As we count down to the official handover ceremony of President Mohamed Buhari to President-elect Bala Ahmed Tunibu tonight, we discuss policy directions for the incoming administration. And President Buhari says Dengote refinery is a game-changer for Nigeria's economy. This is Plus Politics, and I'm Mary-Anna Cohen. As Nigeria prepares for another handover of governance structure at the federal and state level come May 29, it is necessary to discuss how the outgoing and incoming administration should manage to process devoid of glitches. There is no doubt that the quality of the Cabinet-in-close aides of the President-elect will determine how far he would go in dealing with the merits of challenges facing the country, ranging from insecurity to bad economy, unemployment, unstable inflation rates among others. Governments have called on the Tunibu-Shatima administration to prioritize security and use employment, and also to formulate policies to reduce security challenges to the barest minimum. Joining me to discuss this is Ezekiel Nyaito, who is a political analyst. Thank you so much, Mr. Nyaito. He's also former ADC governorship candidate for Acquivalent State. Thanks so much for having me. We are still in the traffic now, so I don't know where it ends, but for now. We are still up. Yes. Now, let's start by looking at May 29, whether we all like it or not, is sacrosanct. Of course, the tribunal is still seating. Most recent is that they have kicked out the issue of televising the proceedings live, devoid of it becoming some big brothers show, according to the Justice. But then many are wondering what lies ahead for this administration, and of course, as a people, the media, we need to set the conversation and set the ball rolling, pre-empting what would happen. So, let's start by looking at the problems that the Tunibu administration will face. In fact, the problems that Nigeria has on its plate right now. Just recently, there was a leaked tape or leaked audio or conversation between a former vice presidential placeholder and Masari, and of course, the governor of Kainu State, Ganduja. The tone of the message, most importantly, was that they felt, you know, abandoned, or he felt abandoned, Ganduja here, speaking about the fact that he's not sure that he can trust the president he elect. Now, that seems to obviously point to the fact that he was quoted to have met with Kwan Kwan Soh somewhere in Europe. And knowing that Kwan Kwan Soh had hit Ganduja very hardly in Kainu, this was obviously the cause for concern. How do you think that this would obviously play out in the choice of people that he would be picking to set up his cabinet? Okay, good. I don't know where to start from, but they are sending information that are extremely fundamental. One of those information is a fact that the electoral process has a beginning and an ending and Nigerians need to know. In terms of the beginning, we don't need to bother, but in terms of the ending, it starts to end. It starts to end on the day of election. After election, there is the next process, and it is part of the process, it hasn't ended. That next process is the tribunal. Anything can happen at the tribunal. After the tribunal, it has not ended. There is still the appeal court. And for the case of the governorship and the presidential tickets, it does not even end at the appeal, it goes back. It only ends at the supreme court. If you remember very well, we had the Oshun election several months back. It only several days back that Mr. Adeleke can sit down and say, yes, I am the governor of Oshun state. You remember very well that of Bayelsa, it was a day to swearing in. One day to swearing in, that there was a judgment that his running mate was not competent to be on the ticket, and on account of that, the man had to relinquish the seat. One day to swearing in. So we must talk with some level of cautious optimism or cautious concern depending on which side of the divide you are in. The fact that we had the first part of the ending favoring APC, we need to be careful not to conclude that it ends there so that there will be management of expectation. If, for instance, on Friday, the supreme court, considering the issue of double nomination that concerns the vice presidential candidate, if on that day they say that there was a case of impropriety, it could be a case of saying, sorry, you shouldn't have been on the ticket, and you know that once you are not on the ticket, your principal is also not on the ticket because the joint ticket, and you need to let these know so that as we talk, we talk knowing that we are just sleeping, we have our eyes closed or open, depending on which side of the divide that you belong. That's the first thing, they steal the tribunal, after the tribunal, they steal appeal court, after appeal court, they steal supreme court, and anything is possible. Look at that of emo state, the man was in office for about a year, and the supreme court says, sorry, it's not you, he had to leave office. So until the supreme court declasses judgment, it's not over. Luckily, with our current electoral act, all that comes within six months or there about, so worst case scenario within six months, we'll know who will finally be the next governor or the next president, as the case may be, but then we can't, for now there is somebody declared Mr. President, so we can now continue our conversation part two. Part two is Kano. You know, I feel sorry for Mr. Ganduja because he's a politician, and he should understand that in politics, there's no sentiment, there's nothing as heartless as politics.  As are today, unfortunately for him, there is a new dawn in Kano state. That new dawn is not the governor of Kano state, he's a one man called Alhaji, or Bong Kwan Kwa So. As a result, the man should just, Mr. Ganduja should just prepare his mind to play the second fiddle. I would believe that during the election campaign, he had told Mr. Hsiewadjou that oh, don't worry, Kano is within our full control, and these and that. So first, there must have been a breach of trust on his side because he did not deliver Kano as he would have, and Mr. Tinubu would have said, look, you know, I discuss with you on the understanding that you are in charge of Kano, but right now you don't seem to be in charge of Kano. I know this is a game of numbers, and Kano is not just another state of the federation. You know, there are some states, there's Lagos, there's Kano, there's reverse. These are some of the states that you don't treat with kids' gloves when it comes to politics. So he's got to know that, you know, the game is over for him. He just relax and pray to God that the incoming president, if he remains the president, will be able to, you know, accommodate him, you know, throughout. Let's talk about the policy direction of this administration, because I was about to interject when you were still talking that whether we know what's going to happen in six months or not, there has to be a policy direction. The fact that somebody has been declared president-elect means that he has to have a plan. Now let's start with what the Asiwadri campaign had, you know, put out as some of the strategies that they would employ in making sure that they bring Nigeria to its private place. Now they talked most importantly about social investment programs. But before we go into that, let's look at the people that will constitute a tenable Shatima government. Many would make reference to when he was governor of Lagos State and that seems to be light years away from today, but many people still remember it. But then the man who is president-elect today might not necessarily be the same guy who was governor of Lagos State back in the day. So my question is, do we see a fully formed technocrat field list as opposed to a political reward system cabinet? You see, I have always said this, and I want to repeat, there are two things I would like to bring out concerning Obang Tenubu. The very first one is time, and the second one is process. You see, I had a very elaborate discussion with a friend today, and I told him that there are two lines, there are two aspects in politics that we get mixed up. It's like in government, government is three arms. There's the legislature, there is the executive, and there's the judiciary. These three form what we call government. But we also, we always see government as the executive, but there are three arms and it's very important. In politics, there are two arms. There is the round pegs and there is the square pegs. Now, if you call the politicians the square pegs, they are those that do the politicking, they are experts, they know how to do the game. But there is a second arm that is called governance. Call those people round pegs. Now, when you have become an established square peg, like Obang Ashiwaju had become, he had become an indisputable king maker over the past 20 years when he left office. He's become a brilliant first class king maker. He's become the fantastic politician. His square peg size had enlarged so much. Now, when you want to transit him to become a round peg, which is a second room called governance, I do not know if he will be able to transit from being a square peg, which is a politician, to a round peg, which is a governance administrator. These are two different things and we need to understand that well. But let's, he's there, he's there. Like they say, we're here, we're here. He is now in the field of governance. There is a second challenge that we must pay close attention to.  