Crucial announcement: any details from this article concerning the ether sale are significantly outdated and likely erroneous. Please exclusively refer to the most recent blog entries and official documents at ethereum.org for accurate information on the sale
Ethereum garnered an extraordinary reaction at the Miami Bitcoin Conference. We arrived there expecting numerous technical inquiries along with a philosophical dialogue about the essence of Ethereum; however, the immense level of interest and excitement for the initiative far exceeded our expectations. Vitalik’s presentation received both a standing ovation and a question queue that took hours to handle.
In our pursuit of ensuring an equal chance for everyone wishing to participate, while assessing the pertinent logistical and regulatory matters for a token sale of this magnitude, we have chosen to delay the February 1 kickoff of the sale. We will announce the new date for the sale launch on our official platform: Ethereum.org.
The Ethereum initiative is also thrilled to share the alpha version of the open source testnet client with the community at the start of February. This will provide individuals with a chance to engage with the project and explore Ethereum scripts and contracts, thereby enhancing their comprehension of the technical characteristics of the Ethereum platform. Launching the testnet on this date will afford prospective supporters of the fundraiser a better grasp of what the Ethereum project entails prior to their involvement.
The testnet will encompass comprehensive support for transmitting and receiving transactions, the initial iteration of the scripting language as outlined in our whitepaper, and may or may not feature mining capabilities. Additionally, this will be the first significant cryptocurrency initiative to introduce two official clients simultaneously, one developed in C++ and the other in Go; a Python client is also under development. A converter from the Ethereum CLL to Ethereum scripts will be available very shortly.
A reminder on security
The ether sale will NOT commence on February 1st, and any efforts to raise funds during this period should be regarded as fraudulent. There have been some scams circulating in the forums so please exercise caution and consider only the information published on Ethereum.org to be trustworthy. It is vital to emphasize to everyone that solely information disseminated and displayed at Ethereum.org should be considered reliable as many may likely pose as us.