How Modular Blockchains Can Create an Enriched World

The scarcity of a single blockchain brings about negative impacts on user experience, modular chains minimize these issues by introducing richness where the overall chain is scarce.

Written by: Celestia

Scarcity negatively impacts monolithic blockchain users in two ways. First, scarce block space makes blockchains expensive for users. Second, the scarcity of options limits developers' choices and constrains innovation.

Modular blockchains separate consensus from execution, enabling blockchains to be purpose-built for professionals. This allows modular blockchains to provide ample block space for cheap access and a wealth of options for developers to innovate.

Let’s see how modular blockchains can be enriched and what this means for the modular ecosystem.

TLDR

• Modular chains like Celestia can provide rich block space as the ecosystem grows, as more nodes allow them to increase the block space.
• Monolithic chains limit developer options by requiring them to conform to their set of features and tradeoffs.
• Modular chains provide rich options for developers, as they can deploy chains with desired features and trade-offs, tailored to their applications.

Rich Scale

High fees have plagued the overall chain, causing problems for users interacting with applications and the developers who build those applications. why?

this is very simple. Due to the limitations of the monolithic architecture, block space is scarce. All is well when activity is low. When an application starts to be adopted, it attracts more users. These users increase the amount of activity on the chain, filling up the available block space. Due to the scarcity of block space, fees can rise due to high activity.

Herein lies the problem, more users make transactions more expensive. Modular blockchains upend this paradigm. Modular blockchains like Celestia can increase their block space as more users join the network. Now, as more apps are built bringing more users, the fee remains affordable. So, how exactly does this work?

Celestia introduces a new technique called Data Availability Sampling [1] . This sampling process allows light nodes [2] Validate blocks with similar security to full nodes and only a fraction of the hardware. This is where the magic happens. More sampled light nodes allow Celestia to increase its block size.

This means that Celestia's block space can grow to meet increasing demand, replacing scarcity with abundance.

So, what is the result of all this abundant block space? Users will have affordable fees to interact with the application. Developers will be able to build applications that are accessible to many users, even as their user base grows.

Rich Selection

Execution Environment

Monomer chains make it easy for developers to deploy their applications. However, monolithic chains offer developers few options.

By deploying on a monolithic chain, developers must conform to the existing execution environment. This determines which programming languages developers can use to write smart contracts, how applications interact with wallets, and many other things.

Working within an existing feature set limits developers' options for building their applications. They may not have access to the programming language they want to use, and supported languages may lack functionality. The way contracts interact with wallets can create a clunky user experience that reduces application usability. These are examples of how developers must adhere to a limited set of pre-existing rules for the overall chain.

Modular blockchains provide developers with a rich choice of building blocks. Modular chains focus on specific functions and offload the rest to existing infrastructure. For example, Rollup can focus on the execution part and plug into Celestia to offload consensus and data availability.

It is specialized, allowing developers to focus only on the execution environment. They can choose from the rollup framework or existing execution environments provided by the SDK. Alternatively, they can experiment and iterate in their own execution environment to provide their application or community with the feature set they want. Added features could include anything from enabling the execution environment to support more desirable programming languages, improving user-friendliness through native account abstractions, or enhancing parallel processing to improve performance.

The abundance of choices enables developers to experiment and increase the speed of improvement and innovation, thereby improving the quality of their applications. Alternatively, they can use their execution environment to add custom functionality to already popular VMs such as the EVM.

While monolithic chains limit developer options, modular chains free developers to focus on their execution environments, leading to a wealth of choices and opportunities to meet their application goals.

Using Modular Building Blocks

The monolithic chain has restrictions on rules outside of the execution environment. Your application must conform to the set of features and tradeoffs made by the overall chain. There may not be a monolithic chain of features and trade-offs that is right for your application. When it's not your chain, there's no easy path to customizing features and their tradeoffs.

With a modular blockchain, developers can leverage an existing blockchain for their desired set of features and tradeoffs. First, they can determine where in the modular stack their tradeoffs fit best. If sovereignty and the ability to upgrade through forks are required, then sovereign aggregation [3] Just fit. Maybe have a settlement layer with [4] local trust-minimized bridge [5] is a higher priority; smart contract aggregation might be a better fit. Alternatively, using Ethereum is as important as cheap fees - Celestium sounds like a better fit.

There are several possibilities for deployment in a modular stack, each with unique capabilities and tradeoffs. The optionality enabled by modular blockchains allows developers to build blockchains that suit their application needs and goals, whereas monolithic chains limit the options.

Summary

The scarcity of a single blockchain creates several issues that negatively impact user experience. Modular chains minimize these problems by introducing abundance where the overall chain is scarce.

The scarcity of block space creates a situation where more activity leads to higher transaction fees, making it impossible for users and application developers to price. Modular chains like Celestia offer scalable block space that can grow with the number of nodes, keeping fees low for users and supporting use cases that rely on low-cost transactions.

The lack of choice limits developer options, limiting innovation and customizability for desired use cases. The modular chain introduces the concept of specialization, enabling developers to customize and deploy where best suits their preferred feature set within the modular stack.

Modular blockchains are rich because the access and options of the blockchain should not be limited.

External link

[1] New Techniques for Data Availability Sampling:

[2] Light node:

[3] Sovereignty Summary:

[4] Settlement layer:

[5] Trust-minimized bridge: