World second largest cryptocurrency Ethereum is 6 years old today after its genesis block went live exactly 2191 days ago on the 30th of July, 2015.
Since launch ethereum has cemented its position as the King of Smart Contracts and the Queen of the Cryptocurrency Market. A position it has held with great style and prestige over the past years.
What is a Genesis Block?
Genesis block as the word describes it the first block ever mined in any blockchain. The Genesis block is key to understanding the full history of a blockchain network.
Launched in 2015, Ethereum has had several ups and downs but the network has remained running despite the several issues it has had over the years. One of these issues is the scalability challenges it has been working to resolve since the launch of the network.
The fees on Ethereum during network congestion is also another challenge which the first smart contract blockchain has been trying to resolve over the past years and thankfully to new Improvement Proposals – the EIP 1559, this will still be a thing of the past.
Ethereum Scalability Challenges
Ethereum by design has not been able to accommodate huge network capacity. This is why Crypto Game such as the Crypto Kitties was able to bring the network down to its knees in 2017.
Despite this, Ethereum has been working on various means to overcome its native challenges such as in Layer 2 scaling solutions and a full migration from its native consensus mechanism Proof of Work (PoW) to Proof of Stake (PoS).
While a lot of work has been put on migration of Ethereum to PoS, the industry awaits the full launch of the new POS Ethereum and what it will mean for the entire blockchain industry and user experience in the now and in the future.
Ethereum has been the bedrock of great innovations in the space and has been where bull runs had been birth, what would be the market reaction when Ethereum POS is on? That’s a beautiful question.
Ethereum Killers
Since the launch of ethereum and the noticing of its technological limitations, several projects have popped up claiming to rival the King of smart contracts and take a share from its market share. Some of these projects have made some progress in their own right, but non has been able to push ether away from its spot.
For now, Ethereum is six years old and but where are the Ethereum Killers?
