Sharing my quick perspective, and interested to hear yours.

My vantage point:

  • I have been “in” since 2016.
  • More significant allocations and DCA to BTC, ETH in 2018.
  • 2019-2021 accumulated the L1 “Ethereum Killers.” Held tight in 2021 and 2022, did a little Ethereum DeFi activity, in 2021-2022… impressed by the innovation, but high fees and complexity definitely held me back from doing more.
  • Acquired SOL in 2021-ish… didn’t use it, didn’t sell it, just sat delegated to a validator through Solflare (https://www.reddit.com/r/solflare/).
  • I would joke about Solana that being the blockchain that can just turn off and re-org as it wishes… not a good look.

Now:

  • Late 2023: Sentiments are picking up. I saw some hype about BONK (too bad I was delegated so didn’t receive the drop, I guess that’s why). Looked fun.
  • Also heard about Jupiter, and wanted to try.
  • Got the Solsnap integration for Metamask.
  • Unlocked my SOL and made some swaps on jupiter.
  • Found Raydium, added to a Pool. Did some Raydium swaps, etc.

Conclusions:

  • Solana, the apps noted above and the others I have uses are simply the BEST crypto experience I have experienced since 2016.
  • Yes, my BTC remains my harder money, but SOL (and memecoining) is the fastest most seamless and least expensive financial experience ever.
  • I sold all the “new L1” coins I had. Tezos, DOT, HBAR, Algo, AVAX, etc. Just trying to take that shit out of self custody and find a place to reliably sell or bridge was a massive pain. It felt like writing a check and waiting for it to clear with BoomerBank all over again (frankly worse).
  • AVAX takes the cake - that is the most overly complex, ill-documented, unsupported tech I have ever seen… and thus, its useless, and will remain so.

Realization:

  • Solana seems to have the most well documented, well supported, low fee, seamless and easy to use L1 infrastructure.
  • ***Easy to use, addicting UX, and truly self-executing and decentralized finance apps that a real person can use to be their own sovereign bank, market maker, etc. WILL WIN IN THE NEXT CYCLE. (***Yes, there is high price correlation among all L1 tokens in the market, but price isn’t everything - capturing active user base and developer talent and interest is what will pump and sustain SOL for the longer term.)

TLDR:

  • I’ve done enough to know a bit.
  • I’ve interacted with a bunch of other L1’s DeFi apps, wallets, etc. (its really not fun).
  • If you want to quit crypto, try doing anything on Avalanche, its like touching a hot stovetop.
  • Solana’s overall experience is a winner (and its fun).
  • Thus, Solana, and projects on Solana, have the chance to be the standout winner/s in this cycle (by price appreciation, but also longer term userbase capture, developer interest, and protocol/business investments/startups.

How do you see it?