Bankless Podcast Summary

Episode: Ethereum’s Next Decade | Tomasz K. Stańczak, Ansgar Dietrichs, Dankrad Feist, & Danny Ryan

Date: December 4, 2025

Overview

Live from Buenos Aires during Ethereum DevConnect, this Bankless episode features four influential Ethereum Foundation voices: Tomasz K. Stańczak, Ansgar Dietrichs, Dankrad Feist, and Danny Ryan. The episode delivers an in-depth, forward-looking exploration of Ethereum’s next decade—from technology and roadmap, real-world adoption, scaling strategies, DeFi priorities, and the personal journeys of key foundation members. These talks capture both the ethos and the strategic thinking inside Ethereum’s core while laying out the big challenges and ambitions for the community’s next chapter.

Main Themes

• Vision for Ethereum’s Next Decade: Universal digital assets, permissionless access, financial automation, open-source institutions.
• Transition from Exploration to “Real World” Ethereum: The shift from experimental to mainstream, practical applications.
• Technical Roadmaps & Scaling: How L1 scaling is evolving, short-term vs. long-term priorities, and community-driven progress.
• DeFi-Centric Strategy: Why Ethereum should double down on being the world’s liquidity and DeFi hub.
• Personal Reflections: Danny Ryan’s moving story of building, burnout, regulatory pressure, and resilience.

Featured Talks & Key Insights

1. Tomasz K. Stańczak: The Next 5 Years of Ethereum (from an EF Perspective)

[04:19 - 27:54]

Vision & Values

• Ethereum should become the layer for “all the assets in the world in digital form,” giving everyone “permissionless access” to any asset, not necessarily to financialize everything, but to enable trusted, automated systems—including AI and robotics.

  “If you want to make sure that the future is safe, automated, connected to global finance for everyone, open source. That’s how we do it. Provide ambient trust.” — Tomasz [05:08]

• A core goal: deliver privacy and security, open-source governance, and “ambient trust” across every institution and system.

Ethereum Foundation Strategy

• Restructuring in 2025: New focus on communication, broader representation, and ecosystem acceleration (developer, founder, app, and enterprise tracks).

• Developer Acceleration:

  • Initiatives like Beetle Guild and Speedrun Ethereum focus on onboarding, workshops, and developer-friendly challenges.
  • Efforts to counter the claim that Ethereum no longer attracts new developers:

    “When you combine all the L2s...the numbers really being top. And also for the new devs. So we wanted to review that claim that Ethereum doesn't really attract new developers anymore.” [09:33]

• Ecosystem Amplification: A new approach to developer reports, bringing in L2, EVM, and mainnet activities under one Ethereum umbrella.

Real-World Adoption & Institutional Engagement

• Application focus: increasing enterprise and founder support, talking to institutions in their language (e.g., risk, assets), not just technical jargon.

• Launched institutions.ethereum.org as a resource for traditional finance.

  “We realized that we talk about the same things, but with different language...then the traditional finance realized, oh, by the way, you actually solved a lot of problems that we're trying to solve and we didn’t even know it.” [11:35]

• Founders Lab: Intensive 1-on-1 mentor sessions with top founders (e.g. Jesse, Sandeep, Mike from Etherfi) to guide new startups.

• L2s as a Unified Ecosystem: Major push for internal unity and messaging—L2s, mainnet, other scaling solutions should feel like one Ethereum ecosystem.

  “Now they feel like, oh, this is all Ethereum. So this is such a strong ecosystem, I can just join and I'll choose later...” [16:40]

Academia, Policy, and Governance

• Increased outreach to universities globally, from Shanghai Jiao Tong to Columbia, supporting cryptography and policy research.
• Establishment of the Policy Support Team, led by Connor (formerly of Decentralization Research Center), directly interfacing with regulators.

Scaling & Technical Roadmap Preview

• Ecosystem is “crushing it”: “TVL on DeFi, stablecoin dominance, and rapidly accelerating L2 innovation.”
• Ended with emphasis on “review of the numbers from RWXYZ”—reinforcing Ethereum’s leading market status.

