AMA for the Community: With Emblem Vault and COVAL Founder Shannon Code — April 2021
Interviewer: We have a healthy list of questions to get through, so let’s get started here @Shannon Code (Emblem Vault Dev). A lot of the questions fell into a few major topic areas, and we’ll try to cover all of them. Here we go:
Interviewer: How are you doing? How is Dawn? And how is Eric? We haven’t heard much from them recently. Can you also clarify their roles in the project?
Shannon Code (Emblem Vault Dev): I’m doing pretty great, Lots of work is being done and I love that, some major upgrades have happened which I also like.
Eric is well, working lots of talks in the backend
Dawn is also well.
Shannon Code: Dawn is taking the CEO role, and keeping Eric an Me on task. But leaving the telegram and discord day to day to us and the moderaters
Interviewer: You guys have a lot of work on your plates. Would you ever attempt to hire someone to speed up the process?
Shannon Code: We have eric working on filling a few roles currently, specifically looking for another developer and a UI/UX person to spice up our presence online (DApp, websites). We are at a place in development where a developer can hit the ground running.
Shannon Code: Specific specialties we are looking for is solidity, security, and chain link. We could also use someone versed in secret contracts.
Interviewer: So there is movement, wonderful. Next up — Is there any future plans to allow people to invest in the company behind circuits of value for equity and not just the coval token? Big/Angel investors/ the general public, or even opening up to the community/token holders first?
Shannon Code: We are entertaining these types of inquiries and are engaged in talks with a few parties who are looking to invest. We entertain both token purchases as well as equity positions. We of course we would only take on equity partners who’s vision is aligned.
Interviewer: How would you encourage those that are interested to reach out?
Shannon Code: send all requests for info, to hello@emblem.pro and I or Eric will get back to you.
Interviewer: Thanks — Some direct comments come before these questions: You should provide information on the progress of development. Investors are hungry for information. There are people who want more communication on this topic. How do you plan to address it?
Shannon Code: We are working toward a more formalized news release cycle. It’s not set in stone yet, but will include a newsletter on a 2 week cadence, as well as periodic press releases that should distribute to crypto news sources along with financial news sites such as forbes, yahoo business and more.
Shannon Code: I also hope to address some of these progress questions today.
Interviewer: I think this builds off of the last question, since this might be the simplest way to relay information to COVAL holders… When will the circuits of value website be updated? Out-of-date information may be dissuading new investors.
Shannon Code: Eric is actively working on updating website information. While I don’t have an exact date, it is a high priority to update our website with current developments and directions.
Interviewer: Partially addressed above — if I had to interperet this question, basically development is a never-ending cycle. So what will signify that “start” moment: “We’ve been hearing a lot about the marketing that is planned after marketplace is released. Can you expand on what marketing is coming? What exactly should be expected?”
Shannon Code: we plan on engaging with a crypto marketing firm that will focus on making our brand visible everywhere, which will include articles in major crypto publications. This has a cost, so will probably be best executed once websites are updated. We can likely start this before the marketplace is complete.
We will likely need to have a much better information site to allow people to learn about the project with more information than a website can convey.
Interviewer: Okay, believe it or not, that summarizes the Marketing type of questions that were submitted, then next few will be about exchanges, then other support topics
Interviewer: “Let’s get some exposure to the AMMs! Cake, Uni and Sushi…let’s not forget about Lazy. What do you have to say about that?”
Shannon Code: I agree, we need promotions, farms and a simple way for our users to locate our AMM’s on these other networks. We are available on more networks than most projects, but I agree people just don’t know about that aspect. A section on the websites will likely go a long way in this.
Interviewer: Then the Centralized Exchange Question: Can we get on a bigger exchange? What does it take to do that?
Shannon Code: hundreds of thousands of dollars is the answer we have determined. Large exchanges have a huge queue, and most tokens get fast tracked by paying a third party negotiator (which really means, listing managers have preferred people they work with) While a few exchanges offer free listings, we have discovered that this process isn’t as transparent as we had hoped. For example we got a quote for $250,000 for a listing on OKEX.
Shannon Code: As we move forward with marketing, we will pick a firm who has had previous success in listing on tier 1 exchanges.
Interviewer: Thanks for the clarification. A miscellaneous question before we move into the Emblem Vault app specific questions: Would you consider making short, ten second videos to help explain the feature of Emblem Vaults?
Shannon Code: I love this idea, and YES!
Interviewer: Ha, I like the conviction! Will you (and when) would you add support for other major currencies like XRP and Nano?
Shannon Code: We will add other currencies as time and demand permits. For example @DesktopCommando often makes vaults that he can determine the address for, send tokens that aren’t yet supported (tracked) be a vault and then shows me. This type of proactive work goes a long way in determining the order by which we add network / token support.
Shannon Code: also, If any project or users of a project want to expedite support, we would entertain a paid enhancement of emblem vault in that direction.
Interviewer: Would you ever place any Emblem Vault features behind another paywall?
Shannon Code: We certainly might. For example, editing vault details might have an additional cost. Our highest level goal though is facilitating the purchasing of vaults using fiat, be it credit card, or other banking system. The idea being to make participation in the product as simple as possible.
Interviewer: Remove all barriers to entry — good stuff… Up next: What’s going on with the Coval bridge function between the different chains? When can we expect it to re-launch again?
Shannon Code: I hope to get the bridge functionality back up within the next week. The past month has been spend hardening and making the application more stable. While the system was unstable we had issues where some bridge transfers being stuck, others being lost and a few got extra tokens. We have mitigated this with the new system, but need to turn it back on and do some heavy testing.
