Санддип Наилвал: Polygon требует независимости для признания своего вклада в Ethereum Headline: Sandeep Nailwal: Polygon Stands for Independence to Acknowledge Its Contribution to Ethereum

Co-founder of Polygon, Sandeep Nailwal, has criticized the leadership of the second-largest cryptocurrency and emphasized that its community has “turned into a circus.”

“To be honest, I’ve started to question my loyalty to Ethereum,” he admitted.

Nailwal noted that this loyalty has cost Polygon billions due to its failure to market itself as a Layer 1 blockchain. He stated that if independence were achieved, the network’s market value could potentially increase several times.

Despite making significant contributions to the ecosystem, the Ethereum community refuses to acknowledge Polygon as a full-fledged L2 solution or to include it in its «investment narrative.» According to Nailwal, this creates a paradox where the successes of the Polygon-based platform Polymarket are credited to Ethereum, while Polygon itself remains in the shadows.

“Nonetheless, I’m stubborn and unwavering. I will make one final push that may reset the whole L2 agenda. Just bear with me for a few more weeks,” he stated.

The expert emphasized that the “Ethereum community should reflect on this,” referencing a post by key developer Peter Siladi, who also earlier criticized the project, pointing out the centralization of power around Vitalik Buterin.

Many leaders in the crypto industry have supported Nailwal. Bankless co-founder Ryan Adams wrote:

“Polygon is a fantastic project that has done a lot for Ethereum. I would certainly like its PoS-chain to eventually become a rollup, but even if that doesn’t happen, it doesn’t negate the fact that Polygon has greatly benefited the ecosystem.”

Solana co-founder Raj Gokal suggested that Nailwal consider merging with Solana. A similar opinion was expressed by former Solana Foundation strategy head Austin Federa.

Abhishek Yadav, creator of the crypto index project Clamp, noted that Polygon needs to clearly define its strategic position and focus on developing as an independent Layer 1 blockchain.

“Polygon’s success is seen as Ethereum’s success, but the platform itself doesn’t receive the recognition it deserves. This project has done the bulk of the work to attract developers and users to the EVM ecosystem post-pandemic, yet it has never been properly acknowledged,” he added.

The issue of the opaque distribution of support from the EF was echoed by Andre Cronje, founder of several DeFi projects. He emphasized that during the creation of Sonic (formerly Fantom), he received no grants or even minimal feedback from the foundation.

“I was surprised. Most teams receive direct support, help with TVL, and audits. I assumed that was the case everywhere. But if support isn’t going to key developers and the most active L2 advocates like Polygon, where are the resources going?” the expert commented.

Buterin also responded to Nailwal’s remarks. The Ethereum co-founder acknowledged Polygon’s accomplishments, highlighting Polymarket as the largest prediction market platform and successes in developing zk-EVM technologies.

He separately emphasized Nailwal’s personal integrity. Nailwal voluntarily returned $190 million to him from donated SHIB tokens and participated in the development of the CryptoRelief initiative, which funds biomedical infrastructure and scientific research in India.

“Personally, I hope that soon Polygon will be able to simply adopt the ready-made ZK solutions that have now become quite advanced and apply them to its PoS chain to obtain full assurances from the first, and subsequently the second level, from Ethereum,” he concluded.

The disputes unfolded against the backdrop of key technical staff exiting the Ethereum Foundation. In January, project Eric Conner left, citing management issues with the EF. In October, Dan Kraid Feist stated that the growing influence of venture funds like Paradigm poses a serious threat to the ecosystem of the second-largest cryptocurrency.