The only difference between deciding a project is decentralized or not is making sure its founder is MIA. Isn’t it?
Satoshi Nakamoto the creator of Bitcoin disappeared back in 2011 after handing over the project to Gavin Andresen and the core Bitcoin developers.
Unknowingly or knowingly, this created such a powerful effect that any invention made after it, even with a better use case, was marked as a scam, a centralized shill coin, or * censored * a shit coin. However, this hasn’t stopped people from working on cryptospace development.
C’mon, Satoshi literally owns over 1 million Bitcoins and is considered to be a billionaire. If he cashes out not only would Bitcoin collapse but the entire crypto market would too. Isn’t the only reason you trust Bitcoin over others is that the founder of the king of cryptocurrencies doesn’t have a face?
Projects that actually are making a big difference but most won’t notice it
Ethereum
No matter what the world talks about Vitalik Buterin or how Ethereum is his pet project and a centralized ecosystem, it doesn’t change the fact that it’s the second-largest cryptocurrency. Buterin was literally 21 years old when Ethereum was released. I mean, you can be smart, you can be cool too, but you’re never going to be half as smart and cool as a 21-year-old kid building a platform that allows Smart Contracts and Decentralized Applications to be developed and run without any third-party intervention.
Even today, Ethereum stands as the number one platform to build dApps. DeFi projects built on top of Ethereum are the biggest drivers of volume growth with a 778% hike as compared to Q1 in 2019. Although Ethereum, Tron, and EOS are the biggest contributors to the transactional volume of the dapp sector, Ethereum is the only platform that experienced a year-over-year growth while the rest two have suffered decreases in users and transactional volume. [Source]
XRP
XRP built by the Ripple team consists of an extraordinary ecosystem. The company runs around the basic vision of making cross-border remittances easier for every person throughout the globe using their products integrated with the RippleNet – xCurrent, xRapid, and xVia.
Nevertheless, ever is so often the media talks about the “centralized” aspect of it.
David Schwartz the CTO at Ripple has counteracted saying, “Since these blockchains are considered decentralized, then by design, the XRP Ledger is also — if not more so — decentralized than both Bitcoin and Ethereum.”
Schwartz in simple words has even explained how the XRP Ledger is based on an “inherently decentralized, democratic, consensus mechanism — which no one party can control.” [Source]
With a decentralized at fast cross-border remittance ecosystem Ripple has managed to onboard way over 200 banks, startups, and payment companies in its RippleNet user network; making most xCurrent software the most used cross-border payments channel in cryptospace.
Cardano
Cardano has received the least attention amongst all the great projects in the space. With a slow, steady, and transparent plan of making the network decentralized, IOHK has built Cardano with a vision of a decentralized tomorrow.
Even though decentralization is not at its best today, the project holds the potential to beat many moneymaking coins of the industry. The technology behind ADA stands on scientific philosophy and peer-reviewed academic research.
Speculators have even suggested that Cardano has attracted investors’ interest in 2020 due to the technological improvements of the coin. With a 5-layer decentralization plan – the team is all set to become the torchbearer of a future decentralized economy.
Final thoughts
Even though the cryptospace is filled with scams there are a handful of projects worth exploring and understanding. Protocols such as Chainlink, MakerDAO, Dash, and more are always worth exploring. The basic idea of Bitcoin transitioned and evolved into multiple noteworthy technologies is what keeps the space moving forward.
Most traditional market professionals exclaimed that the cryptocurrency market would take more time than we anticipate to take off which was proved wrong when BTC pumped to $20K in 2017. Right now people in the fintech industry bank of the technical growth of other cryptocurrencies as no significant amount of improvement can be observed in Bitcoin. Adding to reasons why BTC may never be good enough for global adoption with its lack of scalability.