Initial Understanding of xlog Decentralized Blog#
Recently, I felt inspired to find a place to write a blog. On one hand, I didn't want to build and maintain a website myself, and on the other hand, I wanted my blog to have a few comments and interactions. After searching around, I unexpectedly found the xlog platform. So, I would like to share my understanding and doubts about this place. Since I am not very familiar with many things, there may be omissions, and I hope for some exchanges and corrections.
What is xlog?#
In simple terms, it is a blogging platform that includes most of the features a blog community should have: publishing blogs, liking, commenting, and following. It also supports direct import of Markdown, as well as some support for images, articles, portfolios, etc. It has comprehensive support for the basic functions of a blogging platform. Looking at its functionality as a blogging system, it is quite comprehensive and convenient.
So, what distinguishes it from other blogging platforms? It is a system developed based on blockchain, where everything is on the blockchain, including article content, user information, and records of likes and comments. Article content and user information are all NFTs!
Because it is on the blockchain, it has the following characteristics: decentralization, emphasis on privacy, and security.
So far, the main hype around blockchain seems to still be about cryptocurrency trading, but this project’s application and realization of blockchain is quite exciting.
How to Join xlog?#
You can take a look at this article Five Minutes to Have a Decentralized Blog on Blockchain and IPFS - Songkeys, which is very comprehensive. In short, you need a blockchain wallet, and once connected, you can join the xlog platform. Then, you can go to a faucet to claim some tokens and proceed to write blogs, like, collect, and perform other operations normally. This process is similar to registering on CSDN or Blog Park.
A wallet in web3 is different from a traditional wallet, and the explanation can also be found in that article. The faucet can be seen as a tap in life, from which we can claim the necessary tokens. In web3, all operations on the blockchain must use tokens to pay for gas, which is why you need to claim tokens from the faucet.
All steps on the blockchain require payment in tokens, meaning that on the xlog platform, when we publish blogs, modify our user information, comment, like, etc., we need to pay tokens. This fee is the gas fee, which can be simply understood as the gasoline cost required to send information to the blockchain. Of course, tokens are not only used to pay gas fees; they can also be used for actual payments, just like Bitcoin.
So far, these tokens are distributed for free by the platform through the faucet. It seems that as long as your token balance is less than 0.02, you can claim 0.02 tokens for free from the faucet that day. This amount is sufficient for daily use, reportedly enough for users to publish over a hundred blogs.
Therefore, although this blogging system is attached to web3 and blockchain, with wallets, tokens, and other complex concepts, ordinary users can use it completely for free in their daily activities. Of course, if ordinary users want to better understand the underlying blockchain knowledge, it is recommended to study it in depth.
A Deeper Dive#
How Does xlog Confirm You Are You?#
On web2 platforms, we need an account and password for systems like CSDN and Blog Park to know that you are you, not someone else, allowing you to log in and perform operations after logging in. So how does xlog, without a centralized platform and without registration or login, determine that you are you?
It is done through a wallet, which uses principles related to cryptography to ensure security. Users retain their private keys, while the public key is made public as an address on the network. Users sign with their private keys, and the blockchain verifies the signature using the public key. When users publish articles, they sign with their private keys, and the blockchain verifies that this is your article, thus confirming your identity.
Where Are Published Articles Stored?#
Traditional article data is stored on servers, so where does xlog store its article data without a server? On the blockchain.
We can simply understand the blockchain as a huge data pool. This pool is maintained collectively by all the people who establish this chain, still ensuring the security of the blockchain through cryptography.
For a system, achieving both security and convenience is generally difficult, and the same applies to blockchain. The blockchain guarantees security but loses some convenience. If data were to be stored entirely on the blockchain, a problem would arise: slow data loading, and since operations require gas payments, the costs would also be relatively high. Moreover, if all data were stored on the blockchain, it would waste storage space on the blockchain. Therefore, xlog stores data on IPFS. IPFS is a protocol that also uses principles related to cryptography to ensure data security in a distributed manner.
