Protocols are mainly schelling points.

They tend to start off extremely simply, merely a convention everyone can agree is reasonable.

The simpler they are, the more likely they are to emerge as a schelling point in the first place, because there are fewer things to disagree with.

The power of the protocol is how many actors choose to speak it, which is related to how easy it is to implement (a linear bias cost for implementers, assuming independent implementations) and how many other actors already implement it (which gives compounding value).

The easier it is to implement thus is the primary driver^[vz][wa] of the ultimate compounding benefit.