Author: Chloe, ChainCatcher

The Ethereum Devconnect developer conference was held on Monday in Buenos Aires, Argentina. During the conference, Vitalik Buterin elevated the discussion to explore Ethereum's value within the entire cryptocurrency industry. Tomasz Stanczak and Hsiao-Wei Wang, co-executive directors of the Ethereum Foundation, focused on Ethereum's role during the transition period, emphasizing reliable operation, community collaboration, and continuous innovation. Meanwhile, former core researcher and current co-founder of Etherealize, Danny Ryan, highlighted Ethereum's key role in decentralization and institutions from the perspective of institutional applications.

Moving Towards the Fusaka Phase, Foundation: Achieving Seamless Operational Upgrades

Tomasz Stanczak reflected on Ethereum's development trajectory over the past decade in his speech, noting that a solid foundation for consensus mechanisms, diversified clients, and privacy-related tools has been successfully established during this period. However, he also warned that future challenges will require broad participation to enhance user privacy, maintain decentralization, and improve individual autonomy. Stanczak specifically depicted the diverse participants in the Ethereum ecosystem, believing that these decentralized contributions are key to ensuring network security and operation.

“Ethereum's ability to achieve seamless operation during upgrades is thanks to the efforts of these long-term contributors.”

Hsiao-Wei Wang interpreted the foundation's management philosophy with the metaphor “Ethereum is a ladder,” using “compound steps” to describe ecological evolution, meaning that each step from research to client to application ultimately expands to the community, with each step becoming a new rung for the next generation of builders.

She stated, “This year marks a new chapter for Ethereum. Since the Ethereum Foundation completed its leadership transition, Tomasz and I have set our first responsibility to ensure the stability and smoothness of this transition, as Ethereum is entering a new phase.”

Regarding next month's Fusaka upgrade for the Ethereum mainnet, she explained that Ethereum's entry into “Fusaka” needs to focus on three core capabilities: first, maintaining 100% continuous block production reliability during major upgrades; second, providing flexibility to accommodate diverse technological paths for the ecosystem; and third, the foundation's stewardship governance, which cares for Ethereum but does not control it.

Wang emphasized that Ethereum's decade-long accumulation stems from countless trials and persistence, and the network's ability to maintain 100% availability during all major updates reflects this reliability, allowing users to invest in construction without fear.

Additionally, Danny Ryan, as a former core researcher at the foundation, shared his experience transitioning from protocol development to institutional applications. Ryan criticized the inefficiencies of traditional finance, such as severe market fragmentation, with stock settlements requiring T+1 days and bonds T+2 days, which pales in comparison to Ethereum's instant settlement. He noted that traditional institutional system architectures are fundamentally outdated, layered with laws and paperwork.

However, Ryan was surprised by the strong demand for decentralization from institutions. From an institutional perspective, needs such as decentralized infrastructure, 100% online availability, security for trillion-dollar asset classes, and mature applications with privacy are all essential. Ryan also emphasized that after bridging the cognitive gap, institutions will realize the necessity of Ethereum.

Ethereum is Repositioning, Vitalik Discusses Its Value in the Cryptocurrency Industry

Vitalik's speeches at developer conferences have always framed around “Ethereum in 30 Minutes,” outlining Ethereum's current state and future in just 30 minutes. Comparing the content from Devcon SEA in 2024 to Devconnect ARG in 2025, Ethereum is repositioning itself, from technical maps to its value on the blockchain.

Last year, Vitalik primarily focused on the technical details of the “world computer,” discussing how L1 serves as a trust anchor and how L2 functions complementarily like GPUs. “The reason the Ethereum world computer can unite is that every GPU connects to the most trusted machines through various technologies such as optimistic proof systems, zero-knowledge proofs, SNARKs, STARKs, Jolt, Plonk, etc.”

These systems ensure that L1 can verify what happens internally in L2 without trust, and L2 can read what happens on L1 without trust. There is significant interaction between these two components, and Vitalik stated, “Together, they constitute today's Ethereum.”

Last year, he emphasized decentralized technical practices, such as fault-tolerant designs in multi-client architectures and the diversity of staking pools, and reviewed the journey from the 2013 white paper to the Merge transformation, and then to the preliminary results of the Surge phase, particularly highlighting the significant reductions in fees and improvements in transaction confirmation times (from minutes to milliseconds), showcasing Ethereum's breakthroughs in scalability.

In contrast, the 2025 speech leaned more towards principled reflection, starting with FTX as a cautionary tale. Vitalik criticized FTX for lacking solvency as a centralized exchange, emphasizing its essential difference from Ethereum, which is how to shift from centralized trust to a mechanism that anyone can verify. He widely incorporated cryptographic tools such as zero-knowledge proofs (ZKPs) and fully homomorphic encryption (FHE), introducing the concept of “cosmolocal” (locally global), emphasizing that Ethereum is a global network, not designed to please a specific company or superpower, but to protect the freedom of people worldwide.

This year, the overall technical focus is more future-oriented, concentrating on the return of ZK-EVM full nodes and quantum resistance upgrades. Last year, Vitalik mentioned wanting to perform SNARK proofs for the entire chain, and this year he clearly announced that ZK-EVM has entered the Alpha stage. Vitalik stated at the conference, “Data from ethproofs.org shows that there are now provers who can use dozens of consumer-grade GPUs to prove Ethereum blocks in real-time.”

It can be observed that while Vitalik previously focused on discussing technology, this year he shifted to exploring Ethereum's "existential value," reflecting that Ethereum is transitioning from a foundational construction phase to positioning its influence on-chain.

Perhaps Ethereum is completing its coming-of-age ceremony, as Vitalik said at Devconnect ARG: “Ethereum can become a flag, leading a world supported by permissionless open technology and decentralized security, a world that is freer, more open, and collaborative.”

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