I've said this time and time again. My mother was this iron lady. I mean, my mother, the fear of pandemicitis was the beginning of wisdom. She handled us with iron hand to the extent that I've never smoked because of my mother, fear of my mother. I've never taken beer, even when I went to secondary school. Something always told me, if you try it, a kite will know and which will handle you well. Okay? Now, fast forward, I became a father. I had children. My mother comes home to stay with me. And that iron lady suddenly becomes, I want to discipline my child. I'm like, no, no, son, I can't go in, I can't live, I'm not small, what was I? What was I came for? What was I? What am I trying to say? Age has a way of playing a game on people. So that Ashiraji that we knew 20 years ago that could assemble the brightest and the best that was ambitious, that was a go-getter, is he the same person today? Or has becoming a fantastic politician made him to look at things no longer from the perspective of development, but of, you know, talking about political exigencies or expediency. So the question is, who is Nigeria having today on the seat of power? The fantastic politician who has to speak loud and say nothing? The fantastic politician who knows that he the end justifies the means? The fantastic politician who couldn't care less who's ox is God? Or the administrator who has the milk of human kindness? The administrator who knows that sometimes you need to take hard decisions to be able to get where you're going? So the question number one is, which tinu-du are we having as on the seat of power today? The fantastic politician, the fantastic square peg, or the new man who is now a square peg? So that is my first concern. Then we can, like you said, as we progress, go into the possibilities of the administration, you know, the, I don't know how the question goes so that I don't talk for too long. Yes. Most importantly, because like I said, the, the, as you said, as politicians, the deals that are made, people make promises based on what you deliver in the case of that Ganduji and now talks with Kwan-Kosso. I'm guessing that this would be something that has happened across the different regions of the country. So now that you've put, you know, that demarcation that we're yet uncertain as to who, you know, we have seated there as our presidency leg, then we can't really tell, you know, what, what direction he's going to go in terms of the people who would feel his cabinet. But most importantly, let's go to Reverend Father Masikuka's Easter message and some of the things that he pointed out. He talked about the fact that Nigerians should be the priority of the president-elect. He talks about the fact that Nigerians are angry and the first part of call for the president-elect is to seek, you know, the unity of Nigerians, blur those lines that were obviously divided during the campaign season and election. Do you see this as an easy feat for the president-elect?  Do you see him being able to reach across to every single Nigerian, especially after what happened during the elections? It depends on who we are going to have as the next president. Let's take the man that is already been given the mandate. Let's take the man that has already been given the mandate. Let's discuss him. If he comes in as the politician, he's going to think of his next election. And if he's going to think of the next election, he's going to ask himself, what sort of lines do I work on to ensure that I lay a solid foundation for myself? He's going to say, what sort of deals should I have with Mr. Wike? Number one. Number two, how relevant will he be two years from now? Because you realize that only himself in the whole of the federal republic of Nigeria has been able to build a dynasty that kind of is loyal to him long after they say, long after the price is forgotten, the quality remains, or long after the music stops, the melody lingers. So long after he had left office, he retained power. Now, the next person that could have done that would have been a man like Akpabi, but he couldn't do it. So the question is, how relevant will Wike be in the next two years running to the beginning of processes of second term? If Ashiraju thinks that this man is not going to be useful to him, trust me, he's not going to have any important relationship with Mr. Wike. So that is to say, the politician, if he's the one that comes to party, he's going to be thinking of his next election. So he's going to think in terms of how he can extend his tentacles. He's going to enlarge the position of Mr. Akpabi to have a large on the south, south. Okay. He's going to keep playing the game with Mr. Wike to ensure while watching to ensure that he actually gets reverse state wrapped up. By the time he gets reverse state wrapped up and he gets cannot state wrapped up, he can relax and know that second term he can play. Okay. He's also going to look for those areas that he may do well. But doesn't he have to survive the first term? Don't forget, we have so many problems with doubling us in this country. He's going to be inheriting a bad economy in a very highly indebted country where we have no idea how we're going to be paying back these loans. There's so much that is on his plate. He does have to survive that to even think of a second term. No, no, he doesn't need to survive that. Now, what I'm going to say now, I wanted to just listen to me carefully. If we were to go into a lecture on the basis of performance APC will not come anywhere near. They won't even come a second or third. They wouldn't. The politician in Mr. Tinubu knows how to win a lecture. He knows that it has absolutely nothing to do with performance. That's what I'm saying. It depends on who is going to come to table as our next governor or our next president. Either the politician Mr. Tinubu or the government person that we knew of Lagos State. We need to be able to draw that line very, very well because where it tilts is what we're going to get.  You've made me not just a governor, not just a senator, you've made me relevant throughout till now and you've made me a president. What can I do to give back to you for how good you have been? And God says, take care of my people, feed my sheep. So he comes in as this man for whom governance is everything. He doesn't care whether he gets third term, second term. He just knows that he's got to hit the ground running. So when that happens, what he looks at number one is his team.  But please allow me to get a team that is first class. I want the very best team, including people who are not on my team, who were not in my party. I'm going to go across the lens to be able to fix the economy. So I'm going to bring the very best hands as far as the economy is concerned. Number two, you cannot talk of economy except this piece. The peace and stability is the foundation, the bedrock for a sustainable economy. So the question is over this period, I would have been doing, you know, I wanted to be a governor. So I did a lot of strategic analysis of sectors of issues of, you know, contentions of resolutions of possibilities. So if he did all those things, he would have known where the soft areas are with insecurity and what to do about insecurity. If he doesn't, I'm not an insecurity expert, but I can tell him one or two things inside the house that we'll make. You see, most Nigerians don't understand Nigerians. Most Nigerian leaders, they are one two things about Nigerians that the moment you just touch that, they are the Nigerians are the most believing, most trusting. They are the easiest people to govern in the whole of this earth. But if you don't understand them, they can be the most complicated sort of people. So they are one or two things. And one man that understands Nigerians very well, incidentally, is Mr. El Rufi. El Rufi, you can call him manipulative, but the guy understands what to do per time. They come back, so he's going to look for the issue. I'm sorry to comment that. Did you say El Rufi knows what to do per time? Why is his state in shatters or in tatters? No, no, no. You see, El Rufi is smarter than you guys give me the credit for. Yeah. But why is that not showing in his state in every wise? I'm not just talking about the security and the divisions within his state. The first question is what did he want? We always assume what people want. How many of us have gone behind our minds to find out what El Rufi really wanted? What would have worked for him if he had a personal ambition, was peace really in his best interests? How many people have sat down to understand the configuration and the dynamics of the place? So you're assuming that El Rufi didn't want peace in Kaduna state. Why was he then trying to be government? I am saying that I don't know what he wanted, but I also know that he knows how to get what he wants. And unfortunately, he's not moralistic about it. From my understanding, I may be wrong, but I see him, somebody who is not moralistic about issues, somebody who goes for what he wants. As the way I see him, he was FCT minister. And if you look at the way he got about sanitizing FCT, there was a major strategy which he adopted, which you always adopt. What is that? Look, why am I wasting time with the small, small boys? Catch a big fish and all the little fishes we run. That's his philosophy. And he worked fantastically well. What did he do? When he wanted to sanitize Abruja, he did not go to Masaka, one man village, Mara Kwaoda. No, he went for the chairman of PDP. He went for the general. He went for the head. He went for the juggler. He told the president, come on, are you with me? Can I do this? The president said go ahead. By the time he hit that, the whole country was like, what? Before he goes to Masaka, just hearing that the tractors have started raving the engine. People are already running out. They said that man is a mad man. No, if he could do that to general, who am I? Let me tell you, if you want to fight insecurity, look for whatever it takes. Use a sledgehammer to kill a fly and make one point. When you make that point, I'm not going to take no sense. I'm not going to fail because of you. I've got to have peace because this is not going to fail in my hands. It's one thing you do. One thing you do and all those guys, they relocate. They live Nigeria alone. This mad man, who knows what, you can solve that problem. When you come and start using insecticide, instead of pesticide, you become a toothless bulldog. What you have is that people come and start stroking your beards and like a dog, a dog because they know that you can only bark, you cannot bite. Show them your fans a little bit. They are very fearful in one hand. We are very daring in the other hand. Depending. Do you know that when Mr. Buwari came in, within the first few weeks, God, they feared that great Nigerians, they were afraid to do anything wrong. They said, man, this guy, even the Naira stabilized everything, the body language became the thing. But suddenly they started moving nearly like a child. They said, don't touch this, it will be moving small until it touches and it's because that fire is not real fire, it's illusion. Well, we'll wait and see what happens. Again, looking at what you said, let's see who turns up after the inauguration day, the politician or the technocrat. I want to say thank you. Izik El-Gaytuk is a former governorship candidate of the ADC in Al-Qaibam, and is also a political analyst. Thank you so much for speaking with us. What a privilege. Thanks so much and God bless you. All right. We'll take a quick break. And when we come back, we're going to be looking at Nigeria's Maribor refineries. And of course, the inauguration of the Dangolte refinery here in Lagos and what this means for Nigeria's economy. Stay with us.


