Update: The amount of dev fund was written earlier as 0.044 ETH, however further commits on Github seems to suggest it is set to 0.0055 ETH.
A proposal has been submitted by Ethereum developers to fund the next leg of development by raising money from block rewards. The proposal, EIP 2025, suggests adding 0.0055 ETH per block as a fee for the development of Ethereum’s next version. There is no mention of how the funds will be used, who will be accountable or why do they need these funds in the first place.
This proposal is not new to the industry but is really shocking to see that one of the top projects, Ethereum has to raise money to fund their development. Adding 0.0055 ETH to 3,100,000 blocks will generate 136,400 ETH which is equal to $30 million at the present rate of ETH/USD. The proposal is appalling primarily because of the casual tone while raising such a high amount. There is not a single word that reflects accountability here.
But the real problem lies in the fact that this is a bad precedent in the market as well as leads to a slippery slope of embedding the developer’s fees in Ethereum’s fee structure permanently. It does not seem unfair on the whole but an open-source blockchain with a developer team that is going down a questionable roadmap is asking for trouble here. It is certainly a dent on their reputation.
It also brings to light how much control developers exercise over the blockchain’s decisions and if that makes Ethereum truly decentralized or not? Usually, open-source developers have a sleuth of high paying consultancy and programming projects to make sure they get more than the value they provide for open-source contributions like Ethereum.
EIP-1890
As I said, this proposal is not new. It is based on EIP-1890 that had added a section to the block reward for repaying loans or funding on-going network development. But EIP-1890 had been added with “zero” value in it. So nothing was collected. EIP-2025 proposes to change that value from zero to 0.044 ETH.
However, this still begs the questions about how it will end? Is it just the start of Ethereum network charging fees for funding their development and how will people / users / community hold them accountable in case they fail to deliver? Questions to be asked.
Just a proposal
Many Ethereum developers / supporters have commented on Twitter and Reddit saying this is just a proposal, which is true. This may or may not be implemented. But it is worth noting that there is a possibility of this happening anytime in the future if the community is not vigilant.
Disclaimer: While the entire proposal says the amount of ETH to be added per block 0.044, the summary seems to have mentioned 0.0055 ETH.
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