Lessons Learned Running the Largest State Channel Network by Mo Dong of Celer Network

okay so six everyone for attending the talk and you know I'm gonna try to switch things a little bit that it's like you know been felt a lot of us like division of state channel and also other layers of constructor OPM and generalized you don't roll up and I'm gonna more focus on the production and development stuff that we kind of do and that you know this the real world experience that we gain from running and operating this data and also some applications on top and the some of them are recovered very keen are stories and sometimes sometimes that there are very horrifying stories in a young let's make it a very kind of a you know interactive attack so we're we launched so first of all we are a country analyzing the state Hamilton okay but you know we're kind of okay on the channel side and we are hunting for the new something new and so what did we launch we launched the first version of the generalized este channel recently always are coming and lunch we're gonna wrap this up with a broader knowledge so that people can actually want different emotion back together with different other than the preschool but what we launched it is not only the underlying problem but also two additional things first is this eSport gaming model where people can just download this your mobile app they're a bunch of html5 game play and we can compete with each other either in generalized a channel or just single game system in this form and they can kind of paid each other conditional a amicable win prizes and then we also wrote up we're up but also wrote out this fair access gaming SDK which is targeting not talking about developers but just be no more gaming developers to make a blockchain a additional nation has for them in addition to you know advertisement flows and an in-app purchase so these are the things that we're doing aside from the underlying problem which is that among existing seroius ticket which we're going to upgrade to a also with a lifeline there that it's written purely JavaScript Assuan hopefully we will come home and kind of convert to a common standard so other acts what is their axis is just this time you know you play game with a friend and you know we actually have done for games that submitted by third-party developers today this was like an Asian gumbo game this is in card game itself is running things that on that state channel and you can see that the interaction between two players that very instant there's no be like and you know this fish jump the game though is a kind of an html5 game I mean we had a mechanism it's corainder will compare the score it effectively act as a conditional dependency article or the Alpha chain conditional payment like basically in this era metal very important construct you can do is something called object so you know what we have right now is we launched the desk for about a month and a half and to date we process that about 1.4 million dollar transactions took a lotta work you know these are competing against each other around the globe about 1,100 and universal metric users are competing over about three contrary solvent matches so you know roughly quite a few users I'll show you some of the product matrix later so this is the base error as gaming SDK and you know we also opened that open source said the smart contractor they charged my contract construction alongside with the html5 constructor for the Google game and you know okay so that that part of this finds I just want to kind of quickly go through because I want to get to the kind of experiences of running this so I'm gonna you know split this faction to three parts and a good path so what the karateka I think the most encouraging thing charism layer two is definitely you know and what we have been seeing this is just like a a kind of a screenshot I just did it knocking or weeks panel tracking the status off the application you can see our daily active users are north of 2,500 on that at that number and you know we haven't done a lot of marketing around that per se like but the key thing to note is that look at the day one of attention to that they were retention these sometimes of young them fifty fifty seven percent or 50 percent that is like you know three almost as three times an industry standard for you know kind of you know no more mobile computers and for this graph I'm only just showing the real money place so you know but we're not a congesting if you simple it at the time you know crypto clearly have the same magnitude level of magnitude users as we have right now but you know they are just ready so but we're connecting it and also users are coming back into the application that's what we think is most important that is a user is a great teaming in that and therefore you know we can actually you know have a viable product or have a product market fit in the market basically and you know another thing that is a kind of a good experience that when we operate this product and also the platform is about user acquisition so we always had them a small myth saying that okay there's a this master segment of the user that is blocking users right so and therefore because we're a long time we've had to market ourselves to work with logic units either through coin market cap or either scan or these councils so those who haven't marketed at an avocation before those sites are insanely expensive you know you wouldn't like I wouldn't name the exact terms of like they're insanely expensive so we change the things around and it twice you some says not use our conditions so systemic user acquisition has been a long missing piece in this block in every home everyone just assumed this app doesn't work so everyone just assumed that whoever uses the application must have been a developer of some sort so but we actually tried Google Facebook we're just publishing advertisement that between optimizations that on application or listings and these kind of the application you know promotion stereo stuff yeah we just have like promoting it just another single app so you know it turns out this has been gone our time that is that we're seeing about OneNote API kasidiaris things like to a call to install just using a box is actually catalyze that we use a lot of different avenues oxygen user acquisition channel and these users are actually retaining like pathologies we're marketing towards the right market you know whether it's building a product