At the ETHAsia 2025 Web3 Carnival in Hong Kong, Xiao Feng, Chairman of Wanxiang Blockchain, had an in-depth conversation with Vitalik, founder of Ethereum, and reviewed their first visit to China in 2014. Vitalik emphasized the important role of Chinese miners, exchanges, and developers in the early development of Ethereum, shared his experience of learning Chinese, and affirmed the rapid progress of the Chinese community in ZK, AI and other technical directions.
When talking about application development, Vitalik said that the foundation is positioned as an enabler rather than a leader, and hopes that the local community will promote it spontaneously. At present, we should focus on DeFi, RWA, decentralized social networking and other directions, rather than talking about "applications" in general. He called on the Chinese team to participate in the underlying research of Ethereum POS 2.0 (Beam Chain) to promote the evolution of the protocol. Regarding the "Blockchain Trilemma", Vitalik believes that the layered architecture has broken through about 70% of the technical bottlenecks. In the future, with the help of account abstraction, ZK technology, L1-L2 data sharing, etc., it is expected to achieve a "WeChat-level" Web3 application experience. He proposed that by sinking the service logic to L1, the threshold for L2 development can be significantly reduced, and L2 should also pay for the basic services provided by L1 to achieve value reflux. In terms of the scope of application of "decentralization and centralization", Vitalik emphasized that the real world, such as RWA and identity systems, requires a partial trust mechanism. Blockchain should reduce the trust cost through cryptography and ZK rather than extreme decentralization, thereby improving fairness and efficiency. Regarding the global ecology, both sides believe that Chinese and American developers constitute two core forces. Vitalik pointed out that the Foundation has limited resources and mainly focuses on infrastructure construction and educational support. Commercial applications should be driven by the community. Finally, Xiao Feng suggested that the Foundation set up an office in Hong Kong and restart the Hackathon and Workshop in mainland China. Vitalik responded positively and thanked the Chinese community for their support and contributions over the years.
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Xiao Feng and Vitalik recall their first visit to China. The Chinese community supports the development of Ethereum
Xiao Feng: Thank you everyone, I want to tell you a secret first, 2025 is exactly the tenth anniversary of my acquaintance with Vitalik. We met for the first time in Shanghai in 2015, so we have a lot of emotions when we talk again at this moment. Of course, some emotions involve private aspects, so we will not talk about them in detail in public. In 2015, Vitalik should have stayed in Shanghai for about three months. Although he has been here many times, these three months should be a relatively long time.
So I would like to know what your impressions are of China, Shanghai, the Chinese Ethereum community, or the Chinese Ethereum developers from that time to now? This is a question that many Chinese developers are very interested in.
Vitalik: Yes, I remember the first time I came to China was in 2014. I went from Xi'an to Beijing, then to Shanghai, Hangzhou, Shenzhen, and a little bit of every place. At that time, I felt that there were already many companies, teams, developers, and brands in China doing various things. I remember visiting exchanges such as OKCoin and Huobi, and found that they had more employees than the largest exchanges in the United States. There were also many Bitcoin miners, who were in the transition stage from FPGA to ASIC at that time, around 2013 to 2014.
I remember once when I went to Shenzhen, I saw a very large mining farm in the suburbs, which had a large number of mining machines. At that time, I already felt that China's computing power was very strong, and various teams were actively promoting the development of Bitcoin and blockchain.
At that time, I noticed that these Chinese teams, projects, and companies were very large, but almost no one abroad knew of their existence and had no awareness at all. At that time, internationally, basically everyone only knew about Ethereum and miners, but the Chinese ecosystem was already doing a lot of more in-depth things.
I remember that in 2015, you and some other companies had already started doing some very interesting things. Since 2015, the Chinese community has made many important early contributions to the development of Ethereum. Thank you very much for your support at such an early stage.
