Reflections a Month After EDCON2023 in Montenegro: A Look Ahead at Infrastructure and Application Trends

2023-06-28 20:55:16

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EDCON2023 brings together developers and industry peers from around the world to review the current progress and status of Ethereum, exchange the latest trends in the industry, and spark innovative ideas through the collision of perspectives.

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Author: Jessica Shen

In 2013, Vitalik Buterin wrote the Ethereum white paper, and ten years later, in 2023, the Ethereum Developer Conference EDCON (Community Ethereum Development Conference) was held in Podgorica, the capital of Montenegro. There were no grand celebrations or formalistic fanfare at the event. What I felt was the global developers' commitment to solving the "impossible triangle" of blockchain, enhancing decentralization, privacy protection, and scalability in their respective fields, seeking collisions of ideas, resource exchanges, and win-win cooperation through communication.

Although the conference did not present any new "wealth codes" or innovative ideas, which made it feel like a reiteration of Ethereum's roadmap, I deeply sensed that the current AI revolution's impact on blockchain is gradually spreading. The significance of holding EDCON annually is to allow ecosystem developers to clarify the direction of Ethereum's roadmap, regularly review the progress of plan implementation, sort out the pressing issues that need to be addressed, and discuss breakthroughs in technology "boundaries" within their fields, such as how to achieve better privacy protection, scalability, provide higher security and stability, and create a better user experience (UX, User Experience) and user security (US, User Security) for future application explosions. Participants exchanged innovative points of view, gaining a global perspective on the significance of various technological and cultural changes for the future of Ethereum.

During my time in Montenegro, I attended the EDCON2023 conference and a series of side events, including EDCON's Community Day thematic sharing, Super Demo presentations, World Supercomputer Summit 2023, DAO Montenegro Conference, and Antalpha Labs' Account Abstraction HackerHouse. During my limited time in Montenegro, I also wanted to attend but couldn't make it to events like the ZK Community Breakfast and Zuzalu. To make up for these regrets, I interviewed friends who attended these events to understand their gains and feelings, compiling my own and my peers' insights into this article to share with everyone.

1. Summary of Insights

The topics at EDCON2023 revolved around how infrastructure can break through the impossible triangle of privacy, scalability, and decentralization (The Scalability Trilemma). The current stage is a period of technological maturity for ZK, account abstraction, and L2, with advancements in infrastructure providing a breeding ground for application innovation.
Zero-knowledge proof technology was widely discussed, including zkEVM, ZKML (Zero Knowledge Machine Learning), and the composability opportunities of ZK technology in various scenarios (Programmable Cryptography).
There was considerable discussion on on-chain gaming, account abstraction, and LSD, but the application layer is still waiting for innovation.
ZKML is on the brink of explosion, and AI, empowered by ZK technology, may inject new vitality into blockchain. The ZKML open-source community is worth looking forward to.
The account abstraction (Account Abstraction) track is "flat, hot, and crowded," with challenges in value capture.

Vitalik Buterin speaking at EDCON2023
Source: UZMANCOIN.COM

2. Important Topics at EDCON2023

The main topics at EDCON2023 focused on solving the impossible triangle of blockchain—privacy protection, scalability, and decentralization (Privacy, Scalability, Decentralization). The Scalability Trilemma proposed by Vitalik Buterin years ago has indeed clarified the general direction for Ethereum's technological development. Over the past decade, Ethereum has experienced continuous updates and advancements in infrastructure-level technology, with innovations in the application layer emerging constantly, but we are still quite far from the beautiful vision, as each area of the "impossible triangle" requires more breakthroughs.

The Scalability Trilemma
Image Source: https://vitalik.ca/general/2021/04/07/sharding.html

I have organized my insights regarding industry tracks and trends into infrastructure and application layers. In the infrastructure domain, the advancements in zero-knowledge proofs (Zero Knowledge Proof, ZKP) and Layer 2 (L2) have garnered the most attention from speakers and attendees, making it one of the most discussed topics; in the DApp application development field, the main topics revolve around on-chain gaming (On-Chain Gaming), account abstraction (Account Abstraction, AA), and the LSD (Liquidity Staking Derivatives) track.

Notably, in the ZKP field, I sensed that the discussions at EDCON2023 and surrounding conferences reflected many "ZK+" composability trends. Zero-knowledge proofs, as a means of privacy protection and providing scalability, are being attempted in various on-chain and off-chain domains. Cryptography is typically customized, while the demand for more general-purpose "Programmable Cryptography" has been repeatedly validated. In the application domain, developers are increasingly focused on user experience (UX) and user security (US). Improving UX through account abstraction and accelerating blockchain "Mass Adoption" seems to have become a prerequisite for discussions on application innovation, a goal that both infrastructure developers and application developers are striving to achieve together.

