Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has criticized the lack of originality in current blockchain scaling efforts, stating the industry relies too heavily on near-identical EVM-compatible Layer-2 chains. He argues this repetitive approach mirrors past DeFi stagnation and hinders long-term progress, advocating instead for innovation in areas like privacy and low-latency systems to advance the ecosystem meaningfully.
Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has expressed dissatisfaction with the direction of blockchain scaling, stating many new chains lack originality. In a recent blog post, he noted the industry is overly reliant on launching familiar, near-identical EVM chains instead of innovating new technical systems.
Buterin stated the market favors familiar designs over experimental new models. He argued this repeated approach is hindering the advancement of the Ethereum scaling landscape and mirrors the copy-paste development seen in decentralized finance earlier.
The co-founder was particularly critical of EVM-compatible chains that lack strong integrations with Ethereum. He claimed additional chains with minimal functional value do a disservice by splitting the ecosystem instead of improving it.
Buterin said Ethereum’s base layer has already scaled sufficiently to support a wide range of applications. He encouraged developers to focus on systems that introduce new capabilities like privacy-preserving systems and ultra-low latency execution.
He emphasized transparency is more important than branding, criticizing projects that claim a strong relationship with Ethereum but lack any technical connection. Separately, Buterin is collaborating with early Ethereum developers on a security-focused project involving approximately $220 million from the 2016 DAO incident.
The group is working to repurpose these idle funds into a security-focused fund to ensure network security sustainability. Buterin’s remarks highlight his view that further development will come from innovation, not repetition.
