區塊鏈產業並沒有像我想像的那樣動搖

作者：基倫‧詹姆斯‧魯賓。以太坊 (ETH) 於 2013 年底構思，並於 2015 年 7 月推出。

Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) was conceived in late 2013 and launched in July 2015. I got my start working on Ethereum in summer 2014, which makes it a seemingly unfathomable 10 years in the space. When such milestones pass it can be useful to check in on what we expected versus what actually transpired.

以太坊（加密貨幣：ETH）於 2013 年底構思，並於 2015 年 7 月推出。當這些里程碑過去時，檢查我們的預期與實際發生的情況可能會很有用。

Chains and coins have proliferated rather than consolidated

區塊鏈和貨幣並未整合，而是激增

Blockchains have strong network effects, almost by definition. As such, one might expect there to be a handful of blockchains or even a single blockchain where the bulk of end-user activity occurs. Ethereum was created, in part, as “one chain to rule them all,” in contrast with the practice at the time of making a new blockchain for each new feature.

區塊鏈幾乎可以定義為具有強大的網路效應。因此，人們可能會期望存在少量區塊鏈，甚至單一區塊鏈，其中發生大部分最終用戶活動。以太坊的創建在一定程度上是為了“一條鏈來統治它們”，這與當時為每個新功能創建一個新區塊鏈的做法形成鮮明對比。

Social networks and stock markets show consolidation behavior — we get approximately one popular social network per purpose (X/Twitter — text, Instagram — images, YouTube — video, and so on). The United States has two popular stock markets. Most countries have one or none, with only the top 20 or so really being globally significant. In contrast, there are approximately 2.5 million cryptocurrencies — up a factor of five from 2021. While many of these coins and chains may not see heavy use, there are more than 50 with a market cap in the billions as of September 2024.

社群網路和股票市場表現出整合行為－每個目的我們都會獲得大約一種流行的社群網路（X/Twitter — 文字、Instagram — 圖像、YouTube — 影片等）。美國有兩個受歡迎的股票市場。大多數國家都有一個或沒有，只有前 20 名左右真正具有全球重要性。相較之下，加密貨幣的數量約為250 萬種，比2021 年增加了五倍。的市值達到數十億美元。

Blockchains and coins built on top of them have been relatively easy to build and finance, so it makes sense that a lot of them have appeared. Ethereum greatly facilitated this activity, reducing the launch of a new token to a small code snippet or even a few clicks. Private investment often chases hot areas, with tons of funding flowing to one particular category — such as AI and blockchain, or in the past, things such as ride-share companies.

區塊鏈和建立在其之上的硬幣相對容易構建和融資，因此它們的出現是有道理的。以太坊極大地促進了這項活動，將新代幣的發布減少到一小段代碼甚至幾次點擊。私人投資通常會追逐熱門領域，大量資金流向某一特定類別，例如人工智慧和區塊鏈，或過去流向共享旅遊公司等領域。

We usually see consolidation come after with one to three winners consuming most market share, and other players being acquired or going out of business. In contrast, blockchains and blockchain-native tokens are oddly resilient, with some projects sticking around forever even if they are no longer actively developed. And some come back — Dogecoin (CRYPTO: DOGE), for instance, had a long quiet period but has seen a resurgence of activity from 2020 onward.

我們通常會看到整合發生後，一到三個贏家佔據了大部分市場份額，而其他參與者被收購或倒閉。相較之下，區塊鏈和區塊鏈原生代幣具有奇怪的彈性，有些專案即使不再積極開發，也會永遠存在。有些人又捲土重來──例如，狗狗幣（加密貨幣：DOGE）經歷了很長一段安靜期，但從 2020 年開始，活動開始復甦。

The “markets for everything” thesis has not borne out (yet)

「一切皆有市場」的論點尚未得到證實（尚未）

Around 2014 or so, every lengthy discussion about the uncensorable nature of blockchain technology would eventually turn to assassination markets — markets which allow speculators to bet on the time of someone’s death. Assassination markets did in fact first appear in 2018, but do not appear to have had any sustained presence. Prediction markets have gotten popular in areas that were popular before the blockchains existed — elections and sports — with huge volumes of late.

