tunez@cryptunez
a common criticism of monad is something along the lines of "i can already do everything i need to do on other chains, monad doesn't offer anything new to me"
i understand the argument here.
fans of monad will often say that monad is the first EVM chain that offers the same UX as solana (a decentralized + performant L1), to which critics of monad will reply that these upgrades are becoming less and less marginal over time, so they are not as important
i understand the view of the critics, and in some ways they are right.
another great point people will make against monad is that all chains are the same, and the only differentiator between chains is the apps. they will say "i don't care about the tech, just show me the apps"
i understand this view as well.
all of this also exists in the context of endless chain launches who make wild promises and run huge pre-deposit vaults, or massive onchain farming campaigns, to boost metrics in the short term to create a false appearance of traction
to put it all together, the common monad critic:
- loves apps, hates chains
- hates being tricked
let me defend monad here in reverse order here:
1. Monad is not a trick
Monad was fundamentally designed from first principles to solve arguably the hardest problems that exist in the industry. Nearly the entire blockchain landscape has been designed around the idea of the "blockchain trilemma" where it is not possible to build a chain that is scalable, decentralized and secure. I could spend a lot of time breaking down the designs of every relevant blockchain today, and Solana would be the only one that has actually proven to have solved the trilemma. I would put Monad in this camp as well, but this wouldn't be a fair comparison until we see how Monad performs under similar load as solana handles on a day-to-day basis. This is a chain built by one of the most experienced teams in the industry, that chose not to take any shortcuts and instead spend years solving a very hard problem. There is no trick, the codebase is entirely open source, and this is still just the first version of Monad.
2. Better chains create better apps
I think this is the part that is the most nuanced, where I would argue that application economies are actually second order effects of the developer experience provided by the chain itself. Solana provides developers with an decentralized, performant and secure environment to build apps on top of. When demand to use Solana increases heavily, median fees stay low, ensuring that application developers don't have to worry about their apps getting too much usage. The Solana economy is centered around the $SOL token, which creates wealth effects for the onchain users of Solana due to the correlation of network and token demand. To the critics of chain innovation, and those that think chains don't matter and only apps do...my question for you is simple:
Do you think solana's success is random?
Do you believe that the environment solana created allowed developers to create amazing experiences? Do you believe that network effects are real, and that builders choose to build on Solana because that is where onchain happens today?
I agree with those who say that apps are all that matter. My view is that blockchains are built for apps, and that blockchain innovation enables application innovation. If Monad is successful, it will not be random.
Both of these two criticisms of monad are actually one in the same: The critic believes that fundamentally, chains don't matter anymore...and this is exactly *why* monad is a trick.
Here is my direct response to the critics:
1. You are correct to be deeply skeptical of Monad. You should hold Monad to the highest standard at every step of the journey, now and far into the future. This is the same view that that everybody in the monad ecosystem holds as well. I invite you to read Monad's code, read Monad's docs and view Monad's validator map. There is no trick, there is nothing to hide.
2. Know that your deepest frustrations with this industry are the same exact reasons why Monad was created. We do not need 1,000 new chains, we do need 1,000 new apps. Monad is fundamentally designed to provide builders with the best developer experience possible, so that they can create the best applications possible. This has been the fundamental limitation of the industry for the past decade. Second order effects are real, success is not random, and you should be excited about what's to come. I know that I am.
