Ethereum
A Next-Generation Smart Contract and Decentralized Application Platform - The Hopinionist

What is Ethereum?
Ethereum was launched in 2015, and as of writing this article it is the second-largest cryptocurrency by market cap after Bitcoin.
Ethereum’s founders set out to build a new kind of global, decentralized computing platform that takes the security and openness of blockchains and extends those attributes to a vast range of applications.
Ethereum is open access to digital money and data-friendly services for everyone – no matter your background or location. It’s a community-built technology behind the cryptocurrency ether (ETH) and thousands of applications you can use today.
Ethereum Derives value from :
Gas Fees
Gas is the price for using the system. These gas prices, and all the uses developers are paying to explore, help explain the rise in Ether’s value over the years. As more and more developers look to create things on Ethereum, they must buy more ether to pay gas fees, which in turn increases ether’s price.
Smart Contract Capabilities
Real-world use cases are already beginning to emerge and sustain value, as the Ethereum blockchain can execute smart contracts that power decentralized applications (DApps) like decentralized finance (DeFi) or nonfungible tokens (NFTs).
A New Type of Connectivity
We can think of Ethereum as an infrastructure, one with the potential to revolutionize both finance and technology. It is currently both developed publicly on the permission less Mainnet and on private blockchains that are based on Ethereum technology.
Proof-of-Stake Model
Ethereum is currently working towards changing to a proof-of-stake model, also tagged as Ethereum 2.0, which dramatically changes the rewards system.
Disinflationary Supply
Ether’s supply increases according to a disinflationary mechanism that will continue to be adjusted as the network matures.
Price Of Bitcoin
Bitcoin and Ethereum are two different cryptocurrencies. But Bitcoin price affects the crypto market due to multiple factors such as using BTC as a currency. When Bitcoin is bullish or rising up, other crypto coins like ETH also gain traction.
Vitalik Buterin – The Ethereum Thesis
Vitalik Buterin is a Canadian programmer and writer , a mastermind, who came up with the idea of Ethereum, the project was later launched when he was only 20 years old.
Co-Founders
Charles Hoskinson
Anthony Di Iorio
Jeffrey Wilcke
Mihai Alisie
Amir Chetrit
Joseph Lubin
Gavin Wood
Decentralized Governance
You may wonder, If no one owns Ethereum, how are decisions about past and future changes to Ethereum made? Governance is the systems in place that allow decisions to be made.
No one person owns or controls the Ethereum protocol, but decisions still need to be made about implementing changes to best ensure the longevity and prosperity of the network. Ethereum governance happens off-chain with a wide variety of stakeholders involved in the process.
The parties Involved according to Ethereum:
- Ether holders: these people hold an arbitrary amount of ETH. More on ETH.
- Application Users: these people interact with applications on the Ethereum blockchain.
- Application/Tooling Developers: these people write applications that are run on the Ethereum blockchain (e.g. DeFi, NFTs, etc.) or build tooling to interact with Ethereum (e.g. wallets, test suites, etc.). More on dapps.
- Node Operators: these people run nodes that propagate blocks and transactions, rejecting any invalid transaction or block that they come across. More on nodes.
- EIP Authors: these people propose changes to the Ethereum protocol, in the form of Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs). More on EIPs.
- Miners/Validators: these people run nodes that can add new blocks to the Ethereum blockchain.
- Protocol Developers (a.k.a. “Core Developers” ): these people maintain the various Ethereum implementations (e.g. go-ethereum, Nethermind, Besu, Erigon at the execution layer or Prysm, Lighthouse, Nimbus, Teku, Lodestar at the consensus layer). More on Ethereum clients.

Coin | Bitcoin (Satoshi) | Ether |
Release Date | 9 January 2008 | 30 July 2015 |
Maximum Number of Coins | 21,000,000 | Unlimited Coins |
Blockchain | Proof of Work | Proof of Work (POS Soon) |
Mining | ASIC Miners | GPU Mining |
Scalability | Not Scalable | Scalable |
Algorithm | SHA-256 | Ethash |
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