out there but these channels doesn't work you know it works the ten times better than the audience and of course there are some exceptions ticking everything that is we we actually launched a small user acquisition campaign on Finance as well I think violence does have like high quality users we tried this with some other exchanges as well but like - definitely having a high quality user base and our paying user jump to break out from like a country and that they have problems so another thing I want to share these about you know developer adoption so what our production side we are currently having about $150 then upload it you know either it's a small game or it's like a medium-sized game but the model makes the sense for the app developers because anything need an additional flight position task for them so the management model we have is that if you're playing in this game in a win tonight and a kind of a compete with each other what's gonna happen is that let's say you're putting one dollar into the pan and then opponent $45 again in the end the winner is only character only gonna cap one point six dollar and forty cents close to it so it makes a huge sense for these you know mini game developers because of a head on the sweet spot of the unit game drivers today that even some developers even they have you know hundreds of thousands of users or even for one minute wheelers their monetization have is Omega - and you know by using blockchain we open a global might work for them and this global money flow happens to be very well suitable for our underlying technology as well payment channels and I kind of post payment channels it's not only one directional is like very very balanced and that's work about payment channels and flowing against each other and many hotel revenues are flowing through our games so we have seen you know puffing up and you know we have about like 10 games you know pipeline that is ready to be released we're just trying to pick the right time to do that and I think this is something that is very encouraging flaws that is we think we're finally starting to find some business model for existing developers that can provide them additional value because the us project it's not like we're trying to move the ball team to make something but like liber8 to the possibility of launching out also there to to provide that additional dollars and that is kind of our approach and also on the other side the same thing that is a very very kind of targeting no more users who have no experience on their blocking experiences and you know we're including with so so far you know we took a very meticulous approach in designing the protocol we we minimize the underlay protocol message exchange exchanged across different kind of Intel's in the entertainment at work the amount of the message we actually investment we proved that the amount of the option message is changing the openings that our protocol even actually the minimum and you know we did a lot of things on the deployment of the system and therefore is actually holding water we learned this in a hard way when we launched the first beta test map on you know in March this year which turned almost to a disaster because the you know there were just a human unit flowing work and return to work but now everything victory you wanna be one okay so I'm not only here to talk about the good stuff that I've learned but also share with you some of the bathtub and hopeful they can save you guys some visit first infrastructure infrastructure has been extremely hard if not moaning and building our only known or unknown but the relying in control is running across water basically is your web streaming you know our node also relies on Webster II and we didn't want to build our own web straight buster to hurry give loans to private events to market back so we were looking for different kind of solutions okay so we were trying to use a tiara which unfortunately doesn't actually work and we were also trying to kind of us being out which costumes on all the time therefore finally we kind of realize start to rely on a new upcoming infrastructure so far the experience has been pretty good so it's like definitely really using them and but even with that and even though it easier when we actually look at that different importance as well because we do want to kind of try to be a generic out there too I was the biggest upload a blog I wrote working hard or any other blockchain is living furniture is just not there and 99% of uptime is definitely not enough and you know I would just go back to the previous slide here you may see that this you know on September 6 which is I think yesterday we had a huge drop of active users what because the infrastructure we relied off had an issue in a banker like we couldn't see the deposit in fact there for all the users food for trying to deposit and withdraw is they couldn't just finish the flow and our email our support email boxes just overflowed with customer complaints and people are swearing at us on figuring out of them so this is like you know the importance of the furniture and another thing about you know this is good like in there - you always have this committed to rock this build and start and resolve this you know it's not very widely tested all right so we have so whenever real money is on the line for their hundred percent definitely cheap and there are two ways that they cheat the first way is just kind of rage quit again basically in the middle of the game they don't finish the generalization okay they pick how many of them I think that's kind of an interesting statistic so there are a small commodity people are trying to achieve by going offline that is roughly about seven percent of the other total players that we have seen you know you just really think what it's not really bad but it's also a bit hard to tell because we're kind of trying to make a kind of realization assumption but everyone that business we're just kind of trying to assume that whatever just Pat is time to think Marsha so so in-car disconnection ratio it cost seven percent in all the games running now a mother/son person how much how much how many percent of the games actually got into this pure thing which is basically said the other guy says all in the sky laughter I'm gonna just and I started to disputed against ways against this kind of race traitors that is not a marginal about ten percent of the people actually start to so these numbers are interesting