Income tax 2021-2022, part 1A, child tax credit and credit for other dependents, all filers. Get ready to get refunds to the max diving into income tax 2021-2022. Most of this information can be found in the Schedule 8812 tax year 2021 instructions on the IRS website at irs.gov, irs.gov, income tax formula, we're down here in the credit area. Both deductions and credits are good for taxes, but if you had a dollar of credit versus a dollar of deduction, the credit would basically be better because you'd get the full value of that dollar in tax benefit as opposed to a deduction which would just simply be reducing the taxable income and then the tax would be calculated upon it. Also note that the credits have two primary categories that we can group things into, those being non-refundable credits and refundable credits. The non-refundable credits won't bring the tax liability below zero. The refundable credits could possibly bring the tax liabilities below zero at that point, not really having a refund, although it might still be called a refund, but rather you'd have kind of like a benefit program at that point in time. Some credits might have a non-refundable and refundable portion to them. This is page two of the Form 1040. We're looking at 919, the non-refundable child tax credit or credit for other dependents from Schedule 8812, Line 28, refundable child tax credit or additional child tax credit from Schedule 8812. So now we're considering the items on Schedule 8812. We're looking at Line 4a. So we're going to add the number of boxes checked under the child tax credit. So we're going to be looking at the child's, the qualify for the child tax credit, which we could see on page one of the Form 1040 in column four of the dependent sections on Form 1040 or 1040 SR and enter the result online for A. You cannot check both the child tax credit box and the credit for the other dependents box for the same person. So in other words, if we're looking at the first page of the Form 1040, we're down here with the dependents. If we checked off the child tax credit box, then we can jump on over to the Form 8812 and we're looking at Part 1a of the Schedule 8812. We're looking at 4a, number of qualified children under age 18 with the requested social security number. B, number of children included online for A who were under age six at the end of 2021. So remember that we have that two-tier kind of thing that we get a larger amount of the credit if under the six and then you've got up to the 18 with regards to the calculation being reflected as we put the information into the forms. So Line 2b and a number of children from Line 4a that were under age six at the end of 2021 on Line 4b. Example, let's say you have three qualified children who were ages 15, 10, and 5 at the end of 2021. On Line 4a, you enter three for the three children that are qualifying children and because they're all below 18. And on Line 4b, you would enter one. So in that case, so in that case, you would have then on page one, you would have the three dependents, but possibly and then you possibly would have the child tax credit here, but there's two tiers of the child tax credits. So then when you go over to this page, we would have possibly three up in 4a, but then I believe only one was under age age six. Obviously the tax software would help us out with the calculations of these as we enter the data into the system as well. So Line 5, if Line 4a is more than zero, enter the amount from the Line 5 worksheet, otherwise enter zero. So Line 5 has this worksheet here, which we might go into more detail in a future presentation. Software is often helpful to basically calculate this worksheet. So let's take a quick look at it here. So you've got the calculation up top. Notice that there's a phase out that's being put in place here because down here you can see enter the amount shown below for filing status, married filing joint or qualified widow or the 150,000 head of household 112,000, all others 75. So we've got that 75 here. And then it says subtract line eight from the schedule 8812 line three, which was basically the AGI of the 100,000. And that's why we're getting this 25,000, which is causing basically a reduction. So these are basically the thresholds that you'll start to see reductions as they do the phase out as income goes up because in this particular return, we've got the income or AGI pulling in on line one, which is coming from you can see in the 1040 the 100,000 adjusted gross income on line 11. So that's the general the general idea of it. Here's the worksheet that you could find in the instructions to the form 8812. And you could reconstruct it, we might put it together in an Excel worksheet just to examine it a bit more closely. But you can find that in the instruction software, of course, helps with the calculations with the phase outs and so on. But you want to have an idea of the phase outs as the income goes up, so that you can explain that to people, both in terms of why the calculation did what it did. And so you could reconstruct it and try to project into the future, what's going to happen next year for planning, although planning becomes difficult with this kind of area because you know, there could be temporary changes to these kind of this type of law because it was severely changed due to this economic circumstances. So line number six, add the number of boxes checked under credit for other dependents in column four of the dependent section on form 1040 or 1040 SR and enter the result on line number six. You cannot check both the child tax credit box and the credit for other dependents box for the same person. So now we're looking line six, the number of other dependents. So if you were looking at the form 1040, and you had someone here as a dependent, then you would have the checked boxes on the other side. And you can't have, of course, both of these chop boxes checked is the general idea there. Line 13 box a check box a if you or your spouse if filing jointly had a principal place abode in the United States for more than half of 2021. This means your main home was in the 50 States or the District of Columbia for more than half of 2021. So that would be generally most people claiming the credit in there or that would be the easiest kind of circumstances as well for main home for main home can be any location where you regularly live your main home maybe your house apartment mobile home shelter temporary lodging or other location and doesn't need to be the same physical location throughout the tax year. So now on line 13 most people will basically have this one checked off which would mean you're under the general rules typically. So check all the boxes that apply to you your spouse if married filing jointly a check here if you or your spouse if filing married jointly had a principal place of abode in the United States for more than half of 2021. You don't need a permanent address see box be later if you were a bona fide resident of Puerto Rico in 2021. So we'll talk more about that in a second. If you are a temporarily away from your main home because of illness education business or vacation you are generally treated as living in your main home military personnel station outside the United States US military personnel station outside the United States on extent extended active duty are considered to have a main home in the United States for purposes of claiming a child tax credit. So we got line 13 be now so check box be if you or your spouse if filing jointly were a bona fide resident of Puerto Rico generally you were a bona fide resident of Puerto Rico. If during 2021 you met the President's test did not have a tax home outside of Puerto Rico and did not have a closer connection to the United States or to a foreign country then to Puerto Rico. So then we'd be checking off box be so it says check here if you or your spouse if married filing jointly were a bona fide resident of Puerto Rico and then you could have a situation where you wouldn't be checking either of those boxes a or b. And so we have those three kind of scenarios that could take place for more information on bona fide residents you can see publication 570 tax guide for individuals with income from US possessions. And if you check either box a or b then go to the instructions for part one be if you cannot check either box a or b then you go to the instructions for part C. So we got then we're going to go to the next part will either be this part one be here or then we'd be going to part one C would be the general next steps and then the instructions would guide us from that basically kind of fork in the road.


the democracy here we can't even stay. I think it's because our message brings the truth. The Secretary is fast-forwarding and doing this all over the place. I'm leaving, I'm leaving, but I'm serving. The public here doesn't care the public. The public is not allowed in the public here. Folks, you have to put your signs down. Put your signs up because now it's a demonstration. There's one more in there. There's one more in there. They're not doing anything. They're profiling someone. So we were in there before the hearing started with our sign saying that the blood of the people of Gaza is on the hands of the Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin. And this was the sign I was holding up. I was telling them to remember Aaron Bosnell who is an active duty Air Force Airman who lit himself on fire in front of the Israeli embassy just this week. And that is the Secretary of Defense in there. It's his job to make sure that our service members are taken care of. And I was kicked out for telling them to remember an Air Force veteran who killed himself. I was just in a public hearing that's supposed to be something as a constituent I'm able to view. I had no blood on my hands. I was not part of the demonstration that they originally kicked out. But because I'm wearing this shirt that says until we are all free, none of us are free, I have to be kicked out of that session. He had to arrest me for wearing this shirt in a public hearing. This is a hearing about Secretary Lloyd Austin and his health problems and how he hadn't notified the President when he was in the hospital. But we say there's much bigger health issues and transparency issues and that's the issue of the health of the people of Gaza who have been murdered, slaughtered and are now being starved. And this Secretary of Defense just yesterday talked to the head of the military in Israel and promised that the U.S. would be sending even more money for more bombs. That is a health issue. And that's why we wanted to be in this hearing to say he has an accomplice to genocide and they kicked us out before the hearing even started.


