Lab 9: Project 1 work time
Today you will start work (and hopefully make a lot of progress) on project 1. For this project, you and a partner will research a single cryptocurrency (other than Bitcoin and Ethereum) and prepare an informative, engaging, technical 10-minute presentation on it for your peers.
Topics
Your topic will be a single cryptocurrency (also called an altcoin) or crypto asset (such as NFTs or other exotic such things) that is interesting from a utility standpoint (i.e., it has some cool or unique purpose) and from a technical standpoint (i.e., it uses some cryptographic or algorithmic ideas that are different and worth learning about).
A large list of cryptocurrencies is available here, sorted by market cap which is the total value of all that crypto’s worth today: https://coinmarketcap.com/
You are not free to choose any cryptocurrency, because I want to make sure we learn about a variety of different kinds. Some kinds of cryptos to look out for are:
- Proof-of-stake blockchains (e.g. Algorand, Cardano)
- Proof-of-storage blockchains (e.g. Filecoin, Storj)
- Proof-of-something-else
- Stablecoins with collateral backing (e.g. Tether, Pax Dollar)
- Algorithmic stablecoins (e.g. Fei, Frax)
- Fully anonymous coins (e.g. ZCash, Monero)
- Special-purpose coins (e.g. PotCoin or Fully Usable Crypto Karma)
- Something that doesn’t fit into any of these categories
Once you have a topic and a partner, enter them on this spreadsheet and be prepared that maybe your instructor will ask you to change topics if there are two groups doing something too similar.
Sources
You will need to find good, quality, technical sources of information on your chosen crypto. If your presentation teaches us nothing beyond a quick Google search and reading Wikipedia, you haven’t done a good job.
Some ideas for finding quality sources:
Every crypto should have its own technical description and documentation, sometimes called a whitepaper. There may also be other documents adjacent to the official whitepaper. It’s a good place to start!
If your crypto is based on some new technical ideas, did those come from actual research papers? Google scholar is a good place to search for those.
Other articles and blog posts you find online. It’s inevitable to get this kind of source, but it’s also the most difficult to sift through and distinguish useful, accurate information from high-level overviews, over-simlifications, or just hype. Some tips:
- Check the author. If it’s a good online article, it will say who wrote it, and that person will have some credibility to know what they are talking about.
- Check the source’s sources. Does this article itself explain why its claims are true, based on market data, source code, other cited articles, or any other verifiable sources of information?
- Check the length. Are they getting in depth about what is being discussed, or just making broad overviews for a general audience?
Finding good sources is really hard but it’s an important skill to practice. Expect to take some time on this.
Note on USNA blocking: The USNA network tries to block information about cryptocurrencies sometimes. You can circumvent this in various ways… or ask your instructor for help if needed.
Written submission
You need to hand in on paper, at the start of your presentation, a page or two that:
Says your names and your topic clearly at the top
Lists all sources you used. Specific format is not important, but should contain author name(s), title of the article, the containing publication or website (if relevant), and date when it was written (if known).
If I type this in, your article should be the first thing that pops up on Google, in which case there is no need to also write out the URL.
Along with each source, write a few sentences explaining what specific information you learned and used from this source. I’m not interested in a summary of the article, but a brief statement of what you used from the article.
Presentation
You need to make a great 10-minute presentation for your peers, which will be presented two weeks from today on 14 April during lab time.
Your presentation should…
- have some slides (which will also need to be submitted, electronically)
- be engaging and informative
- be slick and well-prepared
- involve both lab partners seamlessly
- be technically precise and accurate
- explain why your crypto exists, and how it achieves its goals from a technical standpoint
- keep the audience entertained but also thinking and using the background we all share
- try to go into a little bit of details on at least some aspect
- use minimal jargon or concepts haven’t all learned in this or other classes.