AMA Recap: CRYPTO MINERS X ETHEREUM CLASSIC

CRYPTO MINERS
10 min readSep 16, 2022

Ethereum Classic is an open source, blockchain-based distributed computing platform featuring smart contract (scripting) functionality as well as a cryptocurrency. It supports a modified version of Nakamoto consensus via transaction-based state transitions executed on a public Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM). Its main function is as a smart contract network, with the ability to host and support decentralized applications (DApps). Its native token is ETC. Since its launch, Ethereum Classic has sought to differentiate itself from Ethereum, with the two networks’ technical roadmap diverging further and further from each other with time. Ethereum Classic first set out to preserve the integrity of the existing Ethereum blockchain after a major hacking event led to the theft of 3.6 million ETH. Ethereum Classic’s main aim is to preserve the Ethereum blockchain as it originally was, without artificially countering the DAO hack. Its appeal was first to those who disagreed with Ethereum’s response, but the legacy network has since gained a wider fan base, which include major investors such as Barry Silbert, CEO of investment firm Grayscale. As a voluntary organization, the developers of ETC do not aim to turn the network into a for-profit entity. Users pay transaction fees as with Ethereum, and miners collect them based on work done as per the proof-of-work (PoW) mining algorithm. Unlike Ethereum, Ethereum Classic has no plans to convert to a proof-of-stake (PoS) mining algorithm, while multiple developers continue to work on future improvements such as scaling solutions.

We hosted an AMA session with Ethereum Classic on 7th September.

👉🏻 We previously hosted an AMA session with Litecoin, Ethereum Classic, Monero and Bitmain on the importance of PoW over PoS. Have a look here: https://link.medium.com/i2XyHaG5Yrb 🔥

Mr. Ramsy was the host from Crypto Miners and Mr. Bob Summerwill, executive director of Ethereum Classic was the guest. He shared with us the features and functions of Ethereum Classic.
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Segment 1️⃣: Introduction

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
Hello everyone 👋 Welcome to Our Next #Special AMA session With Ethereum Classic

To help us learn more about Ethereum Classic, We are lucky to be joined By Mr. Bob Summerwill

Bob Summerwill:
Hey Ramsy,
Tee me up!

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
Hello Bob 👋

Welcome here Mate

Thanks for bringing Us Ethereum Classic ❤️

First of all Can you introduce yourself to us?

Bob Summerwill:
Hey!
So I am Bob Summerwill, ED of ETC Cooperative, a non profit supporting ETC ecosystem, including the core devs working on Core-Geth and Hyperledger Besu.

Been in blockchain since 2014. Full time since 2016.

Prior to that I worked as a software engineer in the games industry for 18 years.

https://bobsummerwill.com/bobliography/

At EA Sports for most of it

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
Wow, You got a Great exciting experience 🔥

Glad to have you today

So I’m pretty sure that our Community is very much excited to learn more about Ethereum Classic✌️

Shall we start bob?

Bob Summerwill:
Please

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
1. Give us a concise and brief introduction about Ethereum Classic.
How it is playing its role in Crypto world?

Bob Summerwill:
So ETC was born in the aftermath of the DAO hack. You can read lots about that online or in three books now published on Ethereum history.

A hacker took advantage of a flaw in The DAO’s smart contracts to make off with ~$60M worth of ETH. This was 2016, so that sum might be in the billions now. I have not checked.

There was huge uproar in the Ethereum community. I think it was like 10% of all the supply.

The funds would not be exited for a month or so due to the way the contract was structured.

The end result was a hard fork to alter blockchain state to replace the contract with a simple refund.

That fork activated and the forked chain was adopted by the vast majority of people.

A minority was horrified at this intervention into a supposedly immutable ledger and kept on the existing chain. Miners mined it. Poloniex listed and ETC come to life.

A fixed monetary policy was introduced. The difficulty bomb was removed.

Most later Ethereum updates have seen adopted, so ETC is hugely compatible. Everything should “just work” for launching dapps etc. Just point to different chain.

One other thing not adopted was EIP-1559 fee market change.

Because of the fixed monetary policy.

ETC is very miner friendly and stable.

POW forever!

One other tweak was made in 2020 to halve the DAG size and slow growth rate. That let 2GB and 3GB miners come back online.

To boost ETC hashrate after some 51% attacks at a time we had only 3 TH/s or so temporarily.

Now we are at all time record highs.

actually over 50 briefly after that.

Generally speaking, all the major ETH pools have ETC pools too.

