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The article is sensationalist, especially with regard to the "fall" part of the "rise and fall of Ethereum". The reality is that Ethereum as a platform has gai

The article is sensationalist, especially with regard to the "fall" part of the "rise and fall of Ethereum". The reality is that Ethereum as a platform has gained strength, credibility and market traction over the last six months. There have been 3 hard forks and 1 soft fork, partly in response to the system being under almost continuous attack (mostly denial of service). The effective response by Vitalik and company has increased trust, not decreased it. As the saying goes: "What does not kill you, makes you stronger." More and more developers building applications on top of this platform. The MelonPort token sale ICO (on the Ethereum platform) sold out in 2.5 minutes yesterday. It's not just independent Ramen-fueled startups, but "enterprise Ethereum" has become a thing. JP Morgan, Santander, Microsoft, Redhat, Cisco, Accenture, etc -- for better or worse -- are joining the Ethereum bandwagon. I think it is still way early to call a winner in the blockchain platform wars. There are dozens of well-funded competitors trying to gain dominance over established platforms like the Bitcoin technology stack and the Ethereum platform -- including IBM-led Hyperledger Fabric and the bluechip banking consortium led by R3CEV. But if there is one dog at the top of the blockchain platform heap right now, it is Ethereum. See: http://www.coindesk.com/jp-morgan-santander-said-join-enterprise-ethereum-blockchain-group/ http://www.coindesk.com/jp-morgan-santander-said-join-enterp... https://media.consensys.net/the-birth-of-enterprise-ethereum-in-2017-ebe7f7abed92 https://media.consensys.net/the-birth-of-enterprise-ethereum... https://www.reddit.com/r/ethereum/comments/5u6uhb/melonport_ico_is_filled_in_25_minutes_many_thanks/ https://www.reddit.com/r/ethereum/comments/5u6uhb/melonport_...

