by mike + stokes – thursday. february 15, 2024.⋅⋅tl;dr; 

– It has been over three years since Vitalik put pen-to-paper voicing “a rollup-centric ethereum roadmap.” While there have been immense changes in the interim, the vision expressed aged like fine wine as the Ethereum community continued down this path. The launch of the beacon chain, the merge, withdrawals, and the imminent proto-danksharding fork embody the engineering, research, and coordination excellence of the individuals and teams contributing to the protocol. As 2024 sets in, however, there is more noise than ever. We feel it is worth reviving the “rollup-centric roadmap” with an updated worldview; modern problems may necessitate novel solutions.

Rather than starting with the problems and evaluating which is most pressing or concerning, we propound using the values as a starting point. While this may seem dogmatic and disconnected from reality, we believe it’s useful and helps answer the question of “what are the right problems to solve?” We employ a “past, present, future” structure to provide a holistic view of the evolution of the protocol. Section 1 (past) sets out a summary of recent Ethereum history. Section 2 (present) highlights the key issues of today. Sections 3 & 4 pause the timeline to focus on what Ethereum does well (§3) and critically what Ethereum is not trying to do (§4). This multi-sectional interlude lays the foundation for the proposed forward-looking plan presented in Section 5 (future), which we subdivide into the immediate-term (Prague/Electra fork in 2024 [§5.1]) and the medium-term (3-4 years into the future [§5.2]).

Lastly, we would like to emphasize that this article represents the opinions of the authors alone; the ideas expressed in no way represent the “official” views of the EF (even mentioning this feels presumptuous, but to err on the side of caution, we do). Sections 1-4 aim for objectivity as we set the stage for the more subjective ideas verbalized in Section 5.⋅⋅

Section 1 — A Brief History of Ethereum

^would read that

Before looking forward, let’s take stock of Ethereum as it exists today and how we got here. In the 3.5 years since Vitalik’s October 2020 classic, “A rollup-centric ethereum roadmap,” a lot has changed. Using the protocol upgrades as “mile-markers” of progress, we focus on the “main point” of each consensus upgrade. For the exhaustive list of execution layer upgrades and each fork’s EIPs, see the ethereum history page.

At this zoomed-out granularity, the rationale for the upgrade path is clear.

The strategy enacted through these hard forks has been clear, focused, and congruent with the rollup-centric roadmap. Tim Beiko uses the metaphor of each fork being like a “music festival artist list.” While many performers (EIPs) get bundled into one event, a headliner defines the fork. The headliners thus far have been “beacon genesis,” “validator incentives,” “the merge,” “withdrawals,” and “proto-danksharding.” Even with the benefit of hindsight <insert “hindsight is 2020” joke>, we wouldn’t change the focus of any hard fork thus far.

Section 2 — Ethereum in 2024, a vibe check

^is anyone excited for the new “Wicked” movie?

Ok … enough back-slappy, self-congratulatory retrospecting. Let’s take a critical look at present-day Ethereum. As Dorothy points out in the image above, “we aren’t in 2020 anymore”; modern problems call for honest reflection. While the ecosystem grows and professionalizes, many topics vie for attention and action. The resulting cacophony makes it hard to tell what matters and why. We distill many lines of discussion into three central pillars: scaling, MEV[1], & staking (roughly correlating with the “Surge,” “Scourge,” & “Merge” on Vitalik’s roadmap). Completeness notwithstanding, we highlight a few pivotal questions associated with each theme.

While this wall of questions feels scary, we can’t let it lead to analysis paralysis. The subsequent sections aim to reframe the discussion around the protocol goals (§3) and non-goals (§4).

Section 3 — What is Ethereum exceptional at?

Pausing our timeline in the present, let’s look at Ethereum’s exceptionalism®. Because of all these exogenous pressures, clarity over Ethereum priorities is scarce. Instead of top-down reasoning about which risks are *most risky*, we propose a bottom-up recentering on what Ethereum is and what makes it unique ✨.

The above is neither exhaustive nor prescriptive. These points highlight the elements of Ethereum differentiation. This enumeration is especially relevant as we now turn our attention to the “non-goals” of the protocol. In our estimation, focusing on the following would be “missing the forest for the trees,” even if doing so would have short-term benefits.

Section 4 — What is Ethereum not trying to do?

“There you go again with the proselytizing adulation.” If this is your current attitude, then this section is for you. In contrast to what Ethereum is good at, we also seek to identify explicit non-goals (in our view) of the Ethereum network.

*steps off the soapbox.* While we believe the previous section is not contentious (plugging ears to avoid screaming), we permit that it leans into more Subjective Territory; the subsequent section enters the full-blown Opinion Zone. But it’s necessary. With limited resources, hard decisions about the future of Ethereum are mandatory. We present our humble perspective on the Prague/Electra fork (§5.1) and the medium-term (§5.2). (getting lots of use of “§” lol).

Section 5 — Looking forward

^ woke up feeling bullish

If you are still here, thanks for sticking with us. We finally feel equipped to tackle the “looking forward” question. That’s what roadmaps are all about, right? This treatise of sorts for the rollup-centric roadmap with today’s understanding aims to frame the future of Ethereum based on the previously stated:

Until this point, we have been objective and focused on the facts. Conversely, putting forward opinions on how Ethereum should move forward falls squarely in the domain of subjectivity. What follows is the authors’ opinion and is thus colored by their biases – caveat emptor. Nevertheless, we believe it is better to try voicing our views while remaining open to being convinced of other perspectives; “strong opinions, loosely held.”

Since the endgame has been discussed at length, we partition our forward-lookingness into two shorter time horizons. First, we outline a hypothetical Prague/Electra hard fork (conditioned on an EOY 2024 target, which seems to be the rough consensus). Second, we look into the “medium-term” future, which we define as the next 3-4 years. Within each subsection, we split the vision into the three aforementioned tracks: scaling, MEV, and staking.

§5.1 – To Prague/Electra (targeting end-of-year 2024)

Inspired by reth, prysm, and sigma prime releasing their view of the Prague/Electra fork, we share what an ideal (from our POV) end-of-year fork would contain.

Zooming out a bit (but not all the way), the 3-4-year window gives us more room to contextualize the broader themes.

§5.2 – And beyond (“medium-term” ≈≈ 3-4 years)

To close, Ethereum is defined by the community. So much has changed since 2020, but the people remain. Beyond any of the technical directions highlighted above, putting “alignment,” politics, and zero-sum thinking aside while striving to continue being the most open and welcoming community is critical to the success of The Project.

thanks for reading 📖🤓