The development of things follows the "spiral rise of infrastructure and application domains" pattern. EDCON2023 reviewed the current state of development in the Ethereum ecosystem and trends across various fields. Developers are pushing for infrastructure upgrades while waiting for the moment of application explosion to arrive.

1. Infrastructure

At the infrastructure level, the application of ZK technology in both on-chain and off-chain domains, including zkEVM (Layer 2 scaling solution), ZKML (Zero Knowledge Machine Learning), and Programmable Cryptography, is undoubtedly a high-frequency topic at this Montenegro event and surrounding activities. In Vitalik Buterin's sharing, he mentioned, "ZK-SNARKs are going to be as important as blockchains in the next 10 years," which also became a significant point of focus.

Vitalik Buterin's presentation slides at EDCON2023 Source: https://foresightnews.pro/article/detail/33488

(1) New players are joining the zkEVM competition, and the track will maintain high heat

In the first half of 2023, we have already seen many zkEVM projects launch their mainnets, including Polygon zkEVM, zkSync Era, and Starknet. In the second half of the year and into 2024, the industry may witness several more zkEVM projects launching their mainnets, including Scroll, Linea, and Taiko, which are currently in the testnet phase, collecting developer feedback, etc. All of the aforementioned zkEVM projects had high visibility and participation at EDCON2023, appearing multiple times in speeches by Vitalik Buterin and other guests, including emerging projects. The developers of zkEVM are passionate about their endeavors, sharing recent progress and future goals with attendees, expressing their expectations for technological advancements and product updates, and the healthy competition in the industry is evident. In the next 1-2 years, we will see zkEVM's Layer 2 networks continue to stand at the center stage of the Ethereum ecosystem.

Jordi Baylina, the Technical Lead of Polygon zkEVM, shared the latest progress of the Polygon zkEVM project at the conference, including improvements to the PIL2 (Polynomial Identity Language 2) language, data compression solutions being implemented to address data availability, and emphasized that Polygon zkEVM supports account abstraction through ERC-4337. He also shared his thoughts on the landscape of the Layer 2 track in blockchain. I noted that Jordi discussed various data compression solutions adopted by Polygon zkEVM and the formal approval of EIP-4844, both of which will further reduce costs, and the combination of the two will significantly enhance data availability on Polygon. In Jordi's view, we will see more Layer 2 networks in the future, and the composability among L2s in the Polygon ecosystem will be achieved through Proof Aggregation, which will help all Polygon ecosystem L2 chains generate a single proof, increasing the composability among Polygon's L2 chains.

The zkEVM project Kakarot also attracted attention during and after the conference. Kakarot is a zkEVM project built on Starknet using the Cairo language, and its recent announcement of financing has garnered attention because Vitalik Buterin is one of the investors, along with the co-founder of Starknet and Starkware officials. Kakarot's co-founder Elias Tazartes gave a public presentation at EDCON2023, showcasing Kakarot's mission and vision, and Vitalik Buterin also mentioned the Kakarot project in his speech. The project's highlight is that it provides an EVM environment for Starknet based on the Cairo language, allowing Solidity developers to deploy applications directly to Starknet without needing to reprogram in Cairo, meaning Kakarot creates an EVM-compatible platform on Starknet. This way, many excellent EVM projects can be quickly deployed on Starknet, reducing the effort and time developers spend maintaining both Cairo and Solidity codebases. Kakarot seems capable of becoming a Layer 3 on Starknet, but the team will first sprint toward the Rollup-as-a-Service offering in Q4 2023. In an interview with Blockbeats, Elias stated that competition in the Layer 2 track will become more intense. Kakarot, as a zkEVM platform, will actively collaborate with Starknet, Polygon, Linea, and others, and welcomes developers of Solidity and Cairo languages from China to join and work together in this field.

