Author: Vitalik, founder of Ethereum; Translated by: 0xjs@Golden Finance
One of the most important social challenges in the Ethereum ecosystem is balancing (or more accurately integrating) decentralization and cooperation.
The strength of the ecosystem is that there are a wide variety of people and organizations — client teams, researchers, L2 teams, application developers, local community groups — all working towards their own vision for Ethereum. The main challenge is making sure all of these projects are working together to build something that feels like one Ethereum ecosystem, rather than 138 incompatible fiefdoms.
To address this challenge, many in the Ethereum ecosystem have proposed the concept of "Ethereum alignment". This can include values alignment (e.g. open source, minimize centralization, support public goods), technical alignment (e.g. working with ecosystem-wide standards), and economic alignment (e.g. using ETH as a token whenever possible). However, this concept has historically been poorly defined, which creates a risk of capture on the social layer: if alignment means having the right friends, then "alignment" as a concept fails.
To address this, I think we should make the concept of alignment clearer, broken down into specific attributes that can be represented by specific metrics. Everyone's list will be different, and metrics are bound to change over time. However, I think we have some solid starting points.
Open Source
The value is twofold: (i) the code is auditable for security, and more importantly (ii) it reduces the risk of proprietary lock-in and enables permissionless third-party improvements. Not every part of every application needs to be fully open source, but the core infrastructure components that the ecosystem depends on absolutely should be. The gold standards here are the FSF Free Software Definition and the OSI Open Source Definition.
Open Standards
Strive to be interoperable with the Ethereum ecosystem and build on open standards, both existing ones (e.g. ERC-20, ERC-1271, etc.) and those under development (e.g. account abstraction, cross-L2 transfers, L1 and L2 light client proofs, upcoming address format standard). If you want to introduce new features that are not well met by existing standards, work with others to write new ERCs. Applications and wallets can be rated based on which ERCs they are compatible with.
Decentralization and security
Avoid trust points, minimize censorship vulnerabilities, and minimize reliance on centralized infrastructure. Natural indicators are (i) walkaway tests: if your team and servers disappeared tomorrow, would your application still be available, and (ii) internal attack tests: if your team itself tried to attack the system, how much damage would it cause, and how much damage could you cause? An important formalization is the L2beat Rollup stage.
Masakazu
Ethereum-oriented - The success of the project should benefit the entire Ethereum community (e.g. ETH holders, Ethereum users), even if they are not part of the project's own ecosystem. Specific examples include using ETH as a token (thereby promoting its network effect), contributions to open source technology, and commitments to donate a certain percentage of tokens or revenue to public goods within the Ethereum ecosystem.
Towards the wider world - Ethereum aims to make the world a freer and more open place, enable new forms of ownership and collaboration, and contribute positively to important challenges facing humanity. Does your project do this? Examples include applications that bring sustainable value to a wider audience (e.g. financial inclusion), donations to public goods outside of Ethereum, and building practical technologies beyond crypto (e.g. funding mechanisms, general computer security) that are actually used in these contexts.
Ethereum node diagram, source ethernodes.org
Obviously, the above is not applicable to every project. Metrics for L2, wallets, decentralized social media applications, etc. look very different. The priority of different metrics may also change: two years ago, it was acceptable for Rollup to have "training wheels" because it was still "early stage"; today, we need to get to at least stage 1 as soon as possible. Today, the clearest indicator of positive-sum is a commitment to donate a certain percentage of tokens, and more and more projects are doing this; tomorrow we can find indicators that make other aspects of the positive-sum effect clear and understandable as well.
My ideal goal is that we see more entities like L2beat emerge to track how well individual projects meet the above criteria, as well as other criteria proposed by the community. Projects will not compete to have the right friends, but rather to align as closely as possible to clear and understandable standards. The Ethereum Foundation should distance itself from most such projects: we fund L2beat, but we should not be L2beat. Building the next L2beat is a permissionless process in itself.
This will also provide a clearer path for the Ethereum Foundation, as well as other organizations (and individuals) interested in supporting and participating in the ecosystem while remaining neutral, to determine which projects to support and use. Each organization and individual can make their own judgment about the criteria they care most about, and select projects based on which projects best meet those criteria. This makes it easier for the Ethereum Foundation and everyone else to be part of a more aligned incentive for projects.
Only if you define merit can you be a meritocracy; otherwise, you have a (potentially exclusionary and negative-sum) social game. The best way to address the “who’s watching the watchers” concern is not to go all in and try to ensure that every influential person is an angel, but through time-tested techniques like the separation of powers. “Dashboard organizations” like L2beat, block explorers, and other ecosystem monitors are excellent examples of this principle at work in the Ethereum ecosystem today.
If we do more to make the different aspects of alignment clear and understandable, rather than focusing on one “watchdog,” we can make the concept more effective, fair, and inclusive, just as the Ethereum ecosystem strives to be.
