🧵 PANews Original | Former Ethereum Core Member Exposes Internal Letter of Discontent — Trust Crisis for the Ethereum Foundation? 1/ A long-hidden internal letter has once again placed the @ethereumfndn (EF) under intense public scrutiny. On October 20, former Ethereum core developer and Geth client maintainer @peter_szilagyi released a private letter he had sent to EF leadership in May 2024, exposing long-standing frustrations that have reignited community debate around the Foundation’s governance and culture.

2/ Internal Tensions: Centralized Power and Unequal Treatment In the letter, Péter accused EF of centralized decision-making, unfair compensation, and the existence of secretly competing internal teams. He further argued that the Ethereum ecosystem has grown overly dependent on Vitalik Buterin and a small circle of elites, making resource allocation and project outcomes increasingly shaped by personal networks—an apparent departure from Ethereum’s founding principle of decentralization.

3/ Community Backlash: Founders Speak Out The controversy quickly escalated across the crypto community. Polygon co-founder @CharlotteM50741 and Yearn founder Andre Cronje both voiced discontent, criticizing EF for neglecting core contributors, providing insufficient ecosystem support, and lacking financial transparency. In response, @VitalikButerin praised Polygon’s technical achievements and moral integrity but avoided addressing governance concerns directly, instead shifting the conversation toward product and protocol innovation.

4/ Broader Fallout: Governance Fractures The incident has exposed governance fractures within EF and sparked renewed debate about the true decentralization of Ethereum’s governance structure. Meanwhile, @solana ecosystem publicly extends collaboration offers to disillusioned Ethereum contributors amid the turmoil.