The Layer 2 Lament: A Solana Co-Founder’s Scathing Review

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The Layer 2 Lament: A Solana Co-Founder’s Scathing Review

The Layer 2 Lament: A Solana Co-Founder’s Scathing Review

It appears that the esteemed Anatoly Yakovenko, co-founder of the illustrious Solana network, has taken it upon himself to skewer the notion of Layer-2 cryptos, declaring them an unnecessary evil that only serves to complicate the already Byzantine world of blockchain scaling.

With the fervor of a latter-day prophet, Yakovenko proclaimed that Layer-1 solutions, such as the Solana network, are more than sufficient to meet the demands of the modern crypto landscape, rendering Layer-2 tokens nothing more than redundant relics of a bygone era.

A Layer-2-Free Utopia?

Yakovenko’s diatribe against Layer-2 cryptos began in an X post, where he responded to the query of @ripdoteth, who had posited that there was no reason to build a Layer-1. Yakovenko countered with a resounding “There is no reason to build an L2.”

A Solana Co-Founder’s Perspective

Yakovenko described Solana’s data generation as “tiny” at 80 terabytes annually, claiming that Layer-1 solutions are hindered by storage issues.

“Solana generates a measly amount of data. Like 80TB per year so far. It’s just not enough data to build a business around, but too much for any individual to easily store,” Yakovenko said.

The crypto co-founder quipped that users should skip creating baseless Layer-2 cryptocurrencies, saying “You can skip creating a valueless L2 and just launch a token.”

When asked about Solana’s plan for offloading unused storage, he replied that the ledger would be sent to “filecoin or whatever decentralized storage provider wants it.”

Not Everyone Agrees

Several crypto investors disagreed with Yakovenko, arguing that Layer-2 solutions are necessary.

“L1s can’t scale to accommodate 8 billion global users. L2s are needed no matter which chain you see leading the way. And they can be faster, cheaper, more secure, interoperable, specialized to use case, localized or decentralized, evolve fast or ossify,” @RuzhyoX commented on Yakovenko’s post.

Yakovenko retorted that Layer-1 can accommodate 8 billion users, saying, “8 billion * 3 txs per day is sub 300k tps. That fits in under 1gbps of block throughput for 400 byte txs.”

He argued that Solana’s design allows it to compete with every Ethereum Layer-2 solution directly, which is not the case with Ethereum itself. “There is no point to multiple L2s … if a single L2 can handle parallel execution, then it can use up all the blobspace and run every use case.”

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2025-03-25 23:43