Vitalik's new article: It's time to "align" the entire Ethereum ecosystem

Written by:Vitalik Buterin

Compiled by: Scof, ChainCatcher

In the Ethereum ecosystem, one of the most important governance challenges is balance - or more precisely, integrating decentralization and cooperation. The advantage of this ecosystem is that there are a wide range of individuals and organizations - client teams, researchers, second-layer network teams, application developers, localCommunitygroups — all working towards their own vision of what Ethereum could become. The main challenge is to ensure that all projects work together to build one Ethereum ecosystem, rather than 138 incompatible fiefdoms.

To address this challenge, many in the Ethereum ecosystem have proposed the concept of "Ethereum consistency". This may include value consistency (e.g., open source, minimal centralization, support for public goods), technical consistency (e.g., working with ecosystem-wide standards), and economic consistency (e.g., using ETH as aToken). However, the concept has historically been poorly defined, which creates the risk of social manipulation: if consistency means having the right friends, then consistency as a concept fails.

To address this, I think we should make the concept of consistency clearer by breaking it down into specific properties that can be represented by specific metrics. Everyone's list will be different, and metrics will inevitably change over time. However, I think we have some solid starting points.

• Open source – This is valuable for two reasons: (i) the code can be reviewed to ensureSafety, and more importantly (ii) reduce the risk of proprietary lock-in and allow third parties to make improvements without permission. Not every part of every application needs to be fully open source, but the core infrastructure components that the ecosystem depends on definitely should be. The gold standards here are the FSF Free Software Definition and the OSI Open Source Definition.

• Open Standards – Strive to achieve interoperability with the Ethereum ecosystem and build on open standards, both existing (e.g., ERC-20, ERC-1271…) and under development (e.g., Account Abstraction, Cross-chain L2 Transfers, L1 and L2 light client proofs, the upcoming address format standard). If you want to introduce a new feature that is not well served by an existing standard, work with others to write a new ERC. Applications andwalletCan be rated based on the number of ERCs they are compatible with.

• Decentralization andSafetySecurity – Avoid trust points, minimize censorship vulnerabilities, and minimize reliance on centralized infrastructure. Natural metrics are (i) The walkaway test: if your team and servers disappeared tomorrow, would your application still work, and (ii) the insider attack test: if your team itself tried to attack the system, how much would it break, and how much damage would you cause? An important formalization is L2Beat aggregation phase.

• Positive-Sum: 1) Ethereum-oriented – The success of the project should benefit the entire EthereumCommunityBenefit (e.g., ETH holders, Ethereum users), even if they are not part of the project’s own ecosystem. Specific examples include using ETH asToken（从而为其网络效应做出贡献），对开源技术的贡献，以及承诺将一定比例的代币或收入捐赠给以太坊生态系统的公共产品。2) 面向更广阔的世界 – 以太坊旨在使世界成为一个更自由、更开放的地方，实现新的所有权和合作形式，并为人类面临的重大挑战做出积极贡献。你的项目做到了吗？例子包括为更广泛的受众带来可持续价值的应用程序（例如，金融包容性），向以太坊以外的公共产品捐赠一定比例，以及构建具有超越cryptocurrencypractical technologies (e.g., financing mechanisms, general-purpose computersSafety), these techniques are actually used in these environments.

Ethereum node map, source ethernodes.org

Obviously, the above criteria are not applicable to every project.wallet, decentralized social media applications, etc., the applicable indicators will be very different. Different indicators may also change in priority: two years ago, it was acceptable for Rollup to use "training wheels" because it was still in the "early stages"; today, we need to reach at least the first stage as soon as possible. Today, the most obvious positive-sum indicator is a commitment to donate a certain percentage of tokens, and more and more projects are doing this; in the future, we can also find indicators that make other aspects of positivity clear.

我的理想目标是看到更多像 L2beat 这样的实体出现，来跟踪各个项目在满足上述标准以及其他Community提出的标准方面做得如何。项目之间不应竞相结交正确的朋友，而应竞相根据清晰易懂的标准尽可能保持一致。以太坊基金会应该在这方面保持一定的距离：我们资助 L2beat，但我们不应该成为 L2beat。创造下一个 L2beat 本身就是一个无需许可的过程。

This will also provide a clearer path for the Ethereum Foundation and other organizations (and individuals) who wish to support and participate in the ecosystem while remaining neutral to decide which projects to support and use. Each organization and individual can use their own judgment to determine which standards they care most about and deploy them.Xiaobai NavigationProjects are selected based on which ones best meet these criteria. This makes it easier for the Ethereum Foundation and everyone else to be part of the incentives that bring projects closer together.

Meritocracy can only be achieved if the definition of "merit" is clear; otherwise, you have a (potentially exclusionary and zero-sum) social game. The best solution to the concern of "who will supervise the supervisors" is not to pin all hopes on attempts to ensure that all influential people are angels, but through tried and tested techniques such as decentralization. "Dashboard organizations" like L2beat, block explorers, and other ecosystem monitors are excellent examples of this principle at work in the Ethereum ecosystem today. If we can do more to make different aspects of consistency clearer while not concentrating on a single "supervisor", we can make this concept more effective, as well as fair and inclusive, as the Ethereum ecosystem strives for.

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