In the past ten years, the concept of web3, coined by Ethereum co-founder Gavin Wood, has evolved into a reality. Cryptocurrency has become a trillion-dollar industry, NFTs have gained popularity in the art world, and blockchain-based financial services have become mainstream. This progress is thanks to the creativity and innovation of developers who have created solutions that consumers didn’t even know they needed. Today, the web3 ecosystem includes thousands of dApps and a wide range of defi services.
However, despite the rapid growth and diversification of web3 offerings, user adoption rates are not as high as expected. One of the main reasons for this is chain fragmentation. With over 1,000 active blockchains and more than 50 L2s in the Ethereum ecosystem alone, users often have to switch between networks manually, leading to confusion and errors. This fragmentation also results in a steep learning curve for users as each blockchain has its own rules, transaction fees, and functionalities.
To improve mainstream user adoption, developers need to focus on creating more seamless and intuitive user experiences. Encouraging developers to enhance cross-chain compatibility and interoperability is one solution, but the scale of the challenge may be too great for individual developers to tackle alone.
The rapid proliferation of blockchains poses a challenge for developers as well. With a thousand active blockchains today and potentially ten times more in the future, developers are struggling to keep up. Unlike in web2, where developers can build once and attract users from across the internet, web3 developers often need to deploy their apps on multiple chains to reach users and liquidity. This results in developers spending more time on cross-chain solutions rather than focusing on their core value proposition.
To address these challenges, chain abstraction is necessary. In an abstracted web3 ecosystem, developers could build a single instance of their app on their preferred chain and attract users from any chain without hassle. This would simplify the user experience and allow developers to focus on innovation rather than cross-chain integrations.
Overall, the goal is to create an abstracted web3 empire where chains are seamlessly integrated, user balances are unified across all chains, and developers can focus on value-adding innovation. By prioritizing chain abstraction, the web3 community can work towards unlocking mainstream adoption and ensuring that the visionary work of web3 architects and innovators is appreciated and utilized to its full potential.