Ethereum’s big shift to a more energy efficient system that developers had promised for years fell through after they announced they were on track to delay a “difficulty bomb” designed to slowly start miners off the Blockchain. The difficulty bomb, a proprietary code that has always been part of Ethereum, rapidly increases the computational difficulty of mining the underlying token.
Ethereum Merge upgrade delayed
Once the bomb goes off and is allowed to run its course, Merge (merge) – there will be days left for Ethereum to transition to a proof-of-stake (PoS) system for order processing. As we have also reported as Kriptokoin.com, users stake coins to perform transactions. This process is expected to consume 99 percent less power. The developers were trying to fix various bugs they discovered while running the software for one of the network’s oldest testnets, Merge on Ropsten. As a result, on Friday, they decided to postpone the difficulty bomb.
While the developers haven’t officially set a specific date for Merge – Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin said it could happen in August if it’s not a big deal. This raised concerns that the upgrade would take more time. Attending the interview, Thomas Jay Rush said, “Delaying will save you time. “It looks bad for the community, but there’s nothing you can do about it.”
Merge won’t happen this year?
Difficulty grenade has been delayed several times before. Although it expires this month, the developers plan to disable it completely. It plans to recommission it at another time later on. It is unclear when they will do this. Many hoped that Merge wouldn’t have to be delayed as it would happen soon. Buterin said last month that the Merge could be delayed to September or October if the developers needed more time.
Tim Beiko, coordinating Ethereum developers, said that “the odds of Merge not happening this year are only 1-10 percent. During the meeting on Friday, the developers stressed that the difficulty bomb delay had no effect on Merge timing. Beiko said there will be concerns about developer burnout if they rush for Merge without delaying the difficulty bomb for a reasonable amount of time.
The potential delay dampens the excitement around Merge after the developers rolled out the upgrade on Ropsten on Wednesday. As it is one of the oldest testnets for Ethereum, Ropsten would be able to provide one of the most realistic technical environments for testing Consolidation, checking for errors and evaluating the outcome of the final process.
The price of Ethereum collapsed
Following these developments, the value of Ethereum, the largest altcoin by market cap, fell to levels not seen since March 2021. The value of ETH fell as low as $1,661. It is currently trading as much as 65 percent below its all-time high of $4,878 recorded in November 2021.
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