By: Geeq  on Aug 27, 2020

Founder and CDO Stephanie So, with Head of Crypto Hans Sundby, visited the FyreChain Telegram community for Geeq’s latest AMA. FyreChain hosted the Geeqs before the first release as per Geeq’s Tokenomics, and teased the announcement that was coming out later that week. (Spoiler Alert: Geeq, the blockchain solution with the industry’s leading security model, already had an agreement to integrate ChainLink into the toolkit for Geeq’s application developers.)

The hour flew by with more questions than usual about Geeq’s proprietary technology and research initiatives. There was a request for more news and Stephanie clarified that she understood and sympathized with the hunger for news, however, much of the hard work the team has been doing has been to position Geeq for success in the longer term. Having said that, the best is yet to come.

? Here’s the recap! ?
The transcript has been lightly edited for brevity and to insert a few links.

Moderators: Jonathan Habicht and Alex Smith
Guests: Stephanie So and Hans Sundby

Alex Smith:
Hey everyone, A warm welcome to all the new faces as we welcome the Geeq team to FyreChain for this live AMA! The format of this AMA will be as follows: we will lock the channel and ask our own questions before opening up for a live Q and A towards the end – so have some questions prepared. With us today are @hansdallass and @StephanieS representing Geeq.

Jonathan Habicht:
Hey guys, it’s a pleasure to have you here!

Stephanie:
Hi @HabichtJonathan, It’s great to be here! I’m Stephanie So, a Founder of Geeq and Our Head of Crypto, Hans Sundby is here. Hans usually lets me write all the first questions, but I promise he’ll get a chance later.

Hans?Dallas:
Thanks man, glad to be here.

For those who don’t know what GEEQ does, could you please give a short introduction about the project and why it is so important for this space?

Stephanie:
Geeq is a multi-chain permissionless platform which we have developed using our own innovative blockchain technology. Our goal is to be able to make blockchain extremely useful as a back end data service for regular users. We knew we had to deliver the highest possible industry-leading quality in two dimensions in order to succeed: security and ease of adoption in disparate settings.

First: user confidence. In order for blockchain to be taken seriously as an alternative to other ways of processing data, we knew we had to demonstrate it would provide at least as much value to users than what they were used to. Geeq is holding the development of its technology to my own personal standard: that I would be comfortable telling my own mother that it is safe to use. And she is one of the most-risk averse people you would ever meet.

The second goal was ease of adoption, which in my mind, is tied very closely to accessibility and decentralization. We are a highly practical team. We saw potential areas where Geeq blockchain could be useful that other blockchain projects weren’t even trying to reach. One problem facing other blockchain projects is the high technical barrier to understanding what is going on, which I include as part of the human cost of adoption.

The other is that many blockchain protocols that I’ve observed have a tendency toward concentration of power and wealth, which leads to a marketplace not much different from what exists.

Geeq does not engage in performative rhetoric. We have designed a platform that is able to deliver on its promises in the most general case, which is a completely open, permissionless blockchain at low costs – with security.

When you have a technology like Geeq’s, which gives users access and confidence to any blockchain application that you can imagine, it is possible for an ordinary person or business to point to the data and be able to hold each other accountable. At a meta-level, that is not an ability that has been available at low cost before. Before, you had to file a lawsuit, or hire accountants, or waste resources to protect yourself from fraud by writing tremendously complicated contracts, and even then people had to worry. Accountability in the data, that is available to all sides involved, completely changes the market rules and conversation. It’s very exciting to imagine the new kinds of markets that will be possible with that kind of symmetric availability to coordinate on honest data.

Alex:
Thank you for the high level overview Stephanie, for the members of the group who aren’t too familiar with Geeq.

One thing that separates GEEQ from many others in this industry, is that you actually have a patent on your technology. Can you explain a little bit more about it and what is so special about Proof of Honesty^TM? How is it better than traditional PoW or POS consensus mechanisms?

Stephanie:
Thanks for the question, Alex. It’s more legally accurate to say the first of our intellectual property applications is patent pending, and we have a link to the patent application, if anyone would like to take a look.

It covers everything we’ve done to construct the validation protocol “Proof of Honesty” as you say: the separation and complete insulation of the validation layer from a flexible, scalable blockchain application layer, the way nodes are paid automatically for their work, and how applications on Geeq will be validated by their own networks, so that no application has to share the overhead of another.

