This post is on the relationship between blockchain user adoption and the need for interoperability to get us there.
User experience and mass adoption (read economies of scale) are essential lubricants for effective experimentation in blockchain models.
To achieve a high level for both of these requirements, we need to do a better job of interconnecting blockchains.
Therefore, we shouldn’t necessarily assume that all blockchains will always compete with each other.
We should think of the market as a whole.
Every Layer matters.
All layers and blockchains that want to matter in the future will need to be eventually interconnected.
The Internet has millions of interconnected subnets. However, it also has interconnectivity standards at the lower levels of operations, which insulates users at the higher levels of web/mobile touch points.
We need to start connecting the top chains as a standard/native requirement, so that users have a semblance of pleasant experiences, including when moving assets around.
For discrete apps, users should be able to easily connect to various add-on services within that app without jumping through hoops or becoming lost when more features are needed.
The current patchwork of spaghetti chains is not helpful if we want to make the whole bigger than the sum of its parts.
Bitcoin has a ~55% dominance when it comes to market caps. But App user dominance across the blockchain is in no way near 55% for Bitcoin. Usage is rather spread across the panoply of blockchain apps across Ethereum, Solana and other top chains. In-App usage is scattered and squandered at best.
The future of blockchain is about the applications that empower users rather than the battle between different layers. I've already written about it in Beyond the Blockchain Infrastructure Layer Wars: Embracing the Interoperable Future of Apps and Services.
There are some industry efforts to start "tying" things together, such as the proposed ERC-7683, but if standards aren't adopted, no progress can be made.
Imagine the Internet without TCP/IP, IPv6, DNS, URI, HTTP, HTML etc etc Standards. There would be no global Internet.
Blockchain standards are going to be VERY important to finally tie everything together seamlessly for users.
ERC-7683 helps us get there
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Today, I am not seeing enough genuine cross-industry cooperation to make this vision a reality. Yet, I believe this will be essential to grow the blockchain market and let it earn a respectful place in our future.
If not now, when?
