Why are there so many Cryptocurrencys and Blockchains?
If you check Coingecko today there will be more then 6000 Coins listed. The real Number is likely higher if you add hidden/private or smaller Blockchains. But why are there som many Cryptocurrencys and Chains? Some People, may called maximalist, have the opinion that there should be only one Blockchain. The one that they working on or preferably using. So why is there so many Blockchains? Could we not just choose one and get rid of all the overhead, all work on development of the same chain and push this technology forward?
If you build a Blockchain it most likely will be Open-Source. Since the people that using it wanna have proof that the Blockchain works as intended. Its important part of Open Source that everybody can look at the Code. Find faults and contributes to the development if they like to do so. Sometimes a project is forked because the Community can not agree on a certain solution as it was happening 2016 with Ethereum and the DAO Hack. Resulting in 2 Chains: Ethereum and Ethereum Classic, read more about that on our Post about Ethereum.
The Cryptospace has many different Communitys
One argument why are there so many Cryptocurrencys and Chains is that not every Blockchain serves the same purpose. For instance Bitcoin lacks the Support of Smart Contracts in the scope of Ethereum, but has other advantages. The Open-Source Nature of the Blockchain Technology makes it even possible to take existing projects and change them a bit to release it as a own project. The Users decide if the project will succeed or fail. Without adoption or Users the Blockchain is useless. Cardano and Stellar for example are XRP forks but are now built on their own codebase.
Diversification is not a bad thing
If you have a Usecase, Idea or can offer a solution to a problem, you are welcome to take the Open Source Code use it, modify it and release it under your own name. If it makes sense people will try it put and if its works they are gonna attract Users. This was the case recently in the Sushiswap Vampire Attack on Uniswap, and got rewarded with lots of TVL on the 🍣 -Protocol. Even Inventor of Yearn Finance, Andre Cronje moved the Keep3r Treasury there because it offers higher APY.
The diverse ecosystem in the Blockchain Space right now is also nurture Innovation. Since the Protocols are competing for the Users and try to offer Incentives over other Projects. So we encourage you to just try out some Projects that you find interesting. Get involved in Development, translate the Wiki in your language or show others what you learned about it on Twitter or your Blog. In the End it is a good thing that there are so many Cryptocurrencys and Blockchains! If there would be just one Blockchain it could dictate the terms and the consensus could happen to a close circle of individuals holding the most coins or Hashing Power. Until that changes, it means the Internet still is undefeated!
