<\/p>\n
Account abstraction and concepts like user intents \u201cadd a ton of design to the space,\u201d Chase Chapman believes. But the development of off-chain scaling solutions, she notes, could create centralized layers in the system.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Dune headmaster Andrew Hong says he has spoken to a number of teams about the conundrum. Some apps, such as Uniswap<\/a> or CoWswap<\/a>, could implement gossip networks<\/a> for the sake of transparency, he suggests.<\/p>\n \u201cYou can have a node network without a blockchain,\u201d he adds. \u201cThat\u2019s kind of what databases are, to begin with.\u201d<\/p>\n Speaking on the On the Other Side podcast (Spotify<\/a>\/Apple<\/a>), Hong says he doubts that every application will provide this level of participation, mostly for practical reasons.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIf I\u2019m a game developer,\u201d he explains, \u201cand I need things to move really quick, maybe for those [elements], it stays centralized and there\u2019s nothing users can really do to force things to be otherwise.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThere is some risk there.\u201d<\/p>\n Hong concedes that in some cases, the trade-off between better user experience and adoption for some \u201clayer of centralization\u201d is probably worth it.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cLet\u2019s say I\u2019m playing Magic the Gathering on-chain,\u201d he says. In this hypothetical scenario, Hong says that while he might not be able to check the game\u2019s logic as it operates on a centralized layer, he can verify that his on-chain<\/a> cards are under his control.<\/p>\n \u201cSome components? Yes, I really care,\u201d he says. \u201cSome other ones? It\u2019s like, all right, worst case scenario, I still have my NFTs<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n The user intent mechanism is an attempt to find a balance between what does and does not need to be on-chain, according to Chapman. \u201cThey\u2019re minimizing the amount of unnecessary complexity on-chain,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n \u201cYou still have the outcome of your transaction. You just don\u2019t entirely know how it got there, which is probably the case for users anyway.\u201d<\/p>\n The key is to ensure that users retain the option to act directly on-chain, Chapman says, by submitting transactions to the Ethereum public mempool<\/a>. \u201cBut if they want to, they can basically opt into this intent-based system.\u201d<\/p>\n Chapman mentions the example of Uniswap and the recently introduced UniswapX<\/a> protocol. \u201cIf you want to take advantage of an intents-based architecture, where you have gasless transactions and you might actually end up getting a better rate, you can use UniswapX,\u201d she says. \u201cIf you are worried about censorship, for example, then you can use Uniswap.\u201d<\/p>\n The possibility that UniswapX could theoretically censor user activity is a \u201cpotential threat,\u201d Chapman says. She then wonders if it\u2019s possible to limit activities to only interact with smart contracts through user intents.<\/p>\n \u201cThat, to me, is where things get a little bit scarier,\u201d she says. \u201cIt\u2019s basically like, forced use of a centralized provider versus optional opt-in use of a centralized provider.\u201d<\/p>\n Hong notes that many mechanisms such as whitelists and airdrop lists are \u201calready centralized ways\u201d of limiting user activity. \u201cEverything\u2019s a balance,\u201d he says. \u201cYes, if you centralize things so that you can only go through intents, there probably is a censorship risk to it.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cPeople like to build,\u201d he says. \u201cI trust the community of developers to figure this out.\u201d<\/p>\n Chapman retorts, \u201cthey\u2019re gonna build it and then eventually get slapped by the CFTC \u2014 and then we\u2019ll be like, oh shit, censorship is a problem in these systems.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAnd then we build backwards,\u201d Hong replies.<\/p>\n \u201cWe can always go back to just the contract-based way of doing things,\u201d he says. \u201cThis is not a one-way path.\u201d Externally owned accounts (EOAs) and smart contracts are features that are \u201cnever going away<\/a>,\u201d Hong says.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s at least that saving grace.\u201d<\/p>\nThis is not a one-way path<\/h2>\n
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