Written by: Techub News Compilation

Introduction

In 2025, marking the 12th anniversary of the Ethereum white paper release and the 10th anniversary of its mainnet launch, its co-founder Vitalik Buterin (also known as V God) made another appearance on the well-known crypto media podcast, Bankless. In this in-depth dialogue lasting over two hours, Vitalik Buterin (V God) reflected on Ethereum's dramatic ten-year journey, candidly sharing the surprises and challenges encountered during its development, and systematically outlining the technological roadmap and philosophical vision for the next decade. The importance of this conversation lies not only in its historical context but also in how Vitalik Buterin (V God) clearly articulated Ethereum's evolution from the early notion of a "world computer" to a more concrete and focused identity as a "world ledger", and how the community will address core issues such as privacy, scalability, mainstream adoption, and cultural conflicts under this grand goal.

Summary

• Evolution of Identity: Ethereum's core identity is shifting from the abstract concept of a "world computer" to a more concrete definition as a "world ledger", emphasizing its role as the foundational settlement layer and state recorder for global economic activities.
• Technological Priorities: The technological roadmap for the next decade will focus on the widespread adoption of zero-knowledge proofs (ZK), making privacy the default experience, enhancing account abstraction, improving Layer 2 interoperability, and advancing formal verification.
• Cultural Commitment and Balance: Ethereum needs to find a balance between maintaining the core values of cypherpunk (such as decentralization, privacy, and anti-censorship) and embracing mainstream users and institutions, with the key being that the protocol layer must preserve possibilities for privacy and self-custody.
• Strategies to Address Challenges: The Ethereum ecosystem is responding to unpredictable challenges through a "system" approach of parallel exploration by multiple layers and teams. Its layered structure between Layer 1 and Layer 2 aims to create a "sandbox" that accommodates different trade-off choices.

A Decade in Retrospect: An Unexpected Journey Beyond Expectations

Reflecting on Ethereum's past ten years, Vitalik Buterin (V God) admitted that its scale of development has "far exceeded expectations." Initially, it was only a "side project" planned to be completed in a few months, but it evolved into a global movement lasting a decade with nearly full-time commitment. He cited several key "surprises": the explosive growth of decentralized finance (DeFi), the rise of non-fungible tokens (NFTs), the faster-than-expected development of ZK technology, and early interest from institutions and governments.

What made Vitalik Buterin (V God) most proud is the unique contribution Ethereum has made to the world: it has made openness and decentralization the default mindset for many. Concepts like prediction markets and decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) have transitioned from ideation to reality, with Ethereum providing crucial experimental ground. Although the development of DAOs has been fraught with challenges, it has made the organizational and governance structure of resource control "more programmable," a contribution that will continue to yield benefits for decades to come.

However, the journey has not been smooth. Crises such as The DAO incident, ETC hard forks, and the Shanghai denial-of-service attack followed one after another. Vitalik Buterin (V God) believes that the Ethereum community has formed a unique culture for responding to challenges: as an ecosystem, it allows multiple approaches to be tried in parallel, with solutions from Layer 1 and application layers, and even multiple competing solutions existing within the same category. This ability to advance in parallel while seeking synergies, such as the various efforts promoting the maturity of ZK-SNARK technology, has proven effective.

Current Challenges and Ecosystem Adjustments: Price, Narrative, and Foundation Changes

Vitalik Buterin (V God) acknowledged that 2024 will be a "difficult year" for Ethereum. The relatively weak ETH price has sparked numerous discussions and disagreements within the community. A deeper reason lies in the gradual fading of some older narratives (such as certain forms of DAOs and NFTs), while new narratives that can generate economic returns and gain community intellectual acceptance have yet to be fully clarified. Meanwhile, the fragmentation of the Layer 2 ecosystem and potential incentive mismatch issues between Layer 1 and Layer 2 have begun to emerge.

Regarding the recent changes in the Ethereum Foundation (EF), Vitalik Buterin (V God) explained that many adjustments are the result of long-term deliberation, requiring certain "trigger points" to push them forward. Changes in leadership are one such point, as former Executive Director Yan shifted to areas she was more interested in (such as financial inclusion projects in Bhutan) after serving far longer than others. The new leadership has brought about new technical focuses, such as better organizing work on scaling and user experience, as well as strengthening efforts in anti-censorship and privacy (like focusing the PSE team on pushing privacy concepts to production). These changes have been somewhat accelerated, but the direction is set.

On the technical side, current work priorities include raising the gas limit for Layer 1 and, crucially, "improving interoperability between Layer 2s." Vitalik Buterin (V God) emphasized that prioritizing a significant reduction in cross-chain withdrawal times to just one hour or even a few minutes may be more important than pursuing "Phase 2," as lengthy capital lock-up times hinder the adoption of native cross-chain asset issuance.

