over the next decade. Cryptographically-verifiable content-addressing of data means that messages can be exchanged with confidence that they have not been modified by radiation, equipment malfunction, or even a frenemy that you're sharing space with, while still allowing emergency communications. Transport Agnosticity Given the mandate for modularity, there’s a need to have standards and interoperability at the application layer, without needing to know too much about the hardware and transports available. IPFS neatly handles this transport agnosticity because we can cryptographically verify the content as it lands at its destination –– enabling the portability, modularity and extensibility we are used to in terrestrial internet application programming. Locationless-ness Once you can trust that you will receive –– cryptographically, verifiably unmodified –– what you ask for, you no longer have as much concern about where you get it or who from. Locationless-ness means that applications can interact with and operate on data from anywhere reachable, without any prior configuration or knowledge required to find data given the application knows the content address. This can be particularly useful in sharing positioning data in a satellite mesh or broadcasting emergency environmental condition data. Mission Accomplished Filecoin Foundation, Protocol Labs, Lockheed Martin, and Little Bear Labs collaborated to show that IPFS can deliver on this vision, and after a couple of years of planning, design, and testing, the mission completed in October 2023. The mission goals were to: Demonstrate the suitability and benefits of the IPFS protocol for satellite and space communication. Lay the groundwork for eventual large scale storage in lunar/space use cases. Introduce open standards for decentralized communication and data access in space. Introduce and demonstrate cryptographic verifiability as a key component in open, interoperable space applications. The demonstration was completed in the fall of 2023, putting IPFS into space around its 10th birthday. The mission was successful, which set the stage for future deployments of the protocol in real world use. After simulation tests, ground tests, and hundreds of meetings, the IPFS-based application was deployed to both a satellite in geosynchronous orbit and a ground station in Littleton Colorado in the U.S. for a series of tests and transmissions. Diagram showing the operation of LINUSS satellites running Myceli with four satellites in orbit and a ground server. Steps illustrate the satellite establishing a radio link, maintaining a strong Line of Sight (LOS) link for data transfer, downloading data, and stopping data transfer when the radio link is broken. Connections to IPFS interface and the open web are indicated. The LINUSS satellite is designed to be updatable, and is described as “the size of a four-slice toaster.” A satellite orbiting near Earth alongside a floating red toaster. Another satellite is visible in the background. The phrase "Yeah, pretty close I guess" is written in white text next to the Earth. You can read more about the mission in the official Filecoin Foundation announcement. Distant Horizons? IPFS isn't quite interplanetary yet, but it is certainly extra-terrestrial. This is a remarkable accomplishment which shows great promise in IPFS as a part of a resilient, open source, open standards, and interoperable future in space communications. Cryptographic verifiability is an increasingly important primitive for robust, reliable internet communication. This demonstration shows that we can implement content addressing in the modern space technology stack, and deploy it successfully. This sets the stage for more systems building with cryptographic verifiability, like Filecoin, to be competitive in these emerging markets –– and continue to serve humanity’s information, wherever and whenever it goes.

At DeStor, we are dedicated to revolutionizing decentralized storage solutions by seamlessly integrating them with enterprise applications. With over 50 years of combined experience in enterprise data storage, our team has a deep understanding of this segment of the decentralized storage market. We specialize in connecting data owners with Filecoin storage providers through an intuitive and transparent platform. Why focus on the enterprise market? According to Veritas, the average enterprise has 10 petabytes of data, making even small gains in this sector translate into significant revenue for Filecoin storage providers. Since launching in April, 2024, we’ve secured 3 petabytes (PBs) of paid data storage deals and have an additional 39 PBs in the pipeline. Our early success with enterprise customers is no coincidence; it’s the culmination of months of research, conversations, and meetings with IT decision-makers. In this article, we share the key feedback and insights we’ve gathered from these IT executives. Our goal is to empower projects within the Filecoin ecosystem to accelerate their go-to-market strategies and successfully engage enterprise customers. Privacy and Security Top Concerns Decentralized storage is of keen interest to enterprises looking to enhance resiliency and incorporate verifiability into their flows. However, survey feedback from our storage industry executive dinner series in Hong Kong, New York and Chicago highlighted two primary concerns gating adoption: data security and privacy. 