Nov. 1, 2024: ETH to Vyper, "EF YOU!" 🖕🐍
Ethereum has had it with these EF-ing Sneks
Yesterday the Ethereum Foundation spun out the “Argot Collective,” a well-funded non-profit organization meant to focus on maintaining various EVM languages.
Sounds like a great thing, right? Who could possibly object?
As the saying goes, “step on snek and find out.”
The Vyper community would quickly gnash their fangs at the exclusion of Vyper from this list.
The context here is that the cash-strapped Vyper community has been pushing on the Ethereum Foundation for funding for some time, but had been told that languages weren’t really within the foundation’s mission.
The poor usage of the other languages that secured an extended runway is a particular blow. Some of these languages are scarcely in development. The last FE major release was almost exactly a year ago, and the last repo commit was two months ago (in which they were doing legwork for a grant).
Meanwhile, the case for funding Vyper is quite strong. It’s heavily used. It’s secured loads of TVL. It has a rabid following.
In fact, some recent data munging shows it may even be considered as the safest language.
The rough part is it’s the devs who are hurt the most here. We’re of the opinion that top devs should be spared the politicking and allowed to focus on building great things.
Particularly because the Vyper devs are notably in an elite tier.
How elite? Yugely! Many people are saying they’re the greatest…
Except, of course, the haters and losers…
Leviathan News polled to ask what users thought. Thanks to some clever vote splitting, the plurality voted yes.
Now, we don’t actually believe the EF has a “conspiracy.” We don’t particularly believe nearly any assemblage of humans in numbers greater than 1 is capable of committing a conspiracy.
Yet grumblings against the EF have a long and storied history. Look at this handsome gem from a couple years back…
We’re not so much referring to traders’ occasional discontent that the foundation sells $ETH at the local maximum. More so that they have a difficult time remaining as credibly neutral as their namesake blockchain.
We wrote just earlier this week how much we felt the wider Ethereum community could benefit from funding Vyper, and our plea remains true.
While several Vyper advocates clearly felt snakebit by the announcement, some Vyper chads had a more nuanced take. Consider that a 5-10 year funding runway can in fact evaporate fairly quickly. Within just a few years they may well need to seek funding again. Solidity devs being forced to be responsive to the broader market might be a change. Previously they’ve only needed to be responsive to the internal politics of the Ethereum Foundation. Forced to brawl among the masses might wind up making Solidity a better language, which is good for everybody.
Another potential silver lining is that Vyper can position itself a bit as an underdog, with entrenched interests aligned pushing to keep it down.
As far as the underdog narrative arc goes, it’s really been remarkable to see what Vyper has been able to spin up despite an allegedly hostile reception from the powers-that-be. While over-funding other languages has done quite little, just think what Vyper could accomplish with a bit of money.
Stay bullish Vyper, bullish Ethereum, and bullish all crypto innovations!
Disclaimers! Author speaks only for himself, not for Vyper, Curve, or anything else.