Apples and oranges? How the Ethereum Merge could affect Bitcoin
It’s been a month since Ethereum said goodbye to an essential feature its blockchain shared with Bitcoin (BTC). Called the Ethereum Merge, the long-hyped upgrade was widely celebrated, with the blockchain ecosystem. However, for the mainstream audience or even for the average trader, it felt more like a Star Wars Day celebrated by sci-fi geeks than an early Christmas.
As the Ethereum Merge occurred on Sept. 15, the most extensive blockchain ecosystem parted ways with the proof-of-work (PoW), the energy-hungry consensus mechanism that makes Bitcoin tick. The Ethereum blockchain now works on a more eco-friendly proof-of-stake (PoS) mechanism that doesn’t require any mining activities, leaving thousands of miners worldwide scratching their heads.
Price-wise, Bitcoin is yet to take a hit from the fundamental shift of its closest competitor. A whole month has passed since the Ethereum Merge, and the BTC price is still stuck between $18,000 and $20,000.
However, the overarching mainstream narrative of “Bitcoin should contribute to the world, not destroy it by depleting energy resources” is rekindled with Ethereum’s significant switch to a system that keeps blockchain alive with minimal resource consumption.
Cointelegraph reached out to industry insiders to get a clearer picture of the Ethereum Merge’s impact on Bitcoin.
“PoW was a dead end for Ethereum,” says Tansel Kaya, a lecturer at Kadir Has University and the CEO of blockchain developer Mindstone, “Because an Ethereum network that doesn't scale can not live up to its promise.”
However, the Bitcoin community is not happy with the way its biggest price competitor took, according to Kaya. The BTC community often criticizes PoS for being vulnerable to censorship, he remarked,
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