Ethereum (ETH) co-founder Vitalik Buterin called for renewed focus on building decentralized infrastructure rather than chasing short-term narratives in a New Year message.
Buterin acknowledged significant 2025 technical achievements while warning the network must accelerate progress toward becoming a "world computer."
The message comes as cryptocurrency markets enter 2026 amid competing narratives around tokenization and meme coins.
Buterin emphasized applications should function independently without corporate dependencies or third-party interference.
What Happened
Ethereum achieved multiple technical milestones in 2025 including gas limit increases from 30 million to 36 million units.
Blob capacity expanded from three to six through the Pectra upgrade with further increases planned.
Zero-knowledge Ethereum Virtual Machines reduced proving times from 16 minutes to 16 seconds - a 60-fold improvement.
The network deployed PeerDAS technology enabling significant blob throughput scaling without proportionally increasing node bandwidth requirements.
Buterin contrasted Ethereum's vision with consumer products that increasingly require subscriptions and create permanent user dependence on centralized entities.
He argued the network must improve usability, scalability and decentralization at both blockchain and application layers.
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Why It Matters
The message signals potential tension between Ethereum's technical roadmap and market demands for speculative assets.
Buterin specifically criticized focus on "winning the next meta" whether through tokenized dollars or political memecoins.
His emphasis on applications passing the "walkaway test" - continuing to function even if original developers disappear - sets high standards for ecosystem projects.
The technical achievements position Ethereum for higher transaction throughput while maintaining security guarantees.
Ethereum Foundation separately outlined 2026 security milestones requiring zkEVM teams to achieve 128-bit provable security by year-end.
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