I Read Ethereum’s Whitepaper So That You Don’t Have To

Ethereum has come a long way since its inception in 2013. In September 2022, Ethereum completed its long-awaited transition from Proof of Work (PoW) to Proof of Stake (PoS) through the event known as The Merge. This upgrade marked a significant milestone in Ethereum’s evolution, making it more energy-efficient and better aligned with long-term scalability goals. While the network has undergone multiple upgrades since—including Shanghai and Dencun—the foundational vision outlined by Vitalik Buterin in the Ethereum Whitepaper remains strikingly relevant today.

If you’re looking to understand the roots of Ethereum's architecture and design philosophy, the Whitepaper is a great place to start. However, its highly technical content can be daunting. This article offers a simplified yet comprehensive breakdown of the Whitepaper and highlights how many of its original ideas have shaped Ethereum’s trajectory.

Problems with Early Blockchain Networks/Protocols

Vitalik highlighted some problems he believed were hindering consensus protocols back in the early 2010s. Most of these protocols he argued were designed rigidly around a specific application.

“Up until this point all the protocols that have been invented have been specialized, attempting to offer detailed feature sets targeted toward specific industries or applications usually financial in nature”

For example, Namecoin functions solely as a decentralized name registration database while Colored coins only allow people to create their digital currencies. Beyond their main applications, these protocols do not offer much else.

The ever-changing nature of the crypto industry means that what developers have in mind for their protocols in terms of use cases one day might be obsolete one week later. Thus, there is power in generality.

Back then, if developers wanted to build a consensus protocol, they had two options: build an independent network or build their protocols on top of an existing blockchain network i.e. Bitcoin.

While the first option allows developers the freedom to build in any feature set, having to bootstrap an entire network from the ground up takes both time and money which makes implementation difficult. Furthermore, most applications are too small to warrant their blockchain networks.

The latter option requires building on top of an existing blockchain, Bitcoin being the only real option then. However, the limited capabilities and scalability issues of building protocols on top of Bitcoin also present issues for developers.

The Solution: Ethereum as a Generalized Platform

Vitalik Buterin had a very clear vision for Ethereum when he wrote the Whitepaper; Ethereum is to be more than just a digital currency. He wanted Ethereum to be an open software platform, powered by blockchain technology, that developers can easily build decentralized applications on. Ethereum is to be “the ultimate abstract foundational layer: a blockchain with a built-in Turing-complete programming language, allowing anyone to write smart contracts and decentralized applications where they can create their own arbitrary rules for ownership, transaction formats and state transition functions.”

Think of Ethereum as the operating system on which (decentralized) applications run. Developers who are looking to build decentralized applications on top of Ethereum’s chain can expect a fast and simple process. Rapid development time, security for small and rarely used applications and the ability of different applications to interact very efficiently are the things that were promised in the Whitepaper.

While Vitalik viewed Ethereum as an upgrade over Bitcoin, he still thought highly of certain aspects of Bitcoin’s network. For instance, he thought that the consensus mechanism that Bitcoin uses which allows distributed systems to collectively agree to update the ledger solved the important issue of deciding who gets a say in the consensus process while also simultaneously preventing Sybil attacks. In Bitcoin’s consensus mechanism, the weight that a miner has in the consensus voting process is directly proportional to the computing power that he or she can provide i.e Proof of Work.

Vitalik Buterin did not want Ethereum to replace existing aspects of cryptocurrency and blockchain networks but to build on them with some new additions.

Ethereum’s Core Applications

Vitalik outlined three primary categories of applications that Ethereum could support:

• Financial applications These include smart contracts, decentralized exchanges, sub-currencies, and derivatives. Ethereum’s programmability allows users to conduct transactions based on preset conditions—something Bitcoin’s scripting language could not support effectively.

• Semi-financial applications These involve both monetary and non-monetary components. For instance, a bounty program that rewards users for solving computational problems.

• Non-financial applications Examples include decentralized voting systems, file storage, identity management, and DAOs (Decentralized Autonomous Organizations). Through the types of applications that Ethereum supports, we see again how Vitalik wanted Ethereum to be more than just a cryptocurrency and a blockchain network that only supports financial applications.