(2) The demand for Programmable Cryptography has been validated again

In addition to zkEVM, ZK technology is being used in more and more scenarios, and the demand for Programmable Cryptography is becoming apparent. Programmable Cryptography was formally proposed by 0xPARC. With the emergence and updates of zk-SNARKs and other cryptographic tools, more general-purpose cryptography helps more developers quickly implement encryption for applications (such as in digital identity, reputation, etc.) without needing to learn and develop cryptographic privacy protection technologies from scratch. With more Programmable cryptographic development tools, privacy encryption may be applied on a larger scale to blockchain applications and off-chain computations and models. In Jason Morton's presentation "What Is Unlocked by Practical Zero-Knowledge Proofs?", he also mentioned that "ZKP is becoming more programmable." In the guest roundtable forum on zero-knowledge proofs (ZK Panel), Programmable Cryptography was also mentioned multiple times by guests including Vitalik Buterin, expressing great anticipation for this more general-purpose cryptographic application.

Barry Whitehat speaking at EDCON2023 Source: https://twitter.com/search?q=programmable%20cryptography\&src=typed_query

EDCON2023 ZK Panel roundtable discussion Source: https://twitter.com/madhavanmalolan/status/1660269927671156736

(3) ZKML is in its early development stage but has huge potential

ZKML refers to the combination of zero-knowledge proofs (Zero Knowledge) and machine learning (Machine Learning). We all know that machine learning models face trust issues in many aspects: the confidentiality or disclosure of input and output data, algorithms, and model parameters. When trust issues exist, it becomes challenging for ML models to gain larger-scale applications. For example, when using personal information as raw data for training, there is a need for encryption of personal information; model parameters are usually the core competitive advantage of the development team and need to be encrypted to maintain competitive barriers. Zero-knowledge proof technology can provide proof for many things beyond smart contracts, especially as machine learning applications become increasingly common. ZKP can provide proof for an AI model with millions of parameters, thereby enhancing security and privacy protection and helping to address various trust challenges faced by machine learning models. Additionally, machine learning models require significant computation, and when ML models are integrated into on-chain applications, they can generate proofs through ZK-SNARKs, alleviating the computational demands of ML and more efficiently bringing AI into on-chain applications. As AI and machine learning continue to disrupt our lives this year, ZKML is becoming more widely recognized and accepted.

At EDCON2023 and many other blockchain conferences this year, we can feel that many blockchain developers have already joined the ZKML field (for readers who need to learn about this concept, you can check out WorldCoin's article on ZKML. As early as the second half of 2022, WorldCoin and some teams in the ZKML field established the ZKML community, introducing the concept, advantages, and future prospects of ZKML in various public forums such as ETH Denver in 2023). At the first World Supercomputer Summit 2023 held in Montenegro, most speakers were engaged in ZKML-related endeavors. PSE core member Cathie So (@drCathieSo_eth) introduced AIGC NFT EIP-7007, depicting the innovative sparks that may arise from the combination of ZK and ML, and further envisioned how the future World Super Computer Architecture would empower the realization of ZKML. The PSE team is committed to better integrating ZKP technology with the Ethereum ecosystem, actively participating in the research and projects of ZKML. Additionally, Hyper Oracle (a zkOracle project on Ethereum) and Poseidon ZKP (ZK aggregation proof infrastructure), Modulus Labs (an on-chain AI project development team), and WorldCoin's DCBuilder were also speakers at the first WSC conference. Among them, Modulus Labs, as a pioneer in the ZKML field, has conducted numerous experiments in ZKML applications, including DeFi's Rockerfeller Bot (the first fully on-chain AI trading bot), GameFi's Leela vs the World (the first fully on-chain AI game), and NFT projects. At EDCON2023, as a developer in the ZKML field, Jason Morton shared that he has seen the FLOPS (Floating-point Operations Per Second) of ZKP rapidly increase over the past few years, but the Proof per Chain Transaction remains at the tens of thousands level, and he expects breakthroughs in the next three years. He envisioned that when Proof per Chain Transaction further increases to hundreds of millions or even billions, various application scenarios combining ZK and blockchain may emerge in the fields of on-chain gaming, supply chain, and payment transactions.

Many speakers mentioned that ZKML is still in its early development stage. WorldCoin, as one of the pioneers in the ZKML field, has recently established the ZKML community, which has already attracted many developers and peers building in this field. As more products are led by AI and more innovations come from AI and ML updates, ZK can serve as a means of privacy protection and accelerated computation, further empowering a society driven by AI. Although this demand is not very apparent at present, if we foresee a world where AI is ubiquitous, then model and information encryption, as well as improvements in computational speed, will all be essential needs in the future. There are increasingly more programming tools in the market that can help developers create ZK proofs for AI models without needing to learn all the cryptographic skills related to ZKP, which will open up a huge market for more ZKP DApps. The significance of blockchain for AI or ML will also be multi-layered, as blockchain itself can provide immutable and decentralized on-chain records, and cryptocurrencies can become a borderless monetary system in the future world coexisting with AI and humanity.