Transcribed. Listen to Herbert Marshall as the man called X. Wherever there is mystery, adventure, intrigue, in all the strange and dangerous places of the world, there you will find the man called X. It began in a modern hotel room in the city of Dar es Salaam, capital of the Tanganyika territory. And it ended deep in the primeval shadows of an African jungle when the mingled screams of beast and man put an end to the story of primitive terror. Moldavo, welcome you once again to Dar es Salaam, Buena Thurston. It was most kind of you to come. I got your message in Cape Town and took the next plane out. What seems to be the trouble, Moldavo? Moldavo is born too cheap to try to make his people civilized to bring them peace, health, education, God. And you've done it. The outside world is filled with people not half as civilized as yours. All this is no good, Buena, if the work comes to an end. Why should it? You have a son to carry on when you leave off? Moldavo's son is dead. Oh, I'm sorry. It is not for sorrow, Buena, because some of my people to drop the good book and pick up guns, crying to them to burn, to kill, to drive the white devil out of Tanganyika. So that's it. They're spreading their propaganda poison here too, like they live in China, Korea and the rest. How did your people get those guns? Who's been eating them on? Moldavo do not know. He knew only that when his son was killed he was carrying this. Hmm? A statuette with an elephant. Carved out of what is it, some brilliant blue stone. It is so that same blue elephant appear whenever there is violence. This worship by those of my people who now carry guns. They say it trumpets in the night calling for white man's blood. I see. That is why Moldavo call upon his good friend. Why Moldavo ask for help for his people. All right, Moldavo. I'll see what I can do. Since, Ken, wasting your time on some minor African uprising, you've got more important things to do. Chief, of all the metals vital to our defense effort, which one would you say we need the most of right now? Oh, that's easy. Cobalt. Every jet engine, every anti-tank shell needs cobalt. But what's that got to do with Tanganyika and blue elephants? The little statuette Moldavo gave me is carved out of pure cobalt oxide. The finest grade of ore I've ever seen. But that's impossible, Ken. There's no cobalt in Tanganyika, or at least we don't know of any. Well, if there is cobalt here, and it's being mined, and Uncle Sam doesn't know anything about it, well, staring up trouble with Moldavo's people could make a pretty good smoke screen. Yeah. Well, Chief? Let me know how you come out, Ken. You're absolutely certain of your facts, sir Robert. Of course I am, Mr. Thurston. As commissioner of the port, I can assure you that there is not one ounce of cobalt in all Tanganyika. No. No, Mr. Thurston, your theory about the native unrest simply will not hold water. Why not prove it for yourself? Be a weekend guest at my plantation near Cairoby. It's in the heart of the trouble area. Thanks, I will. There's a train leaving this afternoon. I'll have my niece, Jean Thompson, meet with the station, and I'll fly in later and join you. That sounds good. By the way, sir Robert, your plantation must be near some mineral deposits, isn't it? That's right, there's a mining district nearby. What made you ask? Paperweight on your desk. Huh? Paperweight? Yeah. This piece of mineral ore. Beautiful blue coloring. If you hadn't told me differently, I'd almost think it was cobalt oxide. I'll see you at your plantation, sir Robert. I'm afraid Uncle Robert asked you to visit the plantation at Robert in opportune time, Mr. Thurston. Why is that, Mr. Thompson? We've been having some difficulty with abandoned tribesmen. These jungles are pretty dangerous at the moment. Yes, I have noticed the gun you're wearing. When we've killed enough of those beggars, they'll see the light and settle down again. You make it all sound pretty direct and primitive. Life out here is direct and primitive. It's a lesson you'd better learn if you care to survive. A threat, Miss Thompson? Friendly advice. And I would suggest... Pull off the road. Pull off the road. Thanks for grabbing the wheel, Ken. I'm afraid I was rather frozen with surprise for a moment. I suppose we get out of here before our trigger-happy friend checks up on the results. Yes, there might be a possibility. Listen. Who in this way? Over here. Here. This brush will keep us hidden. Not far enough. Get his gun, Ken. I have him covered. His gun? Covered, but... Well, hello, Mr. Thurston. Oh, for pay gone. Good strike, Mr. Thurston.  And with that elephant gun? What a question. I'm hunting blue elephants, Natch. That's right, Mr. Thurston. After I bumped into Motawa and told him where he could reach you, I came out here. Hunting for blue elephants? Or waiting for me to show up so you could chisel a few bucks? Well, you know how it is. Yes. I'm afraid that I don't. Who fires those shots if you didn't? Who knows? Somebody always shooting at him. Bullets go for him like honey goes to magnets. I'll try to figure that one out later. At least we've arrived at the plantation without any permanent damage. What happened to the windshield of this great jean? Flying too low and running into a flock of buzzards? It was a buzzard, all right. The humankind, George, was something like a 375 magnum wind chester loaded for elephant. You're kidding. You wouldn't have thought so if you'd been along with us. Oh, George, this is Ken Thurston. Ken, George Gilmore, one of our neighbors. And I, Mr. Piggins. Hello, Gilmore. Glad to know you, Thurston. You must be the man with the cobalt theory. What do you know about it? Only what Sir Robert told me. Uncle Robert, is he here? No, but he radioed in from his plane, left a message for Thurston. What was it? He said for you to hold on to your hat until he gets here. He found something that proves your theory. You were right about the cobalt oxide. That's your theory about this Bantu business, Thurston. You think it's a cover-up for a cobalt play of some kind? That's about it, Gilmore.  There's no cobalt in Tanyangika. Sir, I'll just, George, you should know that. Well, I do, Jane. Or I did, until Thurston showed me this. But this blue elephant is pure cobalt oxide, nothing else but. That doesn't prove a thing. Why not let the man who knows settle the argument for it? Sounds like Sir Robert's coming in now. You're right. Pretty dark out. How are the landing lights on the script? More than adequate. There. See the script? Yeah. And there's something wrong with those lights. Wrong? The script? Don't those lights run right into the grove of palm trees? Holy smoke, you're right. If he follows him, he'll overshoot the field and then right in the middle of it. Thurston! He's seen the trees! He is pulling up! He'll make it! He's got to make it! He'll... They can't help it now. That's a terrible way to die. Terrible accident. Jane, it was murder. Murder? Yeah. The landing lights? Some auxiliary lights must have been deliberately misplaced to cause that crash. Why would anyone want to do such a thing? Stop him from telling me what he'd learned about Cobalt. Guessing, Thurston? I might be if it wasn't for this. Found it lying back there on the runway. Ken! That... That thing! Yes. Another blue elephant. We'll return to the man called X in just a moment. Friends, there's no way of making him appeal to tornadoes. I can only appeal to you. Tornadoes, which recently swept through six southern states, hospitalized 696, affected 2,433 families, destroyed 1,007 homes, and damaged 1,348 homes. The Red Cross has made an initial allocation of $1 million for immediate emergency relief, and that is just the beginning. So great is the need that your Red Cross has increased its $85 million fund goal by $5 million. So, give the hand of the good neighbor. Answer the call, and give generously through your American Red Cross. Two of the man called X starring Herbert Marshall, with Leon Balasco as Pagansel Schmidt. Deep in the primitive jungles of the Tanyaimika territory, renegade Bantu warriors are taking up arms against the white plantation owners. And Ken Thurston believes it's a deliberate screen for some kind of illegal traffic in one of the most vital of all defense metals, cobalt. And then, Sir Robert Morstan is murdered in a crash landing shortly after he'd radioed that he could prove Ken's theory. The Bantu, they killed him. They want to take these plantations away from us before. They killed him. Cobalt had nothing to do with it. I'm afraid that cobalt elephant I found in the runway says different to Gene. No. The Bantu's murdered him. And I'll kill the one who did it. You hear me? I'll kill him. Easy, Gene. Easy. What you need right now is a good night's sleep. Sleep? After what just happened?  Please, Gene, try to calm down. A tooth for a tooth? That's the law of the jungle. Only you would know about that, would you? All you care about is rubbing in that no-good silver mine of yours. All right, Gene, all right. Now, let's get back to the house. I didn't know your business was silver mining, German. That's right. I got a little mine on the railway spur about ten miles east of here. And I know what you're thinking. Cobalt and silver are usually found together. Well? I only wish it were true. If you're getting rich instead of starving to death on the low-grade ore, I'm shipping out a... One assistant. That you, Motavo? Motavo. I have things to talk about with you. I would like... Motavo, he's the ban-true leader. He's the one who murdered my uncle. Now it's my turn. Put down the gun, Gene.  