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Algorand was and is my first crypto holding. I am recognizing now how spoiled I am with its fast transactions and cheap transaction fees. Over the last two weeks I’ve put a bit of fiat towards BTC and ETH in order to explore Defi so that I can see what all the hype is about on the Ethereum network. It’s very exciting for me to be using BTC and ETH on the Ethereum network as it feels like I’ve been playing on the kids playground and I finally get a chance to see the big amusement park everyone raves about. However, despite all my excitement, I was blown away by the high transaction fees!
So here is my first reason I am bullish on Algorand:
- Low transaction fees! (Always 0.001 algo)
Currently on the Algorand network, all transactions are 0.001 algo, currently $0.00085. When transactions on the Yieldly.Finance platform, for example, usually require 3 transactions to claim a weekly allotment on Yieldly coins, it could really add up if transaction fees were any higher! The elephant in the room on this is the burning question of “What happens when/if Algorand’s value explodes? Will transaction fees have to adjust to retain its reputation for being cheap?”. The answer to that is the upcoming switch to governance voting in October. In the Algo communities its been whispered that voting to reduce the standard transaction fee for the benefit of the community would be easily done once governance voting begins.
My spoiled reality became apparent when I tried to add my small holdings of BTC and ETH to a liquidity pool on the ETH chain…and the transactions fees blew out half of my ETH bag! Its very possible that I made several goofs on my way to adding liquidity so I am to blame for blowing up my bag, but, regardless, the gas fees on the ETH network are far too high for me to feel comfortable moving more of my crypto bag onto the network. The algo network is still young but it has several exciting projects that I would rather wait for and get into early rather than trying to break into the ETH ecosystem when I’m losing money on every movement.
- Quick transaction times
Today I wrapped my BTC in order to use it on the ETH network. I’m so used to Algo transactions that happen with several seconds that I was very anxious waiting for my BTC to work through six transactions until I received my WBTC. All in all, that one movement took upwards of 30 minutes. All of my ETH transactions took at least 10-20 minutes as well. I might sound like a broken record at this point but those times are insane! Algo transactions are nearly instant every time, I can’t imagine having multiple transactions I need to get done across ETH Defi platforms, the wait time and the gas fees would kill me, no one has time to wait around for the blockchain to get sorted when there’s places to be.
- The secret third reason I’m bullish on Algo is probably what everyone says about their own coin’s community:
The Algo community has been super friendly and helpful since the beginning of my time hanging around. Whenever a new project on Algo launches there is a lot of good dialogue about being careful but excited about the new project and how and where to jump into it. I know from being in a handful of other coin communities that there are good people in all of them, however, I haven’t seen this level of comradery matched with motivation to create more platforms on and for Algo that will benefit this small community! And of course, you just can’t beat the people at r/AlgoNFTMarketplace, there are new and continuing projects having fun and exciting NFT games, giveaways and cheerful banter every day.
All in all, I have a lot of respect for the ETH ecosystem and I am excited to have dipped my toes in the water but, I don’t think I’ll be diving much farther in. I feel that I’m too late and too spoiled to do more than stack a few gwei and hold it for the future.
