It's really outrageous. I've been attending Devcon these past two days and have seen a lot of rumors that Ethereum is going to upgrade to 3.0—BeamChain, and layer2 is going to fail (I'm so angry). Layer2, which was already in a passive position, was innocently backstabbed, triggering a sharp drop. In fact, it's a big plus! Let me quickly state my views to set the record straight:
1) Don't assume that you need to fork a large scale or issue a new coin when you mention a new chain
As Justin Drake said, BeamChain is just an upgrade to BeaconChain. It is still just a proposal and is still a long way from being officially launched. It also fully follows Ethereum's Roadmap route planning.
Ethereum is divided into BeaconChain + EVM execution chain. The two together constitute the Ethereum chain we know. The Beacon Chain plays the role of the consensus layer, and the EVM plays the role of the execution layer. Don’t think that the name is a chain, which means we have to launch something new. BeamChain is just a transitional upgrade of the Beacon Chain and does not affect the execution of the Ethereum chain at all.
Where does Ethereum 3.0 come from?
2) Let's talk about the logic of why Beacon Chain needs to be upgraded:
The Proposer block proposer, Realy relay node and Validators of the Ethereum EVM execution layer are the roles of "project manager", "worker" and "quality inspector" respectively. After the user submits the transaction to the Mempool, the block builder Builder will select and package the transaction from the transaction pool. The process will handle some transaction sorting functions, and then distribute the constructed block Realy. Proposer will select the best block, and finally the Validators will conduct acceptance verification.
In this process, there is a high degree of centralization in the process of Builder sorting transactions and Realy distributing transactions. Large builders like Flashbot can decide some block orders and then MEV, which is obviously not in line with Ethereum's grand strategy.
Therefore, Justin proposed an idea to add an inclusion list to the Builder's building block, which is equivalent to a list of transactions that must be included. If there is "centralized interference" in the builder and relay links, or if the proposing node has to supervise the block construction and participate in the subsequent consensus, the proposer-builder separation (PBS), and the validators find that some key transactions are not in the transaction list, they can directly verify that the block is unqualified. You can see that the inclusion list is to enhance the decentralized properties of the Ethereum block generation process to enhance the anti-censorship ability.
The question is, who will put the inclusion list in the entire execution verification process? It can only be added by relying on the BeaconChain consensus layer, but BeaconChain does not support this function, so it is upgraded to BeamChain to improve it. In the future, the beacon chain can publicize all the transactions that must be included. If there is a problem with the execution layer, the verification node will not pass it.
In addition, the Pectal upgrade also adds the issue of changing the pledge threshold 32ETH-1ETH. This time it involves the issue of changing the economic model and management logic of BeaconChain, which also requires a major version upgrade.
Besides, as Ethereum is fully Snarked in the subsequent stages of Verge, the verification process of the beacon chain and the EVM execution chain will also be optimized with SNARKs, and SNARKs support is also required at the consensus layer; moreover, resisting quantum cryptographic attacks has always been one of Ethereum's strategic goals. The upgrade of BeaconChain will change some signature verification mechanisms to make Ethereum safer.
Therefore, the emergence of BeamChain is entirely a series of necessary preparations to cater to the plan of the Ethereum roadmap.
3) Why is it not bad for layer2, but a big positive!
First, Ethereum has long determined the strategic expansion idea of Rollup-Centric, and the upgrade of BeamChain cannot shake the foundation of this strategy. Otherwise, even if Justin has this intention, the proposal will not be passed by the entire Ethereum community.
Secondly, it is said that the new BeamChain beacon chain will help Ethereum achieve the expansion of the main network level. The key point is SNARKs. After SNARKs, the overall framework of Ethereum has changed from storing and calculating all data to only verifying Proof proofs, which naturally achieves a major expansion. However, this expansion is the result of the ZKization of the underlying data structure logic, and it is not the same as the expansion of layer2. One is responsible for reducing operating costs, and the other is responsible for traffic and user application scenarios. So don’t think that the scalability of the main network means weakening layer2.
Furthermore, I wrote a few days ago to interpret @VitalikButerin's idea that when Ethereum is fully SNARKed, EVM will become one of the altVMs and exist in the main network. At that time, other layer2 altVMs that are outstanding will be promoted to the main network level and will be parallel to EVM to execute transactions in the entire Ethereum ecosystem. https://x.com/tmel0211/status/1851597835655078225…
At that time, the role of BeamChain will also be magnified, and upgrading is necessary. And following this logic, excellent VM solutions that meet the needs of Ethereum expansion will be promoted to the main network level to absorb and execute transactions, and the interoperability between Ethereum layer2 will also be smoothly solved, which is completely in line with the development strategy of layer2.
There are so many generic layer2s in the market now. If Ethereum really adopts the modular idea and adopts the new strategy of alt-VM, it is expected that many layer2s will get Ethereum's direct "upward channel", which can also promote the reshuffle and optimization of layer2. Shouldn't this be a direct benefit?
Finally, everyone should look forward to the arrival of the ZK era of big explosion, and really don't do such FUD and rumors without any judgment logic. https://x.com/tmel0211/status/1855949307658273137… (See the link to learn more about what the project parties in the ZK track are doing, please!)
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