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
Numbers speaking good 👌

Bob Summerwill:
4GB or later cards can be used on ETC. 2GB and 3GB cards have aged out since 2020.

We also have a MESS overlay which makes long reorgs very expensive.

Recent very detailed report on ETC security

https://meowsbits.github.io/51-percent-docs/

We have a small but growing dapp ecosystem.

Lots of daily volume.
Huge numbers of exchange listings.

Things really getting exciting with The Merge pending.

ETC price has been pumping too. Now #18 on CMC.
Close to overtaking AVA and TRON.

#4 on market cap for POW coins.
#3 on daily volume.

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
That was a fantastic start 👍

Now let’s see our second question from this segment

2. What are the features of Ethereum Classic that makes it superior and special as compared to its competitors?
How it is changed from Ethereum?

Bob Summerwill:
I think I already answered most of that.

Post merge, it will be pretty much the only POW L1 with smart contracts. There are one or two other tiny ones, but none which get anywhere close to the market cap, volume, exchange listings, dapps, etc.

From a mining perspective, the daily block rewards available will be the main difference versus anything else out there.

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
3. Tell us about the PoW algorithm which Ethereum Classic using!
Also describe about the mining of ETC.

Bob Summerwill:
We have etchash, which is modified version of etchash, as per the above. I believe that most ASICS now have support. Simple for GPUs.

Mining ETC is pretty much identical to ETH.

https://miningpoolstats.stream/ethereumclassic

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
Moving on…

4. Primary use of Ethereum Classic is to executing smart contracts. So how does it works in ETC ecosystem?
How smart contracts are secured?

Bob Summerwill:
That is not really a meaningful question, I am afraid.

Just the same as ETH.
Solidity.

Smart contracts are a nascent development. Best practices and tooling improving fast, but things are only as secure as the developers make them. This stuff is hard and experience is rare and exoebshce.

Expensive

Essentially the same story as any other EVM chain — Ethereum, BSC, AVA, Polygon etc

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
5. Ethereum Merge is near the spot and there’s much hype of it. What do you think about it and is there any affects of it on ETC? As hashrate of mining ETC hits an all time high in previous days.

Bob Summerwill:
We are already seeing lots of hashrate arriving in ETC even ahead of The Merge and we really welcome you all.

It is unclear exactly how much will migrate, versus going to other chains or just turning off

ETC obviously cannot absorb it all. There is 20x more hash on ETH than ETC. That number has been 40x or 50x at times in the post, so the trend is very good.

Profitability would dive if there is a huge flood, so it will balance itself out, but I forsee a large slew across, with corresponding price rises like.

As I said before, lots of liquidity, lots of exchanges, same pools, near identical process to mine. Should be an easy choice for the most profitable miners to move.

ASIC percentage is unclear for both chains. It might well end up being the case that ETC becomes very ASIC dominated, as the most profitable miners in that smaller ecosystem just outcompete GPUs and people just get forced out of mining entirely. We will see

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
6. Now tell us about the coin $ETC, what are its usecases and utilities in Ethereum Classic ecosystem?

Bob Summerwill:
Ether is the fuel of the engine for ETC just the same as ETH.
It is the base currency.
You need ether for any transaction, any smart contract invocation.

Everything needs and uses it

Also, in ETC we have fixed monetary policy, so future emissions are know. There is no hidden inflation or possibility of block rewards getting cut (as happened repeatedly on ETH, both directly and then through 1559 fee market). And then by removing POW entirely 😂

Something I forgot to mention before

Bitcoin has halvenings

ETC has fifthenings. Block rewards are reduced by 20% every 5M blocks

https://ecips.ethereumclassic.org/ECIPs/ecip-1017

Also check out …

https://etcis.money

Next fifthening is 627 days away

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
Now let’s move to our last question from this segment

7. What Ethereum Classic achieved so far and what important updates and developments we’ll get in coming months in Ethereum Classic ecosystem?

Bob Summerwill:
We’ve built a strong and resilient ecosystem, despite years of social attacks, 51% attacks and lack of central funding. The core ethos is very clear, and the technology and dapps are coming. Especially with the merge, things are getting really exciting. Lots of attention, lots of eyes

Antpool have pledged $10M for ecosystem devtlopmrnt

https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/07/26/antpool-supports-ethereum-classic-ecosystem-with-10m-investment/?outputType=amp

Coop and Antpool will be making direct investments soon and also launching an open grants pool for dapp developers to apply for funding.

We had a little of this with ETC labs a few years back, but as a neutral program spanning multiple donors this is a new thing.