There are a lot of ways that we think PoH will be able to serve different business functions and users, we think. Back to user confidence: I think PoH is most distinguished because we have such a tight security model.

Both PoW and PoS can be gamified and the chains can be taken over by concentrations of power, so users who start using a blockchain like that do not necessarily know what they will end up with – and we know “small” or non-technical users care as much that the integrity of their data will be safe as a malicious actor might care about altering the data. We had to make sure Geeq blockchains can withstand any attacks and ended up, in some sense, simplifying the protocol so that it only does one thing: it works to validate, preserve, and guarantee that users will be able to access a blockchain that can be proven not to have been manipulated. Access to their honestly validated data can never be taken away from them.

I could go on forever about Geeq, as you can see, but the same way of thinking about making certain users can be sure that Geeq blockchains will deliver what they were promised, no one can take that away from you, and it is built in so you don’t have to worry about it, runs throughout the platform.

I think of Geeq as a chance to build a new digital economy where any individual has just as much control over their destiny as a big corporation. That’s what I’m trying to achieve and I think our technology does it in a way that PoW and PoS variants will never be able to, because of the way they’ve been conceived from the outset.

For the technical details on how we do so, we have our Technical Paper and quite a few explainers on the website geeq.io and we are always happy to have that conversation.

Jonathan:
Thanks for the insights so far, Stephanie!

Could you maybe shine some light on the GEEQ token and it’s usecases? How do long term holders get rewarded?

Stephanie:
Of course! This is a part of Geeq’s platform that I think is really quite unique – how we involve the community that wants to participate in the blockchain construction.

The primary use case for the $GEEQ token is that it is an ecosystem token which will be transacted every time a transaction or “commit” is validated on any Geeq blockchain. Every node is paid for the honest work they do, according to how much honest work they do, plus a profit in GEEQ tokens, automatically, by protocol.

The Geeq token can also be moved across any blockchain in the Geeq ecosystem. That means users can pay for intermediate or end services on DApps without having to exchange anything else, directly from their wallets and no other fuss. I think of the Geeq as having a property of fungibility within the Geeq economy.

It’s really up to the customers: businesses, enterprises, and developers about the way they would like to incorporate their own use cases for the Geeq token. For example, they might want to use the Geeq token as a way to clear accounts between distributed business partners, with a final settlement outside of the system in fiat. They can do that in a completely decentralized way for thousands or millions of transactions within a day or week or month and then only use the intermediary at the end.

As for long term holders of the token, the token’s value is tied to the velocity and usage of the Geeq platform. We’ve made the platform scalable without limit, with the Geeq token as the fuel that powers the validation engine, so there are no limits to how large that economy can grow.

One of the considerations we took into account was how to jumpstart the economy and the velocity. That’s where IoT and streaming micropayments / microCommerce come in.

Geeq’s platform is the only blockchain back-end that is capable of supporting blockchain applications for all the IoT devices that might be put to work for a smart city. Our CEO and some of our advisors have deep background in IoT. We’re talking about billions of commits, each of which will use the Geeq token at the validation level, if not at the application level. So, that’s our vision of the baseline.

I’m very glad you asked that question.

Alex Smith:
Thank you Stephanie for that in-depth answer for those that wish to support the project for the longer term.

Now I think we can move on to use-cases. What types of DApps are supported by Geeq?

Stephanie:
Yes, so this answer is a bit shorter.

While Geeq’s technology is extremely strict about validation through Proof of Honesty, which has to be written in such a way to deliver proof, parsimoniously, to any user that they’re looking at correctly validated blockchain data, we as a Team are completely agnostic about the kinds of DApps that could be written on the application layer. Anything that is a well-specified DApp can be supported by Geeq, indefinitely.

The only requirement is that the DApp has to be (or should be, for the producer and their customers’ benefit) held to a rigorous quality standard, because once it’s out there, Geeq will validate it exactly to code.

Geeq can support DeFi, it can support tokenization, document or custody solutions, and what we’re really excited by is that validation works so there are no bottlenecks and there are low costs of validation. Geeq is able to support micropayments, which have been talked about for a long time but which blockchain has not been able to become cheap enough to execute in a sustainable way.

