„The narrative that L2s benefit Ethereum is largely wrong“

@boredGenius
@boredGenius

In hindsight the idea that L2s benefit ETH because they settle on ETH has been largely wrong L2s made gas fees (thus ETH burn) go down, but there hasn’t been a sufficient increase in usage to offset the burn reduction. Mainnet gas has been below 10 gwei for months now. Wallet UX became much worse due to the dozens of new networks users now interact with. Liquidity is also fractured across multiple networks, making swaps worse. Innovation has stalled. App developers are now distracted by the need to support multiple networks as well as the many grant programs promising millions if you deploy on their L2. Most devs just launch Uniswap/Aave forks on new L2s nowaday, if they’re not launching their own L2s. The ones who can actually make a difference are nerdsniped by esoteric topics nobody cares about. L2s were supposed to bring more normie users to crypto and to ETH. What has happened was the “let a thousand L2s bloom” campaign took some users away from ETH to L2s and pushed others out of EVM networks entirely to Solana. Normie users are neglected when they’re the ones we need the most. Not saying L2s are bad or anyone intended for this to happen, but it has happened and it’s the reality we’re living with. Something needs to be fixed.

Grug 🪨 (@grugcapital)

If ETH ever loses out, the moment people will probably look back at as when things truly went to shit is probably when sharding, concurrency, etc. were largely abandoned in favor of letting L2s cannibalize mainnet.

x.com
by timdaub.eth12379 🥝 • 2y • x.com
AI summary of the linked article

The author's central claim is that the idea that L2s benefit ETH by settling on it has been largely wrong. Layer 2 networks lowered gas fees and therefore ETH burn, but usage has not grown enough to offset the lower burn, and mainnet gas has stayed below 10 gwei for months. The piece also cites worse wallet UX and fractured liquidity across many networks, plus developers distracted by multi-network support and grant programs, with many simply launching Uniswap or Aave forks. It says L2s were meant to bring in mainstream users but pushed some toward Solana instead.

Recommended by 2 curators
avatar
His perspective is not wrong if we assume that people on L2s will keep doing things that they used to do on Mainnet.

But I don't think it's true. There will be more fresh apps utilizing L2 blockspace, and the demand will eventually rise. Plus, if Ethereum didn't have L2s, an even bigger part of its lunch would be eaten away by Solana.
Characters remaining: 10,000

comment guidelines
HomeNewSubmit