On July 10, 2024, an update from EF Protocol Support on the X platform broke the previously calm rhythm: the team, which had long been responsible for organizing core developer meetings, tracking network upgrade progress, supporting EIP advancement, and operating projects such as the Ethereum Protocol Fellowship, announced its dissolution effective immediately. The announcement was restrained yet exceptionally brief, offering no explanation for the dissolution, no information about the whereabouts of its members, and no indication of whether there would be alternative arrangements in the future, leaving only one fact — that the "centralized" department responsible for protocol development coordination within the Ethereum Foundation no longer exists. At this time, the network was still intensely advancing various upgrades, with an increasingly complex path, while the foundation chose to cut back on the coordination resources closest to the heart of the protocol; the tension between the two was palpable without any need for further embellishment. The news quickly spread through the community, with mixed reactions: some saw it as a natural evolution towards decentralization, while others bluntly expressed concerns about how the core developer meetings would continue, whether EIP advancement would slow down, and if the upgrade rhythm would become more chaotic, especially the potential decline in core development coordination efficiency, which became the primary worry for many participants.
The Moment the Foundation Cut the Central Team
The real turning point was written in a relatively short social media update. On July 10, 2024, the EF Protocol Support team chose to announce the dissolution of the team on the X platform rather than through a lengthy official report. The wording was "organizational restructuring," but for the Ethereum Foundation, this meant something very specific: the internal hub responsible for organizing core developer meetings, tracking network upgrade progress, supporting EIP advancement, and operating the Ethereum Protocol Fellowship was completely removed from the organizational chart, and from now on, there would no longer be a dedicated protocol development coordination department within the foundation.
The boundaries of this announcement were also clear and cold: no financial data, no disclosure of team composition, no explanation of budget, strategic, or internal management considerations, and no mention of the members' whereabouts or whether there would be alternative arrangements in the future, only a brief mention that relevant work might be taken over by other teams or the community spontaneously in the future. The only confirmed facts were the "team dissolution" and "the dedicated coordination department no longer exists"; all speculations about why the foundation made adjustments at this time, whether it was paving the way for a new governance structure, or whether it was due to cost or power redistribution considerations, remained outside the information vacuum, and any further motives could only be viewed as community conjecture rather than verified conclusions at this current time.
Protocol Support Once Controlled the Ethereum Hub
Before being announced as dissolved, EF Protocol Support acted more like a "command center" for the Ethereum protocol layer. In process terms, protocol development involves globally distributed client teams, researchers, and proposers, each with different rhythms and priorities, while Protocol Support was responsible for threading these fragmented forces into a timeline: they organized Ethereum core developer meetings over the long term, ensuring key participants aligned their understanding around the same set of topics at the same time; they continuously tracked the progress of various network upgrades, summarizing the implementation progress, potential risks, and timelines of different clients into a global perspective for discussion; at the EIP level, they facilitated proposals rolling forward within institutional processes, preventing important changes from being swallowed by process details and communication friction. Additionally, the team also operated education and community support projects such as the Ethereum Protocol Fellowship, by nurturing and accompanying a new generation of protocol contributors, continuously supplementing the chain with individuals who understand the protocol and are willing to participate in the processes.
Because these tasks nearly spanned the entire process of protocol evolution, Protocol Support was viewed as the central node of Ethereum protocol development for a long time — not the frontline developers writing code, nor the "referees" making decisions, but the layer of infrastructure that allowed information, rhythm, and decisions to flow smoothly between different roles. Their announcement of the team's dissolution on July 10, 2024, meant that this relied-upon coordinating hub was structurally emptied: who will regularly convene the core developer meetings in the future, who will systematically track the status of network upgrades, and who will resolve process obstacles encountered in EIP advancement, would no longer have a dedicated team naturally assuming these functions in the short term, symbolizing that Ethereum protocol development had entered a phase that must explore coordination methods again after losing the existing hub.
