Smart People in Vitalik's Eyes: Why I Still Have Faith in the Solana Ecosystem

Author: Placeholder VC Partner, Chris Burniske

Compiled by: PANews

On December 30, Ethereum co-founder "Vitalik" Buterin posted on social media: "Some smart people told me that Solana has a serious and smart developer community, and now those terrible, speculative people have been washed out. The Solana blockchain has a bright future. While it's hard for me to judge this from the outside, I still hope the Solana community has a fair chance to thrive."

So, who is this "smart person"? The answer is likely Chris Burniske, a partner at crypto venture capital firm Placeholder VC. Chris Burniske stated on social media that Vitalik Buterin recently asked him why he likes and still believes in Solana, so he decided to share what he told Vitalik Buterin with the crypto community, as compiled by PANews:

The reason Solana is "fascinating" is that its community has a group of hardcore and dedicated developers and "tech enthusiasts," which means that compared to Ethereum and Cosmos, Solana's on-chain innovations are more independent (of course, Placeholder VC is active in the Solana, Ethereum, and Cosmos communities). Some community contributors are hardware enthusiasts, some are focused on network optimization, and validators are fulfilling their commitments on Solana. Unlike those financial speculators, there are still many exciting builders on Solana, which is the vision that Solana Labs co-founder Anatoly Yakovenko hopes to achieve.

While some accuse Anatoly Yakovenko of betraying the ideals of cryptocurrency, he is actually more pragmatic than Vitalik Buterin or Cosmos's Ethan, just as his original vision intended—to bring blockchain technology to billions of people. We all know that cryptocurrency always goes through boom/bust cycles (every few years), and perhaps it is this "commitment" under Anatoly Yakovenko's ideology that has helped the Solana community weather market turbulence.

In terms of the ecosystem, Dapp builders on Solana are more like a hybrid of Web2 and Web3, meaning they have a deep understanding of crypto operating models on the backend and the ability to engage with the mainstream on the frontend. There is no doubt that the crypto industry needs more talents like this, and more importantly, developers in the Solana ecosystem are exceptionally steadfast during the bear market because they know the future of Web2 will be Web3. If you look at the user-friendly products delivered to mainstream users in the Solana ecosystem, you will see that the Solana "team is getting things done."

Solana ecosystem projects that Placeholder VC has directly collaborated with include Vault APP (founded by a former founder of FanDuel), Orca (team members from Ethereum developers), Solend Protocol (team members also from Ethereum developers), and NATION.

All these teams are full of ideals and dedicated to building products for the community. Frankly speaking, for the current stage of the crypto network, culture is sometimes more important than technology, and this is precisely the direction that the Solana ecosystem is striving for.

Compared to many DeFi projects on the Ethereum chain, projects on the Solana chain generally adhere to fair token distribution principles. For example, Orca only reserved 20% of the token supply for the team (as shown in the image below), and most Solana chain project teams did not participate in the Alameda Research "scam," with the entire ecosystem working hard to eradicate such behavior.

In terms of technology itself, the Solana Virtual Machine (SVM) is also relatively novel and efficient, and it is likely to become a new standard for on-chain development in the future. There are already projects built on SVM, such as Sei Labs launching the SVM-compatible chain Nitro, and Eclipse using SVM for customized modular Rollups. SVM processes faster than EVM because the modular stack makes it easier to launch products across different DA layers.

Meanwhile, Anatoly Yakovenko and Solana core engineers are continuously addressing other issues within the Solana network and have made progress in fees, reliability, speed, and decentralization. Firedancer is a good example; this validator client was launched in collaboration with Jump Crypto, the crypto investment arm of high-frequency trading giant Jump Trading, and the Solana Foundation, built using C++ programming language, aiming to coexist with Solana Labs' existing Rust-based validator client. Once deployed, Firedancer may help avoid the issue of Solana Labs' single client holding the majority of validator stakes and facilitate significant upgrades to Solana's core open-source software.

Although market competition remains fierce, Solana has remained resilient after facing "setbacks," partly because they have consistently adhered to their vision. Raj Gokal and his team are also focused on serving Solana builders while ensuring that Solana Labs and the Solana Foundation remain committed to innovation, fostering camaraderie and emotional ties among builders, and even some former Solana team members are strategizing to help improve the ecosystem.

It is worth mentioning that many Dapps are natively developed on Solana, making on-chain products more sticky.

However, now, as the crypto community sees Solana facing difficulties, some may feel that Solana has betrayed the ideals of cryptocurrency, while others may simply worry about being surpassed by Solana. What I want to say is that if everyone looks at the development paths of Ethereum and other blockchains, they will understand that every ecosystem has flaws during its construction process because we are all human… and humans make mistakes.

So, what truly matters is whether you are striving to make things better? Are you learning from mistakes? Are you persistently improving yourself and changing the world? If you are, I fully support you, just as I support Solana.

But for those who excessively suppress Solana, I find it quite disgusting, especially seeing some coming from Ethereum. Have they forgotten how "Bitcoin maximalists" once ridiculed them? Those who are now suppressing SOL remind me of ETH in 2018; despite being mocked, it inspired the Ethereum community. For Solana, it should turn the current suppression into motivation to move forward.

Lastly, Placeholder VC is also a long-term supporter of Bitcoin and Ethereum, and since 2022, has supported Cosmos and Solana, with each blockchain providing a unique and valuable innovative ecosystem.