Ethereum's most polarizing debate is back – and, arguably, as complex as ever.
Largely undiscussed since April, the question of whether the world's second-largest blockchain would consider a system-wide software upgrade as a way to return $239 million lost due to a mishap at a major startup resurfaced with a new round of infighting among stakeholders this week.
Sparked in the days prior to a meeting in Berlin meant to address decision-making challenges on the decentralized network, the issue revolves around a code proposal called ethereum improvement proposal (EIP) 999 and the specific way in which it has been reviewed.
At issue is not just how ethereum developers will handle this contentious code change, but those that may arise in the future as the platform grows and expands.
Still, this week's events began on a smaller scale, with the planned meeting of the Council of Ethereum Magicians, a developer group launched in early 2018 as a forum for discussion on how ethereum should handle technical updates and code disputes.
Following the discussion Saturday, Afri Schoedon, communications manager at Parity Technologies, the startup whose code snafu caused the widely publicized fund freeze, suggested a change to EIP 999 – a proposal that seeks to reactivate the 584 wallets in which much of the lost funds remain.
A relatively minor suggestion, Schoedon asked to advance EIP 999 within the parameters of ethereum's process for code review. Due to what he perceived as a lack of technical objections to the proposal, he inferred it should be set to "accepted" status.
But the move had wider repercussions, with sometimes vitriolic debate surfacing on Twitter, Github and Reddit. The reaction was swift, with those against the code even proposing a rival pull request to move the proposal to the "rejected" state.
"I wish people would stop using the EIPs repository for political grandstanding," core developer Nick Johnson tweeted.
The move has sparked a heated reaction from those who don't want to see the funds restored out of fear these requests will become too commonplace.
As the rationale goes, if ethereum users and developers are able to act like market managers, how are they different from today's central monetary authorities?
"The Parity bailout EIP was just stealth 'accepted' by the Ethereum Foundation despite community rejection. Apparently the community found out and now the pull request has been closed," one observer tweeted: "Ethereum is completely centralized."
Backtracking the code
But if the implications of the move have been lasting, the inciting incident was arguably brief.
Schoedon has since asked for the pull request to be closed, stating that his actions stemmed from a misunderstanding of how others believe the EIP process should be conducted (the subtleties of which are still being debated).
Complicating matters was that Schoedon, who initiated the pull request to move the proposal to "accepted," is also the author of EIP 999.
More broadly, however, the issue appears to have exacerbated the very problems that many ethereum developers have acknowledged for some time – despite attempts to coordinate in person, digital communications hold the potential to vastly polarize users.
On top of this, there are concerns that, on the internet, competing projects could deliberately add fire to the controversy, swarming social media with fake accounts to create the illusion of outrage.
In an effort to ease the impact this could have on core developers tasked with accepting code changes, the controversy has forced developers to consider how to clarity the EIP process, the formal way by which code changes are organized in the ethereum repository.
One user summarized:
"EIP 999 is a great example of stalled governance and it just won't go away, and it is consuming every discussion to the point of exhaustion."
See more:
https://www.coindesk.com/ethereums-most-heated-tech-debate-is-proving-its-far-from-over/
