CKB works ! The real question is : Who will need it?

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After following many recent discussions here, from Proof of Buying and L2 designs to infrastructure upgrades and economic models, I wanted to step back and ask a simpler question.

The bet around CKB is no longer really “does the technology work ?”
The on-chain data strongly suggests that it does.

  • Block times are stable

  • Hashrate is high and resilient, with no obvious miner stress

  • Transactions are regular

  • Unique addresses and cell count continue to grow

CKB clearly functions as a solid PoW Layer 1.

Economically, the model is also coherent: inflation is known and declining, the DAO neutralizes dilution, and there are no artificial yield promises. It’s a serious monetary design, not a marketing one.

Development activity reinforces this picture. Releases are frequent and focused on fundamentals: security, light clients, CKB-VM, and tooling. Very little noise, mostly engineering.

So the real bet seems to be something else:

Will anyone actually need this layer ?

In my view, CKB’s main challenge today is not a lack of fundamentals, but a lack of a clear and simple narrative around what it is for.

Many discussions focus on powerful primitives, but their purpose can be hard to grasp outside a fairly technical audience. This makes CKB easy to underestimate, even when the underlying design is strong.

A possible inflection point could be to clearly embrace a sober positioning:

“CKB is the security and settlement layer for specialized L2s.”

No slogans.
No promises about users or apps.
Just a clear role.

In that framing, complexity becomes a feature rather than a barrier — because it serves a well-defined purpose.
Specialized L2s that need long-term security, durable state, neutral settlement, or UTXO-aligned design suddenly have a clear reason to rely on CKB.

I’m curious how others here see this:

Is this already how CKB is implicitly positioned today ?
Or do we still need to make that role explicit, both internally and externally ?

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I’m honestly just a degenerate crypto trader. Back in 2021, I bought CKB mainly based on reading people’s tone/body language and applying basic logic.
You actually remind me a lot of myself back in 2021.
I only started learning blockchain fundamentals in 2023. I began by watching a bunch of NervosNetwork videos, along with foundational videos on Bitcoin and Ethereum and their core design logic, and gradually built up my technical understanding.
What I’ve realized is that there are still way too many people who don’t really understand the logic behind CKB.
If you have time, study more—that’s my advice. There’s a lot of material out there: conference talks, the whitepaper, the long-term vision, and the actual engineering implementation.
It would be better if you finish going through those first, and then come back with questions.
Don’t trust authority—trust logic.

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CKB’s design and whitepaper positioning clearly positions it as relying on layers for different functions, as a way of addressing the blockchain trilemma.

Currently, it is payment channel networks like Fiber and Perun. Previously, it was L2 EVM designs such as Godwoken and Axon. Some applications clearly benefit from the features of L1 and can accept the trade-offs, others require faster confirmation and will benefit from operating off-chain.

I see the solution to low usage or interest as not pertaining to positioning per se (we once heavily marketed the “layer 1 for layer 2” slogan), but increasing the number of interesting or useful applications on CKB that address real needs, which itself can be helped by drawing in more developers to experiment and play with tooling such as CCC (which in my experience is extremely beneficial to newer developers).

If we can continue to grow a healthy developer community (and I see signs of this from different efforts such as NCC and Spark), I think that speaks louder than most of the social media noise. By the way, most projects in blockchain grapple with the same question and risk becoming obsolete. CKB’s ability to support innovation gives us more opportunity to stay relevant in this rapidly evolving industry. But I agree that potential alone is not enough.

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Appreciate the perspective, and I agree that CKB only really clicks once you spend time with its underlying logic and trade-offs.

Just to add some context on my side : I’ve been involved with CKB since 2021 as well, and I’ve spent quite a lot of time over the years going through the whitepaper, conference talks, ecosystem updates, and the more technical discussions around its long-term design.

My post wasn’t coming from a place of unfamiliarity with the system, but rather from trying to step back after following many recent threads here and ask a higher-level question about necessity and legibility.

In other words, less “does this architecture make sense ?” and more “how do we articulate why this layer needs to exist, and for whom, without diluting its rigor ?”

I think those two questions can, and probably should, coexist. :slightly_smiling_face:

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Thanks, this is a very fair take, and I mostly agree with the direction you’re outlining.

I don’t see the question of positioning as a replacement for building useful applications, but more as a way to reduce ambiguity about what kind of applications CKB is best suited for.

In my mind, a clear L1 → specialized L2 framing doesn’t solve usage by itself, but it helps set expectations — for developers especially — about where experimentation should happen and what trade-offs are acceptable at each layer.

Things like Fiber, payment channels, or more domain-specific L2s make a lot of sense in that context, and I agree that growing a healthy dev community is ultimately what will matter most.

My concern is mostly about legibility : If the system’s role is clear, it becomes easier for builders to decide why they should try CKB in the first place.

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imo you are looking for a user-facing application

”what’s CKB for?”
cool application runs on CKB
”oh wow”

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CKB could consider establishing a clear positioning slogan again, at least to prepare for the next time the market enters a bull run. A strong positioning slogan is especially important when the market moves into a boom and FOMO phase.

Ethereum has also been constantly adjusting its slogan in response to market demand:
ETH — from “the world computer” → “infinite garden” → “a ladder.”

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Infrastructure only reaches developers, the thing that can reach deeper into Web3 market, especially to all of customers in the market, is indeed the APPLICATION running based on these infrastructures, so this’s my goal that I insist on for years.

Recently, I published a fully on-chain GameFi, named the WarSpore · Saga | A Fully On-chain GameFi on CKB , my intention is simple and clear, feature of fully on-chain is aiming to make CKB’s technical potentials inside out with a funny and explicit experience through gameplays.

My intention is to wrap the strength of CKB with a playable game that can easily reach into the deep of market, to reach more and more people and attract their attentions from outside into CKB.

It’s quite hard actually, but here always should be one person to do so, or nothing can be changed. Talking is cheap, show our action.

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