You hear me? I got a kid. It's no wonder after what she's been through. Yes. Can you get her back to the house? Yeah, sure. You two can talk. I'll take care of her. Sorry, Motavo. She's pretty upset. She doesn't know what she's doing. I don't know things of one.  Because you know what? She is one who gives guns to the ban-true so they can kill her own people. They come from Dar es Salaam on railroad today. The labels say farm machinery. The address to Mr. Gene Thompson. Most implantations, Kyroby. The lid is free on this one. Rifles, grenades, sub-machine guns.  She has caused them to forget the way of peace.  Quiet now. Don't shoot, don't shoot.  It is the strange one I get. Strange one? How do you like that? The only thing strange is why Mr. Thurston keeps on jumping out at me all the time. All right, Pagon. Why'd you ship those guns here in Gene Thompson's name? Who shipped what guns and whose name? And I didn't have nothing positively to do with it. Why not? This one, he shipped those guns? Sure. I couldn't miss the handwriting on those labels. It's forgery, Mr. Rex. I swear by father and my father. And besides, they don't really belong to me. I only got them on consignment. It's a sort of... What? No, sure. When Multava told me somebody was shipping guns up here, I figured I might go get into the act. So I sent this stuff here and charged it to that Gene Thompson cookie.  No, no, no. I didn't want nobody killed. I only wanted to make a couple of past couple of bucks. Mr. Rex, please. It's all right, Multava. No harm's been done. We'll see if this stuff is sent back. The strange one should be punished, Buona. Don't worry, he will be. He's going to work. Oh, sure, don't worry. I will be. I'm going to work. Yes. Looking for cobalt in a silver mine. It's longer to have to stay down here, Mr. Rex. That George Dilmer could shoot us for trespassing on private mines or something.  We're not doing any damage. But we've been down here a couple of hours already. What are you looking for anyway? Oh, not what I've been finding. What's that? Low-grade silver ore. Just what Gilmore said he'd been shipping out of here. Come on. Hey, hey, you're going the wrong way. It's an old-fashioned abandoned shaft. Back this way. I want to take one around and look at it before... Oh, watch it. Dilmer would shoot us or something. Let's get out of here, Mr. Rex. Not before I find out who it is. All right, Pagan. You can open your eyes now. Rex. Yes. Oh, but what it can be? He's already dead. Burned up in that airplane crash. Then he died twice. Yes. Sir Robert Moreston. I'm sorry, Ken, but I just don't grasp it. How could my uncle be dead in George's mind when we saw him die in that plane crash? Simple, Gene. He wasn't in that plane. You think his pilot flew it in here alone? After dropping Sir Robert off at my silver mine? It's the only explanation that makes sense. But why should Uncle Robert want to visit George's mind at that hour? Well, that's pretty obvious. He was looking for proof to bolster Thurston's cobalt theory. Apparently they both suspect that I was mining this stuff.  Sir Robert had been dead at least an hour before we found him. Someone else fired those shots in the mine. Any idea who it was? I found a gun beside the body, this one. Recognize it, Gene? Well, of course. It's mine. But I didn't kill my uncle if I only shot at you. I swear, Ken. Maybe the authorities at Daris Salam will believe you. The authorities? There's a train leaving in an hour. I think you'd better be aboard. Well, I guess we got this man all washed up. Hey, Mr. Rex? Not quite, Pagan. But surely you turned over the Gene Thompson to the flat foot. What else is there to worry about? There's no matter of cobalt. Huh? Here's the ship. The Abdul Akbar. So it's a ship. So what?  Look up there. Hey, look at that. That railroad car is filled with rocks. And it's tipping over us. It's supposed to tip like that. It is? Hey, that's right. That guy pulled the Tegama jig and the whole thing tipped silver. Yes, and the ore rolls down that metal chute into the ship's hole. What is that, Mr. Rex? Whatever would they think of next? Suppose we find out. Hmm? By paying a little visit to the hold of the Abdul Akbar.  It's plenty of valuable, all right, but it's not silver. Cobalt oxide. But you said they were unloading silver ore. That's the way they clear those ore cars for export, yes. And there was silver ore on the top layer of those cars. But all the rest of the load was cobalt oxide. That's how they've been getting it out of Tanganyika. Shipping it behind the iron curtain. And to think that that sweet little sugar-plum Jean Thompson was behind all that. She doesn't have anything to do with it. She didn't. But you tossed her in the clean. That was a cover-up. It was time to get the goods on the one really responsible. And it worked. Didn't it, Gilmore? Gilmore? All right, Tyson.  All right, sir. Oh, this man ought to dump any more cars. Look up there. At the control lever. Mr. Rex. It's Motavo. Yes. The law of the jungle, Pagan. A tooth for a tooth. But when you come right down to it, take a look at Gilmore and then a look at Motavo and... Oh, well, it's not too tough to know which one is really civilized in. Now, here's our star, Mr. Herbert Marshall. Thanks for being with us. And my thanks to Lorine Tuttle, Will Wright, Daniel Hurley, Paul Freese, and Harry Bartell. Next week, a Maverick skier. A bottle of germ culture and a sultry blumette. Plunge ten firsts into a situation that can mean only one thing. Death. That might mean death for you. And for once there'll be help from Pagan Zillsmith. Alias Leon Balasco. So join us, won't you, when next I return as The Man Called X. Good night. The Man Called X starring Herbert Marshall is a J. Richard Kennedy production with music by Milton Charles. Tonight's transcribed story was written by Sydney Marshall. This program is directed by Jack Johnstone. All characters and incidents on this program present any resemblance to actual characters or incidents is purely coincidental. And now until next week, same time and station, this is Hal Gibney saying good night for The Man Called X. This is NBC, the national broadcasting company.


Today, I'm excited to talk to you about a new partnership between Alaska Army National Guard and the U.S. Coast Guard along with our continuing relationship with the Air Force of Civil Air Patrol to deploy Marine Safety Task Force personnel to parts of Western Alaska and the Arctic in support of our third year of operations here in 2021. The spring of 2021 marks a milestone for the Marine Safety Task Force Initiative. We spent the winter forming new partnerships, strengthening old ones, and making big plans for the 2021 summer surge season. This summer, for the very first time in MSTF history, the Alaska Army National Guard is flying Coast Guard members from Joint Base Elmendorf Richardson to hub communities such as King Salmon and Gnome. From these hub communities, the Civil Air Patrol will continue to fly our inspectors to remote villages whose runways only allow for smaller airplanes. Sector Anchorage MSTF teams are the boots on the ground and the face of the Coast Guard in these regions. Now that the MSTF initiative is in its third year, Sector Anchorage has expanded its partnerships with Alaska Natives in communities and villages across the state who are actively working toward compliance in unprecedented ways. We seek to ensure the safety of lives in the maritime environment through gradually building relationships that encourage continued movement towards federal regulatory compliance. Coast Guard Sector Anchorage has regulatory oversight for 380 bulk oil waterfront facilities where fuel is delivered by barge in our area of responsibility, and most of these facilities are in extremely remote locations. Coast Guard facility inspectors arriving in these communities must then depend on cooperation from locals for ground transportation. There are typically no paved roads and sometimes no roads at all leading to the facilities. All-terrain vehicles or snow machines are often necessary to gain access to the bulk fuel tank farms in order to complete the on-site physical inspection. Many fuel facilities throughout Alaska have varying degrees of deteriorated infrastructure. Our goal is to get eyes on these facilities in order to increase regulatory compliance, which in turn prevents oil discharges into the environment. We've had to think creatively for ways to complete annual on-site physical inspections of these facilities with a limited number of inspectors and travel funding. Given our expanded relationships that allow routine on-site physical inspections and exams in the maritime environment, the Marine Safety Task Force will continue to work with Alaska Natives, tribal representatives, and citizens of Alaska to build a sustainable community resiliency that ensures our presence across Western Alaska and the Arctic is valued, welcomed, and encouraged.