[Note]: FLOPS, or Floating-point Operations Per Second, is commonly used to measure computer processing speed or estimate computer performance.

2. Application DApps

At the EDCON2023 conference, we heard more about discussions and exchanges regarding underlying technologies, while discussions about DApp applications were relatively few, with on-chain gaming, account abstraction, and the LSD track dominating the content.

(1) On-Chain Gaming shows a trend towards AI

Regarding applications, there is still high expectation for on-chain gaming (On-Chain Gaming). At the conference, when zkEVM public chain projects were asked which on-chain applications they found promising, most answered on-chain gaming. When Danilo Kim shared his life experiences in Zuzalu at the conference, he mentioned the on-chain AI gaming projects Zuland and Zuzuland that were born during his time in Zuzalu. During Zuzalu and EDCON2023, another project that attracted attention was the AI-based fully on-chain game Network State released by Small Brain Games, which is a tabletop role-playing TRPG game inspired by Slobbovia. On-Chain Gaming is showing a trend towards AI.

The current prominence of On-chain Gaming as a major discussion topic is not because on-chain games already have traffic, but rather because the market lacks new narratives. After the DeFi summer, the horizontal competition among DEXs and vertical business expansion have made the head effect increasingly evident, but leading DeFi protocols have not created new hotspots for public chains. To lead the explosion of traffic, it is certainly not feasible to follow the old path; the NFT boom occurred on Ethereum, but during the bear market, even NFTs on Ethereum lacked innovative momentum. NFTs that merely tell IP stories require a lot of operational effort and time, while NFTs with more GameFi elements and metaverse narratives need time for product development. Utility-type and membership-type NFTs require a large number of traditional enterprises to enter, and large-scale explosions also need prior user education and long-term planning and operation by traditional brand teams; the on-chain gaming track has seen a significant increase in AI/ML elements this year, enhancing the flexibility and richness within on-chain games. For example, ZKML has brought Autonomous NPCs (autonomous NPCs) or AI god roles, providing new inspirations for on-chain games, and since ZK is a hot topic, the On-Chain Gaming track naturally garners more expectations. However, regardless of the application track, leading narratives to bring in large traffic during a bear market face more challenges. Therefore, when discussing applications, the answers are all hopeful, but there is no very clear direction.

(2) Account Abstraction (Account Abstraction) competition is fierce, and value capture in the track is a challenge

The concept of account abstraction (Account Abstraction, AA) emerged shortly after the birth of Ethereum, and in recent years, progress at the protocol standard level, especially the formal deployment of ERC-4337 in March 2023, has once again attracted industry attention, with high enthusiasm for entrepreneurship and investment. However, the current situation is that the account abstraction track is already quite "crowded" and competitive, with participants facing challenges in value capture and business models.

During EDCON2023, Antalpha Labs hosted a HackerHouse event centered around the theme of account abstraction, inviting many developers, investors, and researchers in the account abstraction field to share their views and interact, including Compass DAO, Candide Wallet, Account Labs (a merger of Unipass and Keystone), and L2s supporting account abstraction like Mantle Network, Compass DAO, and Mirana Ventures research team. Throughout the week-long HackerHouse event, I participated multiple times to listen to the speakers' presentations and gained a lot, gaining a deeper understanding of the current development status of the track. I also want to thank Antalpha Labs for hosting the HackerHouse event and making it open to the public, allowing participants to learn from each other in a relaxed communication environment.

Account Abstraction HackerHouse by Antalpha Labs Source: https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/kYMkw1lhP0ywp6e35NRqvw

At this stage, many wallet projects, underlying public chains, and emerging startups are striving to implement and land account abstraction-related endeavors. During my time in Montenegro, I participated in the Community Day event of EDCON2023 and the Account Abstraction HackerHouse hosted by Antalpha Labs. After hearing the presentations from various account abstraction track projects, I felt that the account abstraction track is "flat, hot, and crowded." "Flat" refers to the fact that the technical level and functional differentiation of account abstraction SDKs and wallet projects are not significant, and there are no clearly outstanding leading teams or products in the track; "hot" indicates that investors and entrepreneurs have shown high enthusiasm for account abstraction wallet projects in recent years, and the atmosphere at various conferences and surrounding events reflects that account abstraction is an inevitable trend. In the future, more smart contracts will naturally adopt AA SDK for development, with built-in wallets supporting account abstraction, and public chains will also be more inclined to directly support account abstraction (such as Starknet, zkSync, etc.); "crowded" refers to the large number of participants in the track, which has also led to exceptionally fierce competition.

