Top 2 Highlights From The Ethereum Community Conference (ETHCC5)

The just concluded Fifth Edition of the Ethereum Community Conference (ETHCC5) is the largest annual European Ethereum event focused on technology and community. 

The event was held in Paris from the 19th to the 21st of this month and was graced by Vitalik Buterin; Ethereum’s founder and many other prominent figures in the Ethereum ecosystem.

Ethereum Update

• The Merge. 

Ethereum’s move to Proof-of-Stake has been the conversation among many crypto natives if finally drawing closer.

Ethereum’s developer, Tim Beiko, revealed that the merge is expected to happen in the second week of September.

The Layer 2 foundation is growing and different teams are focusing on building solutions on the network, increasing the competition and by extension, making Eth’s future more promising.

Adding the move to Proof-of-work, Eth can predictably be on the road to making a massive impact in the blockchain ecosystem. In an interview with Bloomberg, the CIO of Bitwise Asset Management, Matt Houghan said:

‘What’s happening in Ethereum will catalyze new interest in Crypto, new opportunities in Crypto… Bitcoin and Ethereum will rise side by side  and Ethereum’s share of the Crypto market could increase substantially compared to Bitcoin’

MATT HOUGHAN

The downside to the Merge, which crypto enthusiasts are vocal about, is the resulting inflation from the staking activities.

There is the possibility of the Proof-of-Stake merge incentivizing long-term investors in Ethereum to lock up(or stake) their Eth to earn yields on their investment. This takes Eth out of the market and causes Eth’s prices to increase.  

• The Transitional Phase. 

Vitalik Buterin gave the main talk of the event and he discussed four transitional phases for Eth to undergo: the Merge, the Surge, the Verge, and the Purge. He explained that Ethereum had a lot of work to do in the near term which would eventually pay off as the community grows larger. 

This is synonymous with what he said in his open contradictions in May, that he desired to see Ethereum become a more Bitcoin-like system emphasizing long-term stability but knew that it would take a lot of coordinated short-term change.

The Merge is about moving from POW to POS. The Surge would introduce sharding. And the Verge occurs when the verkle tree helps to optimize the storage on ethereum and help reduce node size.

Conclusion

Bull or bear, ETH doesn’t seem to care. The Merge is building hype within the blockchain ecosystem and nobody seems to care that all these developments are taking place in the bear market.