Interviewer: Is it possible to incentivize people to use those different chains? For example, xDAI and Fantom might not have so much liquidity
Shannon Code: It’s possible, we would need to work out how to best do this. We haven’t spent much time on this problem yet.
Interviewer: I couldn’t find a good way to simplify this question for most peoples’ understanding. So here it is: Are there plans to connect with existing projects to offer multi-chain wallet integration with DeFi since multi-chain liquidity and farming is next evolution.?
Shannon Code: We are starting to get requests from a few projects about this very thing. We have always built this system in a way that other projects can integrate with EV. I suspect that it will be easier to plan for this type of thing after we have our first third party integration. That being said, I have been opening up a dialog with a few wallet apps, such as Exodus and Zerion. But nothing yet about specific integrations.
Interviewer: Next topics: Safety/Security, NFT2NFT, FUEL, and then wrap up before opening the room again.
Interviewer: Can you add support for Trezor/Ledger? For COVAL? For Emblem Vault?
Shannon Code: We certainly can. Trezor / Ledger has been requested quite often. We will investigate the requirements of doing so as time permits. Unless some project expresses an immediate interest (or payment) which would expedite this support as well.
Interviewer: There are a few questions about the security and safety of the vaults, so I think you can explain this one at length to cover all of them. How would you convince someone that the application is secure? What mechanisms are in place that make it safe? Can I lose my funds in an Emblem Vault?
Shannon Code: Technically anyone can lose funds in any system, but primarily it would be due to a user losing access to the wallets that contain their vault(s)
We have taken great care to make the current system’s encryption / decryption methods hidden even from us. The aspect that generates keys and handles claims is simple, has no logging and utilized a remote hardware security appliance located within the google infrastructure. Which also maintains backups in the event of catastrophic failure.
The system relies on a cryptographic signature of the owner of a vault, which can’t be faked or man in the middled.
Our future move to secret network should fully decentralize this process by using their heavily audited systems.
Shannon Code: We also invite reputable auditors to reach out for private access to the source code so that they can bless the system as it stands.
Shannon Code: the move to secret will also enable a fully transparent (meaning no hidden source code) audit.
Interviewer:: And that leads right into the next question in line: When will be the Secret Network ready? Some people not a fan of EV using Google Cloud.
Shannon Code: I’m unable to give a date for this. Their system is foreign and uses languages we aren’t familiar with so progress has been slower than usual. Luckily secret has just released a “Fellow” program which will give us more direct access to their internal development team for assistance.
Interviewer: On to NFT2NFT: How does the team plan to maintain its competitive advantage; particularly with regards to how its NFT2NFT marketplace plans to stay a necessary mechanism across a growing landscape with bridging solutions, how does the functionality of the marketplace not get integrated by bigger projects?
Shannon Code: Well… Largely by mass adoption. We are designing this in a way similar to open sea. Any NFT will be a potential trade candidate, no need to deploy pairs or contracts to facilitate the trade, so it’ll be inexpensive to begin swapping. We are also already live on a bunch of EVM networks, most competitors aren’t able to move to these network fast enough. We can also incentivize using our swaps.
Interviewer: When (roughly) do you expect to have the NFT2NFT market place up and running?
Shannon Code: Once we have a UI, I expect it will take a few weeks to have our beta live. In other news, I plan on making a simple interface to facilitate internal testing (yes with you guys here that want access) middle of next week.
Interviewer: Can I make a marketplace from my collection of vaults? (I take this as ‘categorizable’ sub-collections).
Shannon Code: To start, you will be able to embed your vaults places like a blog or other website. This can be a simple way to create a personalized storefront. We are entertaining the idea of making collections of vaults using tagging. For example you could add the tag “Art Edition 1” to a few NFT’s that would enable what you are asking about.
Interviewer: “Will the new marketplace keep the same UI? The current UX is not attractive.”
Shannon Code: It will not. We are having an entire new interface built for the swaps.
Interviewer: To wrap up this topic: Is there anything else you would like to describe to us about the upcoming NFT2NFT functionality?
Shannon Code: It will not allow swapping an NFT between 2 networks, unless they are contained within vaults on the same network. But… given that we can facilitate cross chain swaps if they utilize vaults, we don’t expect any other swap system to be able to replicate this feature.
Interviewer: Great infos on NFT2NFT — now the next big topic, FUEL.
Interviewer: I am going to let you preach about this topic. There were a number of questions, and they all revolve around “how and when will Fuel be implemented?” with focus on staking, distribution, timing, and benefits to coval, etc…
Shannon Code: We are close enough to the launch of FUEL that we cannot discuss this topic with specificity.
Interviewer: Okay — go as far as you can, and let me know when it’s closed(edited)
Shannon Code: Unfortunately this topic will have to wait a bit longer. /
Interviewer: It’s closed! okay, a couple wrap ups, then we’ll open the room up.
Interviewer: “Partnerships?”
Shannon Code: We have a few in the works. One of which will be utilizing our platform to distribute their influencer’s NFT’s This will be pretty huge in my opinion. social network influencers that are outside of the crypto space currently who wish to monetize their existing content and users.
Interviewer: Last one, then it’s open season: There is a lot that has been developed and deployed in the past couple month. Is there anything not asked here that you would like to highlight?
Shannon Code: Yes, I’m glad you asked.
We just added support for BCH and the NFT’s you can make on there.
We now back the entire system on IPFS, so images along with metadata are stored on IPFS and each vault provides a direct link to the IPFS data
We have added Transak support which allows users within allowed regions to purchase crypto directly into their vaults using standard fiat funding sources such as credit card.
Shannon Code: We have also added a “newest” page which allows better discovery of interesting vaults.
Other Resources
Visit the $COVAL Telegram Channel to meet Shannon and have your questions answered directly:
