Small Applications, Growing Protocols

Small Apps are getting easier to build but harder to sustain, and the author proposes that they team up with durable protocols to capture value that they otherwise cannot. The argument draws on Sam Lessin's comparison of social apps to consumable fashion, and on Lensa, which fell from over $2.5 million in net revenue per day in December to $206k per day by early January. The author describes Small Apps as supernovae that burn brightly and fade, and suggests protocols such as Farcaster, Lens, and Ceramic Network could act as "Dyson Spheres" that capture their energy, updating Joel Monegro's Fat Protocols, Thin Applications framework with a time dimension.