U.Today - After sharing insights on The Merge and The Surge to enhance Ethereum's future, cofounder Vitalik Buterin has now shared insights into The Verge. In his post, Buterin said the ideal future for Ethereum is one in which everyone can participate in node verification on the mainnet.
Getting Ethereum staking properly decentralized
According to Vitalik Buterin, The Verge's core essence is to improve the protocol so that contributions to securing the platform are feasible for anyone, anywhere.At the moment, running a node requires sophisticated computing hardware. While Buterin noted that running a node on a normal laptop is theoretically possible, he said doing so is very difficult. To address this challenge, Ethereum will implement The Verge, which entails using Verkle Trees. Notably, a Verkle Tree offers a "structure that allows for much more compact proofs, enabling stateless validation of Ethereum blocks."
With this provision, a validator can run a node without the required balances. The time required to complete node verification is also slated at "a few hundred extra milliseconds." He foresees a future where running a node on mobile is possible.
In all, Vitalik Buterin stated the core goal of The Verge is to usher in stateless validation, in which storage requirements are minimal and long-term enhancements with SNARK and other technologies occur.
Setting example for layer-2 networks
Ethereum is a legacy protocol that has given birth to many layer-2 scaling solutions. While most of these alternative protocols are lighter than the main chain, Vitalik Buterin has always tried to set an example for Ethereum-dependent protocols to follow.The central idea behind The Verge is to create a system where more people can have a stake in Ethereum's functioning. This major push toward decentralization can benefit the Ethereum ecosystem greatly.
Having set a standard for L2s to attain stage-1 decentralization, Ethereum's entire future rebranding comes off as a way to lead by example.