🏗️ Stronk Livepeer update

2023 saw a lot of R&D efforts with projects being started, but not quite pulled over the finish line. In this post we will summarise our current priorities and commitments.

Current Projects

• Stronk API / DYI subgraph
  The rewrite of the API was nearly completed. The only major components left to port over are the event parser and monthly summaries. After this we will add some extra reducers to track info like earnings per Delegator. This will enable the API to spit out detailed reports for tax purposes! The new API also allows for tracking all LPT transfers between addresses and within the smart contracts. This way we can accurately analyse where all staked or unstaked LPT are distributed.
• Stronk Explorer redesign
  The stronk.rocks website is due for a visual overhaul. Since we have to make some changes to use the new API, the website will get a redesign. Especially for the smart contract explorer we want to make better use of screen real estate and have better filtering and searching options.
• Stronk media pipeline
  We already have a few helpful dashboards online, like the mainnet pricing overview. The pipeline performs great and exposes the full potential of MistServer. It allows for transcoding using Livepeer, as well as ultra low latency hardware accelerated transcoding directly from the media server in case the operator has their own GPU's to hook up.
  However, deployment is manual and we're still missing the API to control access to the pipeline by Delegator status and available capacity.
  Our first priority here will be to finish said API and get a demo website online, integrated with the StreamCrafter, so that anyone can have free access to Streaming->Transcoding->Viewing.
• StreamCrafter
  The StreamCrafter is in a decent state at the moment. It justs needs a public repository, documentation and a website.
• Intel QSV integration and testing
  More info on this further in the post.

Commission rate

With all the stake increases the past few months and the increase in LPT price, Stronk Tech is receiving record amounts of LPT. In the past we've adjusted the LPT commission rate to try and get as close to a 8% reward cut as possible. For now we're not lowering the reward cut just yet. Rather, we want to use the current revenue stream to scale up our operations a bit. A lower reward cut will still happen if we can't deliver on our goals or revenue keeps increasing like it has.

Goals for the year

We have some catching up to do to pull our existing projects over the finish line. We're also keen to look into other ecosystem needs, like taking on running the Livepeer testnet. Running the testnet fits in nicely with our other projects, which are mostly aimed at supporting other node operators and helping onboarding new network participants.

Because of this we'll be increasing our time commitment and looking into hiring a contractor to help out with any frontend work like improving the UI of the StreamCrafter.

We're also still missing a dedicated AI rig. We do have two GPU's (RTX 4080 & RTX 4000ADA) hooked up and ready to take on any jobs, but our goal is to have two 4090's in a dedicated rig just for the AI pipeline.

Up next

Based on the hard work of Brad enabling AV1 and upgrading the FFMPEG base which Livepeer uses, a new project we're taking is to add hardware accelerated QSV support to go-livepeer .

This will allow for hardware accelerated trancoding using Intel CPU's & GPU's. Up to this point CPU transcoding hasn't been recommended as it's using a software based transcode. These look great (a software transcode always looks better than a hardware transcode) but are quite slow. Since Intel CPU's actually have quite a good encoder in it why not use those?

In our new small form factor build we will benchmark the performance of all of our GPU's for transcoding AV1, H265 and H264. This will include cards like the 1080Ti, 4000ADA, 4060Ti, 4080, Intel Arc, and Intel integrated graphics on the CPU.

This allows us to answer questions like: can Intel Arc GPUs compete with Nvidia on capacity? Can pools open up their doors to CPU transcoders, or will we have to wait till 14th gen processors with the Arc GPU built in become more widespread?

Stay tuned for the results of the benchmarks and don't forget: now is the perfect moment to stake to Stronk Tech and support our development efforts. With the crypto market reaching all time highs, you don't want to wait too long!