The eternal machine (Ethereum)

1. A programmable blockchain like Ethereum can be regarded as a virtual machine running in the cloud.
2. This virtual machine, or EVM from Ethereum Virtual Machine, can be used like any other computer.
3. The main benefit of this EVM is that it is decentralized — it is operated by thousands of different node operators using blockchain technology to secure all transactions and programs running on it. It is trustless — meaning you don’t have to trust a centralized entity to run your code (like Amazon, Facebook or Google).
4. Currently, the EVM is very crude and limited — its capacity is worse than that of your normal smartphone in your pocket.
5. So you can do simple calculations on it — like financial transactions. What happens when we scale this EVM to become a more complex computer?
6. With more scale and speed we can run more complex programs. Similar to the transistor computer revolution in the 1950’s — it is hard to imagine what type of applications will use the new scalability. All we know is it is very likely that more scale will unlock new value in computation. Similar to the value centralized computation has unlocked in the past 70 years.
7. This project of the EVM or decentralized computing is sometimes romantically called the eternal machine — because in theory, we can scale this decentralized computer infinitely into eternity.
8. More scale, while keeping decentralization and security, is difficult and is called the scalability trilemma. Lots of people are working on this — and doing awesome progress. Most notably PoS, Sharding & L2 technology are solutions going on as of 2022.
9. What kind of applications will be built in the future using the EVM? Lots of web2 services like social networks can be replicated in the EVM. Many totally new applications will be built that we have a hard time understanding now.

Thanks for reading.