Ethereum can ship faster without ‘sacrificing its values’ — Paradigm

Ethereum developers could implement more protocol changes to evolve with changing market structures without changing its values, says crypto venture capital firm Paradigm.

“We think Ethereum’s core protocol could be improving much faster,” Paradigm said in a Jan. 25 blog post. “There are many high-impact improvements that Ethereum can start accelerating towards today without sacrificing its values.” 

“Historically, Ethereum has shipped about one change per year. Ethereum can do more,” it added.

Paradigm acknowledged that the debate over whether Ethereum should prioritize its base layer or layer 2 networks, decentralization or efficiency and many other design decisions is “tempting” to participate in.

But Paradigm said that “discussions about tradeoffs in values might be premature” and could lead to rigidity. 

“Ethereum has the resources it needs — incredible researchers and engineers eager to build the future,” it added.

“Empowering them with a mandate to move faster, and in parallel, will enable Ethereum to solve problems faster and avoid getting bogged down in premature debates.”

Ethereum’s core values include decentralization, openness and remaining credibly neutral.

However, Paradigm claimed making more protocol changes is the “most important thing” Ethereum can do to push blockchain innovation and “deliver on its ambitious roadmap.” 

It claimed that developments in client diversity shouldn’t come at the expense of shipping speed, which built out the Ethereum testnet Reth for developers to experiment with new innovations.

Paradigm said it would like to see Ethereum layer 2s inherit security from the base layer through “native” rollups — which many Ethereum layer 2 executives agreed to do on the same day of Paradigm’s post.

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The VC firm wants the Ethereum mainnet to scale without modifying the block gas limit and to see improvements in wallet infrastructure to simplify the user experience.

Part of that improvement would entail eliminating the need for users to remember their private keys.

Meanwhile, the Ethereum Foundation said it would allocate 50,000 Ether worth $160 million to support Ethereum’s decentralized finance ecosystem.

Three days earlier, Buterin announced the nonprofit would undergo organizational changes to more actively support developers and provide more transparency to the broader community.

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