Notable Quote

“To make the world open source...you can participate in definition of [institutions/governance] the same way as you work on any GitHub protocol.” — Tomasz [05:55]

Q&A Highlight

On filtering signal from noise (esp. bear/bull markets and social media):

“We don't look at prices like as a target...but it's worth to keep looking at the prices almost as a metric that tells you what the mood of the entire industry is.”
“If you talk to enough people...the truth just keeps becoming clearer and clearer...” [26:15-27:54]

2. Ansgar Dietrichs: Scaling and "Real World Ethereum"

[28:08 - 51:32]

The Shift: Decade of Exploration → Real World Ethereum

• Timeline: For years, crypto operated largely in an exploratory “sandbox”, but now the ecosystem is in a phase transition to real-world usage and impact.
• Analogized to the “ChatGPT moment” in AI: Once real-world adoption arrives, focus must shift from 5-year plans to executing now.

“From the conception of Ethereum...until maybe sometime through last year, Ethereum and crypto as a whole was really in this decade of exploration...I think sometime last year you could really say we flipped...This is the largest phase transition crypto has ever gone through.” — Ansgar [29:25]

Implications for the Ethereum Roadmap

• Old approach: "Breadth first," many simultaneous initiatives, all focused far into the future.

  “There is no like 1, 2, 3 priorities on this list. There's like 50 different topics that all happen in parallel...let's see exactly which of these things basically work, which ones don't...I really think for 2022 that was the right approach...I don't think it's the right approach for 2025.” [35:03]

• New paradigm:

  • Balance long-term vision with 6-12 month deliverables (e.g., clear, limited top priorities).
  • Recent L1 scaling: After four years at 30M gas, pressures led to “Pump the gas”—rapid, staged increases (up to 60M now, aiming for 3x per year).

L1 Scaling Progress & Projections

• Community’s push was key—“Pump the Gas” efforts—showed strength in coordinated action.
• Target: 3x scaling per year is realistic and keeps Ethereum on pace for real-world demand.
  • Specific fork milestones: 45M (July), 60M (current), 80-120M (early next year), further exponential scaling with ZKEVM advances.

Balancing Short Term & Long Term

• Example: Real-time ZKEVM marked as "our ambassador to the future" (Justin Drake); now also focus on engineering and incremental real-world benefit.

Strategic Questions for the Ecosystem

• Defi on L1: What needs to be prioritized to ensure Ethereum remains the home of DeFi?
• RWAs (Real World Assets): How should asset issuance be architected—shared or on one chain, with bridges/interoperability?
• L1/L2 Synergy & Messaging: Is the L2 abstraction the right one? How to best express the Ethereum family of chains to foster synergy?

Practical Guidance to Projects

• “If you are still struggling a lot explaining why what you’re doing makes sense, that should at least be a warning sign. We have real world traction. Let’s not get distracted by all the rest.” [48:00]
• Stay ambitious: Don’t abandon Ethereum’s original scale of vision (DAOs, prediction markets, sovereign systems), but ground work in applications that matter now.

Q&A Highlights

• L1 scaling is not “the only chain you’ll ever need”: Even with magical scaling, “L1 will always be for more valuable use cases...special purpose execution environments will have their place.” [50:15–51:26]

3. Dankrad Feist: Making Ethereum Defi-Centric

[53:22 - 70:17]

Rationale: Revenue Matters

• It’s good for Ethereum to produce revenue, whether as a productive asset, meme store of value, or mix.

  “There’s a lot of talk about, oh, talking about revenue is bad...but, in all those cases, having revenue improves the quality of the asset.” — Dankrad [53:28]

L1 DeFi Supremacy

• Ethereum’s L1 has shown “the most proven source of fees in crypto”—DeFi creates high-value contention, “natural” fit for Ethereum due to network effects and composability.

  “Why would you even want to give up on that? It’s kind of an amazing thing. In the past, we haven’t really, from the L1 development side done that much about it, but it seems like we should.” [57:18]

Rollup-Centric Roadmap vs. DeFi-Centric Roadmap

• Rollup-Centric: DA as main revenue via rollups, but data availability fees are low in absolute terms and easily substituted by alternative DA providers.

  • “If you try to charge a lot for it, rollups can find a different way.”

• DeFi-Centric:

  • L1 as the world’s liquidity layer, with DeFi and RWAs composable at the core.
  • Interoperability: L2s and L1s “can all access [L1] liquidity” via interop/intents.
  • Network effects: Each new crypto user is a potential L1 DeFi user; L2 value accrues back to Ethereum if DeFi remains “home base.”

Path Forward: What to Prioritize

• Scaling/block times/finality to serve DeFi needs.
• Further work on MEV pipeline and making L1 “a fair layer.”
• Focus on interoperability that channels liquidity utility from L1 to L2s/L1s.
• Bring RWAs on-chain as bearer assets, foundational for non-crypto-native DeFi use.
• Eventual minimum pricing for blockspace may be required, but not yet.

