Polygon’s CEO Marc Boiron emphatically acknowledged that the layer-2 community was not contemplating creating layer-3 protocols due to the potential dangers they pose to Ethereum’s safety.
Boiron made this assertion on the again of the early success of Degen Chain, a layer-3 community working on the Coinbase-backed scaling answer Base.
Layer 3 protocols improve scalability by constructing upon Layer 2 infrastructure, permitting builders to tailor application-specific blockchains to their necessities.
Degen Chain
Degen Chain is a layer-3 community constructed utilizing Arbitrum Orbit for the DEGEN token. The digital asset has swiftly emerged as the first group token amongst Farcaster customers, the quickly increasing web3 social media platform.
Since its launch on March 28, the community has captured substantial consideration and transactional exercise throughout the crypto business, witnessing a powerful surge of over 200% up to now week.
Accessible knowledge signifies that the community has facilitated the bridging of greater than $30 million, alongside powering over 3.5 million transactions as of March 30.
Group debates layer-3
Degen Chain’s early successes have attracted debates from the crypto group, who maintain differing views in regards to the community.
In a March 31 submit on X (previously Twitter), Boiron asserted that layer-3 networks divert worth from Ethereum onto the layer-2 platforms internet hosting them.
In line with him, such a trajectory doesn’t align with Polygon’s dedication to Ethereum’s scaling, which the corporate already addresses by its proof-of-stake (PoS) and zero-knowledge Ethereum Digital Machine (zkEVM) chains.
Moreover, Boiron identified the potential antagonistic results of layer-3 adoption, highlighting their minimal efficiency enhancements and the looming risk to Ethereum’s safety. He stated:
“If all L3s settled to one L2, then Ethereum would capture basically no value and, thus, Ethereum security would be at risk.”
He added:
“If Ethereum earns no fees and has no prospect of earning fees other than a tiny amount of fees from this one L2, then the value of ETH will drop and, when it is clear that it’ll continue to drop because there is no economic future for it, validators will no longer be willing to hold ETH and, thus, no longer be willing to secure the network.”
In the meantime, blockchain knowledgeable Cygaar defined that layer-2 networks should not but “matured” and have but to inherit Ethereum’s safety stage due to current challenges like community centralization, upgradeable bridge contracts, and creating proving programs.
Consequently, he argued that integrating layer-3 networks atop layer-2s might exacerbate dangers and compromise the safety of those blockchain networks.