Ethereum Developer Joins EigenLayer as Advisor

Ethereum Foundation researcher Dankrad Feist has announced that he has “recently” become an advisor to EigenLayer, joining his colleague Justin Drake under similar terms.

Together with Justin Drake, I have recently decided to become an advisor to Eigenlayer, on the same conditions — I am taking this position personally, not representing the Ethereum Foundation, and with a focus on risks and decentralization. I am therefore fully expected to take…

— Dankrad Feist (@dankrad) May 21, 2024

“I am taking this position personally, not representing the Ethereum Foundation, and focusing on risks and decentralization. Therefore, I am fully expected to hold opposing views on EigenLayer,” wrote Feist.

He added that he receives a “significant amount” of EIGEN tokens in this role, but this “will not affect thoughts on the protocol and its future development.”

To substantiate his critical perspective, the developer highlighted several existing risks of EigenLayer:

1. “Principal-agent problem” — the operator does not necessarily align with the capital provider and, therefore, may have different incentives than those for which the protocol was originally designed. Tokens of liquid staking also pose a significant threat of “interest divergence.”
2. Additional burden on stakers due to the launch of new services, which could lead to centralization.
3. Use of restaking infrastructure to conduct “bribery” type attacks on the Ethereum protocol.
4. The development of protocols similar to EigenLayer could lead to a “dystopia of dangerously designed restaking services.”

Feist’s publication, like Drake’s post, elicited mixed reactions from the community. Many fear a potential conflict of interest.

your seriously stating that taking huge compensation from an organization with different incentives than Ethereum will not influence your decision making???

You realize we’re not five year olds right?

— ?????? (@safetyth1rd) May 21, 2024

“You seriously believe that receiving huge compensation from an organization with incentives different from Ethereum will not influence decision-making? You realize we’re not five years old, right?” one user expressed indignantly.

A user with the nickname tim-clancy thanked Feist for the disclosure and acknowledged that “for the subtractive model to work, Ethereum Foundation members need to get funding from this so-called industry.”

Thank you for the disclosure. For the subtractive model to work, Foundation members need to get this “industry” funding eventually. What you and Justin are doing is not inherently worse than Protocol Guild mustering client team funding from dangerous actors like Lido.

I think…

— tim-clancy.eth (@_Enoch) May 21, 2024

“What you and Justin are doing is not inherently worse than Protocol Guild mustering client team funding from dangerous actors like Lido. I think you two are mostly anxious because it’s EigenLayer, and EigenLayer is specifically bad,” the user opined.

In February, the protocol’s co-founder Sriram Kannan stated there were no plans for a token launch. By late April, the team announced an EIGEN airdrop. The first phase of distribution began in May.

Earlier in the same month, media reported on the support by the founders of the DeFi platform Lido for EigenLayer’s competitor, Symbiotic.