Cryptocurrency companies use certain strategies to attract users, developers and investors. Various types of activity contribute to the development of their ecosystem: hackathons, tournaments and contests. What contests are held by Solana, Near, Cosmos and FreeTON? Let's take a look at the largest and most ambitious events.

$1 Million from Solana Blockchain

Solana Season, which ran from May 15 to June 7, 2021, is one of the largest hackathons in IT history. More than 13,000 developers took part in the event, and 350 projects were presented to the jury. The event was hosted by the Solana Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to the development of Solana. Hackathon goals: • selection and implementation of the best DeFi, NFT, Web3 project in the Solana ecosystem; • attracting users and developers to the Solana blockchain

The prize pool of $ 1 million was distributed among 39 teams.

The Grand Prize Winner of the Solana Season Hackathon was Zeta, an under-collateralized DeFi options platform built on the Solana blockchain. The team received $ 30,000 and a special prize - two tickets to the Solana event in Lisbon and $ 1,500 for a flight. The best DeFi Project was Solend, an algorithmic decentralized protocol for lending and borrowing. The prize was $ 20,000. The best NFT Project was Coral Reef, an NFT marketplace with the ability to Fractionalize. The prize was $ 20,000. The best Web3 project was Solarium, a decentralized, end-to-end encrypted, censorship-resistant instant messenger based on the Solana blockchain. The team received $ 20,000. The Community Choice Award went to Boring Protocol, a decentralized VPN service on the Solana blockchain. The project includes a P2P marketplace and provides traffic anonymity. The team received $ 5,000.

$50 for each participant and more for the winners From The Cosmos Blockchain

HackAtom RU 2021 is an event organized by Tendermint, Citizen Cosmos and Cyber Academy. More than 150 developers participated in this marathon.

Hackathon goals: • development of the Cosmos ecosystem using DeFi, NFT projects and the IBC protocol • translation of Cosmos documentation into Russian

The main prize pool was $ 20,000.

$8,000 - for the development of a DeFi product using IBC.$5,000 - for the best NFT product on the Cosmos blockchain. $5,000 - for creating a product using IBC. $1,000 - for winning the Community Choice category Participants who completed the tasks of sponsors received special prizes. The sponsorship prize pool was $ 25,000. Each contestant received a $ 50 Cosmos store certificate.

First and Budget Option From Near Hack the Rainbow is the first hackathon on the Near blockchain.

More than 400 developers took part in the competition, and more than 80 applications were submitted.

The main goal of the competition is to create projects that interact with the Rainbow Bridge cross-chain solution to provide interaction between the Ethereum and Near ecosystems. The YNEAR project was recognized as the best solution. YNEAR uses the Rainbow Bridge to create derivatives based on NEAR betting. Users can earn yNEAR tokens by staking NEAR tokens on specific validators, and the yNEAR amount is adjusted to accumulate validator rewards. By transferring yNEAR to Ethereum through the Rainbow Bridge, token holders can take advantage of the diverse capabilities of DeFi projects. A small commission in the form of validator rewards will be collected into the treasury, with the help of which all holders of yNEAR tokens can participate in governance and project initiatives.

The prize for the first place was 10,000 NEAR tokens + 1,000 DAI - about $ 22,000 at the time of the article's release.

In addition, teams that developed the following solutions received 6,000 NEAR + 6,000 DAI tokens (about $ 14,000) each:• AMM-NEARswap protocol. Allows users to safely and efficiently exchange NEAR and Ethereum assets • NEARBook is a chain order book implemented using the Rust programming language. By “chain” we mean that the matching mechanism is implemented as a smart contract on the nearest blockchain. He is using the Rainbow Bridge to leverage Ethereum assets in the NearBook. • Advanced Fungible is a modern, safe and convenient token standard for the NEAR protocol. Aims at fixing some of the issues with previous token implementations, especially ERC-20 and NEP-21. • Intoo TV is a platform for live broadcasting in P2P format. • Influences is a decentralized social network that allows fans to follow specific influencers for a monthly fee. • Vital Point-DAO - Moloch v2 port for NEAR that can be whitelisted or integrated with any NEP-21 token.

More than 150 Contests per Year and Huge Prizes from Free TON Blockchain

During the year, about 160 contests of various levels of complexity and specialization were held in the Free TON community: from the Free TON video presentation contest to the development of NFT platforms. Validator tournaments, development, design, testing contests - these tools are used by the Free TON ecosystem to create a meritocratic community management system. Rewards are paid in the native currency Free TON - TON Crystal.

Here are some examples of recent and upcoming competitions.

NFT marketplace

NFT is a new, fast-growing crypto trend. NFT technology is interesting not only for authors and collectors, but also for traders with investors. The cost of individual NTF tokens - collectible cards, game artifacts, virtual digital art - is staggering. Specialized trading platforms are used to sell and buy NFTs. The NFT marketplace competition was dedicated to their creation. The main goal of the competition was to develop an NTF platform, through which members of the Free TON community would be able to fully work with NFT: create, sell and buy. Prize-winning competition: 1st place - 150,000 TON Crystal - about $67,500 2nd place - 120,000 TON Crystal - about $54,000 3rd place - 100,000 TON Crystal - about $45,000 4th place - 30,000 TON Crystal - about $13,500 5th place - 30,000 TON Crystal - about $13,500 The winner of the competition is the Drozd.red team, with the Grandbazar trading platform. The platform impressed the judges of the competition with its modern and laconic design, as well as the simplicity and convenience of the interface. The jury members highly appreciated the functionality of the Grandbazar platform and the integration of the site with ExtraTON.

Implementation of online auctions

On July 26, the competition for the creation of an auction system based on Free TON smart contracts ended. While voting is in progress and the winners have not yet been determined, the size of the reward is known: 1st place - 50,000 TON Crystal - about $21,500 2nd place - 35,000 TON Crystal - about $15,050 3rd place - 20,000 TON Crystal - about $8,600 4th place - 15,000 TON Crystal - about $6,450 5th place - 10,000 TON Crystal - about $4,300

Voting audit in Latin America

The contest for the creation of a system of decentralized voting audit for elections in Latin America has ended. The solution to a non-trivial problem is highly appreciated: 1st place - 200,000 TON Crystal - about $86,000 2nd place - 150,000 TON Crystal - about $67,500 3rd place - 100,000 TON Crystal - about $43,000 4th place - 75,000 TON Crystals - about $32,250 5th place - 50,000 TON Crystals - about $21,500 6th to 10th place - 25,000 TON Crystals - about $10,750

Ethereum↔FreeTON Bridge NFT

A few days later, the EthereumFTFreeTON Bridge NFT contest starts. You can take part in it by leaving an application in the period from 08/01/2021 to 09/15/2021. The main task of the contest is to develop an application with which it will be possible to freely move NFT tokens between the Free TON and Ethereum blockchains. 1st place - 100,000 TON Crystal - about $45,000 2nd place - 75,000 TON Crystal - about $34,000 3rd place - 50,000 TON Crystal - about $22,500 4th place - 40,000 TON Crystal - about $18,000 5th place - 30,000 TON Crystal - about $13,500

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In the Free TON project, a large share of TON Crystal tokens is distributed among the most active members of the community through contests. The size of the prize pool of Free TON contests can surprise even seasoned crypto enthusiasts.

As you can see, Free TON prize contests are usually several times larger than in similar contests of other blockchains.

With this approach, it is possible that in the near future new serious developers from ecosystems of other blockchains will come to the Free TON ecosystem.