Scalability is a hot topic in the blockchain world, yet few people ever clarify what that phrase means. It is creating a blockchain that everybody on the planet can use. That means the blockchain developer must be able to handle that amount of traffic, which is commonly referred to as scalability.

The user’s experience is crucial for a blockchain developer

But what they don’t talk about nearly as much is the apparent consequence that you need to create a user experience that everyone on the planet enjoys. They are eternally scalable because there is no demand for awful user experiences or the underlying network resources necessary to offer them.

The fact that most projects discuss scaling in terms of technical implementations such as sharding, proof-of-work, or layer 2, which are the methods Ethereum is employing to address its scaling issues.

These projects react to Ethereum’s scaling issues by attempting to integrate scaling solutions sooner. Still, they are overlooking the fact that those solutions only make sense in the context of Ethereum, which is the first general-purpose blockchain and the one with the most developer adoption in the world.

Also, read – Here is everything there is to know about the Ethereum Name Service (ENS)

The first mover is Ethereum

When Ethereum was first introduced, it allowed developers the option to construct apps on a shared blockchain platform using a programming language that was remarkably similar to the ones they were already using: a Turing complete programming language. Compared to the developer experience of building applications on other blockchains, working on Ethereum was a quantum leap forward, making decentralized application development faster, easier, and less expensive. Ethereum’s popularity skyrocketed as a result of this exceptional user experience. The demand for Ethereum’s resources has outstripped supply, resulting in a surge in gas consumption and a corresponding price increase, making all Ether (ETH) holders quite happy.

Ethereum’s creators and stakeholders do not want fees to be eliminated or even reduced. If there is a surplus of demand for their network resources, they are more concerned with growing supply (scaling) while retaining the current user experience. That would be similar to oil producers wishing to lower the price of their products.

Fees for Ethereum are increasing, but traders have other options. That is, however, Ethereum! With first-mover advantage, tremendous developer adoption, and unimaginable capital commitment, it’s the 900-pound gorilla of general-purpose blockchains. It’s a popular platform whose scaling plans make perfect sense for Ethereum. However, they don’t make sense for platforms with no users or developers.

This is why we see so many projects pursuing time-consuming and expensive measures like bridges to Ethereum to suck users away from Ethereum to justify their scaling solutions!

Using analogies as a tool

However, this is typical reasoning from analogy rather than from first principles: making decisions based on what others are doing rather than focusing on the problem and the most efficient path to constructing a solution based on fundamental facts. Reasoning from comparison, thinking that sharding is the way to scale a new blockchain because sharding is the way to scale Ethereum is a beautiful example.

Scaling to the masses does not imply implementing some magical technology that will support everyone and their mother overnight. No digital platform ever goes from zero to millions of users in a single day. Every platform or product that has ever attained widespread adoption has done so through exponential expansion. The exponential growth of any product or platform leads to mass adoption.

How many users or transactions your platform or application stack can manage on Day One makes no difference. That isn’t very sensible. Even if the price is somewhat high, what matters most is that your product has some unique value proposition that a limited number of early adopters would adore.

Experience with video games

Instead of the horrible UX of every other blockchain, this gives the blockchain a video game-like user experience. This provides a fundamentally different and more enjoyable user experience. Ethereum’s fee-based model remains dominating, as seen by its numerous imitators and competitors. It also has a slew of backers, including developers, token holders, and institutional investors (and, by extension, its fee-based model).

🏃‍♀️ https://t.co/Tuhv0qKkIX is a great place for good coders to get started building decentralized applications.

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🛠 Then, test your skills:

🚩 Challenge 0: 🎟 Simple NFT Example

🚩 Challenge 1: 🥩 Decentralized Staking App

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— Austin Griffith (@austingriffith) March 23, 2022

Scaling is a process that occurs throughout a platform’s existence for a blockchain developer, at least if the platform is sufficiently upgradeable. If the platform isn’t upgradeable enough, you’ll have to choose the “correct” scaling solutions from the start, even if you don’t need them. This is more due to poor upgradeability (and bad engineering).