I still remember that you bought a lot of Ethereum Foundation tokens. The Foundation really needed the money at the time, and it survived with that money. Later, I also felt that the Chinese community became more and more complex and diverse, and everyone began to work in many different directions, such as protocol research, cryptography research, formula algorithm research, etc.
In fact, it can be said that in 2015, there were really no particularly interesting blockchain projects in other places except Israel and San Francisco. But in 2016, I remember that you launched many projects, and now you can see that there are many excellent research teams working on ZK (zero-knowledge proof), AI and other directions, which shows that the quality of the community has become very high.
How Vitalik learned Chinese in one year and gave speeches in Chinese
Xiao Feng: I told Vitalik the day before yesterday that we should speak Chinese in this conversation, hahahaha. Just now I recalled that in early 2015, when we were together, he actually didn’t speak a word of Chinese. But one day he told me that he wanted to start learning Chinese. A year later, probably in August 2016, in September of that year, Wanxiang Blockchain held a "Blockchain Week" in Shanghai, and he was our main guest.
I contacted him in August and asked him to send me a copy of the PPT if he had one, so that I could find someone to translate it into Chinese and English for the participants to understand better. But he told me that it was not necessary, he would write the PPT in Chinese and give the speech in Chinese. It only took one year, and I was very curious, how did you manage to not only learn to speak Chinese but also write a speech in Chinese in such a short time? This is actually much more difficult than just being able to speak.
Of course, I also recall that in May 2016, we went to New York, San Francisco, and London together. I remember in a taxi in New York, Vitalik, me, and Shen Bo from Distributed Capital, the three of us were chatting in the car. At that time, Shen Bo and I were discussing something in Chinese. Before we finished talking, Vitalik took out his phone and asked me, "Is that the word you just said mean this?" This is how he learned Chinese, just a little bit at a time. But I still want to hear how you learned Chinese so quickly?
Vitalik: I have tried many different ways to learn a new language. My first step is usually to use an audio course called Pimsleur, which is available in many languages. Each course has 90 episodes, each lasting 30 minutes. They start with the basics, such as the first lesson is "Hello," "I am in the United States," and "I am in China," and the content of each lesson becomes more complex.
The course method is to listen repeatedly, read along, and answer questions. During the whole process, you will keep speaking and repeating, and gradually master the basic expressions.
Later, I added the "character recognition" part, because Chinese requires not only speaking, but also understanding the concept of Chinese characters, which is more complicated than many other languages. I used a memory card app to learn 20 Chinese characters every day. The system would repeatedly test whether you remembered the meaning and pronunciation of these characters. Just keep practicing and accumulate slowly.
The only truly effective way to learn is to communicate with people. Whether it is voice or chat software, speak and write as much as possible whenever you have the chance. I remember when I traveled to some cities in China, I would deliberately look at the road signs of every street, because they all had Chinese and pinyin on them. Through the continuous accumulation of this daily scene, I can learn new things every day.
After about one or two years, the most important thing is to put yourself in a full Chinese language environment, so that you can continue to understand more content and practice more expressions. If you are in this environment every day, you will naturally become more and more proficient.
How do you view Chinese developers’ contributions and feelings towards Ethereum?
Xiao Feng: I still remember that in January 2016, Wanxiang Blockchain and Deloitte jointly held the first Ethereum hackathon in Shanghai. At that time, more than 100 people flew in from all over the world to attend the event, most of whom were Chinese, coming from Beijing or the southwest. But there were also some international participants, such as a high school student from Italy who flew to Shanghai to participate. He came alone, and we formed a team for him on the spot. As a result, his team won the first prize.
Later, this high school student approached Wanxiang Blockchain and asked if he could join our team. He said he didn’t plan to return to Italy. We advised him to at least finish high school and get into college before considering the future. As a result, a year later, he returned to Europe to participate in a project called LTA, and later became a technical backbone of the project.
The reason I tell this story is that the Chinese developer community has made a lot of contributions to Ethereum’s community building, technology development, and marketing since 2015, 2016, and 2017, and they also have a deep affection for Ethereum. This is not just a technical investment, but more of a deep love.
