Bitcoin and Ethereum dominate, but they aren’t infallible. Recent events have exposed their weaknesses when it comes to scalability, Bitcoin transactions have been plagued by long confirmation times, which are now intimately felt as Bitcoin is reaching new highs, and Ethereum users fear a looming network congestion considering the large number of projects built on top of the platform.
The CryptoKitties craze showed that a spike in just one app can be enough to cause bottlenecks in the network. As a result, we are starting to witness cracks in the dominance of a few networks.
I recently spoke with Daria Arefieva from CryptoFriends – a company specialized in high‑end blockchain‑related events – at a blockchain conference in Singapore. According to Arefieva, we are witnessing the rise of new platforms as a result of ongoing challenges the big players are facing.
“As Blockchain and cryptocurrencies continue to develop we will see many different types of platforms not just Bitcoin or Ethereum but hundreds if not thousands of others. As we have seen in previous technology cycles, it is not always the first or second that become the default tech of choice. As the months and years go by and the technology matures we will begin to see how crypto standards will work and be associated with more of our day to day activities”.
Old players, new landscape
Financial services have already felt the impact of blockchain, but other industries should experience the disruption soon as blockchain adoption widens. At the center of this are the two top blockchains, Bitcoin and Ethereum.
Read more at:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/nikolaikuznetsov/2017/12/21/are-new-platforms-threatening-the-hegemony-of-bitcoin-and-ethereum/#d2276c9337dd
