Inviting Polygon Validators to be Indexers on The Graph's Decentralized Network

Polygon Validator Community,

Polygon PoS is now live on The Graph’s decentralized network! The Graph Ecosystem is inviting all Polygon Validators to become Indexers (Indexing - The Graph Docs) on The Graph Network to gain an additional source of revenue for your businesses while supporting the Polygon dapp ecosystem as projects migrate their subgraphs. This adds resiliency to the dapps’ data and ensures the highest uptime for the ecosystem.

What are the technical requirements to be an Indexer:

Since you already have Polygon full archival nodes, you’d just need to spin up and maintain a Graph Node (GitHub - graphprotocol/graph-node: Graph Node indexes data from blockchains such as Ethereum and serves it over GraphQL).

Why is it easier for Polygon validators to be a part of the graph network:

To become an Indexer on the graph network one must run a full-archive node to get the information from the blockchain and also run a graph-node to index that information. Since polygon validators already run full-archive nodes, the largest lift is already done.

You can learn more about becoming an Indexer here: How to Be an Effective Indexer on The Graph Network - The Graph Blog.

We hope you can help make Polygon dapps unstoppable! For more in-depth information, Indexing docs are here: Indexing - The Graph Docs.

Please reach out if you have any questions and/or hop into The Graph Discord Indexers channel here: Discord.

Regards,

Kyle Rojas

Global BD+Partnerships at Edge & Node
Email: [email protected]
Telegram: kyleArojas
Discord: kyleArojas#1602

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Congrats Kyle and The Graph team! This is a great update for both The Graph and Polygon ecosystems.

It seems like becoming an Indexer is a straightforward process, especially for Validators on the PoS chain. Hopefully there is a great deal of adoption.

Looking forward to seeing the cross-pollination of both ecosystems.

I don’t see this proposal adding any extra benefit, I you’re here in the polygon forum and requesting validators to also index the data on the graph, then you should come up with a personalized benefit to them, or else it doesn’t make any sense. I guess if there’s earning opportunity then current validators might already be your indexer but if you are looking to onboard more then read this again.

Hi @ihsotas,

I was simply trying to let all Polygon validators know about a low lift way to earn extra revenue, since you’re already running full nodes. This could benefit the Polygon ecosystem to increase validator sustainability. However, if you’re not interested, no problem at all.

The benefits include:
-Additional source of revenue
-Getting more visibility from the ecosystem and cross-pollinating the infra ecosystems. We’ve also asked Graph Indexers to become Polygon validators, and one of them recently got a slot, which is great for the Polygon eco as well
-This also makes the polygon ecosystem more decentralized and thus more aligned with web3 values

No matter what, we’re excited about the future of Polygon, especially with 2.0. We wish you all the best.

Would you mind elaborating further on this part of the “advantages”?

#2 is somewhat irrelevant, as the competition for slots is already very fierce (hence it only benefits The Graph if an indexer gets a slot, not the other way around**) and as for #3, the same argument is valid, with an added question you don’t even need to answer: how does a new validator who happens to be a The Graph indexer help decentralize Polygon more than another validator who is not an indexer?

I was going to figure out myself/privately what the advantages to a validator are, but your reply to the question above is condescending at best.

Here’s a better example of how you give back to an ecosystem when you ask for something (mind you that since the Beta ended one can run Pocket nodes and get paid directly): https://forum.polygon.technology/t/pocket-network-creates-free-polygon-rpc-community-endpoints/7726

**Note that while making Polygon’s indexing via The Graph more robust does help Polygon somewhat, it is ultimately up to the Graph to create the incentives to ensure this happens, as it is The Graph who reaps most of the reward for said indexing.

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Additional source of revenue meaning being able to earn as a Graph Indexer via query fees and Indexing Rewards (aka new token issuance) thus adding to your businesses bottom lines.

And thank you very much for sending the Pocket Network example!

I very much appreciate the feedback on my approach here.

Hi @kyleArojas

As a long time Polygon validator, would like to say thanks for the info, the offer and considering Polygon validators.

From reading the post it feels like the assumption is that Polygon validators run archive nodes. If we did then becoming a Graph Indexer would add additional revenue to existing tech stack.

However in reality all the validators run pruned nodes and to start now hosting archive nodes would increase our costs drastically and not sure if the additional costs would be offset by Graph rewards.

Just providing info so you have a view from a Polygon validator.

Thank you for your consideration.

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We’re supporting this initiative.
We run an indexer on The Graph Ethereum and Arbitrum networks. And our indexer has one of the highest APY in Arbitrum :slight_smile:

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