How to lay out the potential track in the future?

Yesterday, I reviewed the DeFi tide I experienced with you. The main purpose of reviewing this period of history is to hope that when a track is about to rise from it, can we see some signs and find some patterns?

To be honest, it is very, very difficult to accurately judge this kind of general direction of the future, so today I am just discussing with you and sharing some of my own immature views.

As far as my personal understanding is concerned, it depends on what the future track may be, or whether to return to the market, that is, where the demand side may be?

On the demand side, I generally look at two aspects:One is that there are still deficiencies or unexplored areas in the current system that has a certain scale but is not yet fully mature; the other is whether there are new technologies or new business models.

Let's look at the first point first.

At present, the systems that have a certain scale but are not yet fully mature, in my opinion, mainly include these: DeFi, NFT, and second-layer expansion.

In the field of DeFi, I think that various basic service structures and tools are now slowly maturing, and it seems that competition in various major fields is becoming more and more sufficient. The derivatives field that lacks competition may be the field of derivatives, and synthetic assets There may also be some new applications in this area. Other than that, I don't see any segments that I'm particularly excited about or looking forward to right now.

In the field of NFT, I think the future space is bigger than DeFi. In this field, I think the most lacking thing is how to make these NFT products flow.

At present, a large number of works of high value have been born in the NFT field, including artworks, collectibles, etc., which make the NFT field already have value anchors, so how to release the value of these value anchors in the next step and let them generate Mobility, I think it may be an area with great potential.

At present, only exchanges like Opensea and Rarible allow them to flow, but this is far from enough. If we refer to DeFi, it requires not only exchanges, but also lending and synthetic assets and even derivatives. In addition to exchanges, there seem to be not many well-known and mature products in other segments, so these aspects are worthy of our attention.

Regarding the expansion of the second layer, I have always wondered whether this field will become a separate track? Because some projects have appeared on this track very early. I remember that as early as 2018 and 2019 when IEO, there were some second-layer expansion projects. But over the years, the vast majority of second-tier expansion projects have been tepid.

On the contrary, the exchange public chains that have emerged recently, because they are fully compatible with the Ethereum virtual machine, and because they have strong user resources and mature systems, more and more DeFi projects are built on these chains. Although they have been criticized a lot, But their role in popularizing DeFi cannot be ignored. Because of their many unique advantages, more and more well-known DeFi projects are now migrating to these exchange public chains. The most typical one is that Sushi and a series of projects under AC have begun to support these exchange public chains .

To some extent, these exchange public chains are more like the "true" second-layer extension of Ethereum.

The rise of the exchange public chain is beyond my imagination. In the foreseeable future, I think the exchange public chain still has room for development, which may squeeze the development space of other second-layer expansion projects to some extent. However, it is still difficult to judge the future development of this field, and it still needs to be observed.

We've had readers mention apps in the privacy category.

In fact, the privacy field has had its own well-known projects for a long time. Privacy currencies based on Monero and Zcash existed many years ago, and they have been popular for a while. However, their functions are generally relatively simple, focusing on transfers. I think it is not easy to have new hot spots in this field with simple functions in the future.

With the rise of DeFi, there are new privacy applications built on smart contracts like Tornado Cash. But whether this track will be large enough to form a field, it seems that there is no such sign now, so we need to continue to observe.

Let's look at the second point: Are there any new technologies or new business models?

I think the most popular new technology is the second-layer expansion, but as I said before, because the rise of the exchange public chain may squeeze the space of other solutions, how will these second-layer expansion technologies develop? In what mode and form will it rise in the end, there is no obvious momentum yet.

And when it comes to new business models, I think the most likely to appear is in the NFT field.But for the new model, I have never dared to expect too much.

Why? Because I am particularly worried that I am limited by my inherent thinking. When this new model appears, I can't understand it, which leads to my misjudgment of it. This kind of history has happened to me more than once: I missed Bitcoin and Ethereum in the early years, and later missed the current crypto punk (crypto punk), which impressed me deeply.

Therefore, I am particularly alert to the limitations of my thinking, and dare not boldly embrace new models.

All of the above views are just some of my personal guesses. The future market development is very likely to completely subvert our imagination.

After much deliberation, the only way to embrace the future track is only two points:

1. At any time, we must be alert to the troubles of inherent thinking deep in our hearts. Don’t say that when you encounter something you don’t understand, it is a pyramid scheme, or it is unreliable, impossible, or useless. This old way of thinking will completely block the door for us to welcome new opportunities.

2. Pay close attention to all the information in the circle, and don't let go of any new things you haven't seen.