Decentralized chains predominantly need two things – Security and scalability. Those are requirements that are almost industry clichés now. But, they are also aspects that have accelerated growth in the crypto-ecosystem after the birth of the first-born cryptocurrency – Bitcoin[1].
Owing to limitations like congestion on Layer 1 chains, Layers 2 and 3 functionalities quickly populated the crypto-verse. But, where are Bitcoin and other chains headed from here? AMBCrypto spoke to Muneeb Ali, Co-founder of the Stacks project, to understand this better. He argued,
“Bitcoin is the most decentralized, most secure, largest network with the largest market cap. But even if we end up with a multichain world, which it looks like we are heading towards, then you’ll still have a big Bitcoin economy.”
Expanding crypto-verse
As of November 2021, there are over 7000 cryptocurrencies in existence.[2] Now, many might agree that at this stage, the market is only expanding and is far from saturation[3]. But, even when it gets crowded, I would argue that Layer 1 solutions like Bitcoin and Ethereum can be called the lifeblood of the crypto-ecosystem.
Apart from different use cases, they have garnered investor interest as a currency, property, digital gold, or as stocks. Their Sybil resistance mechanisms like PoS and PoW have provided[4] decentralized security. In fact, according to Ali,
“Layer 1s are sovereign systems — Bitcoin and Ethereum, for instance, can exist by themselves. An L2, like Lightning, cannot exist without Bitcoin, and Arbitrum cannot exist without Ethereum. Stacks cannot exist without Bitcoin.”
On the other hand, macroeconomics and crypto-commentator[5] Natasha Che is betting that proof of stake chains will be a foundational future in the crypto-space. While the survival of POS[6] is a fair