It is for a few hours so let's go ahead and get started. Thank you Alex for recording locally. Sorry that I am tethered to my phone. Here's the agenda. Nothing crazy client updates with a focus on Altair. We will discuss the point brought up by Adrian today on some of the subtleties on gossiping sync signatures. We'll talk about Altair planning. Thank you for Perry for joining to help us discuss and coordinate that. And then general discussion. The merge call was right before so I think we got all of that out of our system. But I think Proto might have a quick update on charting on the research and we'll leave the rest of stuff there at that point. Let's go ahead and get started. How about Techu kick us off. Sure. So we've updated to the Alpha 7 release with the new gossip. SIGID changes and the new rewards for sync committees. That's all up and running. We've kicked off Yerong Pili testnet with that. So the details are in the ETH2 testnet repo. P fixes to the Node Health API to make the book a bit better with Kubernetes in particular for us. We now say we're syncing on that API right after startup until we found peers. Obviously we had no peers so we had nothing to sync. So hey, we're in sync because we don't know anybody yet. So we're actually exposing that startup mode now through that API. That is the main thing. We've got a lot of fixes for discovery that have come out and a few tweaks to our gossip stuff. Mostly that's just Techu specific stuff but a lot of learnings out of the previous dev nets for our tech. I think that's us. Thank you. And thanks for putting up the new dev net. Prism. Hey guys, Terrence here. So we aligned to Alpha 7 passing spec tests. We're working on the new validator RBC endpoints, mainly the sync committee stuff. And almost done with that. And then we're also working on the network spec and that's almost done as well. So we're almost there. I think we're on track to start a local interrupt ish test net to test the fortran station by end of this week or early next week. And if that goes well, we will jump into the multi client test net with you guys as well. On the maintenance front. We are planning to release our e2 API support by next release. So that's very exciting. And other than that, just bug fixes. And then, yeah, that's it. Thank you. Great. I do the progress. Hi mommy here. So on the entire front, we also updated to Alpha 7. Besides that we still continue working on optimizing numbers and we made contribution to significantly accelerate everything that requires public keys from the database by not compressing the public keys. And we also improved or cash or state cash. Besides that, we are working on the validator client. We have a PR sitting there and we managed to control lighthouse with numbers validator client. So we are in good shape. And in parallel to that we are also adding more and more API endpoints to be in line with if to API requirements. Great. Thank you. Hey, so on the altar front, we are still on Alpha 6. We're in the process of upgrading to seven, but we've been fixing various performance issues and stability issues that we have come up just either during our own internal ephemeral test nets or trying to deal with Tech Goose DevNet. As of right now, it looks pretty good locally. We need to upgrade this Alpha 7 and see, see what it looks like. Other than that, I've been doing some other optimizations and things we were going to delete our pending attestation cash, because we found out it's not very DOS resistant and looking for feedback and ideas how to actually implement something like that. We stopped updating our fork choice head on every call. And now instead we're caching that result and then updating it only after processing every block. And then as far as like publishing a load star we've, we pulled out our API client into a separate package. It's pretty nice just to be able to query needs to end point, put that into a package and published it and also pulled out our light client prototype into a package. And we started releasing nightly builds and integrated all that into our Docker system so yeah. Nice. And on the light client has the prototype primarily on the server or on the client itself. It's a client that talks to a beacon note he's over like the rest API with a few additional pieces for sending over updates and proofs. Thank you. And lighthouse. Hello everyone Paul here. So with regard to Altair, we've got alpha seven merged into Altair branch as working well passing tests, we're following your own Pilly. We seem to be getting sync committee messages we had a couple of issues with the new configs. But we sorted those out and kind of yeah it seems to be working out we're looking into it to try and find some bugs and weirdness which I'm sure we'll find. We're also without we're patching an issue with every see we had some problems about signing just around the four boundary so we're going to fix that. We're still finishing some communication stuff and then we'll be working on merging our out there branch into a primary branch at some point. And out of out there now, last week we released version 1.4 point zero and it went quite well which is nice. We dropped our memory from like six gig to 1.5 gig dropped calls to F1 nodes by about 80% and the users seem very happy so which makes us happy. And moving forward we're going to be pushing forward with Altair and hopefully cutting a version 1.5 and release. We're going to be working into this month started next month, which should have some CPU savings and a bunch of other features. Excellent. Thank you. On this recent DevNet Adrian did it do the transition or did it start from Altair. Did the transition. That was some of the confusion I caused for like us it's a epoch 20. I forgot to enable it as we passed through epoch 10 when it was first going to happen. It's a great until you forget to set them. Okay, so you used mist where you intended and then switched it to 20. Yeah, yeah, so that's that's gone through the transition, which the previous ones did as well for just a epoch 10. Okay, great. Let's let's actually do planning and then we can talk about the same committee signature broadcast time and cash. Okay, so we're making progress. Adrian. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I think posting these dev nets up and doing some additional interop is is invaluable. I think that most of you have met Perotosh Perry who is at the EF who does primarily eat your DevOps related tasks so you've probably run into them with test nets and other things. Perry is going to be joining our calls here and getting his hands dirty with various test net things. So helping set dates helping pick and host configs and that kind of stuff and then maybe working on your problems if they arise like hitting epoch 10 and forgetting and then changing it to epoch 20. Perry, do you want to do a quick intro to yourself. Yeah, hi. Like Danny said my name is. And Cool. So I think the, the steps obviously look like short live dev nets, some longer live dev nets, and then picking dates on our two test nets and picking a date date aka epoch on main net. So in terms of, I think we'll do iteration on the short live dev nets. Adrian and or Perry can maybe pick and host another one or two over the next week or two, if that seems valuable. And then what's the current temperature on earliest for one of our large test networks. Is that a two week target is that a four week target is in something like PM on or Prada. Yeah, I would, I would think that two weeks is probably too early. Just looking broadly. I'd be definitely more in a four week kind of racket given those two options. Okay. And I think that's where I would fall on that as well. Terrence, do I see you on mute. Yeah, I should assume sentiment as Paul, I will say between two to four weeks, likely didn't force for it because I prefer more like local interrupt testing or small scale testing before that. Okay, so we are. Two weeks puts us at the first July, four weeks puts us at the 15th of July. So, let's state the intention of continued interop short live dev nets and maybe keep on running once a bunch of people joined it and do some testing just sending random transactions and things like that on the first which is two weeks. The intention would be to set a fork date for one of our large test nets. Maybe in the two week time horizon after that so heading towards the 15th of July. And maybe if we're comfortable at that point setting some targets for a main network. Well, we might get to the first be comfortable setting a test net fork, but then wanting to regroup on the 15th, which would be another call before we actually maybe will the intention would be to fork one of those, then to get to the 15th, and then set fork targets for if things have gone well for targets for the other test net information at that point. I think definitely in the August, early mid August horizon for an earliest main network. Does that all sound about what we're thinking in terms of this is reasonable targets this isn't too aggressive but we'll keep us moving. I think that's about right. I think the key thing we need to get on to now in terms of walking test nets is getting users used to the fact that it's coming and coming fairly soon and they will have relatively short notice to upgrade. Right, because otherwise it's going to go very badly when the chain splits. So we can, I guess, once, once we pick a main net target, I think we'll probably do a minimum from announcing that to the main net launch of four weeks, I think is is what is the minimum given off to non forks on the other side of this thing. So we'll write a blog post target release Monday, making it very clear that this is coming, and also talk with some of the estaker folks to make this is that to make sure that they've begun discussing that within their community as well. I have a question to everyone here. Is every team comfortable with us starting to report bugs crashes that are related to the consensus. The transitions of I'll say, I'll ask the question differently perhaps was not ready yet to receive crash reports that they would be confidentially, confidentially disclosed that right many. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. We'll usually pick one or two people from each team and the years with them directly and disclose those five things directly. Also usually inform Danny and or product of those. Right because there's a chance that something that crashes out there might be able to at least in a similar vein crash may not potentially. Yeah, exactly. I'll take it as you guys are happy for us to disclose some of those bugs so yeah might get a message from you over the next few days. I had another question. Our teams thinking about doing like a quick audit just for the deep that you guys have for a tear. This is something that I've thought about that haven't formally made a decision on so I don't thinking about it. I'm thinking about thinking about it. It's not that this is correct, but it's certainly not done on a per fork basis for most ethwon mainnet clients. That's not saying again that it is correct, but they rely heavily on testing and and test nets and assume that their architecture is generally correct and that they and those processes are the things that are going to best find consensus which is probably true from a to we got a perspective but extra eyes is never a bad thing. If you do intend to do that you need to knock on somebody's door immediately. As you're all probably well aware auditors are extremely backlogged. That's fair. He was just a thought. Yeah realistically I don't think you're probably happy to talk about it. On that front we've actually gone. Yeah, I was going to have respect been audited. You've been looking at it right yes. I have. I love finding bugs and things. The spec is not been audited. The spec was audited some extent quite a long time ago at the phaser respect freeze. I will note that about 10, maybe 20 times the amount of issues and bugs were reported outside of that audit process then from that audit process. Okay, Adrian would you mind discussing the introducing the issue that you brought up this morning. Yeah, so in the earlier tests we found that we were losing gossip messages basically the inclusion rate for sync committee signatures has been really low. With the message ID changes that jumped up to about 70% inclusion rate, but we were still missing a bunch and it turned out that it's because the network was functioning really well so we were producing a block every slot and then immediately