大約在 2014 年左右，每一次關於區塊鏈技術不可審查性質的冗長討論最終都會轉向暗殺市場——允許投機者押注某人死亡時間的市場。事實上，暗殺市場確實在 2018 年首次出現，但似乎並未持續存在。預測市場在區塊鏈出現之前就很流行的領域——選舉和運動——已經變得流行起來，而且最近交易量巨大。

Less dramatically, decentralized on-chain insurance was conceptualized early on, but seems to remain fringe. One can imagine an infinity of micro-insurance markets — will my train arrive on time? And if not, can I be compensated? But the mere capability is not enough for these markets to exist. People aren’t interested enough for these markets to be functional — yet.

不太引人注目的是，去中心化的鏈上保險很早就被概念化了，但似乎仍然處於邊緣地位。人們可以想像無限的小額保險市場——我的火車會準時到達嗎？如果沒有的話，我可以得到補償嗎？但僅僅有能力還不足以讓這些市場存在。人們對這些市場的運作還沒有足夠的興趣。

Institutional adoption has proceeded differently than some expected

機構採用的進展與某些人的預期不同

Institutional adoption has been more about new assets than migrating business processes while legacy assets have been slower to get on chain than expected.

機構採用更多的是關於新資產而不是遷移業務流程，而遺留資產上鍊的速度比預期慢。

In the very early days of the tech industry, it was common for the government (defense, in particular) to be your first customer. Deep-pocketed institutions employed technologists who could work with not-quite-mature products and get a better outcome versus what was then in use. This could have been the adoption path for blockchain technology, especially considering the significant interest from the legacy financial institutions.

在科技業的早期，政府（特別是國防）成為您的第一個客戶是很常見的。財力雄厚的機構僱用的技術專家可以使用較不成熟的產品，並獲得比當時使用的產品更好的結果。這可能是區塊鏈技術的採用路徑，特別是考慮到傳統金融機構的巨大興趣。

Instead, numerically successful use cases for larger institutions have leaned towards the consumer. The technology is perhaps too transformative and difficult to adopt incrementally for legacy players to use for core business processes. New asset classes have been of primary interest, with brands such as Nike (NYSE:NKE) earning a remarkable $185 million in non-fungible token (NFT) revenue, while the iShares Bitcoin Trust (NYSE:BITI) is managing something north of $20 billion.

相反，大型機構在數位上成功的用例已經傾向於消費者。該技術可能變革性太大，難以讓傳統參與者逐步採用以用於核心業務流程。新的資產類別一直備受關注，耐吉 (NYSE:NKE) 等品牌的非同質代幣 (NFT) 收入高達 1.85 億美元，而 iShares 比特幣信託 (NYSE:BITI) 管理的收入超過 20 美元十億。

Startups have had more success bringing legacy assets on chain than legacy institutions. At $120 billion in market capitalization, Tether (CRYPTO: USDT) is the most obvious success story. Major financial institutions have much more AUM, with BlackRock (NYSE:BLK) in the lead at $9 trillion. But relatively speaking, they have moved very little on-chain to date.

與傳統機構相比，新創公司在將傳統資產上鍊方面取得了更多成功。 Tether（加密貨幣：USDT）的市值為 1200 億美元，是最明顯的成功案例。主要金融機構的資產管理規模要高得多，其中貝萊德（BlackRock，NYSE：BLK）以 9 兆美元的資產處於領先地位。但相對而言，迄今為止他們在鏈上的轉移很少。

The industry has not shaken out the way I expected at all. It’s been strange, disappointing in some ways and amazing in others. In his 1997 shareholder letter — a year in which Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) made $150m in revenue — Jeff Bezos referred to the Web as

這個行業根本沒有像我預期的那樣改變。這很奇怪，在某些方面令人失望，但在其他方面卻令人驚奇。 1997 年，亞馬遜 (NASDAQ:AMZN) 的收入達到 1.5 億美元，在他的股東信中，傑夫·貝佐斯 (Jeff Bezos) 將網路稱為