Scroll's Euclid upgrade: "Biggest Leap Forward!" they scream. A financial portfolio? Far from it. Almost the most biggest leap backward down a financial cliff. Tired of getting Euclid-ed right outta your ETH like the rest of us?
Is Stage One Really Number One?
Alright, Scroll, let’s dig into this “Stage 1 Rollup” nonsense. Apparently, in the Euclid world, this upgrade is to indicate that you’ve removed some training wheels. Cool. What does that really mean in real terms for the everyday NFT artist just hoping to pay rent. Does that actually translate to lower gas fees where I don’t have to sell a kidney just to mint a single damn JPEG. Which is great because does that mean I can finally afford that digital art tablet I’ve been drooling over for months? Up to this point, it’s starting to sound a lot like high-tech snake oil hiding a whole bunch of nothing for the consumer.
Let's be real: Vitalik's rollup stages are great on paper, but in practice, they feel like moving deck chairs on the Titanic when your TVL is doing the Mariana Trench challenge.
The Airdrop Aftermath
The timing for this TVL nosedive is suspect, at best. October 18th, 2025 – one year after the Airdrop snapshot was taken. Coincidence? I think not! It's like everyone collectively said, "Thanks for the airdrop crumbs, peace out!" and yanked their ETH faster than you can say "rug pull."
| Metric | Scroll Before Euclid | Scroll After Euclid |
|---|---|---|
| TVL | $900 Million+ | $62.6 Million |
| My Sanity | Relatively Intact | Questionable |
| Meme Potential | High | Off the Charts |
Even if Scroll is truly decentralized, the team no longer has the unilateral power to stop or block transactions, censor transactions etc. That's good. Is it good enough? The idea of a decentralized sequencer is amazing in theory. I won’t trust it until I see tangible benefits – literally, in my pocketbook – and on the NFT marketplaces running on Scroll.
Where's the NFT Love, Scroll?
Let's talk about the real elephant in the room: the NFT community. We’re all the developers that should be deploying to these Layer-2s! We’re the end-users, the ones who are supposed to be benefiting from these technical upgrades! Where's the love? Where's the incentive?
Scroll boasts about user-friendly wallets. To begin with, Euclid improves wallet UX with account abstraction, letting developers automate complex wallet features with smart contracts. I want a vibrant ecosystem with active buyers and sellers of art that affords me the benefits of low transaction fees. Automating everything under the sun via smart contracts definitely isn’t what I’m advocating for.
I would like Scroll to change its mission. Let’s shift our focus toward what digital artists and NFT collectors actually need vs. complicating important conversations with unnecessary tech-speak. How about some grants for creators? How about some partnerships with NFT marketplaces? Or maybe, I quip, a little less cynically but still in disbelief, a statewide marketing campaign that doesn’t read like a computer-generated press release.
(Meme Insert Here: A picture of a desolate wasteland with a single tumbleweed rolling by, captioned "The Scroll NFT Ecosystem Right Now")
Time to Face the Music?
Scroll also boasts being the first zero-knowledge rollup to achieve stage 1. Congrats, I guess? First doesn’t equal best. Arbitrum, Optimism, Unichain, Ink, and Kinto are still chilling in Stage 1, too.
Now it’s time for Scroll to get off its high horse and start hearing the community’s feedback. The TVL plunge speaks volumes. The emperor has no clothes. Or, as they say in crypto, the rollup is empty.
So, is Scroll’s Euclid upgrade the real deal or a fancy looking faceplant? Only time will tell. So I’m planning to continue hunkering down with my ETH in the meantime. Trust me, I’m trying to avoid anything that reeks of “greatest innovation since sliced bread.” DYOR, folks. And maybe invest in a good therapist. You'll need it.
