Advancing the blockchain and cryptocurrency ecosystems will require a very different mindset. Instead of doing everything on their own, it is important for projects to pursue interoperability options. Although it seems like a daunting task, there are a lot of possibilities waiting to be explored.
Interoperability Is Key for Blockchain
Opportunities abound in the world of blockchain and cryptocurrency. Exploring all of these options will require a very different mindset, however. Most companies’ main focus is to create more proprietary blockchain solutions, rather than explore cross-chain solutions to create a stronger overall ecosystem.
One has to acknowledge the potential of interoperable blockchain solutions. They allow for a better exchange of information and data, and they can solve a lot of scalability problems associated with blockchain technology. There is no one chain which can serve all needs and address all problems.
Although it remains to be seen how all of this functionality will be implemented, it is evident these options need to be looked into as soon as possible. Knowing what is going on across various blockchains can introduce a lot more transparency. Given how transparency is one of the main selling points of blockchain, operability seems to be the way to go.
Especially with more decentralized and distributed applications coming to market, collecting more information across more chains will create additional use cases. The ability to move assets from one chain to another will support cross-chain atomic swaps. That will ultimately allow decentralized exchanges to take over from their centralized counterparts.
Other benefits of this cross-chain approach include having the ability to explore cross-chain messaging. Being able to trustlessly relay messages between multiple blockchains is something a lot of users have been looking for. Some companies have already incorporated such technology, although it is evident a more unified ecosystem is direly needed at this stage.
The bigger question is how and when interoperability between blockchains will come to market. Despite some interesting efforts taking place right now, it is evident there is still a lot of work to be done. Consensus protocols seemingly do not work well with interoperability. This means that any real blockchain compatibility – outside of atomic swaps – between Bitcoin, Ethereum, and similar currencies may not happen anytime soon.
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