50% of IT executives identified data security and privacy concerns as the main barrier to integrating decentralized storage within their organizations, despite clear breaches from traditional public cloud storage providers like Microsoft and AWS. A donut chart illustrating the primary barriers to integrating decentralized storage within organizations. The largest segment, representing 50%, is labeled "Security & Privacy." Other barriers include "Lack of Strategic Alignment" at 20%, "Organizational Cultural Resistance" at 10%, "Regulatory Compliance" at 10%, and "Technical & Interoperability" at 10%. This insight revealed that targeting IT leaders with security titles at their organizations (one of our initial buyer personas) is off the mark. These individuals are primarily concerned with preventing malware and ransomware from entering through employee actions. Focusing on infrastructure-based titles (CTO, IT Director, etc.) responsible for recovery post-attack will likely prove more fruitful as these executives are more likely to resonate with robust data recovery and security solutions provided by decentralized storage technologies. The AI Opportunity AI continues to be a hot topic with IT leaders. While the aforementioned data privacy and security concerns are delaying their adoption of decentralized storage, 40% of survey respondents agreed that integrating decentralized storage and AI is a necessary evolution to stay competitive. This confidence inspiring feedback aligns with exciting decentralized AI developments in the Filecoin ecosystem, investment community, and beyond. Even with the promise of decentralized AI, IT leaders still have concerns about the technical challenges faced when integrating decentralized storage and AI. 30% of respondents expressed concern about interoperability within their existing IT infrastructure, and 60% are grappling with the potential for increased complexity in data governance (the overall management of the availability, usability, integrity, and security of an organization's data). While integration and governance concerns are absolutely valid, we believe they can be eased through a combination of education and high-touch technical support. We’ve seen Filecoin storage providers find success by developing proof of concepts (POCs) to win over IT decision makers. And we’ve personally experienced the impact that compelling educational content can have in unlocking paid storage deals, especially with innovation focused teams within the enterprise. Summary The feedback we gathered from IT executives reveals that enterprise adoption of decentralized storage is gated by concerns around data security, privacy, and integration complexity. However, IT decision makers recognize the promise of AI and the role decentralized storage will play in keeping their organization competitive. Successfully engaging with enterprise customers will require clearly defined buyer personas, impactful educational content and the ability to deliver high-touch technical support and POCs. As marketers at heart, we’d be remiss to not have a POV on messaging. Yes, features and benefits-based marketing can move the needle, but it’s increasingly challenging to cut through the clutter of the noisy enterprise IT media environment. Messages that resonate focus on being different versus. being better, creating opportunities to deliver impactful emotional appeals. As organizations continue to navigate the intricacies of integrating AI and decentralized storage, we firmly believe the Filecoin ecosystem is on track to build the foundational stack for the next generation of the cloud.

Harnessing the Power of Decentralized Ecosystems The strength of decentralized ecosystems lies in their broad participation and spirit of sharing. They are built on the diversity of thought and experience brought by their participants. Community-led and in-person activities are crucial for the continued prosperity of these ecosystems, as they enable members to connect, share perspectives, and collaboratively address challenges. But these connections benefit from taking place in person, not just online. Research consistently shows that in-person events offer significant advantages over virtual ones in terms of engagement and networking opportunities. A report from the Harvard Business Review indicates that "in-person interactions are 34 times more likely to result in effective outcomes compared to virtual meetings." The value of having local community ecosystems lies in their ability to address specific regional needs and leverage local knowledge. By empowering individuals to contribute and benefit from technological advancements tailored to their unique contexts, these ecosystems succeed where a single, centralized actor might not. Community-driven events act as catalysts, connecting local audiences with global contributors, thus enhancing the overall cohesion and effectiveness of the ecosystem –– qualities that are increasingly important in a digital world. In this piece, I discuss my experiences moving from a network participant to the head of Filecoin Orbit for the Greater China region –– and the learnings I’ve had along the way. New Avenues for Connection through the Orbit Program One power of decentralized communities is that anyone – across the world – can contribute and engage in the ways that make the most sense for them. Like many community members, I initially felt uncertain about how to contribute effectively to the Filecoin network. However, participating in the Orbit program – a community-led initiative to spread the word about Filecoin and IPFS – has created new avenues for promotion that leverage the strong technical community in Asia –– and beyond. The Orbit community has not only broadened my understanding of the global ecosystem but also showcased the activities and expertise of ambassadors from various regions. For instance, ambassadors in Africa are educating students about Filecoin while those in Europe and the Americas frequently organize technical exchange meetings. This has inspired us to transform our events into more targeted community strategies. For example, in the Asian market already equipped with abundant hardware resources, more qualitative network activities through the Orbit community provide differentiated opportunities for growth. In early 2024, the Orbit China community conducted roadshows in three different cities in China. Notably, the attendees, and their interests, at these roadshows varied significantly. The western region, rich in hardware resources, sought more information on hardware deployment solutions; the central region's