Key Takeaways - Practical Challenges in Proof Outsourcing by @NorbertVadas of @gevulot_labs/@thezkcloud Risks of Auction-Based Proof Marketplaces • Auction-style proof markets risk centralization by favoring resource-rich entities. • Bidding races lead to wasted compute and create unhealthy dependencies for rollups. • One-to-one auction matching lacks redundancy - failure requires restarting the process. Lessons from Ethereum’s PBS Model • MEV relays show that centralization can re-emerge even in large validator sets: 5 builders account for 90% of PBS blocks. • Applying similar relay logic to ZK proving could lead to few provers dominating rollup finality. Importance of Decentralization and Liveness • Provers must inherit the same censorship resistance, neutrality, and liveness guarantees as the underlying network. • Randomized prover selection, not auctions, is the most credible neutrality mechanism, akin to validator selection in PoS chains. Need for Redundancy and Fallbacks • Protocols must build in fallback options (e.g. secondary provers, open job windows) to ensure liveness and prevent downtime. • Sequencers should not have to manually restart the proving process in case of failures. Gevulot’s ZKCloud Architecture • zkCloud uses permissionless, decentralized prover selection with built-in redundancy. • Economics are protocol-driven to prevent cost manipulation by dominant provers. • Designed specifically to meet the reliability and decentralization needs of L2s. • Firestarter testnet is live for exploration. Core Thesis • Proof infrastructure should not reintroduce central points of failure. • Decentralized L2s require decentralized proving, not trusted middlemen.