Jonathan:
It’s interesting that you mentioned DeFi, this leads me to my next question.

With low transaction costs and high throughput, GEEQ would be primed for DeFi applications, what is your plan when it comes to that?

Stephanie:
There’s no question in my mind that Geeq is the platform for DeFi. It’s not only the low transaction costs, high throughput, and the infinite possibilities of individual applications. It’s the security of guaranteeing the contracts will be validated without some more powerful entity coming in and deciding to disrupt the entire ecosystem, and knowing you can’t be defrauded in the sense that your tokens might be moved to a manipulated ledger when you never intended to send them there.

We wrote two pieces about what Geeq can do for DeFi.

I think one of the most serious realizations we had is that, if DeFi were to fail, there is no central bank or government that will have an interest in coming to the rescue. I really believe Geeq’s security would be the key infrastructure there.

In keeping with our agnostic and inclusive stance that we can’t predict the kinds of DApps people want to build, we’re concentrating on building the infrastructure. We think that when DeFi has shaken out some of the more risky experiments, it will be perfect timing to build sensible and really decentralized DeFi on Geeq.

Geeq™ Value Proposition – DeFi

Geeq™ Value Proposition – DeFi 2

Q5. What types of dapps are supported by blockchain Geeq?

Alex:
Amazing thanks Stephanie, I think that will get a lot of people excited to understand how Geeq and DeFi can operate together.

Stephanie:
Thanks so much, I hope so!

Alex:
I think at this point I’d just like to point out to everyone that the transcript of this AMA will be available on The Daily Chain after we have finished here so people can catch up with anything they have missed!
OK… moving on to the juicy stuff.

Stephanie:
That must mean @hansdallass is up, as I tend to be the technical boring one.

How is the Geeq ecosystem going to expand in general? What are the plans in terms of partnerships and growing the ecosystem?

Hans:
Geeq’s main focus is quite different from other platforms you see today. We can take Ethereum as an example. Ethereum is mostly focusing on startups and creating a platform for companies to create easy dApps and smart contracts using the smart contracts and libraries that are already built into Solidity. The Ethereum ecosystem is complicated and seems to be building on itself. Of course, that’s why they have so much of a community of developers, which is great for them, but it is hard sometimes to untangle what is going on if you are starting out in blockchain.

Geeq really decided that, because of the security and scalability and cost concerns, public blockchain had to start over clean. So that’s what we’re doing, and we want to provide the ability for developers to port their applications over regardless of the languages that they are using. We want to make applications very modular and easy to adopt.

The IoT industry is highly interesting for us, as Geeq’s CEO, Ric Asselstine, has 30 years of experience from IoT in Canada. IoT is a great way to achieve fast high volume transaction adoption, as there are already billions of IoT devices out there today that transact on centralized servers and systems.

IoT is just one use case that can take advantage of Geeq and we are absolutely looking at other use cases such as DeFi & SupplyChains, just to name a few. That being said; startups are more than welcome to get a GeeqChain to build an awesome product or to run transactions 🙂

We are currently working on several different partnerships that will eventually make Geeq ready to become a high volume transactional ecosystem real fast and being used in many different sectors.

Stephanie:
I just wanted to say that, having talked to some developers, it seems like there is a real appetite to be able to use different languages and to have the ability to avoid the bottlenecks of a main chain, and not need to worry about the overhead of running or worrying about other applications’ smart contracts. I think that’s why there is so much interest from businesses even in the tech corridors of Canada in a new platform entrant.

Jonathan:
Thanks, guys. Before we open up the chat again, to let our community ask their questions, one more thing:

What are the 3 things the community should be most excited about in the upcoming weeks and months?

Hans:
Can I make it 4?

Jonathan:
That’s even better, Hans!

Hans:
We’re working on all of these Categories for the Geeq Community:

1. Market expansion (Exchanges)
   It is important for us to have a great and wide reach of the GEEQ token, and we are looking to expand on different exchanges and avenues where people all over the world will be able to take part of the Geeq Ecosystem.
2. Patent & info
   Geeq will be sharing more patent information and we might as well publish some new ones we would like to share with you guys real soon.
3. Developer updates
   Geeq will be releasing some exciting developer updates to keep the community up to date and follow the progress and the amazing journey.
4. Partnerships
   Partnerships are something we are working on all day long, if not nights as well. There are so many solutions out there that are great in terms of technology, customer outreach, developer networks and business solutions.