SevenX's project information organization on the account abstraction track Source: https://foresightnews.pro/article/detail/23205

Multiple wallet teams in the track have already developed excellent products, and in terms of technology and development progress, there are no projects that are far ahead and difficult to catch up with; competitors are almost maintaining a "neck-and-neck" state. In terms of account abstraction SDKs, there are already multiple SDK providers, such as Gnosis Safe, Biconomy, Alchemy, Web3Auth, Etherspot, and others. Almost all wallet projects that have emerged in recent years are developed based on the ERC-4337 protocol and pay considerable attention to the developer experience for B-end applications and the user experience for C-end users in a B2B2C business model. In terms of functionality, social recovery, anti-censorship, no seed phrases, privacy protection, and multi-chain support are almost essential options. In addition to SDK providers, wallet projects are also making many attempts and efforts to explore more applications of account abstraction. The underlying logic is that when account abstraction is more widely applied and implemented in smart contracts, capturing the large traffic of smart contracts (B-end) will enable wallets themselves to achieve value capture, which is also the reason why wallet tracks must vertically expand their business in a B2B2C business model. In addition to creating scenarios, some wallet projects are also striving to build infrastructure, including developing SDKs, to attract customers. However, in the value capture phase, many SDKs are public goods, making it difficult for SDK projects to achieve value capture. Wallet-as-a-Service services charge per use, leading to challenges in scalability, and MEV revenue also faces competition. Many leading wallet projects are also exploring more possibilities in the value capture phase.

With the formal deployment of ERC-4337, account abstraction has gradually landed in applications, and the protocol's implementation is an important step in enhancing on-chain UX and US, which will be a crucial tool for driving Mass Adoption. Currently, the account abstraction track is highly competitive, with both SDKs and application scenarios exploring how to attract more users. The B2B2C business model for wallets is gradually taking shape, but effective economic value capture methods in the industry chain are still being explored.

(3) The LSD track has long-term investment certainty

If on-chain gaming is the most discussed application among Ethereum developers in public forums, then LSD and LSD-Fi are topics I heard more discussions about after the conference. There were numerous discussions among speakers regarding "decentralized nodes," with developers continuously exploring technical points on how to enhance the decentralization of POS and the stability and security of nodes. In conversations with investors attending the conference, cryptocurrency funds expressed confidence in the LSD track. Perhaps after many bubbles have burst during the bear market, the LSD track surrounding the POS mechanism is a field with relatively higher certainty and stability. For research on the LSD track, readers can refer to Mint Ventures' recent research reports on the LSD track:

3. Conference Impressions

1. ZKML is on the brink of explosion, and more machine learning applications will adopt ZK encryption methods in the future

This year, we have seen more and more AI-driven products disrupting our previous ways of living and working. Machine learning (ML), as an important subset of AI, has been applied in many off-chain scenarios, while the exploration of ML on-chain faces challenges such as computational costs and speeds, model trust, and privacy protection. ZK encryption methods can enable ML models to generate proofs for the models off-chain, empowering on-chain smart contracts, making them more intelligent and flexible. When ML enters on-chain applications, the industry gains more imagination.

In recent years, ZK technology has matured in both software and hardware, addressing a series of computational, trust, and privacy protection issues that previously existed in machine learning (ML) models. ZKML is also one of the fields that Sam Altman's cryptocurrency project WorldCoin is striving to advance, and WorldCoin, along with numerous research teams and projects in this field, has jointly established the ZKML community to research and promote ZKML technology and applications.

SevenX's organization of the ZKML ecosystem Source: https://appliedzkp.org/

Currently, some existing ZKML applications are still in their early development stages. The aforementioned on-chain AI trading bots and on-chain AI games, as well as using off-chain ML models to suggest parameters for DeFi protocols, are examples. The project that WorldCoin is building is similar to zk-DID, utilizing ZKML to ensure the privacy of biometric information and support the future upgradability of Iris Code. In the future, we expect to see more machine learning models entering the blockchain field, and ZK technology will accelerate the arrival of this "future."

Additionally, I would like to quote a slide from Modulus Labs founder Daniel's presentation at the WSC conference: "(The application of ZKML is) when AI is an excellent tool, but there are 'trust' difficulties." I believe this reflects the underlying logic of the combination of ZK technology with AI/ML. As the concepts of AI and ZKML become increasingly popular, we will see various pseudo-ZKML projects, but grasping the underlying logic and significance of the combination can help avoid getting lost in speculation and bubbles.

