Author: Brayden Lindrea, Cointelegraph; Compiler: Songxue, Golden Finance
Bitcoin (BTC) will only open up to the $57 billion decentralized finance (DeFi) sector , can "hopefully" achieve mass adoptionThis is the view of the developers of Bitcoin's second layer network.
While Bitcoin has served as currency, “digital gold” and, most recently, as a digital art hosting platform (Bitcoin Ordinals), developers point out that blockchain has many more impactful uses. The use has not yet been realized.
“Limiting developers to P2P payments alone stifles creative exploration and may exclude some valuable use cases,” Pseudonymous founder of Bitcoin Virtual Machine (BVM) person "punk3700" said.
Punk3700 created the Bitcoin Virtual Machine, which appeared in January 2023 and adopted the modular Bitcoin Layer 2 "meta-protocol" architecture, allowing anyone to create their own customized Layer 2 blockchain. This solution connects the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) with Bitcoin.
The BVM founder emphasized that there is a real need to create a consumer layer on top of Bitcoin to realize the full potential of the network, adding that DeFi applications are key, even if it May bring "disruptors" to the ecosystem.
“A decentralized world should give developers the autonomy to scale their creations.”
“There will be trial and error, but only then will we have a chance at scale Adopt Bitcoin.”
Last year, Willem Schroé, founder of cross-chain infrastructure company Botanix Labs (creator of Spider Chain), also believed that unless Bitcoin can be connected to the broader financial system, it will potential cannot be realized.
In early 2023, Botanix Labs began working on Spiderchain—a proof-of-stake layer 2 that enables an EVM-to-EVM bridge, allowing Bitcoin to interact with the EVM. Its public test network was officially launched on November 29. Schroé said connecting Bitcoin to Ethereum-based real-world assets, stablecoins, DeFi and non-fungible tokens (NFTs) through the EVM is a first step in this direction.
"This is a lot of value waiting to increase."
SatoshiVM is controversial
Meanwhile, another Layer 2 community-driven project has been working on developing an EVM-compatible Layer 2 solution for Bitcoin powered by zero-knowledge Rollup – although it marred by controversy surrounding the recent coin launch.
Launched in 2023, SatoshiVM has counted over 400,000 unique wallets, processed over 4.2 million transactions, and can connect the Bitcoin and EVM ecosystems.
Its highly anticipated SAVM token launched on January 19. One of SatoshiVM’s advisors, “MacnBTC,” has been accused of making “millions of dollars in profits” from Ape Terminal’s token issuance, which they deny.
The controversy caused the SAVM token to plummet by as much as 38%.
However, not all projects want to see Bitcoin experience the same scaling.
Another Bitcoin-based virtual machine appeared on October 9, a project initiated by Robin Linus, the leader of the ZeroSync project.
However, the project is to increase Bitcoin’s transaction speed rather than implement smart contracts and flood Bitcoin with tokens similar to the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM).
“I don’t want to see everything coming from the Ethereum ecosystem because most of it is a Ponzi scheme,” explains one developer of BitVM, the “Super Testnet” against being built on Bitcoin Decentralized exchanges believe this will be a "step backwards" for the network.
However, Punk3700 believes that since native Bitcoin lacks a common programming language and virtual machine, it makes sense to build one on top of it because “Bitcoin is the perfect consumer brand.”
They said the rise of Ordinals as a non-payment application on Bitcoin is an example. "We have experienced firsthand how excited people are about enabling more use cases on Bitcoin!"
The pseudonym said that GameFi, SocialFi, art and artificial intelligence applications have been built on BVM.
Hiro CEO Alex Miller once pointed out that we should not be surprised that developers are making Bitcoin programmable because this is what Satoshi Nakamoto envisioned:
"Satoshi himself wrote back in 2010, 2011 that he foresees additional layers and additional chains being built on top of this to provide all this programmability."
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