Readings:
- Why Proof of Stake (Nov 2020) Why even change Proof of Work Ethereum? In this article, Vitalik gives some compelling arguments for a shift to Proof of Stake from a security/decentralization lens.
- Base Layers And Functionality Escape Velocity You may have heard about ‘Layer 2’ as a way to scale Ethereum. What problems should we be solving in ‘Layer 1’ (Eth2) vs. ‘Layer 2’ (rollups, etc.)? Vitalik outlines a way to think about this here.
- History of Ethereum This is more of a reference than something to read thoroughly, but it gives a good idea of the progression of changes in Layer 1 of Ethereum. Feel free to spend some time understanding the various changes happening in ‘Eth1’ separate from Eth2 as well (i.e. EIP1559, which should go live this week).
- A rollup-centric ethereum roadmap Finally, in this forum post, Vitalik lays out a perspective on the relationship between Layer 1 and Layer 2 in the short term.
- (optional) EIP 1011 and the reasons it didn’t end up being the way forward EIP 1011 is a proposal from 2018 for how a hybrid PoW/PoS chain might be adapted to mainnet very quickly. It was obviously discarded, but it’s interesting to look back and understand why we collectively took the longer route.