The price of Polkadot’s native token hit an all-time high (ATH) this week, soaring above $30, as the company laid out the next steps of its plans and the systems to finalize the network launch.
Polkadot Roadmap Outlines Layer 0 Deployment Initiatives
Polkadot released a roadmap highlighting that it is currently in its Rococo phase, the first of three major phases until the network goes live.
Here is a breakdown of the roadmap.
Rococo Testnet Rollout
Polkadot (DOT) plans to continue with its launch of parachains, also referred to as application-specific data structures. These parachains, just like with parathreads, are what will allow Polkadot to pair with other more established networks, such as Ethereum and Bitcoin, through a mechanism called Cross-Chain Message Passing-lite.
Polkadot is still in the Rococo phase of testing its parachains. Once the code is evaluated and approved, we can expect to see Polkadot submit its vote via onchain governance to power the parachains and slot auctions on Kusama.
Kusama Rollout
The scalable multi-chain network, Kusama, is what Polkadot says will serve as an “additional proving ground” for parachains. It’s effectively a sandbox designed to support further testing and network effects before launching on Polkadot. Its looser parameters allow developers to test new ideas while also helping gain visibility amongst community members.
Enabling parachain functionality will ultimately fall down to a vote by Kusama governance. Should the rollout be approved, non-permissioned candle auctions will be used to allocate 100 parachain slot leases. Polkadot emphasizes that users can expect a new auction “roughly every two weeks,” with more set to come available as each lease expires.
Polkadot Slot Bidding
The slot bidding involved in parachain offerings plays a significant role. Rather than using the initial coin offering (ICO) model, which can be (and was) easily exploited due to the limited terms of proof needed, its parachain offerings incorporate candle auctions alongside a heavy focus on governance.
But these aren’t traditional candle auctions. Rather than taking the typical route of using a random number to determine the duration of its opening phase in bids, Polkadot’s will be retroactively determined, meaning that the bids that have been placed earliest stand the highest probability of success.
Once an auction has ended, Polkadot will deploy the winning parachain to the network at the beginning of its lease period. Parachain slots can be leased in six-month increments for a maximum of two years, after which they’ll go back up for auction.
Although difficult to estimate the costs of running these parachains, given the price, is “purely a function of market supply and demand,” as Polkadot is aiming for a safer and more secure way of bidding with its parachain auctions.
Next Steps
Once auctions have ended and these parachains are live, Polkadot says the network’s launch will be fully complete. While it’s possible to see future upgrades to the network, this scalability will ultimately be in the hands of its community.
What do you think about the Polkadot network and the project’s roadmap? Let us know what you think in the comments section below.
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