Details to be announced soon

We have two active DEXs, lots of NFTs, bridged stablecoins and bridged ETH. Expect more and more projects to launch in the heat future,

The protocol itself will move slowly and that is intentional and good. We want a solid and predictable foundation.

Scaling will be via L2s, when the need for that arises. We are not there yet. Plenty of L1 capacity, and fees currently very low

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
Thanks Bob for this well detailed introduction about Ethereum Classic 💚

And that’s the wrap up of our the first part of the AMA session ✅

Let’s now proceed to our Twitter Questions section

i hope you’re ready for that!!

Bob Summerwill:
Bring it on

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
Cool 😁

Segment 2️⃣: Twitter Questions

1)As you mentioned “ ETH + BTC = ETC “. Can you talk about this and explain this in a detailed manner? What are the key points which can prove ETH + BTC = ETC?

Bob Summerwill:
That is talking about …

ETC is Ethereum technology with BTC philosophy.

Many see ETC as programmable digital gold to BTC’s digital gold

So BTC with smart contracts

I have a slide. Let me find it.

https://etccooperative.org/posts/2022-08-24-q2-report

https://etccooperative.org/ETC-Cooperative-Retrospective-2021.pdf

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
2)It says that CONGESTION, LOW EXPERIENCES ON LARGE VOLUME, and HIGH GAS FEE are the 3 oblivious pain points on ETHEREUM. So may we know what are your solutions to these pain points? What are the targeted improvements #EthereumClassic has made targeting these Ethereum #PainPoints?

Bob Summerwill:
ETC will have exactly the same pattern on those. It is an intrinsic characteristic of the design choices with the blockchain trilemma

ETC always chooses security over throughput.

So the answer will be L2s, just like ETH

We do have the advantage of lower current use, so lower fees and low congestion at the moment.

That could well be the case for a few more years, but eventually the same path,

We won’t switch to POS and won’t do L1 shards, though,

Like that we mirror Bitcoin

I think one of the biggest learnings of the last decade is that most dapps should not be running on L1.

It is a waste of valuable blockspace.

L1 is really more about money than whatever dapp is the flavour of the day.

Popular dapps generate too many expensive transactions and price themselves out.

Also, little real need for a global immutable ledger of every little tweak to your cryptokitties and other games.

Don’t need hard money for everything

We will instead end up with layers, getting faster and cheaper higher up, but also “less hard”

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
3: Could you tell us about the Sound Money concept and How does this concept works? Can you share the properties of Sound Money?

Bob Summerwill:
etcis.money

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
That’s the wind up of our twitter segment

So let’s move to our last segment — Live Q&A

Bob Summerwill:
Yes please

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
Lets goo then

Segment 3️⃣: Live QnA
(In this segment group was opened for 60 seconds and Miners sent hundreds of questions. Guest choose some best to answer)

1) Dary:
🦋You mentioned before that Ethereum Classic has two active DEXes, can you detail what these DEXes are and what benefits they bring to everyone?

🦋Seeing the news, the “Merger of Ethereum to Proof of Stake” is expected soon in days. What advantages are expected from this interesting merger to continue fulfilling the original vision of Ethereum of “Creating unstoppable applications”? What are the benefits that users receive with this merger?

Bob Summerwill:
https://hebeswap.com and http://etcswap.org

Hebeswap have lots of projects ongoing and recently got the first ever ERC-20 on ETC listing on an exchange (their token)

See also

https://dexscreener.com

2) Jasika:
Where can I get all the news?

Bob Summerwill:
https://ethereumclassic.org

https://etccooperative.org

Https://etherplan.com

I am BobSummerwill on Twitter. Follow me and most of the news will come you way.

Also ETCCooperative on Twitter

Links to the Coop and Community Discord at the bottom of Coop site

*This segment ends here*

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
Thankyou so much Bob For your valuable answers and information about Ethereum Classic 💚

It’s a Pleasure Hosting An Ama With You Bob Summerwill

Bob Summerwill:
Ok
Thanks everyone

Ramsy | Crypto Miners:
Time To Conclude Our AMA Session
Thank you so much for your valuable time

Community, if you would like to learn more about ETC, here are some useful links for you:

Website: http://ethereumclassic.org/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/eth_classic
Telegram: https://telegram.me/ethclassic
Discord: https://ethereumclassic.org/discord
Reddit: https://reddit.com/r/ethereumclassic
GitHub: https://github.com/ethereumclassic
Medium: ETC

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