The current status of Ethereum Layer 2 scaling

Robinhood building its own Ethereum Layer 2 extension reminds me of the various blockchains that major exchanges have constructed over the years.

Among these, the more well-known ones include Binance's BSC, Coinbase's BASE, Uniswap's Unichain, OK's X1, Kraken's Ink, and HashKey's HashKey Chain…

All of these chains are EVM chains, with the exception of BSC, which is an independent Layer 1 blockchain, while the others are based on Ethereum's Layer 2 extensions.

If we also consider other Layer 2 extensions without any exchange background, there are even more, with notable ones being Optimism and Arbitrum.

Despite the large number of chains, the vast majority of them have not formed an impressive ecosystem so far.

Among all these Layer 2 extension chains, according to data from l2beat (https://l2beat.com/scaling/activity), in terms of Value Secured, Arbitrum ranks first, followed by BASE; however, in terms of Activity, BASE is the most popular, with Arbitrum coming in second.

In both of these metrics, these two are significantly ahead of other Layer 2 extensions; in terms of activity, BASE is almost far ahead of all other Layer 2 extensions.

What applications have led to BASE having higher activity than Arbitrum despite lagging in capital accumulation?

I couldn't find relevant data online, but in my observation, the AI + Crypto ecosystem in BASE likely accounts for a significant proportion.

I often think about this situation: why has the most promising and hopeful innovative ecosystem of this market cycle, AI + Crypto, emerged on BASE, a chain that neither launched tokens nor was early to the scene?

What is special about BASE? Or what shortcomings do other chains have?

When Optimism and Arbitrum were in fierce competition, I was not very optimistic about Optimism and favored Arbitrum instead.

The reason is that I believe Optimism has too many artificial traces. This team prefers to take the upper route, placing great importance on cooperation with well-known projects. Back then, to bring Uniswap into its ecosystem, they even offered some exceptionally favorable conditions. This development approach is unlikely to attract "wild," native projects, and often disruptive applications grow out of these "wild," native projects.

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

Arbitrum, on the other hand, maintains an open and cooperative attitude towards all projects and does not particularly favor well-known projects, which is why I am more optimistic about it. However, over the years, it seems that only the DeFi ecosystem has thrived on Arbitrum, with no other newer applications and models.

Some say that the prosperity and activity of the BASE ecosystem are mainly due to Coinbase directing its ecosystem to BASE and having compliance advantages.

I am skeptical of this claim.

If we are talking about directing traffic, Binance's BSC is likely much stronger than Coinbase. Binance not only directs traffic but also uses its strong financial and channel advantages to support various projects it favors, and Binance has indeed supported some AI projects.

Yet, so far, it seems that a large-scale AI + Crypto ecosystem has not formed on it either.

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

In my view, compliance does not seem like an advantage either. Many applications may carry disruptive elements when they first appear, and these disruptive elements are more likely to be non-compliant. Therefore, for a potentially non-compliant project, I believe the best development ecosystem in the world is Ethereum's mainnet or, slightly less so, Binance's BSC, rather than BASE.

Another interesting point is that Virtual, the largest AI + Crypto platform on BASE, seems to be consistently avoided by Coinbase. A clear point is that Virtual has yet to launch on Coinbase's trading platform. Many users are quite puzzled by Coinbase's actions, even directly confronting the co-founder on Twitter.

So, it seems that other chains are more likely to develop the AI + Crypto ecosystem than BASE.

If we compare BASE and Arbitrum, I feel that BASE is more laid-back and has a more geeky atmosphere.

If we compare BASE and BSC, I feel that BASE has less of a commercial flavor and is not as strong in that regard.

Perhaps this hands-off approach provides the most comfortable and pleasant external environment for ecosystem development.