producing a sync signature. And for both nodes actually in the network, they were managing to process sync signature before they actually imported the block. And so they wound up ignoring most of the signatures. And it's just the same race condition we've seen with attestations if you publish them when you first receive a block and other nodes don't have any, any casing say for later type behavior. You get this race condition between the block and the, the sync committee signature or the attestation actually being ready, causing, causing you to drop some. I've run an experiment this evening with delaying producing sync committee signatures to the four second mark in the slot. And we're not getting 100% participation yet, but we're missing entire subnets at a time so I think what's happening is that we're randomly not getting an aggregator. And to do one more log message to prove that but I'm pretty sure that we're actually getting perfect inclusion rate of signatures now, and we just sometimes don't aggregate. Essentially, that, that delay solves the problem. And we now just need to have a choice between whether we. I think there are three proposals on the table. One is just don't publish signatures early when you get a block always wait for the four second mark. And the other was that we introduce a case so you hold on to signatures if you don't have the block they're pointing to until the end of the slot. And the third was yes x suggestion that there's a random delay after you get the block between a quarter of a second and a second. There's a bunch of arguing over semantics but I think, I think we just picked one of those really. My go would be to go with the second and introduce a short live cash so that you can kind of have the dispersal of attestation messages not all being blasted exactly the same time and reuse the mechanism that protects that stations from from having the same issue. The cash, I think should be much more short lived on the order of slot, rather than I think on the order of an epoch. And we get to ideally reuse kind of the similar logic from that structure. Yeah, I mean that's the way I've been as well, partly because I already have the attestation case so plug it in relatively easily. It doesn't do that yet. That's obviously more work. So that's a consideration, and it just feels, it's a deterministic to deterministic solution you are never going to reject a signature because you don't have the block yet. But zooming in. It's possible to build a DOS resistant case. Well, I think so because you've got at most you're going to hold it for 12 seconds and at most you're going to hold 512 signatures because you ignore anything. It's not from this slot and you ignore anything that you've already seen from that validator. But you can get. Can't you get non you can't always verify the signatures of the things that you put into that case is that is that true. That is probably true. Can't you verify the signatures. You may not have that for. Yeah, if you, well if you don't have the block you don't have anything. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, so you get the block roots you in in a fork and therefore shuffling. Right, but there's shuffling I mean the shuffling is in the order of a day. That's true you could just try and verify it against your head and you'd be right 99.9% of the time. If you're rejected on a on a on a sync committee shuffling you're like want a way different fork you can probably drop it. I'm not saying the case is like definitely a bad idea I think that delay is also a good idea because I made an argument somewhere else but if we know that we're going to have to case these things and why make every note on the network case it rather than just the sender hold it for a little bit more. That's that's one argument and then that if we just have some delay, then you can get by without a case. And if the case isn't a perfect case like in this case where we can't always verify the signatures going into it then there's like you know that the case isn't a perfect deterministic solution. And we already have this problem with attestations like I think loads time at the start of it. How do you make the attestation case boss resistant you can't say with this one you can't so the attestation case is a bad idea but I probably say delay it indication. So I'd argue that the, this cash is a lot more dust resistant than the attestation cash because of the way the, I mean, the current sync committees been known for like an entire day before it becomes the same committee. So it's almost certainly finalized. But the, then the randomness. Why does the randomness look much different than this because if I wait 0.25 seconds, or on a random stretch between that like what does that actually buy me because I can still end up sending a signature to somebody who hasn't seen the block yet. I mean it's probably not thinking that it's only 512 it's probably doesn't earn you a whole lot, but just I guess looking from like a broader network perspective, you know, if you're going to, you've got a message right do you just to send.  Do you hold on the sender side or does every receiver hold it until they get it. Yeah, I'm not sure that that's as long as I know but that's that's what I was going with it. I'm also, it's also network latency is not just like the processing of the block into into the into the actual state which, unless you're telling me it's like almost that's almost always the dominant factor. It's a present factor. That one more question which is basically that losing an attestation. By and large doesn't matter. It'll get included somebody will have seen it and then likely to get included anyway. How bad is it to lose this in committee. Certainly less forgiving. What was that. It certainly a lot less forgiving, you've only got one slot to get in there are fewer aggregators that might be around. I can think that would it be worth to introduce some sort of forgiveness mechanism in general. I mean this was during the attestation discussions were discussing whether the attestation inclusion delay should be increased in order to allow for more leniency on block versus attestation timing. I mean it's an option it's a trade off in terms of the optimal latency to follow the chain as a light client. If you if you added a minimum inclusion delay by if it was to follow two slots instead of one slot then you'd have 24 seconds for your node to be able to follow the head rather than 12. One of the things that bits of data we're missing in this is that we don't have a decent size network that we're seeing how this actually behaves in the real world. So I've got two nodes that are right next to each other in AWS. It's not really surprising they're getting the block all at the same time it is all happening very fast. Whereas even on Piedmont and Prada we're seeing a much bigger distribution of when blocks arrive and take your publishers attestation straight away Lighthouse currently drops them if it doesn't know the block. It doesn't seem to be a problem attestation inclusion rates are pretty good. So on a bigger network, how big a problem this is and you know so you're not necessarily always needing to catch the signature. And a lot of these questions about how likely it is to get dropped are still unknowns effectively. I say if possible I'd like to solve this in the PDP spec, which can be done with minimal damage to moving towards a spec freeze, especially on the state transition side networks that have slightly different or nodes on the same network that have slightly different agreement on how they're handling this case would still be able to hang out and chat with each other. So, if possible, I'd like to solve it with one of the two or one of the suggestions that just touches the PDP rather than adding some sort of induced delay on the on the state transition side. If we want to gather more data that's I don't think it's critical that we conform on the solution immediately right now but we should probably pick something in the next five days. So, is the reason that we're not going to send them all the four second mark so that we don't pump the network. And if that is the case there's only 512 messages right so and it just seems appealing to me to say just send them all at four seconds and implement a case if you want as well. There's multiple reasons there one would be there is this, you do want attestations well propagated, so that aggregation can happen at the eight second mark. And so if you have the information that you need to send your message, the ideas that is optimization to send your message when it's available. Like when the correctness is available, and then that also so that you can potentially get aggregated at a higher success rate, but then that is also a suit does help stagger. So you don't have message blast. Yeah, okay, that's a good point. So, going back to the case again, saying that the shuffling is known a day ahead. I guess the problem that we're going to have is that if we get folks more than a day if the network goes unstable then we're going to. I guess the worst thing that happens is the case is going to fill up we're going to start dropping sync committee messages which is not too bad right. It is not too bad. And you've entered into somewhat of an extreme scenario and like clients might have issues then. But even then, even if you're not finalizing for an entire day, the assuming that there was actually two forks that are deep of an entire day and that those networks are actually those partitions the network are actually communicating and not resolving that fork is like a more extreme issue in and of itself. One thing to note is that the signature has the actual validator index. So you don't actually need the shuffling to be able to verify the signature anyway. You do need to do all of the validations like checking if they're in the sync committee. So, right, you're at worst bounded on the number of validators and. Oh, yeah. Yeah, proof as well isn't it. Yeah, yeah, you're right. So that does make it much easier to verify.  I mean, is there a very effective case. Is there not a condition that says drop the message if they're not in the committee. I think there might be. Yeah, there is but you can't validate that without the shuffling. But I think it would be when you have a shuffling. If you don't have the block just use your head shuffling and case it if it if it's if they're in the committee and then check properly once you get their block but I think you're going to be fine. Yeah, I mean, as you say it's a string case. I'm going to go look at how that condition is written but I think the condition is should be written with respect to what you think the head is not with respect to the message that was sent in my opinion. But it's true because it has to match your head doesn't it. Once you've got the block on either. You don't know the parent. But yeah, that would be that would imply that it has to match the shuffling in your head. Okay, this issue was just uncovered a few hours ago, or at least since I was awake. Let's continue chatting about it offline and try to aim for a p to p related solution in the next few days. Otherwise, if we needed to get some better data on larger networks than we can take it there. Adrian you mentioned something as an aside that was interesting that you were not getting aggregators, you weren't always getting aggregators on different sections of the subnets. Yeah, I believe the number of aggregators was the target number aggregators is actually reduced. And that might be an error, not an error but it might not be a good thing so do you have any other data on that or should we, I can look at that number that target number and probabilities and we can chat offline if you don't have any other information. I think the key thing is to try it with a bigger set of our latest I've only got 2400. So I'm seeing duplicates in the scene. Okay, which we're not expecting and that makes it less likely to get an aggregator. Okay. But yeah, it is definitely worth reviewing those numbers. Yeah. Okay, we'll flag that. Okay. Many other alter discussions. Discussion points. Cool. Pretty inactive communication. I know everyone's slightly staggered on where they're at on this, but hopefully mid to late next week. More and more of us are communicating on some of these small documents. Let's shift into research updates. Anybody have anything to share. I can share something about sharding. Just that this merge call so I'm not sure if we have like research updates between alter and