event attracted mostly venture capitalists and financial professionals; and the southern region's meeting drew a larger number of technical developers. The Orbit events brought together participants with different strengths, creating new connections and uncovering new business opportunities. Although these events all centered on learning more about the Filecoin network, the focus of the content shared and the takeaways for participants differed significantly across regions. Yet, the common goal was to bring more value and utility to the network, ultimately driving adoption for both companies and the entire ecosystem. Relying on the power of local ecosystem participants, we can pivot these events to focus on the topics and interests most powerful for the local ecosystem – integrating the unique characteristics of different regions into impactful events that drive a cohesive network. Standardized Collaboration in Decentralized Ecosystems Building and maintaining brand identity and community buy-in across a decentralized ecosystem presents unique challenges. Without a central authority to guide the narrative, the responsibility of creating a cohesive experience falls on community members. However, by developing tools, standardized processes, and branding systems, it’s possible to create a unified and engaging experience that resonates with the community. Perhaps counterintuitively, decentralized ecosystems thrive when there is a clear and standardized collaboration process. In the Filecoin Orbit community, the process for logo and imagery design exemplifies this idea. Fil-city.io, developed by Filecoin Foundation, is a versatile branding platform tailored for global Filecoin events. It provides modular, customizable toolkits that enable event organizers to quickly create visual materials that adhere to brand standards while reflecting the unique style of each city. For example, at FIL HK, Fil-city.io set the primary visual color to bright yellow, inspired by Hong Kong’s night market culture, which was seamlessly integrated across the event website, promotional posters, and on-site decorations. These pre-designed assets allowed our designers to make swift adjustments based on event needs, saving time while ensuring brand consistency. This efficiency lets organizers focus on creative design ideas, maintaining alignment with Filecoin’s design principles, ensuring events are instantly recognizable, and enhancing community engagement and impact. Maximizing Event Impact with Tailored Promotion Strategies Building on standardized collaboration processes, event organizers can significantly increase their event's impact by choosing unique promotional strategies that suit their regional context. Below are examples of marketing strategies the Greater China Orbit community has employed to appeal to attendees in the Asia-Pacific region. Personal Invitations: For FIL Hong Kong, we prepared personalized "invitations" for key figures within the community that were tailored to be shared on social media and group chats. Besides showing respect to the invitees, this encourages them to share the invitation on social media platforms. In the context of the Asia-Pacific culture, where interpersonal relationships and social networks hold significant importance, this approach leverages the influence of key figures, allowing them to share with their social circles quickly. Local Media: We enhanced promotion by working with local media: in exchange for displaying media logos on our promotional materials and at the event venue, local media published event-related content on their platforms. This helped to expand the target audience for FIL Hong Kong to other ecosystems. We ended up partnering with 20 Mandarin and Cantonese media outlets, and 40% of the attendees were new to the Filecoin ecosystem, including individuals from various sectors such as venture capital, other ecosystem developers, and exchange personnel. By leveraging the local media market, we were able to draw more people into Orbit events to learn about the Filecoin ecosystem. Group Chats: Sharing information across different group chats is a highly effective strategy for quickly disseminating content. Many participants join multiple group chats to stay updated on projects or learn new information. For example, as a deep participant in the Filecoin ecosystem, I’m a member of nearly 10 different Filecoin-related groups, each with its own focus, such as storage providers, FVM developers, or general information sharing. Additionally, I’ve joined active technical discussion groups for other protocols to keep up with developments outside the ecosystem. Leveraging this group chat culture, we promote events by distributing electronic posters with essential details and QR codes for easy registration in various active groups. This approach consistently results in a significant increase in registrations. These tailored methods helped us organizers reach a larger potential attendee base more effectively, resulting in 650 attendees throughout the week at FIL Hong Kong. Reflection and Summary: The Transformative Power of Community Players in a typical centralized structure strictly follow a single authority’s guidance, often overlooking the power of collective effort. Decentralized communities are characterized by their multicultural nature and the diverse backgrounds of their members, presenting challenges and endless possibilities. My journey from a participant to the head of Orbit for the Greater China region has underscored the transformative power of decentralized ecosystems. By leveraging standardized collaboration processes like co-design systems and tailoring promotional strategies to fit regional contexts, we have been able to enhance the impact and reach of our events; our attendance outcomes demonstrate the power of local organizers with the intel to capture regional audiences. These efforts not only address local needs but also contribute to a cohesive global network –– a network that is greater than the sum of its parts.

