Optimism is a project aimed at scaling the Ethereum blockchain. The company was formerly known as Plasma Group, a non-profit organization (2019). Then she was mainly engaged in research, and in 2020 she began practical actions. The solution is based on the Optimism Rollup technology, which allows scaling common smart contracts and providing instant transactions on the Ethereum network.
OP is an Optimism project governance token launched on June 1, 2022. Distributed by airdrop to 232,000 users on the waiting list. The launch was not very successful, the token dropped significantly in price after the launch.
Optimism is a comprehensive layer 2 scaling solution compatible with the EVM (Ethereum Virtual Machine). It uses roll-up technology to speed up transactions and reduce gas costs.
The name Rollup reflects the principle of the solution — transactions are transferred to the main chain in “packages”. Aggregators (block producers) publish only the minimum necessary information and provide evidence only in case of fraud.
The process of interacting with the decision of the 2nd level looks something like this:
- The user sends a transaction related to off-chain smart contract deployment to the aggregator.
- He creates a new smart contract, deploying the received transaction locally.
- The aggregator calculates the new Merkle root (state root).
- The aggregator generates an Ethereum transaction that includes this new root.
- If the user notices that the aggregator is deploying an invalid state root (that is, one that includes invalid transactions), the user can challenge this action and force the aggregator to deploy the real root.
- Once the proof of fraud is complete, the network rolls back and resumes from the previous valid block.
- It is stated that as a result, any user using a decentralized application deployed on Optimism receives economic benefits: almost free instant transactions (200 ms).