Hello Coindexter

A new resource for researching blockchain networks

July 19, 2017
Jonathan Libov

Coindexter is a collaborative library for long-term investors in decentralized, blockchain networks.

This project was borne, from two observations that, taken together, comprise what I believed and still believe to be a missing resource for long-term, thesis-driven investors in decentralized, blockchain networks.

First, lots of people I've met who are investing in blockchain are using spreadsheets to track all the "projects". When I first saw this, it occurred to me that a central and open repository for that information would deduplicate much of that work, in a way that neither Crunchbase nor Wikipedia could serve well.

Second, the existing indices for blockchain center around coins and tokens, not the underlying networks, nor their fundamentals. As with the first wave of internet companies, the network's the thing. Blockchain observers who are in it for the long-run know this:


They're developing models that look beyond price, toward long-term utility values:


And the practitioners who are playing the long game all see this too:


Hence the prioritization of Networks over Coins on Coindexter. The term "Network" feels more appropriate here than "startup", which belies the level of self-determination that many networks' progenitors and shepherds have ceded, and "project", which belies the way that blockchain enables the monetization of open-source.

The smart, long-term investors I know are developing theses around these networks, and I hope that Coindexter proves a valuable resource that is currently absent. Being a long-term investor in blockchain entails many things, and reading the whitepaper is one of them. Looking to survey the literature on "sidechains" or "snarks" to better your thesis? An index of coins and their financials won't help you there. By the same—er—token, if you're a short-term investor looking to make quick satoshi, you should already be very satisfied with the candle-graph offerings on GDAX, Whaleclub, Cryptocompare, and Coinmarketcap, etc.

A few additional notes:

  • The index is far from exhaustive today and surely omits or misrepresents information about existing networks and coins. Such is the nature of a wiki: I hope that with your help, we can make this one of the best resources on the internet for researching blockchain
  • Coindexter is free for now, though I may charge for the site on a subscription basis, or add a premium product, in the future.
  • I'd like to add some features to the site that are beyond my technical skill set and time constraints. DM me on Twitter if you're interested in working on this with me. That might involve helping to develop the premium product, or perhaps a smart-contract-based subscription program, so there could be an opportunity to earn from this.

In summary, I hope you find Coindexter to be valuable, and I'm forever grateful if you become a contributor on Coindexter by adding networks, coins and whitepapers to the index.

Thanks to those who have provided feedback on Coindexter, including but not limited to: Nick Chirls, Jake Brukhman, Albert Wenger, Joel Monegro, Chris Burniske, Zack Shapiro and Don Shula.

Special thanks to those who contributed not only feedback and bug reports but substantial portions of the data on Coindexter today: Ari Lewis, and Eric Risley and John Ascher Roberts at Architect Partners.