deegles 10y ago
How did hard forking after the DAO hack increase trust? Wasn't the whole point that "no one" could modify the block chain or the results of a contract? Now it's established that there's a chance a contract can be "too big to fail". I think it would have built more trust if they had let the money go. To paraphrase a saying, they would have spent 15% of ETH on training everyone to build safe contracts, and to vet contracts properly before "investing" in one.
- drcode 10y ago
  > Wasn't the whole point that "no one" could modify the block chain or the results of a contract? If you hold this view you're going to be very unhappy with the many innovations we'll see in the blockchain space in the coming years: Almost every technology in the future is going to put the desires of the community ahead of any specific piece of code- Computer code is a tool, not the final decision maker.
  - deegles 10y ago
    Forking to add features and expand capabilities is great. I'm not arguing against that. I disagree with forking to undo the effects of a hack on a contract.
    - onestone 10y ago
      You speak as if this was an individual's decision. It was not. Vitalik may be influential, but it was not his decision to fork. The community decided so, by a significant majority.
      - nas 10y ago
        Didn't the majority of the people deciding to fork stand to profit? I.e. they would restore their DAO funds? That's my understanding and makes me not want to touch Ethereum with a 10ft pole. Seems very much like mob rule vs a system of rules and contracts.
        onestone 10y ago
        No, the people deciding to fork were the ETH holders. A lot of them owned DAO tokens, but not a majority, probably about 10%. There was a coin vote before the fork which showed about 85% support, and the result was confirmed by the market after the fork (ETH is about 10x more expensive than ETC).
  - setr 10y ago
    >Computer code is a tool, not the final decision maker. Yeah, especially in systems where the fundamental model is code is law
erikpukinskis 10y ago
I am also bullish on Ethereum. A few points to notice: - the price is pretty stable relative to early Bitcoin. - Vitalik and the other devs are still building out economic/game theory models. And Ethereum has successfully made a hard fork. That suggests the organization has some leeway to skate where the puck is going, so to speak. - it's very early days in terms of building out the "standard library". Lots of people working on this, collectively and privately. It's a little like the railroad tracks have been laid but they are still building the trains, not to mention stations. - Ethereum has the benefit of being overshadowed by Bitcoin, which insulates it a bit from speculators and scammers. This is only a temporary effect, but I think obscurity helps Ethereum grow smart and slow right now. - the forums are all about things being built with Ethereum. Bitcoin has a chicken and egg problem, where retailers need to get on board for consumers to care. But nerds can sit down and make something useful on Ethereum today. I would put one check on this endorsement, though. Ethereum is uniquely useful in situations where you can't trust anyone. It shines in that environment. Mostly though, we do trust the people around us. I think once the Ethereum community starts releasing big trustless e-institutions, it will be clear that most of them could run just fine with Venmo, WebRTC, and a little JavaScript. So I think Ethereum will always have a more back-office feel, and I don't quite see it being on The Today Show any time soon. But Vitalik Buterin is very smart and I wouldn't bet against him.
wyager 10y ago
Not sure how anyone could trust it after they reversed a perfectly legitimate transaction. The whole pitch of ethereum was that it was supposed to be an objective platform, free of human bias, to execute contracts. "The code is the law", they said. Of course, that was a big fat lie; someone made a shitty contract with a loophole in it. When someone took advantage of that loophole, the devs said "uh, just kidding" and reversed the whole thing. If I wanted a contract system where humans were able to void contracts, I would use the traditional legal contract system. Ethereum no longer has any advantage.
- drcode 10y ago
  > "The code is the law", they said. And the law can change if the community deems it wise.
  - Klinky 10y ago
    It was pandering to big stakeholders. That's the problem with all cryptocurrencies, they don't solve big players having huge influence over the underlying currency. It is still very much a "who you know" and "how much profit is at stake" kind of game, which is one of the main reasons people hate state-run currencies. The little guys lose thier shirt and get a "too bad,so sad" response. A big player losses thier shirt and they go cry to thier dev friends who fix the boo boo with a fork. How about we fork on every compliant of someone making a mistake?
    - drcode 10y ago
      I agree with what you're saying 100%, actually. Egalitarianism in the blockchain world remains an elusive goal, just as it does in other fields.
      - Klinky 10y ago
        You agree with what I stated, but what you wrote that I responded to suggested the community was in agreement on the fork. It was powerful members of the community who stood to lose a lot of money who pushed for the fork, and everyone had to follow unless they also wanted to lose a lot of money. This doesn't look good on Ethereum and saying "the community changed the law" isn't the actual truth, nor really how Ethereum was advertised.
shuzhang 10y ago
Not sure why the url path includes 'rise and fall' in it, it doesn't look like it's the actual headline in the article, nor is 'rise and fall' mentioned anywhere in the article. The main point of the article isn't that people are losing trust in Ethereum. It's that there's no platform that truly avoids the need to trust other human beings (as some apparently believe). That code is not absolute law because the community can choose to change it and affect pre-existing contracts. I don't think he bashes Ethereum at all, but is just making the case that, if you believe you can rely on a platform like this to avoid the need to trust in human decisions, you're fooling yourself.
- neilk 10y ago
  > Not sure why the url path includes 'rise and fall' in it, These days publications are continually A/B testing headlines.
  - shuzhang 10y ago
    Fair enough. Then I'd argue maybe one headline they're A/B testing is sensationalist, but the article itself isn't, nor does it feel like the article is at all making a point about the 'fall' of Ethereum.
- windwake12 10y ago
  It's in the document title.
- kawera 10y ago
  I'm the OP and I didn't editorialized the title - I never do that. Probably something out of my control happened in the mean time.
woodandsteel 10y ago
You're right, ethereum has not fallen, it has gotten stronger. However, the content of the article does not reflect the title. In fact, your comment just reinforces the point of the article. This is that trust can never really be fully automated, it is ultimately a human phenomenon. And that is just what happened, the Ethereum community decided, on the basis of the sorts of reasons that human beings normally use, that the whole project and the people running it are trustworthy, and so has charged ahead.

deegles 10y ago

How did hard forking after the DAO hack increase trust? Wasn't the whole point that "no one" could modify the block chain or the results of a contract? Now it's established that there's a chance a contract can be "too big to fail". I think it would have built more trust if they had let the money go. To paraphrase a saying, they would have spent 15% of ETH on training everyone to build safe contracts, and to vet contracts properly before "investing" in one.

drcode 10y ago
> Wasn't the whole point that "no one" could modify the block chain or the results of a contract? If you hold this view you're going to be very unhappy with the many innovations we'll see in the blockchain space in the coming years: Almost every technology in the future is going to put the desires of the community ahead of any specific piece of code- Computer code is a tool, not the final decision maker.
- deegles 10y ago
  Forking to add features and expand capabilities is great. I'm not arguing against that. I disagree with forking to undo the effects of a hack on a contract.
  - onestone 10y ago
    You speak as if this was an individual's decision. It was not. Vitalik may be influential, but it was not his decision to fork. The community decided so, by a significant majority.
    - nas 10y ago
      Didn't the majority of the people deciding to fork stand to profit? I.e. they would restore their DAO funds? That's my understanding and makes me not want to touch Ethereum with a 10ft pole. Seems very much like mob rule vs a system of rules and contracts.
      - onestone 10y ago
        No, the people deciding to fork were the ETH holders. A lot of them owned DAO tokens, but not a majority, probably about 10%. There was a coin vote before the fork which showed about 85% support, and the result was confirmed by the market after the fork (ETH is about 10x more expensive than ETC).
- setr 10y ago
  >Computer code is a tool, not the final decision maker. Yeah, especially in systems where the fundamental model is code is law