However, IPFS, as a distributed file system, is not a blockchain. It uses similar cryptographic principles to ensure data security. We can think of it as another type of server that stores our data. When we request data from an IPFS node, if that node does not have the data, it will ask neighboring nodes for it.
IPFS does not seem to be a completely free system; the IPFS on xlog should be a service purchased by the platform? If this cost is not borne by users, will users have to pay for it in the future (after all, the chain that xlog is on also belongs to the developers of xlog)?
Integration with Web2#
IPFS still does not solve the problem of slow reading; it only addresses storage issues and some reading speed issues.
To ensure faster loading speeds, xlog still uses Redis and PostgreSQL databases to store necessary data such as user articles, ensuring loading speed. This actually uses web2 technology, but using web2 technology does not affect its characteristics on the blockchain; it remains secure because the platform uses web2 technology mainly to ensure loading speed. In contrast, another web3 application, mirror.xyz, claims that using web2 has affected the degree of decentralization.
This brings the thought that the future of web3 does not necessarily need to completely sever ties with web2; the two can combine and leverage each other's technological advantages. Centralization and decentralization are not binary opposites.
Immutability#
This is a major feature of blockchain and a guarantee of its security. The blockchain uses its cryptographic security to ensure that the content on the chain cannot be altered, which is also how xlog guarantees the security of articles. But this could also be the biggest problem.
When we publish content on web2 platforms, it is subject to review to ensure compliance with community standards, and it may be taken down, modified, or deleted by community administrators. However, the immutability of blockchain means that content on this platform cannot be taken down, deleted, or modified by administrators, and users themselves cannot modify or delete it either. We may see an article modification feature, but once it is on the chain, it cannot be modified; the content you modify is merely a new version, while the old content remains on the chain, and we can still find the article through the original information.
Some may think this is a good feature of blockchain, meaning it belongs to you and will not be censored. But I think this is also a frightening aspect. Once your words are published, they no longer belong to you. Moreover, if someone publishes forbidden content through xlog, no one can make it disappear from the blockchain. Content can only be monitored, not managed.
The author mentioned a method that may not display certain content on the front end, and in the future, it may be decided through DAO and community governance (this method may exacerbate the spread of harmful content and lose the meaning of review) whether an article should be taken down and not displayed on the front end.
I think this is a superficial solution. This method is similar to removing content from the menu; we cannot see the dish and cannot order it. However, the immutability of the blockchain means that the dish still exists; having its information on the chain means we can directly ask the chef to make the dish without going through the front end or the menu, and we can still see the related content.
If xlog wants to ensure this decentralized mechanism, it will lose the ability to be managed and can only be monitored. I am not sure if it is possible to directly delete stored article information from the IPFS server; I still do not fully understand these aspects of IPFS. If it is possible, does that also mean losing some degree of decentralization?
Conclusion#
At first glance, this project is quite interesting. Beyond cryptocurrency trading, it shows a practical application of blockchain that is conceptually exciting, secure, and ensures that data is not owned by those giants, will not be used for big data operations, and will not be censored, while being a fully functional blog community.
It ideally realizes the concept that data does not belong to the platform but is owned by oneself.
I still do not understand how the platform maintains its operation. Is the data really owned by oneself? After publishing, the data cannot be completely deleted or corrected. Most importantly, I think regulation is still a relatively important aspect, and it can hardly be regulated.
Most web3 projects seem idealistic, and in practical application, I believe they will ultimately involve some philosophical issues.
What kind of community is an ideal community?
Supplement#
This article is a preliminary understanding and reflection on xlog, not very rigorous, and I welcome criticism.
If there are any typos or grammatical errors that I did not catch, they will also have to go on the chain.
References include the following content:
The First Open Source On-Chain Blogging System xLog - DIYgod
Dialogue with RSS3: Paving the Way for Web3 Social and Content Creation - BlockBeats
Xlog, Let You Have a Modern Style Blog for Free in Five Minutes
I have expressed my shallow thoughts.
Words drift away from me.
New thoughts surge like flowing water.
Most Shang Chuan