I remember when you gave a speech at the Wanxiang Blockchain Forum in 2016, you were so well received that you were treated like a star, even more enthusiastically than now. So next, I would like to represent the Chinese Ethereum community and Chinese developers, whether they are currently developing directly on Ethereum or not, everyone is very eager to hear you or the Ethereum Foundation express some ideas. How do you hope to support Chinese developers and help them better play a role in the Ethereum ecosystem, build communities, and develop applications?
Vitalik: Yes, I think one of the important points is that we have actually solved a lot of information gap problems. In the past, communities such as China, India, and Latin America did not know a lot of things, but now the situation has improved a lot.
For example, during the three days I was here, I met many community activities and organizers, who already had a deep understanding of topics such as account abstraction and consensus algorithms. This shows that our information connection is getting better.
In addition, we recently launched a project called Deep Funding, which is an open competition. Anyone who can provide a good AI model and answer community questions will receive a reward. I met a participant at another event last year, and he is now working on such a project. This kind of connection is becoming more and more common, bringing many positive effects.
As for what we need most now, it is actually more specific "applications". But sometimes I don't like the word "application" because it is too general. For example, Facebook is also called an application, Tencent is also called an application, then if Ethereum is just summarized as an "application", it is actually difficult to reflect the unique value of this industry.
I hope to see more people pushing forward in some niche areas, such as DeFi (including real assets such as RWA), decentralized social, info finance, etc. It doesn’t mean that a hundred people should work together to make an application, but they should be distributed in different directions, and each direction should have 20 to 30 talents pushing forward in depth, so that the community will be more interesting and more promising.
In fact, there are already many teams working on communities, discussing topics, organizing activities, and attracting developer participation. These are all very encouraging things. The Ethereum Foundation also has many local community support programs. For example, for the various activities you have seen in the past few days, we will provide different forms of support - including funding, tools, platform resources, etc.
The goal of our foundation is not to control the Ethereum ecosystem, but to promote its self-growth. The ideal situation for us is that if we do something today, we will no longer need to do it in the future because the ecosystem is strong enough and autonomous enough.
Another important point is about L1 (Layer 1) development. In fact, everyone can start on their own in this regard. They don’t need to know anyone in particular, nor do they need the approval of the foundation. As long as they have passion and ability, they can directly participate.
Another problem we are working on recently is the definition and promotion of L2 decentralized standards (stage 0, stage 1, stage 2). Many L2 projects now claim to be decentralized, but the standards are not clear and are more of a marketing gimmick. We hope to use a set of clear technical standards to judge, such as meeting certain security requirements and technical specifications, so that it can be recognized as a true stage 2 decentralized network.
This approach can make the entire ecosystem fairer and easier for newcomers and small teams to participate.
We have the same idea for the development of L1. Now our researcher Justin Drake is promoting a project called Beam Chain, which can be said to be an attempt at Ethereum POS 2.0. We have done a lot of research on POS (Proof of Stake) in the past decade, and now we have a deeper understanding of algorithms, quantum security, and game theory. We hope to bring these results together in a new L1 experimental project so that teams around the world can participate.
There are at least 7 candidate teams for Beam Chain. I know that teams from Shanghai Jiaotong University and some domestic universities are also conducting related research. If anyone is interested in this direction, I strongly recommend that you pay attention and get involved.
The problem that L1 research currently faces is that if you don’t know people in the relevant group, it’s hard to participate even if you have good technology. This is a problem we particularly want to solve. Therefore, Beam Chain’s research and development will adopt a completely open approach to attract more new teams to participate in the construction from scratch, so that Ethereum’s basic layer can evolve in the long term.
How can blockchain break through the "Blockchain Trilemma"? When will "WeChat-level" applications appear?
