Jesse Pollak, the creator of Base, a layer-2 network adjacent to Coinbase, believes that memes will play a crucial role in onboarding millions of users to his platform. The network has seen a significant increase in total value locked, tripling since March.

Speaking at a memecoin hackathon in New York on April 20, Pollak emphasized the importance of memes in the on-chain economy, expressing excitement about the prospect of more Base-related memes circulating to attract users to the world of decentralized finance (DeFi).

Pollak noted the significant energy surrounding Base, highlighting how memes have been instrumental in bringing thousands of people into the new decentralized economy. He mentioned that the growth in memecoins and transactions on Base surged following the Ethereum London upgrade in mid-March, which reduced fees on layer-2 networks.

As a result, Base's total value locked has surged by almost 250% since the beginning of March, reaching an all-time high of $1.61 billion on April 21, according to DefiLlama.

Pollak also mentioned that besides speculation, meme creators on Base have pioneered new ways to onboard people to their communities. He described this phenomenon as a "Cambrian explosion of onboarding experiments," where various strategies are being explored to introduce more people to the culture of decentralized finance.

He expressed conviction that memes will continue to be a major driver in bringing millions more people to Base in the years ahead, as they constantly work to onboard more individuals in a creative way.

Pollak highlighted the diverse teams and sub-cultures evolving within Base, emphasizing how they are bringing their culture and energy into the decentralized economy and capital market.

The most popular memecoin on Base currently is BRETT, with a market cap of $567 million and a price explosion of 7,780% since the beginning of March. Other large-cap memecoins on the Coinbase blockchain include DEGEN, with a market cap of $435 million, and TOSHI, with $185 million, according to CoinGecko.

While platforms like Solana and Base have attracted a large number of memecoin enthusiasts due to their high throughput and low fees, it's important to note that not all memecoins are legitimate. An investigation by Cointelegraph revealed that 16.7% of new Base memecoins were scams, with over 90% of them having vulnerabilities.