As we move into the era of digital autonomy, driven by machines and machine-generated data, we need to vastly improve the world’s capacity to manage and process data at a scale previously unimaginable. At Holon, we believe the intersection of data infrastructure and green energy needs to be re-imagined and re-focused on commercial applications to enable significant, sustainable productivity gains and information resiliency for humanity. The exponential growth of data Through extensive research and analysis of data trends, The Holon Data Report conservatively forecasts that over 75,000 Zetabytes (ZiB) per annum of data will be created by 2040, largely driven by machine-generated data. This represents an exponential shift from the total of human-generated data that pushed us from 1 ZiB in 2010 to over 100 ZiB 10 years later. Today, approximately 4 ZiB of enterprise storage is available globally. Based on our data projections, the world will require closer to 1,000 ZiB of enterprise storage, or some 250 times larger than today’s capacity, in the next five years. And even at this level of capacity, the demand for data storage will outpace the capacity for data storage, as energy consumption to meet these data demands is much more than what our current infrastructure can support. Alongside these exploding volumes of data, the data business model underpinning the world’s largest companies generates over US$300 billion per annum in revenue. In this context, the resourcing for the world’s data growth is now an urgent issue. Meeting future data needs – Web 2.0 vs Web 3.0 The Web 2.0 technology stack, maintained by air-cooled hardware solutions and grid-supported metro data centres, cannot physically afford to support the level of data creation we anticipate. Simply put, the cost and energy requirements will be unsustainable in a world dominated by machine-generated data (see Part 3 of the Holon Data Report). However, Web 3.0 data networks represent a profound structural shift in the way we can run data at scale, such as: Decentralised Infrastructure** - Moving away from having to trust nodes (e.g., AWS, Google, Microsoft) to trusting a network where data is verifiable, significantly reducing storage and compute costs and resources; Energy Transparency** - Providing complete transparency down to the “byte” – allowing precise energy efficiency calculations for data infrastructure solutions that are not achievable in Web 2.0; and most importantly, Data Ownership** - Enabling ownership of data through a structure that allows for every data point to become a digital bearer object. In pursuit of these capabilities, Holon is currently building a bridge from traditional energy architecture to Web 3.0 through two main infrastructure solutions: Green Modular Data Centres: Utility-scale, non-latency dependent, 100% renewable-powered centers that interact with the grid to support renewable energy transition; and Green Edge Micro-Data Centres: Distributed, low-latency solutions that are 100% renewable-powered. Building distributed cloud solutions, like our Green Data Centres, where the storage providers own and control the solar, batteries, and IT immersion-cooled hardware, is the only way that we can begin to reduce the energy consumption needed to process a rapidly expanding amount of data. And while this technology is built on a Web 3.0 technology stack, it also has the advantage of servicing Web 2.0 – and beyond. The future of data economics is green edge The crux of all of this is decentralised, distributed data infrastructure – bringing closer proximity between the user and data source. In a world of exponential data creation, these edge data solutions will become increasingly valuable as the key generator of efficiencies and economic benefits. Web 3.0 data networks such as Filecoin are, by design, the ultimate edge solution, with the capability to horizontally and vertically integrate distributed and decentralised infrastructure, energy, and data. Additionally, storage providers, who are essential in driving the critical infrastructure of Web 3.0 open data networks, have the potential to access two revenue streams (fiat and digital asset rewards) across traditional Web 2.0 data services and emerging Web 3.0 consensus services and verifiability. We believe that this killer combination produces the required economics for Web 3.0 networks to disrupt the current data model, significantly bootstrap their networks, and provide the world with sustainably green, decentralised, and distributed data solutions. In the future, Web 3.0 data networks will facilitate large-scale data trusts to solve some of humanity’s greatest challenges. Green data storage and compute providers will increase in value as they drive the next evolution of the cloud model, where energy and cost efficiency are not at odds but rather aligned features. Inevitably, market forces, consumer demands, and business efficiency push the future of data to this ideal – to the green edge.