Vitalik Buterin, one of the co-founders of Ethereum, has proposed raising the standards for rollups in the Ethereum ecosystem. In his recent blog post on March 28, Buterin discussed the future of Ethereum after the DenCun upgrade, which significantly reduced transaction fees for rollups on layer 2.
Buterin acknowledged that Ethereum is undergoing a significant shift from a period of rapid progress on layer 1 to an era where progress on layer 1 will still be important. He also highlighted that the scaling efforts for Ethereum have transitioned from solving a “zero-to-one” problem to an incremental problem. Future work on scaling will focus on increasing blob capacity and improving rollup efficiency.
Buterin emphasized the need for stricter standards within the ecosystem. He classified layer-2’s decentralization progress into two stages. Stage 1 represents networks that have made significant advancements in terms of security and scaling but are not fully decentralized. Only five layer-2 projects listed on L2beat have reached either stage 1 or 2, and only Arbitrum is fully compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM).
The next steps in the roadmap include implementing data availability sampling to increase blob capacity, optimizing layer 2 solutions through techniques like data compression, optimistic execution, and improved security. Buterin envisions a future where rollups are fully backed by code, and a security council can only intervene if the code “provably disagrees with itself.”
Buterin also mentioned other changes such as Verkle trees, single-slot finality, and account abstraction, which are significant but not as drastic as proof of stake and sharding.
Ethereum is currently in “The Surge” phase of its upgrade roadmap, focusing on scalability through rollups and data sharding. The next phase, “The Scourge,” will address censorship resistance, decentralization, and protocol risks from miner-extractable value (MEV).
Buterin advised developers to adopt a “2020s Ethereum” mindset when designing applications, embracing layer-2 scaling, privacy, account abstraction, and new forms of community membership proofs.
Overall, Buterin’s blog post highlights the ongoing developments and future plans for Ethereum, emphasizing the importance of decentralization and scalability in the ecosystem.