Ethereum Foundation & Ethereum Update by Hsiao Wei Wang - Devconnect

Hi, very excited to be here in Argentina at defcon. Well, um, has always be a climb is a place where people who started with nothing could rise through their own efforts. This is a system that grows taller every time when someone builds something new. It is a ladder that never finishes because it uh its future is still being made by people in this room. A ladder works because um it leads you to something, a direction, a chance, a way up.

And Ethereum works at similar reason. It doesn't promise uh a destination. It gives people the path that can climb at their own pace. And when someone adds something new like a new step, everyone can rises together. So um my story I didn't join Ethereum because I thought I could lead anything like here today which I am very honored and normal person I joined because I saw the system this is a system that um built by the people who actually believed strangers could create something uh better together.

My first step was small. It's just learning on the internet and listening to the talks like the conferences we have today and understanding the protocol. And like everyone here uh I started at the beginning. Yeah. And after that was has been like a seven or eight years.

And then this year's um ever since the uh EF the eastern foundation new leadership um change it has been eight months. The fir our first um responsibility uh Tomas and myself was to ensure uh we have a steady transition and then it will be the strategies uh toward EF scores and to keep the uh early steps strong so that the new ones come join the system can build and to continue the climb. And the EF we don't we doesn't um the EF doesn't uh sit on the top of the ladder. We don't get to tell like the ecosystem where exactly the destination is to climb. Our roar is quieter.

We hold the base steady and we fix the steps when they weaken. We make sure the climb remains possible for everyone to come and um is entering a new phase. It is a phase that defined by uh three abilities. This is the ability to one of the ability is to remain the reliable uh under the pressure and also the ability to evolve with the feedback from community and then it is the ability to practice with the real stewardship and um reliability is not uh just a slogan. It is something that we have to earn block by block.

Ether has delivered um like every major upgrades uh with 100% life uh network lifeness and we know like a saka will be the next reliability is something like is something that let people come to build together without fear. You have to know like your uh the step you are standing on is stable. And ever since Ethereum started, it has been 10 years. We celebrated the 10 years C ann today. Yeah.

And um yeah, this year and then has 10 years of open assets of collaborative um inventions of the impossible things that become normal. What makes Israel reliable is not just luck. It is the work that of many independent teams and then to improve the diffic the different aspects parts of the ecosystem. We did the the the test. We have the uh like over 10 clients team things to to work on the protocol.

And then the people who obsess over the details like nobody sees they are the people like um the invisible labor that keeps the system works and the ladder upright. And then the second one is the uh flex flexess. It means like we don't um we don't pretend to that we know everything. It means like the EF we listen to people when the community tell us like which part of the system doesn't work which part of the seasons like uh it should be improved. It means like we adjusted uh course with humility and the ladder gets stronger when we all understand like how people actually climbing and where um the EF is is uh the EF does not controls Ethereum.

We cares about the Ethereum but uh we don't control the direction. We support the environments that where the direction emerges. Stewardship uh is not the power of over Ethereum. It is the contributions and the responsibility and Ethereum works also because the people uh enter from everywhere no matter you are like researchers, clients, app builders, inventor in investors, uh app users, uh like scientists, academics and um students or like local community people um beginners or experts. The ladder in invites uh whoever is willing to build something here and also this is the magic of our community that when someone climbs um they don't climb alone we have so many uh resource here and then they create another step another step like a step that someone else can uh stand on.

This is how ethereum compounds together. Yeah. And then here is a quick uh story of how gross compounds uh look like and how the ladder gets taller. So imagine like uh we have a user uh that discovers um crypto and then they started with maybe it was the defy use case and they get more of gets more with defy like to uh to earn what they wanted. But this is just the the start of the his journal and they may spend much more time and learning about they the more they read the more they learn and they will get more absurd with the techn technology the cultures and they may meet someone else like interesting in Syrian and learn even more and then They started to write research on the new way of how to use Ethereum in a different ways and then app builders get inspired by these researchers this new researchers idea and then the app builder found his uh co-founder at an ethern hackathon and then they together start to make a new product.

