Five years ago, a bet was placed at a CoinDesk conference about the future of crypto, particularly concerning the development of decentralized applications (dapps) built on top of Ethereum. The wager was between bitcoin maximalist Jimmy Song and Ethereum co-founder Joe Lubin, two polar opposites in the crypto world. Fast forward to 2023, and the results of this bet can provide valuable insights into the current state and future prospects of the cryptocurrency industry.
To win the bet, Lubin needed to prove that five or more Ethereum-based applications would maintain 10,000 daily and 100,000 monthly active users for at least six months in any 12-month period before May 23, 2023. Blockchain data firms Artemis and Nansen say that five dapps met these specified usage levels, barely achieving a win for Lubin, but there is still some debate over whether those names qualify as dapps.
The results highlight the early nature of the industry, in an era where Ethereum’s main innovations were still in their infancy. Song remained skeptical, believing that even a popular dapp could be easily replaced by a centralized platform. Lubin, on the other hand, saw decentralized applications as valuable and useful tools, with Bitcoin catering to a narrow set of use cases.
At the time of the wager, the bet value was $500,000, with Song’s portion being worth $1.5 million, and Lubin’s worth $1.9 million today. The five applications that broke both the specified daily and monthly active user marks were Circle, OpenSea, Tether, Uniswap, and wrapped ETH (WETH). A few other names like MakerDAO, Gnosis Safe, and MetaMask met the 100,000 monthly users criteria, but did not achieve the 10,000 daily user threshold.
However, the crypto community is divided about what constitutes a dapp, with some arguing that Circle, Tether, and WETH should not be considered applications. While the outcome of the bet might remain uncertain, it is clear that there are several applications on the Ethereum network with significant activity, even if they don’t meet the bet’s criteria entirely.
Ultimately, the long-term rivalry between the two largest blockchains and their respective technologies is far from settled. Regardless of the outcome of the bet, the evolving landscape of cryptocurrency applications will continue to shape the industry, driven by innovative thinking and the potential for mainstream adoption.
Source: Coindesk
