Today, there will be an Arrow Glacier update on the Etherium network. What will it give the cryptocurrency?
A few months ago, the developers of Ethereum asked users to upgrade their nodes, the network nodes that run the network software and predominantly store a copy of the cryptocurrency’s complete blockchain. Upgrading most of the nodes has traditionally been a prerequisite before integrating the London hardforward. Now, programmers have once again announced the need for an upgrade – this time in order to delay the so-called complexity bomb, a mechanism that increases the complexity of Ether mining to incentivise the ecosystem to migrate to the Proof-of-Stake algorithm. We tell you more about what’s going on.
Traditionally, we'll start with an explanation. The last major update to the Ethereum network was the London update, which took place on August fifth, 2021. First and foremost, it is remembered for the new model of forming commissions in the cryptocurrency network and introducing a mechanism to burn them. Thus, the creation of each new block in the blockchain ends with the destruction of a certain amount of ETH.
According to The Block, the cumulative amount of ETH destroyed reached $4.44 billion yesterday. That is the exact equivalent of ETH taken out of circulation for good.
The total amount of destroyed ethers
The remaining coins in circulation have thus become more valuable. However, online users still face the problem of high commissions. For example, right now you will have to pay about $6.9 to send ETH. Well, ERC20 token transfer costs $21.
Commissions on the Etherium network
Anyway, blockchain updates are happening regularly. Today we are waiting for another one of them.
The update to the Etherium network
The latest update to the Etherium network is called Arrow Glacier. It is due to be activated today. Unlike the London hardforge, it doesn’t involve such drastic changes. The main purpose of Arrow Glacier is to delay the complexity bomb. This is done to give developers more time to transition to the second version of the Ethereum protocol, according to Decrypt.
Developer progress on the transition to Ethereum 2.0
As a reminder, the concept of a "complexity bomb" emerged back in 2015 along with the launch of Etherium. It is about gradually increasing the complexity of ETH mining. In the end, this would affect the network as follows: the complexity of mining increases, it becomes more difficult to create blocks with the same equipment, blocks are mined more slowly, it becomes more difficult to conduct transactions, and eventually it would become impossible to use the blockchain.
At the time, programmers hoped that such a mechanism would provide an additional boost to the transition to Proof-of-Stake. Unfortunately, the transition itself is a rather time-consuming process that stretches over several years of active development. That's why the complexity bomb has been delayed several times in the end. The same will happen today, with the "bomb" being delayed until the launch of the updated Ethereum 2.0 network.
The decision to abandon the current Proof-of-Work (PoW) consensus algorithm looks very logical in the context of the long-term problems of this method of confirming what is happening on the network. PoW consumes too many resources to find solutions for new blocks using expensive crypto-farms or conventional graphics cards. That said, the more popular a cryptocurrency is, the more resources it will consume in the future.
There are several arguments in favour of the updated Proof-of-Stake. First of all, it is modern and allows validators to avoid wasting time setting up farms and fixing them periodically. In addition, the PoS consensus algorithm itself allows for better network protection. Finally, in the spring, the community outside of cryptocurrency took to actively criticising the energy-intensive nature of PoW mining in Bitcoin, with Elon Musk also joining the comments. In this case, it will avoid potential reputation problems for the project.
That said, the transition of Etherium to PoS also has its own disadvantages and inconveniences. Read more about them in a separate article.
Etherium
The Arrow Glacier will be activated on a block of 13,773,000, which is due to be mined on the Etherium network today, December 8, 2021. If you have a cryptocurrency network node, you should update your software to the current version of the clients. Here’s a list of them:
- Geth 1.10.12
- Besu 21.10.0
- Nethermind 1.11.7
- Erigon 2021.11.01-alpha
- EthereumJS VM 5.6.0
Etherium network hash rate growth over time
Arrow Glacier will postpone the complexity bomb for stability in the Etherium ecosystem. If we now take the gradual increase in mining complexity, ETH mining and network security will become uneconomical for many miners, which could severely undermine the stability of Etherium. In addition, the cryptocurrency is the platform for many DeFi applications and the NFT-sphere, so a complexity bomb would do far more harm than good right now.
One can only hope that the complexity bomb will now be delayed for the last time. Still, something like this has happened more than once, which means the concept can essentially be considered a failure. Yes, the developers are actively preparing the blockchain for the transition to the second version, but the main reason for this is definitely not the "bomb".
Anyway, we are waiting for the next important update to the Etherium network. It won't be long before the necessary blockchain.
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