POL is the upgraded native token of Polygon 2.0, along with its accompanying contracts and initial configurations to handle emission management and token migration. POL allows for a one-to-one migration with MATIC with an initial supply of 10 billion POL and yearly emission of 2% that will be equally distributed to stakers and a community treasury contract.
The token of the Polygon PoS chain, MATIC, powered this single chain that allowed Ethereum to scale during times of high network congestion. Polygon 2.0 is the next iteration in the Ethereum scaling journey, with zero-knowledge proofs (“zk”) facilitating the expansion of Ethereum block-space across a multitude of L2 chains whilst also inheriting its security.
POL represents a next-generation token able to accommodate an ecosystem of zk-based Layer 2 chains by enabling the following utility:
- Staking,
- Community ownership, and
- Governance.
What is Polygon?
Polygon is a Layer2 scaling solution that achieves scale by utilizing sidechains for off-chain computation and a decentralized network of Proof-of-Stake (PoS) validators.
At present, the main product of Polygon is Ethereum sidechain. The side chain is an independent chain with separated block parameters and consensus and is connected to Ethereum by a two-way bridge. It supports all the Ethereum toolings so that projects can build an alternative ecosystem on it. The chain is faster and cheaper (1,000 TPS) than Ethereum mainly for two reasons. First, the consensus and validators of the sidechain are separated with Ethereum. Second, instead of the full transactions, it only publishes transaction scripts (Merkle Root) onto Ethereum.
But these advantages also come with some shortcomings. The governance of Polygon is relatively centralized, and the Polygon committee controls billions of funds through Ethereum<>Polygon PoS bridge. In addition, the validators are selected through auctions with capped positions (100), which means the positions could be controlled by funds staking.
Apart from sidechain, Polygon is also developing other Layer2 scaling infrastructures such as Optimistic Rollups, zkRollups, and Validium.
What are the top projects on Polygon?
- Trading: Quickswap ($QUICK), ApeSwap ($BANANA), ParaSwap ($PSP), Gains Network ($GNS), IDEX ($IDEX)
- Web3: Opacity ($OPCT)
- Stablecoin: Mai Finance($MIMATIC)
- Prediction Market: Augur ($REP)
- NFT & GameFi: Aavegotchi ($GHST), Decentral Games ($DG)
History of Matic Network
Matic Network was founded in 2017 by 3 Indian founders, Jaynti Kanani, Sandeep Nailwal, and Anurag Arjun, in hopes of solving Ethereum scalability issues.
They were originally inspired from a paper written by Vitalik Buterin, and Joseph Poon, titled: “Plasma: Scalable Autonomous Smart Contracts” 6. About a year later, Matic founder Jaynti worked with developers at Decentraland to create “More Viable Plasma,” a more efficient version of Plasma. This version of Plasma became the basis for the Matic network.
The Matic team originally offered 2 scaling solutions: Plasma chains, and a Proof of Stake chain.
In early 2021 the Matic team rebranded themselves to Polygon, aspiring to become the swiss army knife of scaling solutions, and turning Ethereum into an “Internet of Blockchains”. Something similar to the Polkadot or Cosmos framework.
Polygon also introduced a 4th founder to the team after this name change, Mihalio Bjelic.