Ethereum was a very respectable proof of concept, but it's time is past. It gave a glimpse of a future that is really incredible for those of us who had time to

Ethereum was a very respectable proof of concept, but it's time is past. It gave a glimpse of a future that is really incredible for those of us who had time to poke around before fees got out of control. Sadly, Eth 2.0 does not look to be the messiah many seem to be preaching about. Sharding is a very questionable design decision. My take away from dabbling in Ethereum land is that Ethereans, and crypto folks in general, got their values mixed up. They hold decentralization to the highest standard above all else. But upon close inspection, virtually nothing in the Ethereum ecosystem actually lives up to the standard of decentralization. The kinds of decentralization you see are very superficial and largely seem to be intended to dodge regulation above all else (which I have no problem with, but we need to be honest with ourselves). After using the tech, you realize that whats really valuable about these systems is open APIs for value exchange, permissionlessness, and censorship resistance. The decentralization is not a value add. It is a hedge against counter-party risk. And that is important, especially as we go head first into an increasingly dystopic looking global financial system. But teasing apart these different aspects gives you a much better idea of what to focus on if you want to build the next generation of blockchain technology.