Days after more abrupt departures from several high-profile Ethereum Foundation researchers and contributors, the silence from the EC has only added to the uncertainty gripping the Ethereum community.
What began earlier this week as shock over several exits of core figures has now evolved into something more existential, according to some community members: a public assessment of whether Ethereum’s most influential institution still understands the ecosystem it was built to manage.
The foundation has yet to provide a detailed explanation for the departures or address the growing criticism of its management and strategic direction that many have pointed out over the past few weeks. In that vacuum, community members, investors, and former insiders have begun to create their own narratives about what has gone wrong at EF and what it might mean for Ethereum’s future.
On Thursday, former Ethereum Foundation researcher Dankrad Feist published one of the clearest articulations yet of a growing perception among critics: that Ethereum’s governance and institutional structure is fundamentally misaligned with the network’s financial interests.
“The way to save Ethereum,” Feist wrote on X, “is for the community to create an organization that is financially aligned with Ethereum and accountable to it.”
Feist argued that despite its cultural influence, the EC does not have much of an economic impact on the ecosystem. The fund now controls “less than 0.1% of all ETH,” he wrote, and receives no direct stream of stakes or fee income from the network.
“If we want to get Ethereum back to winning ways,” he said, the ecosystem needs a new institution with permanent funding, explicit accountability and leadership focused on growth. Among his proposals: a $1 billion treasury, partially funded through stake revenue, overseen by a board incentivized to see ETH rise in value.
‘Original Sin’
Crypto journalist Laura Shin, host of the Unchained podcast, framed the question even more directly.
“I think Ethereum’s original sin was not considering tokenomics with every move it made from Dencun,” Shin wrote on X, referring to the March 2024 upgrade that dramatically reduced transaction fees on the Ethereum layer-2 network.
The “ultrasound money” thesis, the idea that ETH would become increasingly scarce through fee burns, had once become central to Ethereum’s investment narrative. But critics argue that Ethereum’s scaling plan, particularly its embrace of rollups and lower base layer fees, weakened that dynamic without offering a compelling replacement narrative for token holders.
“Most people,” Shin wrote, “don’t want to believe in anything that doesn’t also put points on the scoreboard.”
Her comments reflected a broader frustration emerging from some corners of the Ethereum community: that the EC has become overly focused on ideology while neglecting competition, business development, and ETH price performance.
“When the main offering becomes ideology/communism and money/tokenomics/capitalism is overlooked,” she wrote, “the peasants will revolt.”
Others pointed to the EC’s recent internal controversies, including the “mandate” that some contributors were reportedly asked to sign, according to Shin, as well as lingering questions about recent leadership appointments and decision-making processes at the foundation.
In the absence of direct communication from the EC, speculation has increasingly centered on what role new executive leadership may have played in departures, and whether the exits reflect a deeper culture shift underway within Ethereum’s most important institution.
“I personally don’t think it’s good for Ethereum if its most competitive people leave,” Shin wrote. “Ethereum’s unwillingness to stop the brain drain will only benefit its competitors or create new ones.”
Read more: ‘What’s happening at EF?’ The Ethereum community is looking for answers after high-profile departures
