A sharply critical essay titled What happened to ethereum ? argues that Ethereum’s biggest setback did not come from rival chains, but from its own strategic choices. Written by Pavel Paramonov and later adapted by BlockTempo, the piece says the network spent years draining momentum through roadmap confusion, ideological disputes, and misaligned incentives, leaving the rollup-centric vision in a weaker position than many supporters expected.
The rollup-first plan did not unfold as promised
The article revisits Ethereum’s original pitch: Rollups and Validiums would handle scale, users would transact on L2s, and Ethereum L1 would focus on verification and settlement. The appeal was obvious. Building a rollup appeared faster and easier than launching a new Layer 1, which fed the idea that the ecosystem could expand through a large number of Ethereum-linked execution environments.
According to the author, that vision never translated into a stable direction. Instead, Ethereum drifted into prolonged arguments over identity, governance, and whether the ecosystem should keep defending a rollup-centric path that was no longer producing clear results. One example in the essay is the debate over whether certain L2s should even be considered part of Ethereum, with Base used as a focal point. The author’s complaint is simple: these fights consumed energy without resolving what users actually needed.
Technical superiority did not bring broad adoption
The essay also takes aim at the endless comparisons between Based Rollups, Native Rollups, Booster Rollups, and other design variants. In the author’s view, the market outcome remained largely unchanged, with Arbitrum and Base continuing to dominate attention and usage. That gap between theory and adoption sits at the heart of the criticism.
Paramonov points to @0xFacet, described as the first rollup to reach Stage 2, as a case that should have validated Ethereum alignment in practice. Yet the article asks where the users, developers, and vocal supporters were when that milestone arrived. The implication is not that the engineering work lacked merit, but that technical purity alone was not enough to attract durable demand.
Decentralized sequencers ran into revenue reality
A central argument in the piece is that economics, not engineering, became the real bottleneck. The author says projects including Arbitrum, Scroll, Linea, zkSync, and Optimism all talked about decentralized sequencers, but very few followed through. Metis is mentioned as one project that did, though the article says the market largely ignored it.
The reason, the essay argues, is straightforward: giving up sequencer control can mean giving up revenue. It cites Base as an example, claiming that only about 5% of its revenue flows back to Ethereum. That, in the author’s framing, makes it hard to argue rollups are simply extensions of Ethereum. The article also references Taiko, saying there were periods when the fees it paid to Ethereum exceeded what it collected from users, a dynamic the author presents as evidence that “Ethereum-aligned” models can be financially punishing.
Weak token utility fed speculative behavior
The commentary goes on to name Eclipse, Movement, Blast, Gasp (Mangata), and Mantra as examples tied to what it sees as the excesses of the rollup narrative. The claim is that some teams leaned on messaging such as Ethereum alignment or bringing SVM into Ethereum, while failing to build long-term value underneath. In the author’s telling, many rollups eventually ran into the same structural problem: their native tokens had limited utility because users were still paying fees in ETH.
The essay extends that criticism to Ethereum’s treatment of Polygon. It argues the community never fully recognized Polygon as a real L2 even though it contributed materially to Ethereum’s asset growth during the 2021 bull market. For the author, that inconsistency exposed confusion over what Ethereum considered culturally aligned versus technically legitimate.
Developer pay and exits became part of the backlash
The article’s criticism does not stop at roadmap design. It also targets the Ethereum Foundation and the incentives available to key contributors. Paramonov writes that Ethereum may be decentralized technically, but remains culturally centered around Vitalik. He also revisits the Ultrasound Money narrative, arguing it lost force after ETH’s annual inflation rate turned positive in 2024, despite earlier momentum following EIP-1559 and the Merge.
One of the most pointed sections concerns compensation. The essay says chief engineer Péter Szilágyi earned about $100,000 a year, then notes that he has left, Danny Ryan has also left, and Dankrad Feist moved to Tempo. It also says Justin Drake and Dankrad faced community backlash after taking advisory roles with EigenLayer in 2024 and receiving token allocations. The broader claim is that Ethereum struggled to retain top builders while expecting them to accept unusually low financial upside.
Vitalik signals a shift as EF changes continue
Near the end, the piece points to a recent post from Vitalik in which he said the rollup-centric roadmap had failed and that Ethereum needed a different path, including scaling the L1 itself. The author treats that acknowledgment as meaningful, but also suggests it may have come late.
The article also notes recent changes at the Ethereum Foundation, including new leadership, treasury transparency, and a reorganization of research and development. It mentions the addition of younger talent such as Abbas Khan, Binji, and Lou3e. The essay does not close with a confident prediction. It leaves Ethereum facing a narrower question: whether these changes can rebuild momentum after years of internal strain.