So this is the like a a practice of then the product and the reaches to the users which will inspire more and more uh users to build on this and then this is the new step um will be added to the ladder and then when someone else climb on this it enables billions of people who do something previously uh through it would be impossible. And this similar stories has been repeated in every hackathon, every conference and then also the online forums. And the cycle repeats and this week will be the place where the new inspirations will happen. This is the ladder and it's not a hierarchy. This is a loop and each step so someone takes um becomes it is like each step someone takes uh becomes the next person's starting point and then this is how protocol works uh becomes real progress.

This is also the apps becomes uh step steps and the research become opportunity. And this is how Ethereum grower for all of us and then for even for the ones that who hasn't uh haven't discover it yet the EF uh invest explorations invested uh the early explorations in places that uh others probably won't um for example like the early ZK they research their early uh plantings development and because we see the client diversity is important and also some early experiments many of these um we it wasn't clear at the beginning but later of the years we found oh these are this many of these becomes serious critical steps that a new ones um we able to plan something else above these researches And the meanwhile we cannot pretend like uh decentralizations maintained by will maintain by itself or like a convenience um comes without any tradeoffs or the capture won't happen. So honesty and the transparency is also uh what protect is kind. These are the um like real decentralization um credible neutrality and resilience under the pressure. These are the steps like we can't uh compromise but also like because of um if they it's not because if they break sorry it is because like if this um ideas break all the steps will both them will collapse accordingly.

And today after 10 years uh is not just a blockchain. It is a place where the new forms of assets identity culture coordinations can emerge. It is a platform that I for the ideas um that the world has not discovered yet. And our job is not to climb first. Our job is to make sure like everyone else uh is able to climb higher than we ever will.

Now um when my family ask me like what I do, I can tell them like I help keep the ladder steady and if someone some people I never met can climb into the places that I will never reach. succeeds because no single team owns it. Um, not the EF, not the L2s, not one single validator. We rise only because we rise together. The future of Ethereum will not just built by the people uh on the stage today.

It will be built by the people in this room and people at home right now by your experience. um by your imagination by your courage to stand on the step does not promise an easy come. It promise a fair chance for everyone to join a climb that where every step changes what is possible. Our promise is simple. We will do a quiet and glamorous work that keeps stable.

So when people works on this it will make it extraordinary. Thank you for being of this journey and thank you for believing in this open system. Thank you for building the next step together is a ladder and we will climb it together. Thank you.

That was awesome.

Thank you so much. We have time for I think three questions from the audience. Um the most important one is Bulbasaur your favorite Pokemon? This is the most uploaded.

This is not just the uh my favorite Pokemon is the best Pokemon.

There you go. Official answer. Um second question is it's actually Bulbasaur related. If Ethereum [snorts] is Bulbasaur, how do we fend the Charmanders off?

How do we

fend the Charmanders off? How do we protect Ethereum

from from the fire type? Um I think this metaphor is like drives me crazy but um I think so like the philosophy of Babaso is to grow with the land with the we I the growth with the the friends I think is about coordinations I mean there's so many Pokemon memes here about Babaso but we can talk next time. It's like about I think Babaso is a good coordinator and that's also is

coordinates and win. What is the one thing you'd say you're most excited about for 2026? Is there one thing? Is there many things?

Uh I think it will be continue with the the trend of 2025. It will be an um the second stage of what we see in 2005. We will see more adoptions. We will see more um people in real world use, use the D5 protocol, use the like um open zero knowledge um technologies in real life. Yeah.

Um do you think the ladder is becoming easier to climb? I think for for the pe uh new people join yes I think um this is a stable stable ladder right now like for newcomers to to join um but on the top of course uh it's every new inventions every new step is will be somewhat challenging but uh with the people in the community I think it we will make Yeah.

Awesome. Can we get another round of applause for Shawe, please?

Thank you.

Thank you.