The Vacuum Period of Upgrade Rhythm and Core Meetings
When the team that had long been responsible for organizing core developer meetings, tracking upgrade progress, and supporting EIP advancement disappeared, the most immediate change was not an instant inability to "hold meetings," but rather that the originally taken-for-granted rhythm began to loosen. In the past, core developer meetings were coordinated by EF Protocol Support, with a relatively clear timeline and summarization of who would report, which EIPs would be on the table, and how upgrade milestones would align across different clients. Now, without a dedicated department within the Ethereum Foundation to assume this coordination responsibility, it means that while some will still write code and some will still discuss proposals, the "hand" that gathers the people at the same table and makes executable decisions at the same time has become unclear in the short term.
This ambiguity will first reflect in the upgrade rhythm. Without a dedicated coordinating role, the core developer meetings may become more dispersed in their agendas, the sequence of EIP advancement will rely more on each team's subjective priorities, and certain cross-team disputes may take longer to reach a consensus without a "process facilitator." The market and community have already shown mixed reactions, with some members concerned that core development coordination efficiency may decline as a result. The briefing also mentioned that relevant work might be undertaken spontaneously by other teams or the community in the future, providing a potential self-healing path for the vacuum period, but this feels more like a grassroots attempt rather than a top-down clear arrangement. Especially in the current context where there has not yet been a formal statement regarding a new core development coordination team or process, the extent to which this transitional spontaneous collaboration can restore the original upgrade rhythm can only be seen as an unverified open variable.
Community Anxiety and the Test of Decentralization
After the news of the team's dissolution was announced, the mixed market response was mirrored by quickly polarized community emotions. The most direct concern of some developers and token holders was that, without a dedicated protocol coordination department, core developer meetings, upgrade plans, and EIP advancements would potentially encounter more frequent "stalls," thereby amplifying technical disagreements into governance risks: who decides priorities, who takes responsibility in case of opinion conflicts — these roles, which were previously assumed to be taken care of by the foundation internally, suddenly became open questions. For participants accustomed to "someone being responsible," this is not only an anxiety about efficiency but also a collective unease regarding the stability of future decision-making.
However, for another part of the community, this anxiety itself is a real stress test of Ethereum's ideal of decentralization. The community has long narrated Ethereum as a network emphasizing decentralization and open collaboration, and now the weakening of the foundation's role in protocol coordination is interpreted as a step forward in this narrative: either proving that the network can operate under a more decentralized authority structure, or exposing issues that were previously masked by centralized coordination. The open discussion surrounding "how to balance efficiency and decentralization" is evolving into a self-inquiry: without the central hub within the foundation, can client teams, research groups, and the broader community spontaneously form a new coordinating order without slipping into efficiency collapse or hidden power concentration? This has become the most critical observation indicator for the foreseeable future.
The Road for Ethereum After Losing the Hub
At the moment EF Protocol Support was pressed the "reduction key," a structural contradiction was brought to the surface: the demand for protocol upgrades has not decreased, and may become increasingly complex as the roadmap progresses, while the dedicated team responsible for development coordination within the Ethereum Foundation no longer exists. The official announcement did not provide a new coordinating structure design, nor did it clarify who will take over core developer meetings, manage upgrade rhythms, and advance EIPs, which means that while the original clear central hub has been removed, the system load has not been correspondingly reduced.
Without a dedicated central team, Ethereum might head down several entirely different paths: one path is for the multi-polar client and research teams to spontaneously form "alliance-style coordination," exploring decentralized collaborative mechanisms such as rotating leadership and cross-team working groups in practice; another path could involve other teams, either within or outside the foundation, gradually taking over the original functions, effectively rebuilding a more implicit hub; there is also a more radical possibility that core meetings and EIP advancement could descend more into the open community, driven by volunteers and ecological projects pushing agenda arrangements. The current reality is that the official has not announced any clear alternative arrangements, and the briefings only vaguely mention that relevant work might be undertaken spontaneously by other teams or the community, forcing the entire network in the upcoming upgrades and developer meetings to try out and answer one question: can Ethereum, without a central coordinator, cultivate a sufficiently stable new collaborative order by itself?
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