you know we were basically trying to understand that why they want a lot more people trying to dispute it really and you know maybe just because of the amount money on the line is not that big or maybe it's just like you know and we also had this case where you know there were funky conversations so we started to launch this by using full verification you know and then you know federal verify the phone number and also other one died in the channel both gave up another time to time and you want to imagine that this kind of bill comes up off layer two with this kind of concept also kind of a you know blockchain is resting you to the worldwide upon hunters it's not actually so we we launched the video that the campaign on day one and after about two days we start to see 100 pick it up and after because the kind we see about six thousand five hours I think trying to deposit dye into the stage and get the free guy and we've got a to data it did happen and you know of course there's no kind of bias on the contract regions the IPS that we're seeing are all coming from mahaganesha and they have to to congressman he usually is what we what we are seeing like the funny car is coming from a very sophisticated because I'm sure there is some VPN tunnel tool towards that so we contracted that by immediately blocking all IPS from that and after just two hours all over the world they are IP popping out doing so and and a technical test we actually do from number verification we use a pretty good conical verification service to it all these fake phone numbers Google Voice number stuff like that but it still happens it happens a lot and just like real stuff that we need to be careful about when we actually launch control product and also we have been noticing there are car computer box are to play that one okay and you know because como cocaine is not exactly kind of a fair game because it's like it if you've got the first hand you always have and if you wait you're almost like always way so even which changes the Concord a little bit to make it more even but even that which we see there are parking saving food players with extremely low reaction time and we believe that there so this is this is a party you know sometimes appearing blocking project or doing project product actually need to go beyond who's watching equals to have an even real working so we built on that you know matching engine to to relearn the profiler to learn the diffusion of the winning rate for each others to our users and we single all these kind of outliers in the users and we match those together so unique added all platform balls are fighting results and you know because the business model we have that is basically cutting some action please quickly this raising mechanism that will make the bottom because it's like making make a little bit like and they're just kind of just you know I generally do friction and and there are a lot of layers of friction involved in this process you know first ways quality positive usually is raining hard the actual Dom evaporation much much higher than 2,000 but only that one people actually learn how to eat olive and also happen to be more deposited from their one to iñárritu this is something that we have in constantly trying to address in our product and you know see if there are better ways to do this and we have you know you know once one interesting thing is that even though we're doing type of you know totally non cost but again and the total a kind of a blockchain style payment system has a gaming system it's always good to come familiarize the users with them familiar context so we introduced this thing called better pay and in that in a fuel and any kind of questions that we are and we answer we just say think about this as you're attacking at home and think about the blocking asset as you're saving time so that actually played by introducing that kind of a small explanation in the app the deposited Rachel you know basically time to fall over over like their wallet so these are the small things that have a smooth alter for a chance even though it doesn't that kind of a adhere to the pure blockchain spirits you know it's almost like we're pretending we're not watching and on your name we are at watching company so this is like I think a general approach that week we found out that that extremely those popovers and we are also implementing some console work teachers I'm going to cut about that we're implementing something called truck with a colorful strap that except when you order are actually starting to buy die the first time we're not letting them to apply into a contract at all or put this Michael we're basically creating a contract out creating a channel that is a counterfactual and you know basically the user didn't use the user use the user enough crazytown but we are created in california and in fact the channel itself is also not in statute it's also it's almost like a virtual channel I thought to a certain amount with let's say the donors by Mike five time we allow user to instantiate this kind of channel so we don't need to consider gap and you also need to me to console care and we never will never do they want to additional make a lot more art finds you in stolen by that's when we try to cover and to be wrong with when a user study on us and we know early without shoulder is actually you know reduce the cost or reduce the friction of the company and also like interesting thing that if the customer support you know before this we never talk about customer support either thing and you know and that we launched a user facing product and customer counts and that we receive a lot coming every day and I would say we did Jennifer your calculation that a comment at least are actually because of the software doesn't work or there's a bottom well we are very soft works so about 15% of them are actually a possible problem but about 85% of them are just educational conferences and I think that is partly because we are kind of a buying or we're basically doing systematic user acquisition of course is not without actually specifically targeting watching others but you know I think that part I'm not sure how to kind of a makeup and you know we're still trying to refine the segment we're talking to and you know hopefully we can either have find a scalable customer support solution because if you go up there and ask all these customer support all sorts of companies that can use the for my app my habit is that block