Notable Quote

“L2s don't accrue value to eth. That was kind of like the big worry last year. And I think if we properly implement the [DeFi-centric] strategy, then we’ll get to a world where all chains accrue value to eth.” [64:35]

Q&A Highlights

• Is this a pivot? Some pushback that this isn’t radical but evolutionary: “If we don’t keep improving the chain at a higher rate than in the past, then I don’t think that will stick around forever...Eventually Ethereum would lose that moat.” [69:40]

4. Danny Ryan: Personal Reflections — Building and Surviving Ethereum

[70:28–91:43]

Origin Story

• Danny’s accidental entry into Ethereum circa The DAO era; hooked by the “aha” moment of blockchain’s potential.

  “I read this article and I was like, oh, shit, this is crazy. And I had that moment...I got obsessed.” [72:08]

• Became active in open source, contributing code, attending open research calls (with Vitalik and Vlad Zamfir), joining EF through sheer persistence and helpfulness.

• “The doors were wide open, comically wide open.”

Building the Network

• Led key research and operations (“wrangling” researchers). Helped drive the transition to Proof of Stake—three years of work just for beacon chain phase zero; the Merge would come much later.
• Reflections on relentless work, burnout, optimism, skepticism, and “terrifying control” of tech megacorps.

Burnout & Regulatory Brush

• After years at EF, Danny hit total exhaustion and took a sabbatical—only to be served personally by the SEC.

  “I was served by the United States government. I was served by the SEC personally... I felt fucking crazy.” [82:08]

• Lived for months under the threat of interrogation, extreme legal stress, and existential anxiety—until receiving an unexpected “case closed” letter, attributed by his counsel to shifting US politics.

  “Never in our history have we seen the SEC proactively close a case...It was politics...Because it was some political mandate to destroy crypto.” [85:08]

Rediscovering Purpose

• Post-sabbatical, still felt drained, until solving a sleep condition changed everything.
• Newfound resolve: Technology is a tool, not inherently good or bad. Re-engaged with renewed caution but persistent optimism.
• Found new energy working with others, focusing on practical, impactful, global onboarding opportunities, and efficiency in open finance.

”I think I’m certainly less naive...it’s a tool...we can do things with it, but I don’t think it’s inherently good. I don’t think it’s inherently bad. I think it’s ultimately...how we choose to wield it.” [89:55]

Q&A Highlight

What makes you optimistic today?

“If I work really hard...I might be able to make certain financial systems more efficient...expand access...hopefully maybe we can reduce the...centralizing nature of technology. But I don’t know. I’m definitely much more in the ‘I’m going to work really hard on something’ rather than 'this thing’s just gonna make everything better’ crowd.” [91:06]

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments (with Timestamps)

• Tomasz Stańczak:

  “If you talk to enough people...the truth just keeps becoming clearer and clearer...” [27:07]

• Ansgar Dietrichs:

  “The lesson of real world Ethereum is just to say hey, we need to at least keep iterating on these questions. We need to make progress on the timescale of 12 months, not five years.” [47:16]

• Dankrad Feist:

  “The broke way is like L2s don’t accrue value to eth...If we properly implement the strategy, then we’ll get to a world where all chains accrue value to eth.” [64:35]

• Danny Ryan:

  “I’m definitely much more in the ‘I’m going to work really hard on something’ rather than 'this thing’s just gonna make everything better’ crowd.” [91:43]

Important Timestamps

• [04:19] Tomasz on EF’s new structure and vision for Ethereum.
• [16:13] Unity across L2s: “It’s just the messaging, communication, invitation, and being friendly that really increases the feel and the strength of the ecosystem.”
• [28:08] Ansgar on the “decade of exploration” and moving into real-world implementation.
• [40:09] Scaling the gas limit: 10x, 100x, 1000x, targets and methods.
• [53:22] Dankrad: “I think that makes sense to create a revenue strategy based on real world application.”
• [70:28] Danny Ryan personal journey: burnout, SEC battle, sleep, and rediscovering purpose.

Conclusion

This episode is a comprehensive, candid, and sometimes emotional window into both the technical and human sides of Ethereum’s push into its second decade. It moves smoothly from top-level vision, through organizational change, to the detailed realities of scaling and DeFi, all underpinned by a very real sense of community, personal struggle, and continued optimism.

Whether you’re a developer, community participant, or ETH holder, the message is clear: Ethereum’s future will be built by those who show up, work hard, and keep their vision both realistic and ambitious as the world, finally, comes on-chain.