As the author of the Ethereum white paper and co-founder of Ethereum, Vitalik's every move has varying degrees of impact on the cryptocurrency industry. His speeches and statements at various events are also regarded as one of the "industry trendsetters." His personal platform Projects mentioned multiple times are also considered "Ethereum orthodox projects".
On August 7, Vitalik said: “From my perspective, both Layer1 and Layer2 confirm transactions within seconds, Layer2 costs less than $0.01 per transaction, and the performance of Farcaster, Lens and Polymarket over the past year has been amazing. "Wow, we have begun to enter the ZK ID and ZK voting stages." Not only has he consistently praised the development of the L2 network, but he has also highly affirmed the popular products in other tracks.
Odaily Planet Daily will briefly sort out his past remarks in this article and interpret Vitalik’s “cryptocurrency masterpiece” in his eyes.
Popular Cryptozoologist: Polymarket, the leader in prediction market
In May this year, the prediction market Polymarket completed a US$45 million Series B round of financing, led by Founders Fund and others, and participated by Vitalik Buterin, co-founder of Ethereum. Previously, investment institution General Catalyst led the company’s Series A financing, with the financing amount reaching US$25 million. Its earliest seed round of financing dates back to October 2020. When the project was first launched, the financing amount was US$4 million, led by Polychain Capital.
This also means that as the "popular crypto hot chicken" in 2024, Polymarket's total financing has reached US$74 million. Combined with the decline of the crypto prediction market in the past, this move can be called a "crypto miracle."
Among this, Vitalik’s support for Polymarket is not only reflected in real money investment, but also in many previous “support platforms”——
On July 2, Vitalik posted: "Prediction markets and Community Notes are becoming the two flagship social cognitive technologies of the 2020s. The pursuit of truth and democracy is based on open public participation rather than pre-selection. "I want to see more of this kind of technology." Later, he also believed that "the two are very complementary." This view was also endorsed by Musk in real name.
At the end of July, Vitalik mentioned Polymarket again in his latest speech "The Next Decade of Ethereum" and emphasized: "In 2020, I paid $1,000 in transaction fees on Augur, and today the transaction cost on Polymarket is almost Zero." He praised the latter's products.
This is not the first time Vitalik has expressed his views on the prediction market track and products. As early as 2021, the year after the 46th presidential election in the United States, Vitalik predicted that prediction markets will become an increasingly important Ethereum application.
It can be said that Vitalik’s insistence on “decentralization” and the game between culture and technology have long been predicted.
Original picture: XPolymarket X platform account homepage
ENS: The “non-financial application” that Vitalik is most proud of
We previously mentioned in the article "Evolution of the Crypto Venture Capital Cycle (Part 1): Rebuilding a New World" that Vitalik raised a series of "industrial torture" in 2017. Compared with speculative financial applications, Vitalik's focus on banking services, Many key issues, including anti-censorship of commercial transactions, practical application of DApps, real interest rates, anti-inflation, and payment channels, are of greater concern.
Compared with the frenzied speculation and trading that everyone in the cryptocurrency industry is obsessed with, he values the "practicability" of cryptocurrency, especially the Ethereum ecosystem. This is one of the reasons why "non-financial applications" such as ENS (Ethereum Domain Name Service) have been highly recognized by Vitalik many times - the nicknames of his multiple social media platforms are vitalik.eth.
In addition to his personal demonstrations of "spreading the word", Vitalik also has many "outspoken opinions".
On January 3, Vitalik stated that “all L2 should run on a (trustless, Merkle proof-based) CCIP resolver so that we can register, update and read ENS subdomains directly on Layer2. ENS is very Importantly, it needs to be affordable for everyone.”
On May 21, Vitalik once again "supported" ENS - in discussions with others about sequencers & intentions, he gave examples of his views on cross-Layer2 infrastructure, and emphasized "Token transfer, ENS, smart contract wallets" "Key changes (individuals and organizations)" these 3 points, he mentioned, "We need an open decentralized protocol for quickly transferring assets from one Layer2 to another Layer2 and integrating it into the default sending of the wallet. Page, key changes in Token transfer, ENS, and smart contract wallets can all be easily implemented on Layer1, but are very difficult on Layer2. Light clients, basic reliability, and proof systems are also more secure/decentralized on Layer1. , it’s far from enough on Layer 2.”
Later, he emphasized, “ENS is our most successful non-financial application, and I don’t know why more people don’t care about it!”
It can be seen that Vitalik is very hurt by the "pearl in dust" of ENS. After all, most people only care about the price movement of $ENS, not the actual applications of ENS.
It can be said that ENS places Vitalik’s expectations and hopes on “building emerging networks”.
Original picture: XENS X platform account homepage
Social protocol: Lens and Farcaster become his "favorites"
In November 2022, after Musk launched the "blue tick restriction" after taking control of Twitter, Vitalik posted, "I am eagerly trying Mastodon, Farcaster, Lens and other applications, and I will pay tribute to Lord Elon and pay monthly It costs $8...but only if the apps are available on non-iOS platforms. There will be multiple winners!
It can be seen that for an "online social cow", Vitalik was extremely dissatisfied with the platform changes brought by Musk, so he tried niche social applications including Farcaster, Lens, Mammoth, etc.
In September 2023, Vitalik's X account was hacked and a phishing link was posted to receive ConsenSys' Proto Danksharding commemorative NFT for free, causing the user to lose more than $690,000. Later, Vitalik stated in Farcaster that his X platform account was subject to a SIM card hijacking attack. The reason may be that the mobile phone number was exposed when authenticating Blue V. He also said that he had uninstalled X and added that he could control the account recovery through the Ethereum address. Farcaster.
In February this year, in the comment area of DragonFly partner Haseeb's post, Vitalik commented: "'Bad GameFi is replacing fun with financial speculation. Blockchain games need to be as interesting as games' - I said this Many times. I believe a similar situation exists in crypto social: Farcaster and Lens will not be abandoned in 4 months or 1 year.
In May, Vitalik once again expressed his optimism for Farcaster and Lens, saying, "Never forget the ultimate goal: to build a free, open, and trustworthy network. This cannot be achieved by theory and real-life role-playing alone. It requires Practical use of technology.” In June, he responded to a post by Bloomberg Podcast spokesperson Joe Weisenthal expressing frustration with crypto culture: “We are still here! And a lot of idealized open network content has actually made great progress. , for example, Farcaster and Lens, etc."
There is no doubt that just like many people’s obsession is “betting on the next Ethereum”, “open network” is also one of Vitalik’s obsessions.
Summary: The original intention of Ethereum is social networking, transactions, and games
At the end of 2013, Vitalik mentioned in the Ethereum white paper: "I propose to design a new Bitcoin. This new Bitcoin will be based on a universal programming language and can be used to create a variety of applications, such as social networking , transactions, games, etc." It can be said that he has always been a person who "unifies knowledge and action." Therefore, the projects and products endorsed by the platform in the more than ten years after the birth of Ethereum have always "remain true to the original intention."
Now that Ethereum has entered the "next decade", the products of these industries will continue to receive great attention from Vitalik and become a member of the "group where Ethereum's legitimacy lies".
[Disclaimer] There are risks in the market, so investment needs to be cautious. This article does not constitute investment advice, and users should consider whether any opinions, views or conclusions contained in this article are appropriate for their particular circumstances. Invest accordingly and do so at your own risk.
This article is reprinted with permission from: "Foresight News"
Original author: Wenser, Odaily Planet Daily
