Early Days of Ethereum

Preserving the history and stories of the people who built Ethereum.

Vitalik Buterin

Vitalik Buterin

Ethereum co-Founder

(Nov 2013 to present)

DEVCON0 self-introduction

Vitalik Buterin DEVCON0 introduction

Connecting Gavin Wood

In Gavin Wood's 2018 Epicenter interview, Gavin recalled that Jonathan James Harrison ("Johnny Bitcoin") had been spending time around Barcelona with Vitalik, received an early Ethereum white paper draft from him, and then passed it to Gavin while making the introduction between the two. That chain of contact was one of the routes by which Gavin entered Ethereum's earliest development.

Governance Debates

The same interview also captures how central Vitalik had become to Ethereum's public governance debates by 2018. Brian Fabian Crain framed Vitalik and Vlad Zamfir as leading voices for off-chain social consensus, while Gavin responded directly to Vitalik's critique of on-chain governance and referenced Vitalik's ideas around quadratic voting.

Primary Sources