Freeloaderz is a coalition of problem solvers who are working together to streamline and create improvements for the Cardano ecosystem. That’s where we are today, but the organization started as a friendly discussion about congestion on the network. When Sundae Swap initially rolled out, the level of congestion virtually brought the network to a standstill. It was a very frustrating time but beneficial in that it caused Chris from Santo Pool and Ryan from PANL pool to put their heads together and look for solutions. When they looked at the problem, they realized that each wallet was running its own set of relays (servers). To oversimplify just a bit, this caused a bottleneck and the transactions lined up and waited interminably, just like you do at the DMV when there is one clerk and 50 people waiting. Freeloaderz mitigate the bottleneck by using the relays that stake pools already have to relieve the congestion, opening up additional exit lanes that allows transactions to flow much more efficiently.
How does it actually work? Basically every stake pool should have a relay (server) and many have several for redundancy purposes. This means that up to 10,000 servers are available to help with transaction submission processing. Every stake pool operator can install the program that will run the transaction submission for the everyday user, which is called Cardano submit api. Therefore a user can input the address of any participating stakepool and submit the transactions using stake pool relay node mempools and thereby avoiding the long line. Of course, every stake pool could do this individually, but there would still be problems related to bottlenecks and downtime. Freeloaderz solves these problems with a load balancer which evenly distributes submitted transactions across over forty participating pools.
Here is a graphic description of how Freeloaderz works from their website:
The Freeloaderz team has made every effort to create a process that is both secure and easy to use – both for participating SPOs and end users. Their website includes a list of best practices for participating SPOs and their discord is accessible if there are additional questions. This is also true for end users who wish to speed up their transactions. In NAMI, for example, set up is an easy process of six steps as shown below:
As a result of their hard work and dedication Freeloaderz has grown from a tiny bootstrapped project to a network that is capable of processing over 25,000 submit transactions per day and has over 400 discord members and 15 core members. This crew is all about working together to improve the blockchain. Someone casually mentioned the other day that there are 12 developers freely donating their time to the Freeloaderz project – just because it’s the right thing to do. In order to facilitate the continued growth of their organization, Freeloaderz is building a DAO and a token that will allow members and token holders to participate in, and guide the direction of, community governance. This token won’t have a fixed monetary value. Rather it is a mechanism to reward early supporters and allow vested parties to guide community governance. There will be airdrops to active community members and a bounty program for contributors.
Freeloaderz does have two proposals in Catalyst, both written by Rhys from Stoic Pool. The first is related to the installation and setup of another load balancer and can be accessed here. This will be a redundancy against system failure and a support to decentralization. Freeloaderz is continuing to grow and requires additional infrastructure. This funding will allow them to increase capacity and be more geographically diverse. The proposal is under the new member onboarding category and will allow Freeloaderz to add new members to existing workflows and increase capacity for new projects. They are asking for 5000 in Catalyst to cover the cost of the equipment and installation.
The second Catalyst proposal, for a token and NFT distributor, can be found here. It is in the DApps and Integrations category. This proposal will create a mechanism that allows native tokens and NFTs to be distributed faster and at a lower cost by harnessing the combined submit API of all participating SPOs and a simple transaction script that batches transactions. They will combine this with a WEB3 / DApp connector token claim facility that will enable users to come and claim tokens at a much lower cost. They are requesting 25,000 or 1 percent of the total category funding. The requested funding will allow Freeloaderz to expand their existing services and continue to add value to the Cardano ecosystem.
Like Cardano itself, Freeloaderz is still growing and developing.The Freeloaderz project offers an opportunity for everyone to become involved. Their discord is open to all interested parties because, instead of building an exclusive club, these folks are committed to shaping and enhancing an entire ecosystem – a place where everyone is welcome and all skills are needed.
