We're all in this space because ultimately we all believe in the long terms prospects of cryptocurrency as well as its power to redistribute wealth properly without the middle men taking a sometimes undeserved chunk. However in order for this space to grow there definitely needs to be some introspect and examination of what ultimately is wrong with crypto and the things that are ultimately holding it back. These are 5 things I think are wrong with crypto today but I'm sure there are more.
1. Scalability - Not necessarily an issue for some of the newer cryptos out there that are built to scale but this is a huge issue for some of the most well established cryptos (I'm looking at you ETH).
2. Scams/Rug Pulls - While this happens everywhere including traditional investments this is usually at the mom and pop type of level. Once a coin is available to an regular investor it should have been fully vetted by all exchanges. This is where regulation can help crypto to stop these type of scams from occurring where millions are lost. These types of rug pulls you see every so often hurts the image around cryptocurrency and hinder it from widespread adoption.
3. Tribalism - Most of us are guilty of this to a certain degree whether this is to spout the greatness of the coins we invest in or maybe some of us are a bit more nefarious and shit on the projects that compete against the projects we have invested in. In order for cryptocurrency to succeed the way we all want to see it succeed we need to throw away Tribalism. Beside outright scams, we should be taking the time to learn about other projects and push the space as a whole into positive light.
4. Ease of Use - Outside of centralized exchanges the ease of getting into cryptocurrency is a killer. I don't know about you guys, but I hate having to read through a bunch of posts/blogs/wikis to find out how the hell I'm supposed to be using something. No one who lacks time in their busy schedules is going to take the time to learn about wallets/defi/dexes/crypto taxes and everything under the cryptoworld. The barrier to entry is high and the barrier to actually using the vast majority of crypto services is high. I'm going to probably give an unpopular opinion here but we need the space to be regulated and in doing so I think we can see this barrier to entry decrease as things become more clear and integrated.
5. The Brand - It sucks to say this but the branding surrounding cryptocurrency still to this day is, its used for money laundering or its highly volatile asset that people really shouldn't invest in. It will take time just like the internet did but we need some actual projects with working products that fulfill a need for the masses. I think only then will people be talking about crypto not from a money laundering perspective but more of a "oh did you see this new dApp that helps financed our mortgage".
We need to really think of the cons of this space and we need to address them head on instead of accepting some of these things as the quirkiness of the cryptocurrency world.
