Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin says the crypto industry may be overcomplicating the practical uses of blockchain.
After attending a real-world cryptocurrency conference focused on cryptographic research, Buterin published an article on X saying that stepping out of the typical blockchain bubble helped him rethink Ethereum’s core role.
Instead of starting with Ethereum and trying to find places to use it, he suggested that developers should first ask what tools are needed to build secure, open and censorship-resistant technology.
Viewed in this light, Ethereum’s most important function may be surprisingly simple: serving as what cryptographers call a “public bulletin board.”
Many secure digital systems require a place where information can be published and verified publicly. This could include things like secure voting systems, lists of revoked digital certificates, or records used in encryption protocols. These systems do not necessarily require complex smart contracts or financial transactions, but rather a shared location where data can be reliably stored and accessed.
Ethereum can play this role because it provides a decentralized network where anyone can publish data and anyone can read the data.
Buterin said recent upgrades to Ethereum have made this use more practical. An upgrade called PeerDAS increases the amount of data the network can store and share, with plans to further expand capacity in the future.
While these systems don’t always require payment, there is usually some financial cost to preventing spam on the open network. This is where Ethereum’s native token, Ethereum (ETH), comes into play.
Payments can help protect decentralized services from abuse. Buterin gave the example of if a messaging app allowed anyone to create unlimited accounts for free, attackers could flood the system with spam. Requiring a small fee in ETH could make such an attack expensive while still keeping the system open to anyone.
Buterin also noted that Ethereum could help drive new payment systems. Technologies like zero-knowledge payment channels allow people to pay small amounts for services while keeping transactions private.
Smart contracts still play an important role, especially in holding deposits or enabling automated agreements between users.
Overall, Buterin described Ethereum as a “global shared memory”—an infrastructure that allows many different applications to store data, exchange value, and coordinate with each other.
“There is a lot of value in Ethereum, and if you take a step back and think of it purely as a technical tool: global shared memory, you can see that in the fundamental principles,” he wrote.
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