Blast is repositioned as a full-stack chain, and 'fitting into Ethereum' has gradually become a MEME?

Original Author: Deep Tide TechFlow

A few weeks ago, after the Airdrop was completed with Blast, it seems that everyone didn’t pay much attention to this project.

But as long as the community keeps an eye on it, all the details are easy to grasp.

Yesterday, sharp-eyed netizens discovered that Blast changed the account name of his official X account from the original @Blast_L2 to @Blast.

Official accounts often represent their own brand and positioning. A difference in wording can make a big difference in meaning.

Although this is just a small account name change, it may not be enough to warrant a corresponding official news release; but from the perspective of brand and awareness, it is very likely to be “part of the plan”.

At the same time, Blast’s official account description has also started to describe itself as “The Fullstack Chain” instead of just an L2. This seems to be a deliberate attempt to downplay its common association with Ethereum’s L2.

However, is this just a novelty in branding, highlighting differentiation selling points; or is it a self-reliant technology, to cut off from Ethereum and make its own independent chain?

Help Ethereum is important, but self-development is more important

Without a doubt, Blast is one of the most slick and possibly unmatched in operation and activities among many L2s.

Of course, Tiexun will not only do Airdrops to gain popularity, but Blast has actually been written into its second phase development plan, becoming a full stack chain.

From the official provided diagram, the meaning of this full stack is that Blast is not just a ledger for processing transactions and recording transaction state changes, but Blast also wants to integrate with the upstream and downstream of the chain.

From Fiat Currency deposits and withdrawals to Wallet, Telegram bots, and Dapps in the ecosystem, all become part of the Blast chain, allowing businesses to reach a wider audience.

From infrastructure to applications, from capital flow to information flow, it feels like everyone wants a share.

It has to be said that this is indeed a fairly ambitious and very reasonable strategic choice. The L2s all look similar, so how to make oneself more recognizable, it is necessary to build around the chain merch that can radiate upstream and downstream.

However, the original intention of L2 is actually to help Ethereum deal with performance issues. Now, looking at Blast’s full-stack chain initiative, it’s not just a simple performance issue.

The stronger sense of self-improvement, however, also enhances the experience of ETH users. That’s fine too.

But from L2 to full-stack chain, does it mean that if you don’t do L2, you have to do an independent L1?

It doesn’t seem so at the moment.

In the most viewed post on this topic yesterday, Twitter user @0x jim interpreted it as “leaving Ethereum to form a separate chain”.

In the comments section, Wang Qiao of Alliance DAO interprets it as an “integration” - that is, having its own deposit channel, Wallet, and related chain support, rather than directly cutting with Ethereum.

And other voices in the community are even sharper, pointing out that there may be longer Rollups in the future calling themselves chains; this is not about setting up a separate L1 and ETH fork, but rather:

** “It looks the same as all L2s today” thing to do the cut. **

Technical homogenization is the original sin, standing out is obsession.

Every L2 will have big ambitions when it is first established.

Although the descriptions are different, the goals all point to making Ethereum better.

This also precisely points out the relationship between L2 and Ethereum - ethereum alignment, as a part of Ethereum’s ecosystem.

Help you process trades faster, help you alleviate congestion, help you scale…

If there are L1s acting as Ethereum killers, then L2s, including Blast, should be Ethereum’s assistants.

Just that these assistants’ technologies are too homogeneous, whether it’s ZK or OP, Rollup as a service has already appeared, and you can quickly create your own L2.

When assistants start to compete with each other, the obsession to stand out becomes overwhelming.

The attention and funds of the encryption market are limited, and users don’t really care about the technical choices of different L2s. Because the effects that L2s can achieve are basically the same, just choose 1-2 to use.

When everyone’s experience is very similar, dozens of L2s in the market are competing, and sometimes the brand and perception are half a position ahead, which can bring a lot of change.

So, you can easily see these ETH assistants, who started from the original intention of helping ETH, gradually become successful.

If you go and check different L2 official accounts again, you will find that they have surprisingly consistent tacit understanding:

No L2, willing to say that they are Ethereum’s L2 in their own introduction.

In the end, it’s becoming more and more like a MEME about Ethereum.

After all, projects are all living for themselves, and no project will use their passion to be a Lei Feng to help Ethereum without seeking any return.

Understanding this point, you need to be more cautious when surfing in the encryption world:

The original slogan and narrative are always just a means, not an end.

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