Vitalik Buterin Advocates for a Return to Ethereum's Cypherpunk Roots Amid Transaction Cost Concerns
Summary:
Ethereum's co-founder, Vitalik Buterin, is advocating for the platform to return to its cypherpunk roots, focusing on blockchain's foundational values like decentralization, open participation, credible neutrality, and resistance to censorship. Bemoaning the rising trend of Ethereum users speculatively investing in memecoins and NFTs, Buterin believes these values should guide not just the future of Ethereum but the internet's evolution from Web2 to Web3. However, achieving his vision means confronting the platform's high transaction costs and greater support for non-financial applications like Ethereum Name Service, which stands as a notable success in alignment with Buterin's vision.
The co-founder of Ethereum, Vitalik Buterin, dreams of returning Ethereum to its cypherpunk roots, emphasizing blockchain's foundational principles including decentralization, freedom of participation, resistance to censorship, and credible neutrality. On December 28, 2023, Buterin advocated for the embrace of these principles in the evolution of Ethereum, as well as the transition of the internet from Web2 to Web3.
However, he expressed despair over Ethereum users who desperately gamble on memecoins and nonfungible tokens (NFTs) to make a quick buck. Buterin believes this kind of behavior is acceptable in moderation, but a problem arises when such speculative traders form the majority on the chain, as this influences public perception of cryptocurrencies and modifies the culture within crypto spaces.
To achieve his vision for Ethereum, Buterin has a formidable task ahead. He conceded that, except for the Ethereum Name Service (ENS), the network is majorly used for financial services. Despite Ethereum's enormous support for ENS, the fact that other projects on the platform haven't reached this level of success since ENS's launch in 2017 is quite disappointing.
The question now is whether speculators should bear all the blame for this state of affairs.
The Ethereum Name Service stands out as a leading example of a productive cypherpunk project. ENS, being a domain naming service on the Ethereum blockchain, enables users to customize their Ethereum addresses into more identifiable terms.
A conversation with Nick Johnson, the founder and lead developer of ENS, shed light on what could potentially spur Ethereum's Cypherpunk resurgence. Johnson expressed his belief that as centralization and its disadvantages become more evident to the general public, decentralized options, which align with the cypherpunk ideology, will become a preferred choice.
Johnson opined that while it takes time for solutions to evolve, a counterpart that is decentralized exists for every centralized option. He intimated that Buterin's distinct recognition of ENS's significant non-financial contribution to Ethereum confirms its integral standing within the Web3 framework.
However, Buterin pointed out a significant problem facing Ethereum: high transaction costs. He argued that when these fees reach staggering amounts, as seen during bull markets' peaks, only desperate gamblers remain willing to play. Buterin suggested that the high cost of transactions on Ethereum could be attributed to network limitations.
At the beginning of 2022, Ethereum transitioned from proof-of-work consensus to proof-of-stake in an attempt to increase its transaction throughput and enhance scalability. But even after this transition, the network still has a lot of work to do.
Despite the apparent challenges, some people like Barney Mannerings, co-founder of the Vega Protocol decentralized exchange, believe that Buterin's dream of a cypherpunk Ethereum is achievable.
Mannerings drew parallels with the struggle for robust end-to-end encrypted communication, asserting that achieving technical success is easier than gaining widespread adoption.
He concluded by asserting that while the road to achieving Buterin's vision might be long, its realization is worth striving for, and Ethereum, with its strong standing, aligned community, and dynamic ecosystem, is well-positioned to pioneer the charge.
Published At
1/23/2024 4:40:00 PM
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