Modulus Labs' PPT presentation at the World Supercomputer Summit 2023 Source: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1KJ6csWNpwBPoy8DeJtW_2mY2Ii8h46yK/view

2. The account abstraction track is "flat, hot, and crowded"

As mentioned earlier, I felt during the EDCON2023 conference, in post-conference interviews, and in daily work exchanges that the concept of account abstraction is gradually beginning to be applied. There are many participants in the track, and many wallet projects hope to lay out the entire industry chain to better connect the B2B2C business model. However, the deeper challenge faced by the track is the establishment of a value capture system. As mentioned earlier, fierce competition can turn account abstraction SDKs into public goods, making it difficult for B-end businesses of account abstraction in smart contracts to scale and face intense competition. The C-end traffic of wallet end users is still controlled by application DApps, bringing value capture challenges to many account abstraction wallet projects. However, for users, Ethereum will continue to promote the larger-scale and deeper application of ERC-4337, providing users with better UX and US. I believe that in the next cycle, account abstraction will no longer be just a concept but will become an imperceptible yet exquisite experience in a high-traffic application, which is worth looking forward to.

3. The important role of Public Goods in the blockchain industry has been mentioned multiple times

During the surrounding activities of the EDCON2023 conference, Buidler DAO, SeeDAO, and Mask Network jointly held the DAO Montenegro Conference, discussing topics including public goods. During the conference, Gitcoin founder Scott Moore also discussed Public Goods, emphasizing the importance of "coordination" in helping blockchain protocols address current societal network issues. (Gitcoin, as an open-source project funding platform, aims to build and fund digital public goods.) Coincidentally, during the conference, I discussed the topic of public goods with Shumo, the founder of Manta Network and Poseidon ZKP. "The ultimate goal of blockchain infrastructure is public goods," Shumo said. My understanding is that blockchain infrastructure is similar to roads as "quasi-public goods," possessing limited non-competitiveness and limited exclusivity, and should be more widely used by society as a tool to improve financial systems, lifestyles, and work efficiency. The underlying code of infrastructure in the industry is usually open-source, which is due to both the open-source culture and atmosphere of blockchain and the spirit of equality and win-win brought by the later Web3.0 concept. This leads to the difficulty for infrastructure projects to maintain their competitive edge, as there will always be new open-source projects bringing free positive externalities to the industry.

In conversations with other attendees, I could feel that many Ethereum developers have little utilitarianism in their original intentions; their starting point is usually to solve a specific problem or pain point in the Ethereum ecosystem, and the products or projects developed are often open-source for everyone to use and improve. Most of the underlying blockchain infrastructure is open-source public goods, which is one of the reasons why the cryptocurrency and blockchain industry can iterate rapidly.

Gitcoin founder Scott Moore speaking at EDCON2023 Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHLP_T42840\&list=PLe3T1ZflXe4GsxOvHAktPweug0qoBBtKz\&index=3

4. Conclusion

Andy Guzman from the PSE Foundation mentioned in his speech "Harnessing ZK and Existing Infrastructure for Ethereum's Mass Adoption" that the current stage is a period of technological maturity for ZK, account abstraction, and L2, and the convergence of the three will enhance Ethereum's User Experience (UX) and User Security (US). According to his envisioned future, we can imagine that on a faster, safer, and more stable Layer 2, ZK encryption technology will empower AI/ML to bring more flexible DApp applications, while account abstraction will better assist new users in entering the cryptocurrency field, providing users with a safer, more convenient, and lower-cost account experience and interaction experience. EDCON2023 brought together developers and industry peers from around the world to review the current progress and status of Ethereum's development, exchange the latest trends in the industry, and collide ideas to generate innovative thoughts.

Andy Guzman speaking at EDCON2023

5. References

6. Acknowledgments

Thanks to the industry peers who accepted interviews, including Derek from BTX Capital (@begasbtxcap), Jack from Blockbeats (@jackxiong137), 0xMinion from GBV Capital (@0xminion), Ray from CypherBabel Index (@CryptoGOOO), Suede from Hyper Oracle (@hyperoracle), Shumo from Poseidon ZKP (@shumochu), Tommy from Beosin (@TommyDengDAO), Hank from Bixin Ventures (@0xHankester), and Qi Zhou from EthStorage (@qcqizhou). Thanks to Maxlion (@RealMaxlion), Wang Ye (@snappyebit), and Gigi (@realgigiyip) for helping proofread information and providing ideas!

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