“Ethereum’s Journey to the Public Eye: A New Era Unfolds”

I initially penned the first version of the Ethereum whitepaper on a chilly day in San Francisco during November, as a result of several months of contemplation and frequently vexing labor in a field that we have come to designate as “cryptocurrency 2.0” – in essence, utilizing the Bitcoin blockchain for purposes beyond merely currency. In the preceding months prior to Ethereum’s emergence, I had the honor of closely collaborating with various initiatives striving to execute colored coins, smart property, and distinct forms of decentralized exchange. At that time, I was thrilled about the immense possibilities these technologies could offer, as I recognized that many of the significant challenges still afflicting the Bitcoin ecosystem, such as fraudulent services, unreliable exchanges, and an often surprising deficiency in security, were not a byproduct of Bitcoin’s defining characteristic of decentralization; instead, these problems were attributable to the notable centralization that persisted in areas that could likely be quite easily eliminated.

What I came to understand soon, however, was the substantial challenges that many of these ventures were encountering, coupled with the often unsightly technological workarounds that were essential for them to function. Once one examines the issue carefully, the source becomes clear: fragmentation. Each separate project was attempting to create its own blockchain or meta-layer atop Bitcoin, leading to significant duplication of efforts and loss of interoperability. Ultimately, I discovered that the solution to address the problem definitively hinged on a straightforward insight that the realm of computer science first conceived in 1935: there is no necessity to forge a separate infrastructure for each distinct feature and implementation; instead, it is feasible to design a Turing-complete programming language and empower everyone to utilize that language to implement any feature that can be mathematically articulated. This is how our computers operate, and this is how our web browsers function; and, with Ethereum, this is how our cryptocurrencies can operate.

Since that moment, Ethereum has made significant strides over the last two months. The Ethereum team has grown to encompass dozens of developers including Gavin Wood and Jeffrey Wilcke, the primary developers of the C++ and Go implementations, respectively, along with others such as Charles Hoskinson, Anthony Di Iorio, and Mihai Alisie, along with numerous other exceptionally skilled individuals who are unfortunately too many to acknowledge. Many of them have even come to comprehend the project so deeply that they are more adept at elucidating Ethereum than I am. Currently, there are more than fifteen individuals in our developer chat rooms actively working on the C++ and Go implementations, which are already surprisingly close to attaining all the functionalities needed to operate in a testnet. In addition to development efforts, there are numerous people functioning around the globe in our marketing and community outreach teams, creating the non-technical framework necessary to establish the Ethereum ecosystem as the solid and vigorous community it merits. Presently, we have reached a collective resolution to take our organization significantly more public than we have previously done.

What Is Ethereum

Simply put, Ethereum is a next-generation cryptographic ledger designed to facilitate various advanced features, including user-issued currencies, smart contracts, decentralized exchange, and what we believe is the inaugural genuine implementation of decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) or companies (DACs). However, this is not what distinguishes Ethereum. Instead, what sets Ethereum apart is its approach to executing these functions. Rather than striving to specifically accommodate each distinct type of functionality as an individual feature, Ethereum incorporates a built-in Turing-complete scripting language, enabling you to program the features yourself via a mechanism known as “contracts.” A contract functions akin to an autonomous agent that executes a specific code segment each time a transaction is directed to it, and this code can alter the contract’s internal data storage or initiate transactions. Advanced contracts can even alter their own code.

A straightforward illustration of a contract could be a basic naming registration system, enabling users to register their name alongside their address. This contract would not execute transactions; its sole function is to compile a database that other nodes can subsequently query. The contract, composed in our high-level C-Like Language (CLL) (or perhaps more accurately Python-like language), is structured as follows:

if tx.value

And there you have it. Five lines of code, executed simultaneously by thousands of nodes globally, and you have the inception of a resolution to a significant challenge in cryptography: human-friendly authentication. It is crucial to note that when the original iteration of Ethereum’s scripting code was crafted, we did not envision name registration; rather, the fact that this is feasible emerged as a byproduct of its Turing-completeness. Hopefully, this will afford you insight into precisely what Ethereum enables; for additional applications, complete with code, consult the whitepaper. A few examples include:

• User-issued currencies / “colored coins”
• Decentralized exchange
• Financial contracts, including leverage trading and hedging
• Crop insurance
• Savings wallets with withdrawal limits
• Peer to peer gambling
• Decentralized Dropbox-style data storage
• Decentralized autonomous organizations

Perhaps now you understand why we are enthusiastic.

