As a seasoned crypto investor with a decade of experience under my belt, I have witnessed the evolution of Ethereum from a promising platform to a behemoth in the blockchain industry. The ongoing debate about raising gas limits is a familiar tune that echoes the challenges faced by any rapidly growing ecosystem.
The Ethereum community is going head to head in a debate over whether or not to raise the gas limits on the Ethereum mainnet by as much as 100%.
In simpler terms, the gas limit sets the upper boundary for how much computational effort (gas) can be used for processing a transaction within a single Ethereum block.
A group of Ethereum developers and influential figures are advocating for increasing the gas limit, arguing that it would expand the capacity of the L1 network and stimulate innovation. On the other hand, some developers, including Toni Wahrstätter from the Ethereum Foundation, express concerns that this change could potentially jeopardize stability and security.
On December 9th, Ethereum researcher Justin Drake announced his plans to adjust his validator’s gas limit to 36 million, representing a 20% rise from the current 30 million. While some developers advocate for much larger increases, up to 60 million.
Why raise gas limits in the first place?
Emmanuel Awosika, the head of creativity at 2077 Collective, explained to CryptoMoon that increasing gas limits on Ethereum serves as a demonstration of its ongoing commitment to innovation and offering a rich environment for developers with big ideas.
At present, due to the low gas limit, some applications might not be suitable for deployment. This is because if these applications gain popularity, gas costs could significantly increase, leading to a poor user experience as a result.
A larger capacity allows more developers to feel secure about deploying their projects at the L1 level, reducing the risk of being unfairly priced out.
The main point of contention is whether it’s more advantageous to enhance the capabilities of the original blockchain (L1) to facilitate high-worth DeFi operations, or if the majority of these activities should be shifted towards Ethereum’s Layer 2 solutions due to the L1’s limitation in scaling up while preserving its maximum level of decentralization and neutrality as a foundational layer.
Even though a significant portion of the Ethereum developer community is now focusing on the L2-oriented strategy, which Vitalik Buterin has been strongly promoting since 2022, Awosika cautioned that we might have overdone it and the focus could have shifted too heavily.
For an extended period, it seemed like everyone simply agreed that the L2 roadmap was acceptable, with no one voicing any concerns. However, I’ve always had a different perspective and believe that this consensus is actually misguided.
“The ideal version of the Ethereum roadmap is where you still have high-value applications on the L1, things like Uniswap that require lots of security and then you can leave a lot of the other stuff to the L2s.”
“There should always be this focus on making sure the L1 has a lot of valuable stuff on it. This is what makes Ethereum fundamentally different from Bitcoin, which is designed to be left as it is at the base layer.”
Nevertheless, crypto analyst Evan Van Ness stated that although increasing gas limits by up to 100% might be commendable, this concept may prove unworkable from the outset because the inherent limitations in scalability of the L1 (Layer 1) make it difficult to implement.
In simpler terms, “Van Ness stated in a December 9 post that by significantly increasing the gas limit, several applications returned, everything seemed fantastic initially. However, as demand consistently outpaced supply, it once more became common for transactions to cost approximately 120 gwei again.
“Again, gas prices are [already] reasonably low, raising the gas limit isn’t innovation.”
Technical complications above a 40M gas limit
On December 9th, Wahrstätter posted on the Ethereum Research page about Ethereum’s Consensus Layer (CL) client. This client sets a limit of 10 megabytes (MiB) for the maximum uncompressed block size, ensuring efficient transmission across the network.
Ensuring this limitation is key to preserving the smooth spread of blocks, avoiding any potential delays or instability issues.
As suggested by Wahrstätter, increasing the gas per block to 60 million might surpass that limit, causing issues with transaction propagation, missed validator time slots, and overall network instability.
Dankrad Feist summarized the highly technical details in a Dec. 11 post to X.
In simple terms, it’s the validators who have direct control over the gas limit, and they make their decision with each new block by casting a vote on whether to increase or decrease the gas limit. Unlike the Ethereum Improvement Proposal (EIP) process, there is no set procedure for elevating the gas limit in this case.
Since the Merge took place, the gas limit has remained unchanged. Prior to the Merge, it was customary for miners not to adjust the gas limit on their own whim, but rather after receiving a signal from the core developers that it was appropriate to make such a change.
“Unfortunately this hit a bit of a speed bump as Core Devs discovered that raising it over 40m was actually not safe due to a constant that has to be changed in the clients first.”
Despite the possibility of increasing the gas limit beyond 40M, the intense discussion sparked a quiet consensus within the developer community. They agreed that setting 36M as the default was a sensible “initial move”.
He mentioned that it’s quite probable that several large pools might merge within the coming weeks, leading to a noticeable rise.
Top dev’s departure signals “intellectual bottom” for Ethereum
As a crypto investor, I’ve been closely following the discourse regarding increasing gas limits and fostering innovation on the L1, which gained momentum after Ethereum core developer Max Resnick announced his decision to join Solana’s community. His move was prompted by the perception of a restrictive developer ecosystem within Ethereum and an apparent reluctance to scale the Ethereum L1, which he identified as key issues.
As an analyst, I’ve consistently expressed my concerns about Ethereum’s strategy that prioritizes layer 2 (L2) solutions over scaling the mainnet (layer 1 or L1). I believe a stronger emphasis on enhancing the scalability of the L1 would enable mainnet-based applications to not only survive but also flourish.
To Awosika, Resnick’s exit and the subsequent uproar on social media, notably from Ethereum supporters, represented for him an indication of the current era or state of things.
Max has been among the pioneering developers of Ethereum. He was exceptionally talented and harbored grand visions for the network’s future development.
As a crypto investor, witnessing the events unfold, I found it hard to suppress my anger. Not only did he seem to be forced out, but upon his departure, there was a palpable sense of relief among many, with whispers of him being an imposter echoing throughout the community.
This marks the intellectual bottom for Ethereum.”
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2024-12-16 16:22