One of the core value propositions of blockchain technology is its resilience, which comes from a decentralized and redundant infrastructure. Yet components that are essential for the daily use of crypto rails, such as RPC nodes, often still rely on a centralized architecture, making them vulnerable.
To address this, Infura, a leading Web3 API provider and part of Consensys, announced its partnership with 18 major internet infrastructure companies, including Microsoft and Tencent Cloud. This alliance, which started at Devconnect in Istanbul, aims to create the Decentralized Infrastructure Network (DIN).
Described as a decentralized RPC-as-a-service, DIN is a new venture that provides developers with a robust, scalable, and highly reliable blockchain infrastructure.
RP-what-now?
To understand the essence of an RPC node’s role, imagine a blockchain as a large, bustling restaurant kitchen where dishes (transactions and blocks) are constantly prepared, served, and recorded (the blockchain ledger).
In this kitchen, the chefs (nodes) are busy preparing dishes, with each dish representing a piece of transaction data or a block in the blockchain.
Now as a customer (user) you cannot just walk into the kitchen to order a dish, or check the progress of the Beef Wellington. Instead, you interact with a waiter (the RPC node) as your point of contact. Whenever you want to place an order (perform a transaction), or check if the previously called pickup order is ready (retrieve transaction details), or pay your check (add a new block), you call the waiter.
The waiter takes your request, goes to the kitchen and passes it on to the chefs. They look for the right dish in the restaurant’s culinary oeuvre (locate the correct data in the blockchain), prepare it (process a transaction) and ultimately you enjoy a delicious meal (transaction confirmed).
In technical terms, the RPC node acts as an intermediary that helps users interact with the blockchain. It processes users’ requests, translates them into actions that the blockchain network can understand, and then sends the results or confirmation back to the user. This makes the entire process more manageable and efficient.
Decentralization is resilience
At least most of the time.
Infura and its main rival Alchemy are responsible for the majority of the RPC node infrastructure – 70% to 80% according to Konstantin Zaitcev of DRPC, a decentralized RPC provider for Ethereum and connected chains. So if one or the other goes down, it could have a significant impact on most users’ ability to access decentralized apps.
For example, a major outage in Infura’s nodes in April 2022 made it difficult for MetaMask users to reach Ethereum applications for hours. (The Ethereum blockchain itself has never gone down.) MetaMask, another Consensys company, uses Infura by default, but users have the option to manually set up their own RPC provider.
Ensuring reliability will undoubtedly become more important as Web3 becomes more popular. Eugene Yeo, technical director at node provider Luscent.io, sees the DIN as analogous to electricity supplies, without which “our modern lives could not exist,” suggesting that uninterrupted blockchain access will be of similar importance.
“It’s a step in the right direction,” Zaitcev told Blockworks, but added: “It’s really early to talk about a ‘decentralized solution’, and even very early, when it comes to [a] ‘divided’ one,” he added.
Other node providers, such as Ankr, have been focused on decentralizing this aspect of the Web3 infrastructure for years.
“Decentralizing RPC infrastructure is not just a trend for us; it is a commitment to a more robust and scalable decentralized ecosystem,” Ankr vice president of product Josh Neuroth told Blockworks. “It is nice to see that other providers recognize the importance of our approach.”
Consensys’ announcement, made at the Decentralized RPC Summit during DevConnect in Istanbul, highlights the joint effort of 19 partner organizations. These include Grove, Covalent and other leading names in the technology sector.
Erik Ashdown, head of Covalent’s ecosystem, said the DIN partnership “embodies the ethos of crypto and the expression that a rising tide raises all ships.”
DIN’s ultimate goal is complete decentralization, a process that will develop gradually. The network plans to expand its membership and jointly develop a roadmap towards this ambitious goal.
DRPC plans to help, Zaitcev said, “because ultimately the market will decide and we need to cooperate more with each other.”
“Currently, Infura only works in the US,” he noted, meaning “they cannot provide good latency for the rest of the world.” DIN may be able to help them address these shortcomings, he said. Blockworks contacted Consensys for clarification.
“From my perspective, it could be better to support one of the existing players instead of creating their own [decentralized network]but maybe they will also create something cool,” Zaitcev said.
One of the key differences between the two approaches is that Infura operates its own nodes, and Zaitcev said these will likely handle the majority of RPC requests – even in this more distributed vision.
“In our case, we don’t have our own nodes – we focus on developing the best possible solution, not on maintaining nodes,” he said.
The status quo is like comparing a local farmers market to Walmart, Zaitcev said.
At the market, for every vendor, “every sale is very important, and they take care of their vegetables and service,” he said. “But big stores can sell you anything they want, at the price they want. You can choose from the options that the store offers you [and] they will probably be modified tomatoes without flavor.”
Decentralized solutions democratize access to markets – at least in theory – allowing service providers to compete on quality above all.