as in the past when bitcoin had problems with high transaction fees, then ethereum emerged with a smart contract blockchain that almost dominated the cryptocurrency market, which was predicted to be able to beat bitcoin position. And now, ethereum also has the same problem where the increase in the cost of GAS is in the spotlight today. Other altcoins that have the opportunity to compete with ethereum such as EOS, Cardano, NEO, maybe even BNB, apparently have not been able to beat ethereum's position. Apart from technology, it looks like community and hype can be a contributing factor to making altcoins big.
Exactly. For once, Ethereum was a true competitor of Bitcoin with its low fees and fast transaction settlement times. But after it became extremely popular, everything went down the drain. Now we're expecting developers to release "ETH 2.0" to the public to increase Ethereum's transaction capacity. The urge of having low fees and fast transaction confirmation times for smart contracts has led many developers to create alternative blockchain networks for the benefit of all. We now have various scalable smart contract platforms such as TRON and EOS which challenge Ethereum's place on the market. While the aforementioned blockchains are centralized, most people prefer convenience above anything else.
I believe that Ethereum's direct competitor is Cardano because it has an approach to decentralization unlike no other alternative on the market today. The Cardano development team is working hard to make a robust smart contract platform that it's as good as Ethereum (or even better). With the adoption of the "Ouroboros" PoS consensus algorithm, Cardano will be able to compete with ETH's PoS implementation dubbed "Ethereum 2.0". The ever-increasing popularity of "De-Fi" and stablecoins will make both blockchain networks' development quite an interesting one. Perhaps, there will be a fusion between various smart contract platforms (interoperability) in order to make crypto land a better place. Ultimately, what matters is utility instead of scalability. And so far, Ethereum is the most adopted smart contract platform in the world unrivaled by its competitors. Just my thoughts