Recently, everyone has been talking about modular chains. To put it simply, for someone like me—a terminal user—the most direct change isn’t that the “technology is more advanced,” but that the experience is more fragmented: more bridges, more signatures, more addresses, and before you know it, you can end up losing yourself. What used to be done end-to-end on a single chain is now like being split into several outsourced chunks: the speed might be faster, but the risk is also cut into a lot of small pieces. If anything goes wrong, you have to handle it yourself.

I used to be a bit stubborn, always saying, “I only look at what’s on-chain,” and thinking that data wouldn’t lie. Then when airdrop season arrived, with the task platform going anti-sybil + a points-based system, the “farming” crowd was pulling rewards like clocking in at work. On-chain data looks lively, but a whole bunch of those actions are actually driven by rules… Now I’ll look at on-chain data, but I also have to admit: emotions and incentive mechanisms can shape the on-chain “mold.”

Anyway, my habits are still the same: if I can self-custody, I self-custody; before signing, I take an extra look at the contract and authorizations; I avoid crossing chains too much—I’d rather move slower. I don’t know whether modularity is really any good or not, but I’m going to keep my hands from reaching too far.