, bundles up user transactions and settles them on Ethereum for cheap. It has played a lead role in expanding accessibility to the second-largest blockchain ecosystem by market capitalization – and serves as the template for the publicly traded crypto exchange Coinbase's own layer-2 network, Base.
In theory, rollups are supposed to secure themselves via"proofs," which are mathematical formulas that Ethereum network observers can reference to check if the data passed down from the rollups reflects real user activity. "Fault proofs allow for permissionless, crypto-economically enforced withdrawals," Floersch explained in an interview with CoinDesk."Today, on the chain, you must trust the security council to operate honestly in order to keep your withdrawals secured."
The biggest sacrifice, according to Floersch, was that the initial proof system was"compatible" rather than"equivalent" to the Ethereum virtual machine , meaning there were certain elements of its programming that would complicate the process of porting apps to Optimism, and would make it more difficult for the whole system to scale.
Under Optimism's old proof system,"it was like building a shack out of sticks," said Floersch."We're like, 'Alright, we can get up real quick, but we can't actually build a skyscraper with this thing. So it ended up not being that useful."