Xiao Feng: Haha, yes, after what you said just now, I actually have three questions to discuss with you. The first question is, everyone knows that there is a theory called "The Blockchain Trilemma of Blockchain" - that is, decentralization, security and performance, you can't have all three at the same time, you can only take into account two of them and sacrifice the third. This is not just a problem of blockchain, many other systems, such as the exchange rate mechanism, also have similar logic, which is essentially a mathematical problem.
So how can blockchain significantly improve performance and scalability while ensuring decentralization and security? If efficiency and scalability cannot be improved, it will not be able to support large-scale applications. From the perspective of cost and user experience, it seems that solving this triangular problem on a plane is not feasible.
So my personal opinion is that, until today, I still believe that only the layered architecture proposed by Ethereum, that is, the L1 and L2 approach, is the best solution to this "Blockchain Trilemma". You just mentioned the relationship between L1 and L2.
But then I want to ask from another perspective - how to solve the problem of "ease of use"? That is to lower the threshold for using this technology to the lowest, lower the cost to the lowest, and maximize the experience. Because only under the premise of being truly easy to use, a high-tech new product or service can be adopted by a wider range of people.
Our industry has been asking a question: When will the "killer application" in the blockchain field appear? That is, the application with a large number of users. The premise of large-scale application must be higher performance, lower cost, and stronger scalability.
Just like the computer system evolved from the original DOS command line operating system to the graphical interface, and then to the mobile Internet APP, the threshold for use has been lowered step by step. If we still use the DOS command line today, I am afraid that there will not be hundreds of millions of people using computers in the world. So after Microsoft launched the graphical operating system, the number of users expanded from millions to hundreds of millions, and then billions. Finally, the popularity of mobile Internet allows operations to be completed with one finger, reaching the scale of more than 5 billion Internet users worldwide today.
So what I want to ask is: our current layered architecture is good, but the threshold of "ease of use" is still too high. When will the "APP moment" of blockchain appear? In other words, behind a complex Web3 system, ordinary users can access it through a super APP without any perception, just like WeChat - no matter how complex the system is, users can use it by just clicking an icon. When will this "WeChat-level" blockchain experience appear? I think that will be the real node for the outbreak of killer applications. What do you think?
Vitalik: Yes, I think it will take a long time to achieve that moment. We are indeed making progress, but there are still some technical problems that have not been fully solved.
As I mentioned in my speech this morning, Ethereum is still facing challenges in terms of scalability. You may remember that I mentioned in my speech in 2015 that the development of blockchain faces four technical challenges: the first is scalability, the second is POS (proof of stake), the third is privacy protection, and the fourth is security.
Now, zero-knowledge proof (ZK) is developing rapidly, and scalability has been significantly improved. The POS mechanism has been successfully launched, but there is still room for further optimization; in terms of security, we not only focus on the security of the protocol itself, but also on the security of user accounts.
For example, in the past, there were two extreme options for users to manage their assets on the chain: one was complete self-custody, storing private keys on computers, mobile phones, or even paper. This was very decentralized, but too complicated and dangerous for most people, and even difficult for me.
Another way is to use centralized services, but this brings up trust issues. The collapse of MT.Gox and FTX are obvious examples.
So our current work focuses on how to find a better balance between the two. For example, we now have a series of solutions such as multi-sig, account abstraction, ZK Email, etc., all of which are aimed at improving user experience and reducing security risks.
Going back to the "APP moment" you just mentioned, I think that we have achieved about 50% to 70% of the four goals we set in 2015. As long as we solve the remaining technical problems, the application will definitely come.
Why do I believe this? Because we have seen some cases, such as Worldcoin now has 10 million users, Sony, Kraken, Deutsche Bank and other institutions have also deployed L2 on Ethereum, and there are many countries, such as Argentina, Turkey, and some areas in Southeast Asia, where a large number of users are using stablecoins, ETH, and DeFi services.
All these indicate that the infrastructure is almost ready. As long as the final user experience bottleneck can be overcome and developers are willing to invest, killer applications are entirely possible.
So I'm optimistic. We're going to have that "app moment". OK.