Ether (ETH): The Native Currency

“Ether” is the cryptocurrency of the Ethereum network. It has a “dual purpose of providing a primary liquidity layer is to allow for efficient exchange between various types of digital assets and to provide a mechanism for paying transaction fees”. On top of being the fuel for the network, Ether can also be tradeable on most crypto exchanges. When investors and traders trade Ethereum, they are trading Ether.

Ether serves as both an incentive and a disincentive for users. Developers are rewarded for designing quality applications on Ethereum’s network and ensuring that the network runs smoothly. As computations and file storage place a strain on Ethereum’s network, fees (in terms of Ether) discourage developers from excessively using the network.

Denominations of Ether:

• wei (10⁻¹⁸ ETH)

• szabo (10⁻⁶ ETH)

• finney (10⁻³ ETH)

• ether (1 ETH)

Ether Supply

While Ethereum doesn’t have a hard cap like Bitcoin, the annual issuance is now significantly reduced post-Merge. With the introduction of EIP-1559 in August 2021 and subsequent updates, a portion of gas fees is now burned, making ETH a potentially deflationary asset under certain network conditions.

Fees

Fees are imposed on each transaction on the Ethereum network. As transactions place a strain on the network, fees serve as a regulatory mechanism to prevent abuse of the network.

One of the potential issues that the Ethereum network might face is the Halting problem. Think of the Halting problem as similar to a distributed denial-of-service (DDOS) attack. In the case of the Ethereum network, without these fees, attackers can potentially run programs forever on the network, diverting valuable resources away from the network.

“The intent of the fee system is to require an attacker to pay proportionately for every resource that they consume, including computation, bandwidth and storage.”

Decentralizing the Validation Process (Post-Merge)

In the Whitepaper, Vitalik criticized Bitcoin's increasing mining centralization due to expensive ASICs and centralized mining pools. Ethereum's move to Proof of Stake with The Merge in 2022 addressed these issues:

• Validators replace miners and are selected based on their ETH stake, not computational power.

• No specialized hardware is needed, reducing barriers to entry.

• Decentralization improved as staking can be performed even by solo validators or through staking pools.

This PoS mechanism aligns better with Ethereum’s long-term vision of sustainability, security, and accessibility.

Ethereum’s Scalability Challenges and Solutions

Scalability remains one of Ethereum’s most critical challenges. Vitalik acknowledged early on that having every node process every transaction would create bottlenecks. Since then, Ethereum has taken several major steps to address this:

1. Layer 2 Scaling Solutions

Protocols like Arbitrum, Optimism, and Base reduce congestion by processing transactions off-chain and settling on Ethereum.

2. Data Availability Upgrades (EIP-4844)

Introduced in 2024, this upgrade significantly reduced costs on rollups by enabling “blobs” to store temporary data more efficiently.

3. Stateless Clients and Danksharding (Upcoming)

Future upgrades aim to decouple computation from storage, allowing nodes to validate blocks without storing full state history—improving scalability without compromising decentralization.

A Glimpse into Ethereum’s Future

While Ethereum’s ecosystem has matured dramatically since the Whitepaper, many of Vitalik’s core principles still define its roadmap:

• Modular design for broad application support

• Open development ethos with decentralized governance

• Sustainable consensus mechanisms

• Scalable infrastructure for mass adoption

Today, Ethereum powers a vast array of use cases: DeFi protocols, NFTs, DAOs, Web3 gaming, identity management, and much more. Yet, the Whitepaper remains a foundational read for anyone seeking to understand the philosophy behind it all.

While it might seem obvious now, many layer-one blockchain networks back in the early 2010s did not have the multi-purpose capabilities that we see today. Ethereum has evolved far beyond its 2013 blueprint, but its guiding vision—to create a flexible, decentralized platform for global innovation—has held firm. The Merge, alongside continuous upgrades and the rise of Layer 2s, represents a new era for Ethereum: one that is more scalable, energy-efficient, and accessible than ever before.

Reading the Whitepaper today offers not just historical context, but insight into where Ethereum is headed next. For anyone participating in the crypto ecosystem—developer, trader, or investor—it remains a timeless reference.

Disclaimer: This material is for information purposes only and does not constitute financial advice. Flipster makes no recommendations or guarantees in respect of any digital asset, product, or service. Trading digital assets and digital asset derivatives comes with a significant risk of loss due to its high price volatility, and is not suitable for all investors. Please refer to our Terms.