Future Cornerstones: Privacy, Account Abstraction, and the "World Ledger"

Looking ahead to the next decade, Vitalik Buterin (V God) outlined several core technological directions:

1. Privacy as the Default Experience: This is the area Vitalik Buterin (V God) is currently focusing on. He believes that privacy is the core spirit since the cypherpunk movement, and now, with technologies like zero-knowledge proofs, we can achieve both decentralization and privacy. The short to medium-term goal is not to embed privacy directly into Layer 1 (due to technology being immature and difficult to upgrade), but to make privacy a default feature of wallets. "We shouldn't have privacy wallets; privacy should be a feature of wallets." Users should be able to conduct private transactions easily in mainstream wallets. The Ethereum Foundation has already begun work to integrate privacy features into existing wallets.

Regarding regulatory compliance, Vitalik Buterin (V God) pointed out that concepts like Railgun's "privacy pools" are being tested in real-world scenarios, allowing legitimate users to prove they do not belong to blacklisted addresses, providing a technological pathway to balance privacy and regulation. He emphasized the need to clarify to the public and policymakers that minimizing data collection and adopting privacy-preserving technologies are the safer choices, while excessive centralized data collection poses national security risks.

2. Account Abstraction and User Sovereignty: Vitalik Buterin (V God) continues to advocate for account abstraction (e.g., EIP-7701), aiming to ensure that even if users rely on smart wallets or multi-signature schemes, their basic operations can be accomplished without depending on specific intermediaries. This is an essential infrastructure guarantee for maintaining user sovereignty and anti-censorship capabilities.

3. From "World Computer" to "World Ledger": Vitalik Buterin (V God) believes that the metaphor of "world computer" is too broad, while "world ledger" more accurately captures the core value of Ethereum Layer 1 — recording state changes of high economic value. It serves as the settlement layer for DeFi and the global state machine for systems like ENS. Layer 1 is the "world ledger," while Layer 2 is the "world computer" for handling specific calculations and scalability. This layered structure clarifies their respective responsibilities.

Culture, Values, and the Ethnicity of Ethereum

In the face of certain cultural trend shifts, both within the crypto space and globally (Vitalik Buterin (V God) did not specifically name them but hinted at some oppositions), Ethereum seems to maintain relative stability. Vitalik Buterin (V God) believes that Ethereum is essentially a diverse ecosystem that naturally attracts people with differing viewpoints. Each project should strive to practice the philosophy its members are most passionate about. The key is for Ethereum to avoid falling into a vicious competition of empty talk about "atmosphere" without any real progress.

When asked in what aspects Ethereum should remain steadfast (convex) rather than compromising, Vitalik Buterin (V God) provided a structural answer: Ethereum's strength lies in its multi-layer architecture. Layer 1 must remain strong, decentralized, and value-oriented, setting rules and a trust foundation for the entire system. Above this "sandbox," various Layer 2s and applications can accommodate different trade-offs in centralization, user experience, latency, etc. The role of Layer 1 is akin to a "dictator locked in a box" — it constrains and holds accountable the upper-layer applications through mechanisms like cryptographic proofs and bypass channels, thus controlling potential risks while achieving innovation efficiency. Therefore, Ethereum's "convexity" is reflected in building and maintaining a powerful, trustworthy, and value-driven Layer 1 foundational layer.

Regarding ETH assets and the recent rise of ETH government bonds companies, Vitalik Buterin (V God) believes that ETH is the core for aligning the economy of the entire ecosystem, and maintaining its strong role is crucial for community cohesion. ETH government bonds companies, as a type of financial product providing investors with different risk exposures, are valuable as long as they do not overly leverage, as they offer more people access to ETH and enhance its narrative as a corporate reserve asset. He humorously stated that the price of ETH sometimes feels like "set by 14 demons living on a moon of Jupiter," but nonetheless, it is always the right direction to make Ethereum more relevant and central in global finance.

Ultimate Vision: A Future Based on Verification Rather Than Trust

For the ultimate hopes for the next decade, Vitalik Buterin (V God) painted a picture:

• Completion of the Technological Roadmap: ZK/STARK proves everything, optimizing all components (e.g., replacing Keccak with Poseidon), achieving ultra-light node verification, making privacy the default, developing self-custody solutions that are both user-friendly and respect sovereignty, and formal verification of the entire stack.
• Global Impact: Financial activities default to taking place on Ethereum, allowing users to freely transfer and combine assets across different applications and having strong privacy protection options.
• Social Paradigm Shift: Achieving a trustless security vision based on cryptography and code verification that becomes the societal default standard. Making the era of "Trust me, I’m safe" look as outdated as the era of "non-potable water." "We have achieved this through HTTPS, and I believe we need to achieve it in all other areas too. And Ethereum can be an important part of realizing this goal."

As for his personal role, Vitalik Buterin (V God) stated he will continue to commit to all the necessary work for Ethereum and may participate in broader "decentralized altruism coordination" efforts, including bio-defense, security of the underlying technology stack, and the goal of making this "full-stack open, secure, and trustworthy world" a reality, which aligns with his goal since he first encountered Bitcoin in 2011.

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