The blockchain industry is at a critical inflection point. Web3 is starved of consumer applications with the potential to reach mass adoption, yet the supply of shiny new infrastructure projects is ever-increasing. We are grappling with the unpleasant realization that 15 years in, our dream of a decentralized web remains unfulfilled.
Monolithic chains were the first iteration of blockchain infrastructure. Modularity is the natural succession to that framework, presenting solutions for the restrictions of monolithic architecture – from limitations in computational capacity, data availability, high latency, and UX issues.
This shift broadened horizons and expanded the design space for dApp developers to think bigger about what they wanted to create. But here’s the harsh truth. While modularity introduces greater flexibility and customizability for developers, it equally introduces fragmentation and new complexities. These are not intuitive to navigate; they present new challenges for developers to overcome. It is our job to anticipate and alleviate these new friction points.
Responsibility around what you deploy
We have a collective obligation to not only prove the revolutionary value of the infrastructure we are building, but to give developers every tool necessary to achieve that potential. This is critical to the success of the entire blockchain industry.
Modular projects are failing to take the shared responsibility of alleviating the burdens of blockchain development off developers’ shoulders. Recently, at EthCC, we heard calls to “build whatever” and “build next-gen apps” rightly being challenged as superficial and empty. They assume that developers can intuit what to do by simply observing the tools presented before them.
It is our duty as the engineers of modular protocols to provide simple mechanisms and frameworks that guide dApp developers how to build with the tools we’re providing – from understanding each layer of the stack to how they optimally integrate. Without this support, modularity is ultimately too complicated and too inconvenient for dApp developers to embrace.
For modularity to succeed, we must solve this complexity for them. We must radically simplify the development process and reduce the learning curve, to pave the way for a smoother experience.
Easy to use ≠ easy to build
Ironically, achieving simplicity isn’t simple. Our smartphones are simple to use thanks to the clear separation between the device’s functionality and the complex underlying hardware and software that powers it.
This same principle applies in web3. Just as we would not burden an end user with the intellectual demand of understanding exactly how their dApp works, we must reduce that cognitive load for developers.
As modular protocols become more stable, reliable, and easier to use, developers will have most of the technical complexities abstracted away from them. They will finally spend their time on the technical challenges that are specific to their applications, rather than struggling with the chains, VMs and infrastructure they rely on.
While we are not there yet, we are inching closer. Modular protocols need to coordinate closely to make blockchain stacks easier to customize and assemble at the dApp level. These collaborations can take multiple forms, many of which go beyond the basic technical integrations and partnerships we’ve seen so far. They include:
- Joint public research. Blockchain research is largely siloed and protocol-specific, resulting in significant differences in the way problems are understood. Creating opportunities for knowledge-sharing could create a better common understanding of joint challenges and their potential solutions.
- Joint system design and development. Just like LEGO, the modular blockchain industry would benefit from jointly developing a collaborative design system that leads to the best possible interfaces and interoperability mechanisms. We must proactively develop infrastructure that is compatible with other modular protocols, versus working out how to integrate retroactively.
- Industry standards on trust assumptions. Trust assumptions refer to the set of beliefs about the behavior of participants on a given network, acting as a strong indicator of its security, functionality and reliability. While L2Beat does tremendous work in the area of standardizing rollup security research, there is plenty of room for creating more robust standards when disclosing the trust assumptions a network operates on, as well as how they interact with each other.
- Joint app-layer experimentation. Again, much of blockchain experimentation remains heavily siloed and project-specific. Joint initiatives and development across different protocols (and at different layers) would help us better understand the friction points developers face so we can fix them faster.
- Joint business development, investment and growth initiatives. Ultimately, modular projects cannot validate their individual value propositions without demonstrating the value of the modular stack as a whole. Collaboration can extend beyond building shared development interfaces to providing additional resources (like investment and marketing support) to accelerate the creation of more commercially viable products. Shared ecosystem growth opportunities can also be fostered through experimentation initiatives where members of different communities come together to exchange knowledge and build together in conducive environments like hackathons.
These collaborative efforts are not a romantic call to end competition. They’re a call for real and reasonable cooperation. The better we coordinate to provide simplicity for dApp developers, the faster we will cultivate fertile ground for successful consumer applications in web3.
When the addressable market for web3 becomes comparable to web2, modular chains can split a much bigger pie than the sliver we compete for today. More importantly, the world at large will begin reaping the benefits of blockchain, and we will have finally delivered what we have long promised.
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