Solana is a public blockchain platform with smart contract functionality. It was officially launched in March 2020 by the Solana Foundation. It aims to improve scalability by introducing a proof-of-history (PoH) consensus combined with the underlying proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus of the blockchain.
Solana has its own native cryptocurrency, SOL, and has a market capitalization of $3.51 billion. Anatoly Yakovenko is the man behind the Solana project. In 2017, he started working on Solana along with his fellow programmers Greg Fitzgerald, and Eric Williams.
In March, 2020, Solana’s first block was created. And in June 2021, Solana raised $314 million in a funding round led by Andreessen Horowitz, a private American venture capital firm.
In December 2021, Melania Trump released her first NFT which was reportedly sold for 1 SOL. However, a Solana representative said that Trump’s use of the blockchain was not part of any Solana-led initiative.
Solana Solstice 2022
According to its official site, Solana can be used for non-fungible tokens (NFTs), decentralised finance (DeFi), payments, gaming and decentralised autonomous organisations (DAOs). In 2022, the Solana community was focused on bringing crypto into the real world.
Solana Mobile Stack and Solana Mobile’s flagship device Saga, was announced to much acclaim at a surprise event in June, aiming to free web3 from desktops and make mobile a much friendlier to dApps.
It must be noted that Solana Pay was introduced in February and is now being used by stores and brands alike — and will continue to grow in 2023.
This year was a banner year for the humble Solana developers. At theAt of the end of November, there were 2053 active developers working on projects that use Solana — and 1654 of those who are only working on Solana projects.
This was the year that traditional companies took note of the power of the Solana ecosystem. In a surprise announcement that took the web3 world by storm, Google Cloud said that they have been running a block-supporting Solana validator.
“This month we’re excited to be adding 15 new DApps to our Wallet Partner program, nine of which are built on @Solana! This impressive roster spans DeFi, DAOs, NFTs, and infrastructure across several chains.”
“2022 was also the year that Brave integrated Solana into their wallet. The privacy-focused browser announced the integration at Breakpoint 2021, which would give default support to Solana dApps in their mobile and web browsers.”
Nancy J. Allen is a crypto enthusiast and believes that cryptocurrencies inspire people to be their own banks and step aside from traditional monetary exchange systems. She is also intrigued by blockchain technology and its functioning.
Source: https://www.thecoinrepublic.com/2023/01/01/a-glimpse-at-solana-and-its-2022-journey/