How to make L2 lighter and easier to build: move the dirty work to L1, and L2 pays the fees
Xiao Feng: You just mentioned that traditional large institutions like Deutsche Bank have also started to build the second layer (L2) on Ethereum. We also launched Hashtag Chain in December last year, which is an L2 based on Ethereum. But in the process of building HushKey Chain, I always have a feeling that compared with developing an APP, the cost of building an L2 chain is still very high.
For example, if you want to build an L2 from scratch, it may take 20 engineers and a whole year. Not only do you have to build the chain itself, but you also have to make browsers, wallets, development tools, etc. It is far from being as simple as "writing a chain". During the operation of this chain, the cost of technical operation and maintenance alone may reach millions of dollars per year.
Of course, I know that L2 cannot be as cheap, fast, and low-cost as mobile APP, but if you think about it from another perspective, for those who want to start an L2 project from scratch, the threshold is indeed too high. They have to recruit 20 professional developers and solve various integration and operation and maintenance problems.
So I now have a "fantastic" suggestion: Can these "dirty and hard work" be sunk to L1 as much as possible? In other words, L1 can provide more basic capabilities to make L2 itself lighter, thinner, and easier to develop. In this way, there is no need to invest so much manpower, time, and resources to build an L2 like HushKey. Do you think it is possible? When can it be realized?
Vitalik: We are actually already doing this. Let me give you some specific examples.
One of the high costs of L2 is integration. That is to say, application developers on L2 usually need to access various basic services, such as Oracle, Filecoin, identity system, etc., which need to be deployed and managed separately.
So what we are doing now is to make the connection between L2 and L1 more efficient. I also mentioned this topic this morning. For example:
The first step is to improve the communication efficiency between L1 and L2. Currently, it takes about a week to submit the status from L2 back to L1. We hope to reduce it to one hour first, and eventually to 12 seconds. This will significantly reduce the latency of data transmission.
The second is that L1 introduces an opcode called L1SLOAD, which means that the EVM on L2 can directly read the data on L1. For example, if each L2 needs to deploy an Oracle independently, it is actually a waste of resources. But if you can directly read the Oracle information on L1, you can share data and reduce duplication.
Another example is wallets. If we want users to support Account Abstraction, such as being able to freely change private keys, switch signature algorithms, etc., the current practice is to issue transactions on each L2 to update the settings every time, which is very troublesome. But if we deploy these key account information on L1, we only need to change it once on L1, and each L2 can read the status synchronously, and this problem is solved.
This is also the concept of "Keystore Wallet" that I proposed - the core state of the user's wallet is stored in L1, and all L2 can read it directly, truly realizing a shared account structure.
Therefore, as long as we can do a good job in the interface design between L1 and L2, we can make L2 lighter and developers do not need to reinvent the wheel.
Moreover, this model can bring an additional benefit: we can promote the emergence of "L1 and L2 hybrid apps". These applications are no longer exclusive to L1 or L2, but can use data and services of both layers at the same time to achieve a more powerful combination of functions.
Xiao Feng: If L1 can take on more "dirty, tiring and hard work", it will indeed solve a core problem that everyone is criticizing. Because many people currently say that L2 has created a lot of value, but this value has not been fed back to L1. L1 provides infrastructure, but in the end it does not capture the value it deserves.
If L1 can provide more basic services and make L2 lighter and easier to use, then L2 should pay for these services and return part of the value to L1. This is not only technically reasonable, but also a "value return" mechanism in the economic model. Being able to do this is definitely good news for the entire Ethereum ecosystem.
You just mentioned the issue of decentralization. Now there are indeed some projects that are decentralized for the sake of decentralization, and they put up a photo and say they are "Ethereum native" and "decentralized." But at the application layer, the problem becomes much more complicated.
For example, the RWA (Real World Assets) you mentioned, the fact that real assets are put on the chain is essentially impossible to be completely decentralized. Because the issuance of any RWA is almost legally considered as a securities issuance, it must involve issuers, operators, approval processes and regulatory agencies, which inevitably involve centralized elements.
