During a keynote speech title "What Excites Me About the Next Decade" by Ethereum Co-Founder Vitalik Buterin on 18 September at TOKEN2049 Singapore, he entertained or rather, surprised the attendees when he started singing the theme song of Laputa: Castle in the Sky titled "Kimiwo Nosete".
Castle in the Sky is a 1986 Japanese animated fantasy adventure film written and directed by Hayao Miyazaki, and animated by Studio Ghibli.
Not an English rendition but the original Japanese cover no less.
I was wrong when I thought he would stop after one verse; he did a whole stanza to everyone's amusement.
The lady beside me thought Vitalik was "cute" and I silently applauded his courage, for which I had none.
But if you think this is his first time showcasing his vocal skills in front of an audience, think again.
He did the same thing back in 2019 during Edcon event.
You can check out the original full length version below.
Vitalik's inspiration for Ethereum can be traced to Hayao Miyazaki's iconic film Laputa: Castle in the Sky, animated by Studio Ghibli.
In the movie, the character Sheeta possesses a powerful crystal that holds immense energy and has the ability to lead its bearer to the stars.
This concept of harnessing boundless potential resonated with him as he envisioned the foundation of Ethereum's decentralised network.
He likens blockchains to "castles in the sky," viewing them as secure and vibrant spaces where communities can thrive while safeguarding cultural history, much like modern museums.
For him, this analogy captures both the serious and playful dimensions of cryptocurrency, reflecting its potential to foster meaningful connections and innovation.
He even expressed his love for Studio Ghibli and claimed he watched Castle in the Sky multiple times.
On the subject of cryptocurrency's challenges, according to Vitalik, people often say that we are still in the early days, we are still building on the basic infrastructure.
He expounded:
“You know, look how long something like the internet took to get into production, right? And this is something that I think people have been saying since, like, basically almost since Bitcoin itself launched. And one of the challenges with saying this, of course, is that today, you know, we are not in the early days anymore, right? Bitcoin has existed for 15 years. Ethereum as a project has existed for more than 10 years. And, you know, we see things like ChatGPT rising up from not even existing as companies to suddenly completely changing everyone's understanding of what intelligence even is. And so you have to ask the question of like, well, how did we actually even think about this, right? Were we actually early? And the way that I answer this question is I think we are not early to crypto, but we are early to crypto actually being usable.”
Vitalik recounted that in 2013, there was immense excitement about Bitcoin as the next big revolution in payments.
People were working hard to get regular merchants worldwide to accept Bitcoin.
Back then, being a "Bitcoin-accepted" establishment was a badge of pride, and there was no perceived contradiction with other social stances, such as being LGBT-friendly.
The enthusiasm was real.
So, what changed?
A memorable visit to Argentina in 2021 sheds some light:
“…the first thing that I noticed was that there was this population countrywide that was not just incredibly excited about crypto, but that was actively using it on a massive scale. But literally, I was walking around on Christmas Day, and the first coffee shop that I noticed was open. I walked in, the owner knew who I was, and the owner let me pay in ETH for the cup of coffee and some dessert that I had with my friends.”
However, he discovered that most locals were using centralised transfers, not decentralised crypto systems.
Why?
Because these transfers were instant and free—something that Bitcoin and Ethereum, with their rising transaction fees, struggled to match.
He added:
“And this is ultimately the same problem that I think ended up killing at least the original wave of exploration into getting everyone to adopt Bitcoin as a currency.”
Initially marketed as a solution to exorbitant fees from services like Western Union or PayPal, Bitcoin's own fees eventually skyrocketed, reaching as high as $50.
Ethereum faced similar issues.
He also cites poor user experience as another factor.
Back then, he was forced to pay over $800 in gas fees for a single privacy-preserving transaction.
However, Vitalik highlighted a major breakthrough for crypto, noting that transaction fees on Ethereum layer-2 (L2) networks have dropped to "basically zero":
“From being somewhere between $10 and $0.50 to being under $0.01, basically zero. At the same time, Optimism and Arbitrum, two major Ethereum layer twos, have hit this important security milestone… So rollups are rapidly becoming safer and rollups are finally affordable.”
This development represents a significant step forward in enhancing the accessibility and efficiency of blockchain technology.
Vitalik emphasized that the future of the industry hinges on balancing the needs of mainstream users with the core values of decentralisation.
He stressed the importance of maintaining open-source principles while fostering practical solutions to drive widespread adoption:
“We need to satisfy the needs of mainstream adoption, and we need to hold on to open source and decentralization values, at the same time.”
His call to action urges industry participants to develop scalable, user-friendly solutions that enable mass adoption without compromising the decentralised nature at the heart of blockchain technology.
He highlighted that crypto is often framed in binary terms: either sacrificing practicality for decentralisation, limiting its appeal to a niche community of "691 users," or compromising decentralisation for broader practicality.
Vitalik argued that neither extreme is desirable and emphasized the need to strike a balance between the two to ensure the ecosystem's growth and relevance.
Vitalik concluded:
“We do not have to take either of these dark choices. We have decentralization and we have practicality at the same time. Eat both pills. Be purple.”
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