The Current State of Ethereum Layer 2 Scaling

Robin Hood's construction of its own second-layer extension of Ethereum reminds me of the blockchains built by major exchanges in recent years.

The more well-known ones include Binance's BSC, Coinbase's BASE, Uniswap's Unichain, OK's X1, Kraken's Ink, HashKey's HashKey Chain......

These chains are all EVM chains. Except for BSC, which is a layer blockchain (L1) independent of Ethereum, the others are all second-layer extensions (L2) based on Ethereum.

If other second-layer extensions without any exchange background are counted, there will be even more, and the more well-known ones are Optimism and Arbitrum.

Although there are many chains, most of them have not formed an impressive ecosystem so far.

Among all these second-layer extension chains, according to the data from l2beat (https://l2beat.com/scaling/activity), in terms of deposited funds (Value Secured), Arbitrum ranks first and BASE ranks second; but in terms of activity (Activity), BASE ranks second with the highest popularity.

In these two indicators, both are far ahead of other second-layer extensions; and in terms of activity, BASE is almost far ahead of all other second-layer extensions.

What application makes BASE more active than Arbitrum even though its funds are lagging behind?

I can't find relevant data on the Internet, but in my opinion, AI + Crypto ecology in BASE is estimated to account for a large proportion.

I often wonder about this situation, why AI + Crypto, an innovative ecosystem with the most potential and hope in this round of market, will happen on BASE, a chain that neither issues coins nor goes online late?

What is special about BASE? Or what are the shortcomings of other chains?

When Optimism and Arbitrum were competing fiercely, I was not optimistic about Optimism and was more optimistic about Arbitrum.

The reason is that I think Optimism has too many traces of artificial carving. This team likes to take the upper-level route and attaches great importance to cooperation with well-known projects. In order to introduce Uniswap into its ecosystem, it even gave some extra preferential conditions. This development method is difficult to attract "barbaric" and native projects, and often subversive applications grow out of these "barbaric" and native projects.

So it is easy for me to understand why AI + Crypto did not appear on OP.

Arbitrum is different. It is open to cooperation with all projects and will not be particularly inclined or partial to well-known projects. Therefore, I am more optimistic about it. But for so many years, it seems that only the DeFi ecosystem is prosperous on Arbitrum, and there are no other newer applications and models.

Some people say that the reason why the BASE ecosystem is prosperous and active is mainly because Coinbase diverts its own ecosystem to BASE and has the advantage of compliance.

I also doubt this statement.

If we compare traffic diversion, Binance's BSC is much better than Coinbase. Binance does more than divert traffic. It also uses its strong financial and channel advantages to support various projects it favors, and Binance has indeed supported some AI projects.

But so far, it seems that there is no large-scale AI + Crypto ecosystem on it.

Take Creator.bid for example. It was first born on BSC, but later the development and growth of the ecosystem still ran to BASE.

Compliance is even less of an advantage in my opinion. Because many applications are likely to have disruptive elements when they first appear, and these disruptive elements are more likely to be non-compliant. Therefore, for a project that may not be compliant, I find a more suitable development ecosystem. Instead, I think the best platform in the world is the Ethereum mainnet or Binance's BSC, not BASE.

Another interesting point is that Virtual, the largest AI + Crypto platform on BASE, seems to be always avoided by Coinbase. One obvious point is that Virtual has not yet been listed on Coinbase's trading platform. Many users are quite puzzled by Coinbase's move, and even went directly to Lianchuang's Twitter to angrily criticize it.

So no matter how you look at it, other chains are more likely to develop the AI ​​+ Crypto ecosystem than BASE.

If you want to compare the differences between BASE and Arbitrum, I feel that BASE is more Buddhist and has a more geeky atmosphere.

If you want to compare the differences between BASE and BSC, I feel that BASE's commercial flavor is not so heavy and not so strong.

Perhaps this kind of laissez-faire governance has instead provided the most comfortable and pleasant external environment for the development of the ecosystem.