BSV Blockchain recently held its annual DevCon on 20 May 2024 at the London ExCel Convention Centre. The DevCon aimed to empower developers to leverage the BSV blockchain as an infrastructure for novel applications, services and businesses.
David Case (Visionary of 1SatOrdinals) and Luke Rohenaz (Founder of Tonic POW) are the two principal pioneers of the 1SatOrdinals protocol on the BSV blockchain. In their presentation, Rohenaz and Case explained the concept of 1SatOrdinals, how the protocol works and what applications and use cases can be built with it.
The basic concept of ordinals
Case highlighted that an ordinal in the context of the BSV blockchain is simply a satoshi, the smallest unit of BSV, which is tracked as a unique entity through a set of rules. This tracking allows each satoshi to be treated as a token, which can record significant events, such as having an image file written onto it and stored on the blockchain.
This means the owner of that satoshi owns everything associated with its history. This tracking system enables the creation of NFTs (non-fungible tokens) and various other innovative uses. While some functions of this technology have already been developed, the possibilities for further functions appear far from exhausted.
How ordinals are more versatile and useful on BSV
Rohenaz expanded on this, highlighting the unique passive approach of ordinals. Unlike other protocols that require specific identifiers in the transaction scripts, ordinals track the origin and movements of satoshis without labels, freeing up space in transactions.
This idea, inspired by constraints on the BTC blockchain, was implemented on BSV, allowing additional functionalities like sCrypt contracts. Initially used for NFTs and a community mint-style fungible token protocol called BSV20, it evolved to BSV21, enabling smart contracts and innovative features like “lock to mint.” An example is POW20, which enforces proof of work for token issuance.
Case illustrated a recent project showcasing the integration of sCrypt and ordinals through a custom image NFT contract. This contract generates unique NFTs by combining ten transparent image layers, each ordinal, using deterministic math. Each execution of the contract produces a distinct SVG image, resulting in an HTML page pointing to multiple ordinals. This approach demonstrates the potential for creating complex, layered NFTs.
Scalability of ordinals
Case also addressed the scalability of ordinals and explained that they do scale, but understanding what a Satoshi represents requires tracing its entire transaction history back to its origin. This process involves verifying a chain of transactions and associated Merkle proofs, typically up to a manageable number like 100, to validate ownership.
Rohenaz added that as BSV processes large volumes of data, additional infrastructure like indexers and aggregators becomes necessary for efficient validation. Despite the data accompanying NFTs, which includes transaction histories, it remains manageable. Supporting infrastructure in that regard are the overlay networks, SPV wallet and ARC.
Websites, resources and additional info
The presentation also included an open-question round. One of the audience members asked about website links related to projects that were showcased in the presentation. Case provided information about Bubblemint for generative NFTs and pow20.io for tokens generated through proof of work.
He mentioned the onesat market (formerly a subpage of 1satOrdinals.com) as a platform for NFTs and introduced the onesat. market as its continuation. Rohenaz elaborated that 1satordinals.com will transition into a community and developer resource site, while onesat.market will serve as the marketplace for NFTs and minting activities.
Many other questions concerned the possible future developments and applications for businesses. For those who are interested, we recommend watching the recording of the event on our YouTube channel.