sharding. I think sharding is probably the main thing to share. Right. Okay. So we're currently at is this updated sharding spec with a new state format. So this makes it easier to track confirmation data and keeps it all in one place to make miracle proof to the commitment easier. Generally happy with that piece of refactoring where there is more. So we're thinking of changing the way. Shard proposers are tasked with their, their proposals. Currently the split sharp proposers up over split validators up in charge committees. And then out of these committees, we select the proposers to keep the proposers per shard separate for a time window of about a day. So this helps the network player, but within the spec, there's not really much to it. The problem though is that it adds this cashing complexity, and that we can, these incentives on a network player to stay on a topic for that long are relatively big. Meanwhile, we have this discussion about MFV and how we should organize the main net chain. And we have this concept of separation of block builders and block proposers. And we could do something similar on the sharding layer where it's the block builder that base a fee for the proposal for the to get the data there. And then the proposer selects data transaction, and they can select one without seeing the complete data. So we may even end up with a model where the proposers can select data can grab data, they don't have to learn all the layer tools they don't have to specialize as much. And then it's the builder that after paying the fee is then incentivized to make the data available by publishing it on the shard topic. So we're looking into this change in incentives that could work. It all fits in with regard to network timing and it does clean up various things. But of course, by changing this incentive, we need to carefully look at the change and see if it actually works. And then cut already noticed one possible issue. And if a possible fix. And we'll just create a PR to the specs repository to to further discuss these sharding change. Yeah, another thing I really like about moving in this type of direction is that the shard data transactions don't actually need to have the payload and so there's not an excess of data being gossiped around pre selection for for inclusion, just kind of like the commitment to that data and proof that you can pay a fee. And so I think that would actually greatly reduce the bandwidth requirements. Even in the event there's a competitive fee market or competitive landscape for getting transit data into the charts. Then there's this discussion about firewalling MFE. So making it open like flashboots, I think is really good is we should try and encourage every every validator to to participate in a way that all these incentives are even there's no validator with a lot more MFE or that has to do a lot of extra steps to special class. So if there's this market of builders, then those can specialize and become firewall that away from the protocol. And then it's basically the data, the data transaction that first offers the data and then later the builder publishes the data. So we shift this availability. So this is one of the parts the builder. And so this is good for privacy, since we don't have to. So it is like, if we have this very critical part of publishing the data, like, and this is a larger piece of data on the charts. And then we move that away from the validator from the consensus identity. And I mean it can still be the same person. But if a builder can publish this and has incentive to do this, then we can just separate it out. And then also, we remove this, this specialization need of validators. So whenever there's a new layer two, or whenever there's a new kind of depth that wants to use short data, they can just participate in this builder market instead. And the proposers, the sharp posters can just keep doing their task and don't have to worry about these, these kind of niche changes. So I produce going to be working on a PR that highlights some of these changes soon. I'm thinking about the after the match. So this is like sounds like this separate block builders sounds like an alternative to the execution services right. So just prepare the a lot being type a lot for the proposer and because there will need to be to sign off on it. Right. Basically, yes. So there, there is no combination of multiple data pieces of data on the proposer side. So we try and fit it in, but I don't think we should go into that direction. I said it's just much, much simpler. It's more minimal to this to do it this way. And then the builder can still combine different depths, they can still combine data and fit it together in one block. So thinking of like standard outside of the protocol, but something that steps would use, think of it like the ERC 20, unlike which kind of layer this lives on. And we basically just need users of short data to recognize which parts of the chart blob is being used for which protocol for which application. And so we need some kind of small header to say where to find data of specific dumps. So it's basically combination of offsets and some kind of ID. We can figure this out at a later time. We're not quite there yet. Yeah. Okay. So, yeah, for the execution service now it will not be an alternative because it just allows for building blocks, but testers will have to execute the payload anyway. So yeah. This is for sure data. So there's no execution, but yeah, yeah, yeah, right, right. As a product was just this mention in this separation that was recently published. Right, so it is similar to the main net separation in a way that we do have builders like this data is still as meaning. And the point is that the base port called layer one doesn't execute the data, but the builders will still want to execute their role of data and sequence transactions, whatever they want to do. And this is separate separate process from the sharp proposal role, which just needs to select data. We shift this incentive from of the availability towards the builder. And meanwhile, this cleans up some of the networking some of the concerns around specialization of block building and whatnot. And yeah, I think we'll just start with a PR and then we can discuss more. Other research updates. Yes. Just a quick comment. The, the work that I showed a couple of months ago about the resource consumption of the different clients will be published at the blockchain research conference in Paris in September. And there will be also a poster about the network crawler that we can be working on. And talking about the network crawler we develop a new version of the crawler that can run 24 seven gathered data continuously and charging a dashboard. So we're trying to release this dashboard into the coming weeks. And another thing is that with partners we finally have a first minimum set of metrics that are already existing across all the clients. And we are just in the process of deciding the best nomenclature best names for this metrics, so that we can have some first standard for the metrics across clients. That's it on my side. Got it. Thanks. Okay, any other research updates. Great. Anything else related to spec or any discussion points in general that we'd like to discuss before we close today. Okay. We will aim to get this P2P sync committee issue resolved in the coming days. And we also are continuing to increase test coverage for out there so we will expect a new very iterative release next week with additional tests then. Thank you. Really appreciate all the hard work and excited to see out there moving. Talk to you. Thanks for opening. Bye.


Here we go, here is cyberpunk. Disabled copyrighted music, yes. Ray tracing, ultra. Yeah, everything is on high, baby. Space reflections, psycho. Let's see what happens. Ray traced lighting, psycho. Turn off nudity, good point. Nudity sensor on, good idea. They say you wanna understand the streets, you gotta live them.  I think I kinda wanna do street kid. Should I be a lady or a man? I'm gonna be a lady. So what we're gonna do, we're gonna do random and we're gonna stop at 10. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10. Ho ho ho, ho ho, yah. Whoa, Eunice, honest, dude. That's actually sick though. Whoa, guys, it's post Malone. Nails, ooh, short, we'll do the crank gameplays, chipped. Wow, yes. Guys, look at this though, look at this. Now this is nice, I like it when my computer actually works well. This is cool, look at all these cool cars. This is so cool looking. I'm so glad that I can run this at ultra and I can still stream it and not have it lagged. Uh-oh, I don't like that. Uh-oh, okay. Uh-oh, uh-oh, got it. Oh, uh-oh, oh, whoa, how did they do that? And they went through the thing. Suggesting we let them go, sir. I suggest you toss them in the scene. Cough legs broken so this trash doesn't float. Whoa, they can't actually do that, dude.  Jacob, dude. That's not what I meant to do. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. Goddammit, dude. Crazy, dude.  You don't like the beach, dude? Guys, I'm really, really good at most, if not all games. Ow. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. Yup. Nice. Head shot. You don't like the beach, I get it. It's sand. It's coarse, it gets everywhere. Pick up the body. Is he not dead? Dude, I'm strong as hell. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. That was toxic, dude.  Whoa. The future, the mirror turning on. Wow, the exposures. Fucked. He tangled us up with Maelstrom in the military. There's this combat-bot, military prototype. Maelstrom collected, then Dex paid to take it just before the gang goons had to switch up and manage. All right, all right, heard about that. Royce versus Brick. Hostile takeover. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. What? What just happened? I have to sneeze. You can't shoot me, I'm sneezing. I've got sneezes in me, Bride Ma. Hey, I wanna, I wanna hit you. Thank you. Get him, get him, get him. Continuous, get him. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. I just hit him over and over again in the face. Wow, okay, you didn't see this dude there, dude? That's tough, dude. How's things going, Miss B?  In the game or in real life? Not a bolt, right? I'm a good Christian boy. I'm not Christian. Have a hood.  Well, it's hard to drive, dude. I can switch the camera. Tell him to press Q. How do I press Q? How do I press Q? Well, that hurts. Why is it not letting me, it's so slow. Why is my car bouncing up and down? I love how cars move.  Did I run over something? What's going on with that? Okay, sure, yeah, I just got out of the car. I didn't press to get out of the car, I just got out of the car. You got baseball. I'm legitimately trying to read your tattoo, I'm not just looking at your boobs. Moxes. Foxes? Moxes. What did you say to me? Through the beans, babe. Why are these fries floating in the air?  How's the brain dance supposed to help? You got cool glasses. Sorry. I think babies are only good for- Poggers, that's cool. That's right, dude. Plot of this game? I don't know. Cruisin' the major leagues. Maybe I've just been half paying attention because I've been streaming, but I feel like the plot isn't... Stuff like this has been happening a lot, too. We're like, there's random weird glitches in the game, which make for a funny experience. Brian, I'm doing the dual PCs setup. Look at this, hold on. Let me just brag real quick, Brian. Look at this, look at this. Hi, 16. Hi, hi, hi, hi, ultra. I've got the RTXs on, baby. We got ray tracing on. And ray tracing lighting? Psycho? Yeah, we're not getting any frame drops, baby. That's that 3090 coming into play. Anyway. Baby, look at that.  While the game boots up, I got something wonderful. What is it? I have a peanut allergy, as many of you know. So I got from a wonderful company called Vermont, Nut Free Chocolate, they make nut free chocolate. I got Reese's Peanut Butter Cups that are peanut free. I hope. Kanky, dude. Maybe he's into it. Yeah, dude.  Yo, he dead-dead? Okay, let's go. I did it. Okay, let's go. What's going on with this, dude? What's going on with this guy?  Come on, mister. Come on, mister. You want to go faster, dude? Like, I know you got shot, but come on, dude.  Please, please go faster. What are you doing, Vader? What are you doing? Jesus Christ. I am probably gonna end it really soon, though, although I think I am Keanu now. Yep, I'm Keanu. There he is. I know that that's kind of a tease, but I am actually going to... I am pleasantly surprised with the game of Cyberpunk.