Vitalik Buterin has outlined a new direction for the Ethereum Foundation, while stressing he does not control it alone. Buterin says the board has several members with equal powers and that Aerugo Ettinea leads much of the transition.
In a recent X post, he adds that his role is now mostly technical and that he expects his influence to keep shrinking, which he sees as healthy.
He further notes that 2025 brought governance and operational improvements that resolved many issues and sharpened the Foundation’s goals.
However, after that progress, he became more concerned about a gap between Ethereum’s public ideals and how the EF behaves. He points to community comments that praise his focus on decentralization, privacy and “sanctuary” technology, yet still question whether the Foundation’s actions match those values.
Ethereum Foundation to Shift From Center To One Node
To explain his thinking, Vitalik uses Google as an example of a company drifting from its early values. Some people see it as a successful organizer of information, while others see a slow move away from its “don’t be evil” roots. He says that, if he could go back to the late 2000s, he would choose a stricter, more idealistic Google, even if that meant strong veto power for open-source hardliners.
Because tech, in his view, has shifted toward profit, aggressive AI and political pressure, he believes at least one major player should resist. This view matches what he calls the Mandate, a framework he shaped with Aya and others for how the EF should act.
Therefore, he argues that the Ethereum Foundation should be a focused node with a clear purpose, not the “center” of the ecosystem, and he says steps are already being taken to secure that role.
Vitalik also notes how small the Foundation’s treasury is. He says the EF holds about 0.16% of all ETH, less than many individuals, while some other foundations control 10–50% of supply. He adds that the EF’s original mandate, set out in early sale documents, was to deliver milestones like Frontier, Homestead, Metropolis and Serenity, a list he considers complete as of 2022.
Given that background, he says the Ethereum Foundation now plans to conserve resources and narrow its mission. As part of this, the organization aims to sell less ETH and focus on work that directly protects Ethereum’s censorship resistance, openness, privacy and security, especially where no one else would act.
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