- Vitalik Buterin responded to Nick White’s criticism of the blockchain
- White questioned the integrity and governance of the blockchain
- Buterin said that the decentralized committee is still a committee
- And gave some additional comments in favor of Ethereum
Vitalik Buterin and Nick White held a discussion on blockchain, during which White expressed his opinion that he does not think decentralization is a sufficient method to ensure integrity and governance.
Buterin said that the point of blockchains is verifiability and the decentralized committee is still a committee, and gave some additional arguments in favor of blockchain in general and Ethereum in particular.
More About the Discussion Between Vitalik Buterin and Nick White
Celestia partner Nick White questioned whether decentralization alone is enough for the integrity and governance of blockchain.
Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin responded that:
“It saddens me that to some this is a fringe take, but the point of blockchains is verifiability so that we can get rid of committees and intermediaries. A more decentralized committee is still a committee.”
He added:
“I don’t think this is a fringe take at all. If Ethereum gave up on verifiability and accepted committees and centralized intermediaries for everything, I would consider it no longer Ethereum.”
He also highlighted the importance of Ethereum trying to maintain “highly democratized participation,” which he believes is another key method other than verifiability to make the technology “trustless, open, and for everyone.”
In addition, he emphasized that there is always some balance and that they are working on a set of network improvement methods that enhance functionality although challenging to make fully verifiable, such as API nodes, Proof-of-Stake infrastructure, and encrypted mempools.
Buterin’s main message is that you don’t have to give up one ideal for another, even if realizing both may be more challenging and require more patience.
Conclusion
Ethereum remains the core infrastructure of Web3 and the foundation of many other solutions built on it. Therefore, all of its developments are of direct relevance to the entire crypto industry, and the commitment to ideals and the desire to realize them even while overcoming additional challenges may speak in Ethereum’s favor.