erikpukinskis 10y ago

I am also bullish on Ethereum. A few points to notice: - the price is pretty stable relative to early Bitcoin. - Vitalik and the other devs are still building out economic/game theory models. And Ethereum has successfully made a hard fork. That suggests the organization has some leeway to skate where the puck is going, so to speak. - it's very early days in terms of building out the "standard library". Lots of people working on this, collectively and privately. It's a little like the railroad tracks have been laid but they are still building the trains, not to mention stations. - Ethereum has the benefit of being overshadowed by Bitcoin, which insulates it a bit from speculators and scammers. This is only a temporary effect, but I think obscurity helps Ethereum grow smart and slow right now. - the forums are all about things being built with Ethereum. Bitcoin has a chicken and egg problem, where retailers need to get on board for consumers to care. But nerds can sit down and make something useful on Ethereum today. I would put one check on this endorsement, though. Ethereum is uniquely useful in situations where you can't trust anyone. It shines in that environment. Mostly though, we do trust the people around us. I think once the Ethereum community starts releasing big trustless e-institutions, it will be clear that most of them could run just fine with Venmo, WebRTC, and a little JavaScript. So I think Ethereum will always have a more back-office feel, and I don't quite see it being on The Today Show any time soon. But Vitalik Buterin is very smart and I wouldn't bet against him.

wyager 10y ago

Not sure how anyone could trust it after they reversed a perfectly legitimate transaction. The whole pitch of ethereum was that it was supposed to be an objective platform, free of human bias, to execute contracts. "The code is the law", they said. Of course, that was a big fat lie; someone made a shitty contract with a loophole in it. When someone took advantage of that loophole, the devs said "uh, just kidding" and reversed the whole thing. If I wanted a contract system where humans were able to void contracts, I would use the traditional legal contract system. Ethereum no longer has any advantage.

drcode 10y ago
> "The code is the law", they said. And the law can change if the community deems it wise.
- Klinky 10y ago
  It was pandering to big stakeholders. That's the problem with all cryptocurrencies, they don't solve big players having huge influence over the underlying currency. It is still very much a "who you know" and "how much profit is at stake" kind of game, which is one of the main reasons people hate state-run currencies. The little guys lose thier shirt and get a "too bad,so sad" response. A big player losses thier shirt and they go cry to thier dev friends who fix the boo boo with a fork. How about we fork on every compliant of someone making a mistake?
  - drcode 10y ago
    I agree with what you're saying 100%, actually. Egalitarianism in the blockchain world remains an elusive goal, just as it does in other fields.
    - Klinky 10y ago
      You agree with what I stated, but what you wrote that I responded to suggested the community was in agreement on the fork. It was powerful members of the community who stood to lose a lot of money who pushed for the fork, and everyone had to follow unless they also wanted to lose a lot of money. This doesn't look good on Ethereum and saying "the community changed the law" isn't the actual truth, nor really how Ethereum was advertised.

shuzhang 10y ago

Not sure why the url path includes 'rise and fall' in it, it doesn't look like it's the actual headline in the article, nor is 'rise and fall' mentioned anywhere in the article. The main point of the article isn't that people are losing trust in Ethereum. It's that there's no platform that truly avoids the need to trust other human beings (as some apparently believe). That code is not absolute law because the community can choose to change it and affect pre-existing contracts. I don't think he bashes Ethereum at all, but is just making the case that, if you believe you can rely on a platform like this to avoid the need to trust in human decisions, you're fooling yourself.

neilk 10y ago
> Not sure why the url path includes 'rise and fall' in it, These days publications are continually A/B testing headlines.
- shuzhang 10y ago
  Fair enough. Then I'd argue maybe one headline they're A/B testing is sensationalist, but the article itself isn't, nor does it feel like the article is at all making a point about the 'fall' of Ethereum.
windwake12 10y ago
It's in the document title.
kawera 10y ago
I'm the OP and I didn't editorialized the title - I never do that. Probably something out of my control happened in the mean time.

woodandsteel 10y ago

You're right, ethereum has not fallen, it has gotten stronger. However, the content of the article does not reflect the title. In fact, your comment just reinforces the point of the article. This is that trust can never really be fully automated, it is ultimately a human phenomenon. And that is just what happened, the Ethereum community decided, on the basis of the sorts of reasons that human beings normally use, that the whole project and the people running it are trustworthy, and so has charged ahead.