The EthereumPOW core team is disbanding to achieve decentralized governance, with OneDAO providing temporary support. Image by Sergey Nivens, Adobe Stock.

The core development team behind the proof-of-work (PoW) fork of Ethereum announced on Tuesday its decision to dissolve EthereumPOW’s centralized structure in favor of complete decentralization.

Transition to Fully Decentralized EthereumPOW Underway

According to the announcement, the EthereumPOW core team will be disbanded in order to achieve full autonomy. Going forward, EthereumPOW will rely solely on PoW consensus and decentralized governance “to become a deity-less public chain.” This move hands over governance of the EthereumPOW blockchain to its community of users and miners.

Servers supporting the network will be transferred to OneDAO, a decentralized protocol on the Harmony blockchain. OneDAO will provide transitional maintenance for EthereumPOW until long-term ecosystem partners can be established.

This is good news. They have fulfilled their original commitment. towards decentralization

— Chuong (@chuongbitcoin) December 19, 2023

Lead EthereumPOW developer Jadal Page explained the reasoning behind relinquishing centralized control.

“We have explored and validated the feasibility of ETHW operating independently without Core’s support, confirming the fundamental technical and operational conditions for ETHW in such a scenario,” Page wrote in the announcement.

Decentralization Hoped to Reinvigorate the Ethereum Fork

The Ethereum hard fork occurred in September 2022, just before the main Ethereum blockchain transitioned from PoW consensus to a more energy-efficient proof-of-stake model following the Merge upgrade.

Some developers and miners unhappy with the perceived centralization and loss of revenues created EthereumPOW to preserve the original PoW-based Ethereum. Since its launch, the forked token ETHW has struggled to gain adoption, however.

Grayscale decided against supporting ETHW in September, citing a lack of liquidity and custodial support. This removed a major source of potential demand. As a result, ETHW has declined from its launch price of $100 to around $2.59 currently.

By dissolving centralized control and embracing community governance, the EthereumPOW team hopes to reinvigorate the network. OneDAO will provide technical assistance during the transitional period as the developers step back. Still, success will ultimately hinge on whether the cryptocurrency community chooses to adopt EthereumPOW over the dominant Ethereum PoS blockchain.

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