can happen they will say nope so the because that no like you know maybe 10 times already that basically said okay how about we find someone who can just answer the call tell customer this is a staff you need to do and they just said okay no no like we don't do blocking stuff is this stuff is too complicated we cannot understand this so it is different from a very different from cow attack for example and you know now I kind of completely understand our testing sighs you know coinbase early days when they literally had no probably the same stuff there okay another interesting thing happen so this is the move out and it wears you on festive life and the interaction experience with Apple okay so that's exactly that so you basically come shot up a shot in a hat again and you know because of some regulation changes and you know you wake up the other day is coming to your app you basically average every step we move just a one step further if you think what our path it is a high risk and it comes in all the sensitive materials in there it contains cryptocurrency it contains why are this you know really romantic gaming easily or not it contains that you know application inside of the application are you guys longing design-wise I look at Congress what is possible if you're decentralized our sections go today like you came to Cal so it has been the educational process to work with Apple advocate the reviewers that and this process and we have made a lot for West there and hopefully you know the Apple in this round at the store very soon the next step because basically many of the things that if you were launching mobile app that will be can ask tourism is this ETH stuff some game hotel that we missed the game token you need to buy the slipping averages so we fight with them in a practice problem for about months to let them understand that we are not selling these we're not creating these in something that is the currency that is generated by the descendants and that took very long time price and yeah that's that's our experience but they're reasonable geocanvas I would say like a you know if you come to keep working with them there are they're reasonable ability you can find with all the proper kind of guidelines in the Apple Store to my advantage I was all ready to do that so if you ever considering launching a mobile app on a passport with cryptocurrency let it go okay so la acción runs via our app is basically the ugliest part of using launching again like not necessarily miniature state channel channels but definitely Sofia Conrad knows they can just Park you in recovery and you know for all the bad stuff I think I have a good solution for that but a for the ugly stuff I think the Internet industry just yeah and with that if you want to and that's pretty much it so the absolutely there are there are actually two problems the first problem is dynamic to evolve in html5 and most of the react authors are killed by them because they do not they are extremely sensitive in frankly the application and you know we are we're okay because even though that the game itself is interpreted at least about five so we try to explain to them for the authorities we don't need to definitely know that they can be free bundle it into the virus so that's kind of how we explain that that problem and then the other the second problem is that are you trying to compete with that positive absolute and that is like also a problem that got picked by love watching lovers we're not we're just a focusing on game we're just focusing on working we're not like having providing access the true that's a decentralized exchange we're not being kind of that so they were also okay with this is how we could not get it back so question soon when you say you're going to a three stores I assume as a tap-in after source it will become cottage it all other game so do you think that would be also raising a threat or those people who play the game [Music] which is really yeah I think that that could be you know I think I think our hand code here is that we're okay people say failure packs sucks after gaining half but you shouldn't our goal here is to not let them even know this is a project I thought that's that that's horrible basically we're trying to fight as much detail as possible about marching away from the general audience so we're actually like thinking about even changing the name of that into something else to make people easier to understand that is just like a something that packets what want to do a stop time is just like too hard man we can definitely be something like USD but these part of the direction of going that we're trying to kick this little toggle it's just - it's not that isn't it something that we've been doing it was because we had again witches and the people what she watches in iPad when you need to go in that word school you compare your treaty competitive it's all again great fun yeah that this goes back to the this goes back to the business follows everything the business would normally in a boat and also the player battle they offer is that you can actually like and get instant and you know with a client Conrad Carter get all connect stuff first of all this kind of eSport competition game realistic ways group room my conviction game itself is extremely classically the market size moving to a salon pool about 50 times in our view on this and you know the way we are enabling this is that you know we're enabling global audience and global people to compete with each other which is something that no other outcomes can provide first and also extremely fast apparel so for the players of this kind of skill based of cash game that the casual of process extremely controllers takes about three months for them to actually so if you have a way that and like really compete with a larger audience and the other condition is actually easier to come it's launching it's flat I so we don't actually need to go through each of their payment service providers and credit card providers as well but there is a fee on gateway in that particular country you guys you guys I think two things are getting much much better over time even much better in the past few months so both players it is not just a game as a game can compete at night and it's not just a painting and computing Mike but again become comfortable inviting with the probe audience and with extremely local national identity so that's kind of like the value the whole inherent value for the game on