The long-awaited Ethereum merge is just around the corner, but not everyone is excited about the major upgrade. A group calling itself ETHW Core has voiced its opposition to the change and is set to conduct a hard fork within 24 hours following the merge.
Under the project name, along with ETHPoW and the token ETHW, ETHW Core plans to separate from the main ETH blockchain and maintain a PoW version to keep ETH mining alive beyond merges.
“ETHW will happen within 24 hours of the mainnet merge. The exact time will be announced 1 hour before launch with a countdown timer and the timing of everything including the final code, binaries, config files, nodes info, RPC, Explorer, etc. Will be made public when finished,” the group wrote in a September 13 tweet.
The merge will move the Ethereum network from its current proof-of-work (PoW) mining model to a proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus mechanism, phasing out miners and replacing them with validators.
In their August 29 open letter, explaining their motivations, the group explained why, in their opinion, “POS is truly a game changer, but only in bad ways.”
“It is only prudent to continue with PoW Ethereum, which should be unadulterated for advocates of openness and free markets as there are no downsides. After all, if PoS Ethereum is really so great, why be afraid of the competition? ? “
Although many in the community believe that this fork is motivated by money rather than ideological differences.
And serious concerns have been expressed over the ChainID fork and whether it will increase the risk of replay attacks and other hacks.
Hudson Jameson, a former member of the Ethereum Foundation, wondered on September 8 why it was launching after the actual merge.
“I highly doubt they will gain much hash power if they launch post-merger,” he wrote. “The hash power will be on other chains by then and the price prop of ETHPoW is already weak,” he wrote.
So.
1. ETHPoW is not actually freezing the contracts.
— Hudson Jameson (@hudsonjameson) 8 September 2022
2. It is not clear whether they are still editing EIP-1559 to move to “Minor DAO” (code PRs suggest this is happening).
3. They’re likely launching a few days after they’re merged (from what I can tell in the code). https://t.co/vvjf7neS0w
CoinbaseCloud protocol expert Viktor Bunin has reportedly contacted ETHW Core for clarification on the issue. The result of the query was not posted.
I’m disappointed that our team has to submit a PR (because the issues are inefficient), but it’s mandatory that @EthereumPoW The team provides clear guidance on ChainID
Failing to do so puts all users at risk and exchange of assets on both chains due to replay attacks. pic.twitter.com/6Z80AjdDjT
— Victor Bunin ️ (@ViktorBunin) 9 September 2022
related: Ethereum Ready to Merge as Last Shadow Fork Completes Successfully
If all goes according to plan, the ETH merge is currently in less than a day.
At the time of writing, the ETHPoW token is trading at $29.71 but only exists as a future ticker, which is conceived in anticipation of the upcoming fork. Ether (ETH) is currently priced at $1,599, down 2.26% over the past seven days.
