Bitcoin has recorded over 15 million Ordinals inscriptions.
Bitcoin maximalists have proven to be staunch supporters of the crypto asset. For more than a decade, they have maintained a united front, but the emergence of the Ordinals has shaken up the long-standing narrative. 2023 will be known for many things, one of which is the split of the Bitcoin community into two warring factions.
The first group are skeptics of Ordinals and supporters who are “loyal” to Bitcoin and use the asset purely to process transactions. The second group are Ordinals fans. Both groups have convincing arguments to support their views, but Vitalik Buterin believes that the flourishing of Bitcoin Ordinals has helped to revive network developers.
Vitalik Buterin praises Ordinals
Speaking on Twitter Space with Eric Wall and Udi Wertheimer on July 7, the Ethereum founder said that Ordinals are starting to revive a “culture of actually getting things done,” which, according to him, feels like “a real backlash to the laser eye movement.” He sees this trend as a positive for the entire ecosystem.
The Ordinals protocol enabled NFTs on the Bitcoin network. Prior to this, Ethereum dominated the NFT space. Therefore, it can be said that Ordinals played a crucial role in changing this dynamic by bringing NFT creators from Ethereum to Bitcoin. The influx of new developers triggered a surge in network transaction fees.
However, Buterin praised the BRC-20 token standard and said its growing prominence marks a radical departure from the “stagnant” politics that he believes plagued the Bitcoin ecosystem.
Ordinals: The Year of the Explosion
The latest statistics show that Bitcoin Ordinals trading volume increased by 2,834% to a staggering $210.7 million from Q1 to Q2 2023. The historical volume of 554,215 transactions from 150,969 unique traders indicates a growing interest among users keen to explore new digital assets.
Furthermore, according to Dune Analytics, Bitcoin has over 15 million Ordinals inscriptions at the time of writing.
Earlier this week, the Bitcoin Ordinals proposal was released to cut inscription costs by 90%. Ordinals startup platform Luminex proposed a new standard BRC69 that, in addition to reducing inscription costs, also brings new on-chain features such as “pre-show collection launch and on-chain display.”