So I think we have to be realistic. At the infrastructure level, Ethereum must remain decentralized, open, and permissionless. But at the application level, decentralization is not a panacea. The key is to find a balance between "minimizing trust" and "maximizing efficiency" rather than sticking to a certain form.
Discussion on the scope of application of "decentralization" and "centralization"
Xiao Feng: The issuance of a security asset will naturally involve the issuer, operator, approver and regulator, and there will definitely be some centralization or some degree of centralized elements. If we want to combine blockchain with traditional finance and build a new financial infrastructure with the help of Ethereum or other blockchain systems, we must face this reality.
Finance is strictly regulated because it has strong negative externalities. In the traditional financial field, the so-called "cutting leeks" behavior is illegal because it reduces social welfare, creates risks and unfairness, and therefore requires regulation. Once this negative externality is introduced into the blockchain world, it cannot be ignored.
As the integration of blockchain and the real world deepens, I think it is reasonable to "layer" the system. As an infrastructure, Ethereum L1 must adhere to decentralization. Just like the basic protocols of the Internet (such as the IP protocol) are open source and permissionless, anyone who uses the IP protocol to build a network does not need to obtain authorization from others. This openness is the foundation for the development of the Internet.
The same is true for blockchain technology. As an underlying protocol, its core value lies in open source, permissionless, and decentralized. But at the application layer, the situation is different. Internet applications are essentially centralized. The Web3 world does not necessarily have to copy this structure, but the rationality of centralization in certain areas cannot be ignored. How do you view this balance of "centralization vs. decentralization", especially at the application layer?
Vitalik: Yes, at the application layer, if we are dealing with issues such as real economic activities and relationships between people, complete decentralization or complete trustlessness is impossible.
Why do I say that? Because many behaviors in the real world cannot be proven by cryptography. For example, if I want to sell you a mobile phone, you first transfer 0.5 ETH to me through Ethereum, and then I send the phone to you through DHL. After you receive the phone, you confirm the transaction on the chain.
But the problem is that in this process, the chain cannot verify whether I really sent the phone. You can't use cryptographic methods to prove "I put the phone in the package" or "DHL did take the phone away."
Perhaps in the future we can use some very advanced zero-knowledge proof (ZK) technology to prove that I really gave the phone to DHL, or DHL issued a verifiable logistics proof on the chain (such as ZK + TLS Notary) — but even so, you still have to trust DHL and believe that I really put the phone in. Such problems exist widely in the real world and are areas that cryptography cannot fully cover.
Of course, the role of blockchain and cryptography is to reduce the need for this kind of "trust" as much as possible. Because when the trust threshold is high, only large institutions that are widely trusted can participate, and ordinary people are excluded, which is not conducive to fairness.
What we can do through blockchain technology is to allow more people to have the right to participate. For example, RWA (real world assets) can be issued in the form of tokens. For example, I issue a Filecoin token, a total of 1 million units. I only issue 1 million on the chain, and the system can publicly verify that there is no over-issuance. And through ZK technology, I can also prove to the chain that I do have USD or HKD assets corresponding to these 1 million tokens in a certain bank account.
For example, if a government wants to issue digital identity IDs, the public may worry that it secretly issues "ghost IDs" to manipulate elections or social platforms. If these IDs are published on the chain and the total amount is visible, the public can confirm that the government has only issued 1 million, not 2 million. This mechanism can greatly reduce the cost of trusting the government.
This trust-reducing mechanism can improve efficiency on the one hand, and enhance fairness on the other. This is because the high trust threshold means that small organizations or individuals find it difficult to participate, and only large institutions that are widely trusted can enter. Once the verification mechanism can replace trust, more people will have opportunities, which will make the economy and society more open and fair.
