Cardano (ADA) founder Charles Hoskinson recently revealed the crypto project that almost overshadowed Ethereum (ETH) during its early stages. This revelation followed Hoskinson’s remarks about his greatest fear while he was the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Ethereum.
The Crypto Project That Almost Overshadowed Ethereum
In an interview with Altcoin Daily, Hoskinson mentioned NXT as the crypto project that could have displaced Ethereum while it was still in its early stages. He claimed that NXT scared him the most among other cryptocurrencies while he was still the Ethereum CEO between 2013 and 2014.
He further explained that he was scared of the crypto project because it came out of nowhere and achieved impressive growth in under three months. He noted that NXT was built on Java and had an “incredibly engaged community.” Hoskinson added that NXT was also adding features to its product offering and had user-driven assets.
Interestingly, NXT was already on proof-of-stake then (while Ethereum was still running a proof-of-work mechanism) and had made plans to implement smart contracts on their network. The Cardano founder sounded intrigued by the NXT’s growth as he mentioned how they were “running” and going “so fast.” However, things didn’t end well for NXT, with Hoskinson mentioning what he believes led to the project’s downfall.
Hoskinson claimed that their token distribution wasn’t so good, although he quickly added that that could have been fixed. The Cardano founder mentioned that the more “important” thing that “killed” the project was that they didn’t have a good governance system, which caused the team to fracture and break out into several other new projects.
Hoskinson remarked that Ethereum “wouldn’t exist” if NXT had the right governance system, as the latter would have been “number one” and had just continued to grow immensely. He added that NXT would have absorbed everybody and was a “sexy project” because it was new and had an interesting technology.
Governance Matters A Lot
Having explained what led to NXT’s downfall, Hoskinson further highlighted the importance of governance in the crypto ecosystem, stating that it is the “core differentiator between whether a project is successful or a project will fail.” He added that poor governance would kill a project and noted how poor governance made Microsoft fall behind Google, Apple, and Facebook.
Interestingly, Hoskinson also alluded to decentralized governance, suggesting that it was a better way to run a crypto ecosystem, as everyone having a say would make things run better. He stated that this is what they are hoping to achieve with Cardano, and this is why Cardano stands out from the rest of the pack.
Cardano is on the verge of undergoing the Chang Hard Fork, which will usher in the “Voltaire” era, which focuses on decentralized government. Once this network upgrade occurs, Cardano’s ecosystem will become community-driven. Hoskinson boasts that Voltaire would be the “most advanced blockchain governance system.”
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