Mainnet Building the Source of Truth: Ryan Soury on Why Developers Should Care about TRUF.NETWORK
From provenance to prediction markets, Usher Labs is helping take TRUF NETWORK from bold idea to critical infrastructure.
DAY 47 of 100 Days of TRUF
“We began with a simple but radical idea: what if we could prove, cryptographically, exactly where data came from?” Ryan Soury leans back, eyes sparking. He’s not pitching a VC. He’s speaking to developers. And he knows he’s speaking their language.
Soury is co-founder of Usher Labs, a company building privacy-preserving infrastructure to connect real-world data sources to blockchains. Today, they’re deeply embedded in TRUF NETWORK, helping shape it into what he calls “the missing layer for smart contracts.”
Data Provenance as Infrastructure
At its core, Usher Labs is solving for provenance. “It’s like the food supply chain,” he says. “You think you’re buying a great bottle of wine, but unless you can trace every step from vineyard to shelf, can you really be sure?” Replace ‘wine’ with ‘data’ and you’re at the heart of what they’re building.
“The challenge with existing oracles is you’re trusting a committee of validators. But we wanted to build irrefutable certificates proving the original source of data.”
That means you can know, not hope, that a CPI figure came from the Bureau of Labor Statistics or a price feed came from CoinGecko.
For TRUF NETWORK, this is critical. It moves them beyond ‘oracle network’ into something more ambitious: an open, verifiable data layer that any app, protocol, or DAO can trust.
Why TRUF NETWORK Excites Builders
Soury’s excitement is palpable. “Whenever I say I’m working on TRUF or Truflation, especially in the US, the response is electric,” he says. The network’s reputation for “doing CPI right” has turned heads among investors, builders, and liquidity providers.
But it’s the possibilities that really light him up.
“Smart contracts today are static,” Soury observes. “They’re like early web pages; fixed, limited. TRUF lets us move to the next paradigm: data-driven smart contracts. Real-world data fueling dynamic applications.”
He points to prediction markets as “obvious low-hanging fruit.”
“Look at some of these markets, they use human committees to agree the result - room for problems? Oh yes. That creates uncertainty. With TRUF’s verifiable attestation tech, prediction markets can finalize outcomes directly from government APIs or trusted data feeds. No humans in the loop. That’s a major unlock.”
He also sees huge potential in on-chain index funds and real-world asset (RWA) allocation.
“How do you rebalance a fund of 10 assets if you don’t have a trusted, real-time data layer? TRUF solves that.”
Building Tools for Developers
For developers, Soury sees a future where integrating with TRUF is as easy as spinning up a React app.
“We’re working on SDKs to push and fetch data from the network. Anyone could operate a node, access the full database, and analyze it however they want.”
There’s even talk of using AI agents to automate data source integrations.
“Imagine saying to an agent: ‘Connect me to this API.’ It understands the schema, develops the connector, and pipes data directly into TRUF. That’s the future.”
Advice for Developers Entering Prediction Markets
Soury has one clear message:
“There’s still so much room for innovation.”
He warns that current systems leave too much uncertainty on the table.
“If you’re building in prediction markets or fintech, focus on the guarantees around data. TRUF is your critical infrastructure for that.”
His closing thought is almost a challenge:
“The internet started with static pages, then exploded with dynamic web apps. Smart contracts are on the same trajectory. TRUF NETWORK is how we get there.”
Why This Matters
For builders of prediction markets, RWAs, DeFi protocols, or even AI agents, TRUF isn’t just another oracle. It’s the foundation for applications that need verified, real-time, multi-sourced data – the “Source of Truth.”
And for developers like Ryan Soury, that’s what makes building on TRUF exciting.
“It’s not just about trustlessness. It’s about correctness. Once you have that, you can build anything.”
