Dan Larimer of EOS Pokes Fun At Ethereum’s Continual Delays

Dan Larimer, the co-founder of EOS, has gently prodded Ethereum for continuously delaying its hard fork. Larimer stated on Telegram that “Ethereum’s next hard fork is like the pot in Pixel Master…it will be postponed forever.”

Ethereum Suffers Setbacks

Ethereum’s next upgrade, the Constantinople hard fork, was originally scheduled to be released by the end of October. However, a bug that would have enabled denial-of-service attacks caused developers to push the testnet release back to November. The upgrade was then further delayed to due to consensus issues. Last week, it was revealed that Constantinople will be released in 2019.

EOS is a major competitor to Ethereum, so Larimer’s words carry some weight. The two blockchains remain the most popular platforms for dApp developers and users, and competition is tight between the projects’ leaders. Vitalik Buterin has been heavily critical of EOS’s security in the past.

Pixel Master Won’t Die

Larimer’s allusion to Pixel Master refers to the dApp that he conceived last month—an online canvas that sells drawing space to users. If the canvas remains inactive for 24 hours, it pays out a prize pot to users who purchased pixels over the course of the day.

Since the game went live, players have consistently reactivated the canvas at the last possible moment. In response to this, Larimer suggested that the game should end if the prize pot does not grow by a certain amount over a 24-hour period.

Pixel Master subsequently decided to end the game and pay out if the prize pot does not grow by 0.1% per day (now 0.5% per day). This change prevents individual players from single-handedly reviving the canvas at the last minute. But despite efforts to wrap up the game, Pixel Master is still going strong.

Suggested Reading : Learn more about EOS in our beginner’s guide.

The Bigger Picture

Although Larimer’s jab at Ethereum is fairly light-hearted, it does represent a larger issue in the crypto world. Blockchain projects are frequently delayed or rescheduled due to complications. This can have a negative impact on the value of the platform as competitors come onto the scene and users lose interest over time.

Although Pixel Master is just a game, it is fairly innovative in that it is trying to adapt its value to a deliberately uncertain schedule. Whether it provides any lessons that can be translated to a larger scale and longer time frame remains to be seen.