Of course, in some rare scenarios, such as the verification of math competition questions, complete decentralization can indeed be achieved. For example, if I design a smart contract, if you can submit a valid ZKP (zero-knowledge proof) that satisfies a certain formula, I will give you a reward; otherwise, I will not give you a reward. This type of scenario is suitable for fully automatic and verifiable logic loops.
But in 99% of economic activities in the real world, this idealized completely decentralized mechanism is not possible.
Xiao Feng: Yes, I agree. This is actually a point we must always remind ourselves when developing Web3 or blockchain applications - not all problems can be solved by decentralization.
Of course, we should try to use the parts that can be solved by decentralization, because it can reduce the cost of trust and improve the fairness, efficiency and transparency of the system. However, for those scenarios that need to connect to the physical world and require behavior verification, such as mobile phone transactions and physical logistics, the on-chain mechanism cannot currently cover all of them.
The example you just gave is a good one. We still have to trust DHL to deliver the phone and believe that it actually completes the delivery.
So we should not be obsessed with "100% decentralization from the bottom layer to the application layer". Decentralization is not the goal, it is just a means to achieve a more efficient, fairer and lower-cost economic system. We should make good use of it, but also accept its boundaries and limitations.
Now, Ethereum has entered the layered architecture stage, which I believe is the prerequisite for blockchain to move towards large-scale application.
How do Chinese and American developers collaborate when launching large-scale applications?
Xiao Feng: Well, now this new stage has arrived. Vitalik just mentioned that many key technologies, including the continuous optimization of L2, are advancing rapidly. We are also gradually approaching the threshold of large-scale application of blockchain.
From the Internet, AI to cryptocurrency, we can see an interesting phenomenon: the top 15 Internet platforms in the world, except for the United States, are basically Chinese companies. The same is true for AI big models. In addition to the United States, China has also proven its R&D capabilities, such as through DeepSync, Huawei, Baidu, etc. However, countries like Japan, India, the European Union, and the United Kingdom have not yet come up with a competitive big model. In other words, technical capabilities are not evenly distributed around the world.
I think a similar pattern will emerge in blockchain. Although developers are spread all over the world, they are mainly concentrated in two language circles: the English circle (centered on the United States) and the Chinese circle (centered on China). The scale of English developers is indeed larger, but Chinese developers also constitute another large ecological group.
So the question is: if we really want to push Ethereum into the large-scale application stage, how should Chinese developers, product managers, operators, and users participate? In fact, Chinese people are very capable in the application layer. They have won in the "volume" since the Internet era, creating a large number of excellent product managers and platform operators.
For example, among the top ten digital asset exchanges in the world, more than half are founded or operated by Chinese. Why? Because the technical essence of Bitcoin is the same in all exchanges, but customer experience and user service are areas where Chinese people are obviously better at.
So if we recognize that Ethereum is entering a development phase dominated by applications, how can we better leverage the advantages of Chinese developers? Not just developers, but also operators and users. There are more than 1.4 billion Chinese Internet users, plus Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan and overseas Chinese, which is a huge market. Do we have a strategy for this group to encourage them to develop applications on Ethereum and promote adoption?
Vitalik: Yes, this is a very critical issue.
First of all, I think that the Ethereum Foundation should not be the one to “directly undertake” the development of applications. We don’t want everyone to still rely on the Foundation to promote the development of the ecosystem in five or ten years. We hope that every local community in the world can grow up, have the ability to promote itself, and organize, incubate, and implement various projects on its own.
In recent years, we have noticed that the developer communities in China, Asia, and even Africa have grown and established more and more communication links with our foundation, especially in promoting local developer organizations, project incubation, and talent training.
There are two reasons why we don’t want to do everything:
The first reason is to avoid centralization. A healthy ecosystem cannot rely entirely on a centralized organization. We hope that Ethereum can evolve on its own, rather than the foundation taking the lead in promoting every application or project.
The second reason is limited resources. You may not believe it, but the amount of ETH held by the foundation is even less than that of Justin Sun(laughs). Our budget is very limited, and many organizations in the community actually have stronger financial strength than us.