Who is Ethereum

The core Ethereum team is composed of four members:

We likewise boast a remarkable team of developers, entrepreneurs, marketers, and advocates:

• Dr. Gavin Wood: Principal C++ Developer
• Geff Obscura: Principal Go Developer
• Dr. Emanuele Costa: Quantitative Analyst; SCRUM Master
• Joseph Lubin: Software Engineering, Quantitative Analysis
• Eric Lombrozo: Software Architect
• Max Kaye: Developer
• Jonathan Mohan: Media, Marketing, and Advocacy (BitcoinNYC)
• Wendell Davis: Strategic Partnerships and Branding (Hive Wallet)
• Anthony Donofrio: Logos, Branding, Web Development (Hive Wallet)
• Taylor Gerring: Web Development
• Paul Snow: Language Development, Software Engineering
• Chris Odom: Strategic Partner, Developer (Open Transactions)
• Jerry Liu and Bin Lu: Chinese Strategy and Translations (http://www.8btc.com/ethereum)
• Hai Nguyen: Accounting
• Amir Shetrit: Business Development (Colored Coins)
• Steve Dakh: Developer (KryptoKit)
• Kyle Kurbegovich: Media (Cointalk)

Looking Ahead

On a personal note, I will be speaking at the Bitcoin conference in Miami on January 25-26. Shortly afterward, on February 1, the ether pre-sale will commence, allowing anyone to acquire some of the initially pre-allocated ether (Ethereum’s internal currency) at a conversion rate of 1000-2000 ether for 1 BTC by visiting http://fund.ethereum.org. The pre-sale will continue throughout February and March, with early contributors receiving greater rewards; individuals who transfer funds in the first seven days will earn the complete 2000 ether, followed by 1980 ether on the 8th day, 1960 on the 9th day, and so forth until the baseline rate of 1000 ether per BTC is maintained for the final three days of the pre-sale.

We will have the capability to construct fully functional and robust Ethereum clients with a minimum of 500 BTC in funding at present rates; basic implementations in Go, C++, and Python are nearing testnet quality already. However, our ambitions extend well beyond that. Ethereum is not merely “another altcoin”; it represents a transformative step forward for cryptocurrency and ultimately for peer-to-peer protocols as a whole. With that in mind, we aspire to allocate a significant amount of capital towards securing exceptional talent to enhance the security and scalability of the Ethereum network itself, while also supporting a resilient Ethereum ecosystem that may welcome other cryptocurrency and peer-to-peer initiatives into our realm. We are already progressing with discussions involving KryptoKit, Humint, and OpenTransactions, and are eager to collaborate with other groups such as Tahoe-LAFS, Bitmessage, and Bitcloud as well.

All these initiatives have the potential to gain from integration with the Ethereum blockchain in some manner, simply due to the layer’s universal nature; owing to its Turing-completeness, an Ethereum contract can be designed to incentivize almost everything, and even completely non-financial applications, such as public key registration, offer extensive advantages for any decentralized cryptographic product intending to include, for instance, a social network. All these endeavors will contribute great value to the Ethereum ecosystem, while hopefully, the Ethereum ecosystem will reciprocate with value to them. Our goal is not to compete with any entity; instead, we intend to collaborate.

Throughout the fundraising period, we will diligently engage in development; we aim to release a centralized testnet, a server where anyone can deploy contracts and transactions, in the near future, followed by a decentralized testnet to evaluate networking functionalities and mining algorithms. We also plan to organize a competition, reminiscent of those used to determine the algorithms for the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) in 2005 and SHA3 in 2013, inviting researchers from universities worldwide to compete in creating the best possible specialized hardware-resistant, centralization-resistant, and equitable mining algorithms, while also investigating alternatives like proof of stake, proof of burn, and proof of excellence. Further details on this will be disclosed in February.

Ultimately, to encourage local community development, we plan to establish public community hubs and incubators, tentatively referred to as “holons”, in several global cities. The first holon will be located inside Bitcoin Decentral in Toronto, where a significant portion of Ethereum development will occur; anyone seriously interested in actively participating in Ethereum should consider visiting us over the next month. Other cities under consideration include San Francisco, Amsterdam, Tel Aviv, and a city in Asia; this segment of the project is still in its infancy, and more information will follow in the coming month.

For now, feel free to explore our resources:

Reddit: http://reddit.com/r/ethereum