In a recent webinar, ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin said that the blockchain’s software transition is unlikely to be significantly impacted even if some miners gravitate to alternative chains to mint tokens.
“I don’t expect Ethereum to really be significantly harmed by another fork. In general my impression from pretty much everyone I talk to in Ethereum ecosystem, they have been completely supportive of the proof-of-stake effort and the ecosystem has been quite united around it," Buterin said in a webinar on Saturday.
Buterin’s comments come ahead of a long-anticipated major software upgrade to the blockchain that aims to reduce the extensive energy use. Last month, Ethereum Foundation member Tim Beiko suggested September 19 as the provisional launch date for the Merge.
Soon, the current Ethereum Mainnet will merge with the Beacon Chain proof-of-stake system. This will mark the end of proof-of-work for Ethereum, and the full transition to proof-of-stake. This sets the stage for future scaling upgrades including sharding. The Merge will reduce Ethereum's energy consumption by around 99.95%, it claims in its website.
Historically, blockchain software upgrades have often been surrounded by disruptions. Back in 2016, soon after Ethereum underwent a software upgrade to reverse a major hack, it experienced denial-of-service attacks. If everything goes smoothly, no one should even notice that the Merge has happened, Tim Beiko, who coordinates Ethereum developers, said in a recent interview with Bloomberg.
“There were these genuine arguments that like, there were people in the Ethereum community that really believed in the immutability thing. And a lot of them went to Ethereum Classic," Buterin said.
The cryptocurrency market failed to recover from Terra’s collapse in May as insolvency threats loomed large over major crypto lending companies, spreading fear among market participants. However, July was a great period for Bitcoin, Ether and others. Bitcoin rose 27% for the month, the most since October, while ether added 70% in its best monthly performance since January 2021.
(With inputs from Bloomberg)