We will announce partnerships along the way for our community, it is important for us that we have the right partners with us on this journey that can make a difference for Geeq. Last note:

Geeq will reveal an awesome partnership this week, I know several of you are waiting for that one. It will come.. before your weekend vibe kicks in. Look out for it. It´s exciting!!

Alex:
Thank you @hansdallass! I know that will get many people excited ?

Jonathan:
I think everyone was waiting to hear something in that regard ?

Alex:
Alright then everyone, a huge thank you to Hans and Stephanie so far!
We will now open up the chat so everyone can ask their questions. Will be open for a couple of minutes before the team chooses the best ones and then mute the chat again whilst they answer ??

How many patents have you applied/ plan on applying for? You hinted there’s more than one?

Stephanie:
Thanks for the question! The first patent was a major one, it’s very long because it spanned so much. We have at least two more planned, and probably more to come.

How many NDAs are in place regarding partnerships?

Stephanie:
I’ve personally lost track of these. These involve so many different parts of the company – for example, the work we have going on in Canada to discuss DApps, the strategic advisors in the crypto/blockchain space, potential customers abroad … fortunately, I’m not the clearinghouse for the legal documents, nor the only one who answers requests.

Will Terepac be a customer from the off given Rics connection?

Stephanie:
Yes, of course.

With the level of focus on IoT, I’m wondering how far the team has explored smart city projects. Are there any smart city projects being planned that GEEQ may be involved?

Stephanie:
I’d like to invite you to check out one of our partners from nearly the beginning, Miovision. Also, Rise-Ops, and also, our key partner in Singapore, Morpheus Labs, which is heavily involved in smart cities.

Is there a particular geographical focus GEEQ will target? Whether it be Canada, Asia given the JUN partnership?

Stephanie:
As our CEO Ric Asselstine likes to say, we made plans for Geeq to be “born global”. With the kind of technology we have, geographic constraints aren’t as binding as they once were. What counts, as Hans said, is forming valuable partnerships with a lot of potential to create value.

How secure is Geeq compared to most other blockchain?

Stephanie:
I used to say: Geeq is the most secure that I know of, and that was when I started speaking publicly in 2018. I think the vulnerabilities that have been revealed since then – each one of which I look at (as long as it’s not about stolen keys), I think, we’ve already thought of that.

But if it interests you, we also have a chart and the Technical Paper and our experts, so I would be glad to talk about those. Let me find the link to the chart and if you have more questions, please let me know!

We need news.

Stephanie:
There seems to be an insatiable demand for news, which I can certainly understand. What I can say is, we don’t make up news for the sake of news, and there has been a tremendous amount of work that has to go on behind the scenes – much of which has been done and we are getting to reap the benefits of – to make this new kind of project work.

We’re looking forward to sharing updates from the dev side soon, so the public can start seeing the different approach Geeq is taking to building foundational code, and then it will be a lot more fun for the dev community to ask questions, make suggestions, and start making plans.

It took a long time for the legal “going global” and token compliance – and also the equity work, since Geeq is a company – to be established also. (Because Geeq is a company), it means we’ve been thinking about making partnerships, and customers all along, so that when we have product we also have people who want to use it.

I have to give a lot of credit to both the corporate (headquarters), which depends on our business side led by CEO Ric Asselstine in Canada, and our crypto side, led by our Head of Crypto Hans and his incredible team, for working through the details of exchanges and compliance, on both ends.

That said, we will have news! 🙂

Alex:
Exciting times indeed for Geeq! Thanks for all the questions everybody and for taking the time to attend this AMA today. A huge thank you to @StephanieS and @hansdallass for taking the time today to discuss the project and all of the exciting things that are coming up in the pipeline.

Jonathan:
Thanks to everyone!

Stephanie:
Thanks so much to both of you for hosting us, I’m thrilled we had a chance to be here. There were some tough questions, but they’re good to get out in the open and to answer them.

Alex:
Absolutely, but now our community has a much better understanding of how you are currently positioned and how you plan to move forward ??
Thank you @hansdallass.

Hans:
Thanks alot everyone for an awesome AMA and for having us guys ?