1/x Quick morning brain dump after reading the latest piece by . @VitalikButerin. All personal opinions, not financial advice.

The #Bitcoin and #Ethereum ecosystems both spend far more on network security (PoW mining) than research, protocol development, grants, etc combined.

2/x This is an obvious misallocation compared to traditional systems/networks.

The powerful social force driving this misallocation is "legitimacy". I've also heard this be called "social consensus" or the "social contract".

3/x Legitimacy is a very special thing in this space: it gives NFTs their value, allows chains to recover from 51% attacks, and is at the absolute bottom of the "assumption stack" below even "blockchain".

4/x IMHO, blockchains can only gain this legitimacy when you combine transparency, decentralization, and participants who value those things above all else.

5/x Justin Sun acquiring Steem and Hive forking from it is a great example of how this "social consensus" layer ultimately dictates the legitimacy of blockchains.

6/x Likewise, the ETC/ETH valuation since the hard fork shows how this force is arguably more powerful than even the underlying blockchain technology of these networks.

7/x I've recently found myself describing my hypothesis for "doomsday scenarios" for certain blockchain networks, and why I believe the market overvalues the risk associated with such scenarios.

8/x This idea is fundamental to my thesis and it is what allows me to take on a level of exposure to this space that many others would not. It's the reason why I value #Bitcoin and #Ethereum and not many other Layer 1 Blockchain protocols at this moment in time.

9/x As more and more users/developers/investors recognize the current state of legitimacy in this space, I believe the Ethereum ecosystem (and $ETH) will absorb the majority of value that shifts into this ecosystem over the next 1-2 years.

10/10 Despite this thesis, I challenge myself and others to avoid becoming "maximalists" for a certain blockchain. Rather, we should ground ourselves as maximalists for decentralization and transparency (legitimacy) above all else.