Moreover, fundamentally speaking, applications can generate their own blood. If you make a valuable application, you can attract users, obtain investment, and achieve profitability. Therefore, we pay more attention to those areas where "if the foundation does not do it, no one else will do it."
For example, L1 core research and development, ZK Email, Account Abstraction, ZK Wrapper and other infrastructure components. These are directions with high barriers and low commercial returns, so we are willing to provide more support.
However, for the development of DApps, wallets and other applications, they are actually already profitable and no longer need to be promoted by the foundation itself.
Therefore, our strategy is to focus on supporting the growth of local communities. We hope to help more developers understand the core concepts and architecture of Ethereum, such as L1, L2, ZK, clients, etc., and guide them to explore specific application scenarios.
We have no way to build and manage all communities around the world, so we need to work with local organizations to allow them to build their own developer ecosystems within their own cultural and language backgrounds.
We have already taken some actions in this regard. Compared with two years ago, communication and cooperation with Asian developers have become much smoother.
We also encourage everyone to actively express their needs. If you encounter problems or have specific needs during the project, our foundation is willing to provide support. We hope that in the next one or two years, every city will have a stronger developer community and breed a new generation of core builders of Ethereum.
This transformation has actually already begun, and we believe it can develop better and broader.
Ethereum should set up an office in Hong Kong and restart hackathons and workshops in mainland China
Xiao Feng: Yes, just like you said, the foundation focuses on doing things that application developers cannot do independently, such as ZK (zero-knowledge proof), Layer 1 protocol research, etc. This is correct. Because the foundation should have a clear positioning. When application developers build on Ethereum, they may indeed need the support and help of the foundation and the Ethereum community to understand how to do better on Ethereum. This help may not necessarily be funding, but more likely technical guidance, resource docking, or even exposure channels.
So we are holding this meeting at ETH Action today and have invited Ethereum community representatives from various Asian countries. We hope that there will be such a gathering of the Asian Ethereum community every year. Everyone can exchange ideas on how to promote Ethereum applications and technologies in Asia. This is a good platform in itself.
On this basis, I have two suggestions for the Ethereum Foundation:
The first suggestion is that I hope the Ethereum Foundation can set up an office in Hong Kong. This will be very helpful to the Ethereum community in Asia, including application developers. This office is not only a symbolic existence, but also a contact window that can actually provide technical consultation, coaching resources, and exposure opportunities. Many developers do not necessarily need money from the foundation, but they do need a place to seek support and connections, especially for some start-up projects.
In fact, one of the purposes of our two-day meeting is to help these developers and projects increase exposure, establish connections, and find cooperative resources. This is the first suggestion, and you can see that everyone has expressed their support with applause just now, haha.
The second suggestion is that I think the foundation, including you, should return to mainland China and restart face-to-face interaction with Chinese developers. You did a very good job in the past. I remember that you often came to Shanghai in 2017 and 2018, but it was interrupted due to the epidemic.
Now that the epidemic is over, it is a good time to resume this interaction. For example, the Foundation can consider restarting hackathons and workshops in the mainland; you can also go to various places in person to communicate with developers face to face. In October this year, we will hold the 11th Blockchain Global Summit in Shanghai. You have participated in the previous seven consecutive sessions in the past, and we also welcome you to participate again.
We at Wanxiang Blockchain are very willing to assist and promote this. We hope to restart Ethereum workshops and hackathons in multiple cities in the mainland. This form is not just an event, but also a substantive guidance for developers, helping them master Ethereum technology and create more practical applications. These are the two suggestions I would like to give to the Foundation and you today.
Vitalik: Okay, thank you very much, Mr. Xiao. Thank you for your support to the Ethereum community, the Foundation, and the entire blockchain ecosystem for so many years. I really appreciate it.
Xiao Feng: Okay, thank you everyone. That’s all for today’s conversation. I can guarantee that we didn’t have any rehearsal or communication before this.
BUTA: Hahaha, OK, thank you.
