1/ In this thread, I want to offer a few thoughts around the broader #Ethereum vision, the recent high gas prices and why I think we should be more forgiving of Ethereum's current limitations.

(short thread)

2/ If you're involved with using Ethereum today, you are a pioneer of a new technology that you believe in some way will grow to fundamentally change the nature of finance (through DeFi) and the web (through web3).

Being a pioneer isn't always fun!

3/ As pioneers of a new technology, you have to accept that you'll be the one that goes through early growing pains.

Those growing pains currently manifest in high gas prices, unintuitive UI/UX, poor scaling, lots of jargon, unknown upgrade timelines and many other things.

4/ Here's a reality check.

If you take this (very generous) estimation of how many "users" Ethereum-based DeFi apps currently have, you'll get ~174,000.

There are literally 14 year old's on TikTok that have more followers than that.

Source of image: https://explore.duneanalytics.com/dashboard/defi-users-over-time

5/ Ethereum is currently no where near mainstream adoption levels but we're already hitting its scaling limitations.

This is okay.

Apps come first, then the infrastructure (read below for more color on this). https://www.usv.com/writing/2018/10/the-myth-of-the-infrastructure-phase/

6/ In saying that, any users that we onboard now may also become pioneers themselves and go onto create educational content, become developers, invest money into the ecosystem or onboard more users themselves.

The more pioneers we add, the healthier the ecosystem becomes.

7/ Yes, it really sucks that the gas prices are currently high (especially when it's caused by scams/ponzis) but it's good to remember that it's temporary.

There are smart people working on scaling solutions every day with some already live ( @loopringorg & @synthetix_io demo).

8/ Same goes for UI/UX - most of it currently sucks for the mainstream but it's getting better every day.

For example, @argentHQ just launched v1 of their mobile wallet app that aims to abstract away as much of the "Ethereum stuff" as possible.

We *will* solve these problems.

9/ At the end of the day, if you're not into being a pioneer - that's totally fine!

Come back in a few years when we've built out the mega-city that is Ethereum - though you'll have missed out on all the fun of the journey to get there :)

10/ On the other hand, if you want to stick around and be part of an exciting movement to reinvent the way the world does finance and interacts with the web.

Well then...

It's time to build (on Ethereum)!