Layer 1 networks are seeing remarkable growth as investors place their bets on a decentralized universe and the web 3.0. Most of the projects in existence today were inspired by the success of Ethereum, a chain that is now valued at over $300 billion.
While the number of layer 1 projects has risen, the reality is that most of them are ghost chains, meaning that they have not gained traction among developers. As such, while Ethereum has thousands of apps, they either have none or have apps that are not used by most people. Here are some of the top ghost chains to avoid.
Ethereum Classic
Ethereum Classic is a blockchain project that came to life through a hard fork of Ethereum's mainnet. That fork happened as developers disagreed on how to allocate blocks in the ecosystem.
Therefore, fundamentally, Ethereum and Ethereum Classic are similar projects but with a few differences. Also, Ethereum Classic's goal is to help developers build quality decentralized applications (DAPPs).
However, in the past few years, many developers have generally avoided the networking. Indeed, it is a bit difficult to see the DeFi, Non-fungible Token (NFT), and metaverse projects built using its network. This is despite the fact that Ethereum Classic is one of the biggest chains in the world today.
ETC, its native token, has a total market cap of about $3.7 billion, making it the 38th biggest coin in the world.
Developers have avoided the network because of the traction they had with the original Ethereum ecosystem and the fact that developers have stuck with its proof-of-work approach. Most importantly, it is a platform that has multiple 51% attacks every year.
EOS
EOS is another ghost chain to avoid. The ecosystem was launched a few years ago after its parent company raised $4.4 billion in the world's biggest Initial Coin Offering (ICO).
Since then, the overall performance of the chain has been underwhelming to say the least. This was even confirmed by the CEO of the EOS Foundation who warned that its overall goals had failed.
Fundamentally, EOS Public Blockchain is better than some of the top layer 1 projects. For example, while the Binance Smart Chain can handle less than 100 transactions per second, EOS can process about 2,800 transactions. It also uses the well-regarded Asynchronous Byzantine Fault Tolerance mechanism.
However, EOS is a ghost chain that has not seen any significant traction among developers. Its token has a market cap of about $2.2 billion, making it the 57th biggest coin in the world.
