Don't just follow the trend and shout about privacy narratives. Before the Midnight mainnet, I only believed in the 'rational' tested by real money.
I can't quite remember which snow it was at the end of last year, but anyway, it was when the Midnight Network testnet was just starting to make some noise, and I dove right in. At that time, the whole community was scratching their heads over the so-called privacy chain pain points. Transferring money in DeFi felt like running naked on Chang'an Street, where anyone could pull down your pants for a look: on-chain data is publicly accessible worldwide, and regulatory agencies could knock on your door at any time with a whip. Looking back at those old privacy leaders, Monero and Zcash have taken privacy to the extreme, but what’s the result? Their compliance is a total mess, and institutional funds see this structure and shake their heads like a rattle drum. Aleo's promotional slogans are deafening, boasting that their universal privacy circuits can conquer the world. I excitedly went to try it, but good grief, the circuit compilation speed was so slow it made me want to smash my computer, and the developer threshold was so high it directly discouraged me. Aztec? Claimed to be good for L2 privacy, but essentially it's still tied to the Ethereum ecosystem. When gas fees rise, the privacy costs become painfully high, and it reveals its true nature. Mina's lightweight zero-knowledge proof (ZK) sounds really cool, and the concept is quite slick, but in practice, while the size of the ZK proofs has decreased, the interoperability with Cardano’s rhythm is so off that it makes me anxious to watch.