Native account abstraction: leave validation open to account code (EIP-8141) or bind it to a protocol-defined set of authenticators (EIP-8130)
Protocol design · 22 participants · 36 quotes · 2026-08-24 ~ 2026-09-15
Gabriel Shapiro (lex_node) provocatively said that L2s are great for the crypto industry and for those who own sequencers, but for the Ethereum protocol itself they are merely less bad than competing L1s, and that L2s that are not Stage 2 are not true users. Pedro Gomes (pedrouid) fired back that the premise that improving user experience is bad for Ethereum makes no sense, and that Ethereum would not have survived without rollups.
Background
Ethereum's scaling roadmap has moved toward leaving execution to L2 rollups while L1 provides data availability through blobs (blob, EIP-4844). L2Beat classifies rollup trust assumptions from Stage 0 to 2, and Stage 2 is the highest stage, where exiting to recover funds to L1 is guaranteed by code even if the operator behaves maliciously. lex_node reads Vitalik's earlier-this-year shift from an L2 scaling strategy to Ethereum's own CROPS value proposition as a sign that the logic of treating L2s as Ethereum's own scaling strategy is wavering.
Why it matters
The answer to this question determines the case for expanding DA and for blob pricing policy. If L1 eventually converges on a strategy of proving every block with ZK, blobs could be redefined not as a resource for L2s alone but as one shared with L1 and apps. The community's judgment on whether to treat sub-Stage 2 L2s as Ethereum users will shape future roadmap priorities.
Resolution
At ACDE #245 (2026-09-10), the EIP-8141 frame transaction was confirmed as the headliner of the Hegotá fork. The shared-standard collaboration between 8130 and 8141 broke down on September 14, and it was settled that Base and Ethereum would each implement their own AA standard.
Key points
- Do L2s increase the value of the Ethereum protocol itself, or are they external users that merely consume ETH?
- Can L2s that are not Stage 2 (the stage where exit guarantees are enforced by code) still be considered true users of Ethereum?
- Should Ethereum keep the data availability (DA) supply for L2s at the current level, or increase it?
Against — They are only "less bad" for Ethereum itself
CH, Pedro Gomes, jesse.base.eth, Eric (ericliu.base.eth), _gabrielShapir0
- L2s are great for the crypto industry and for those who own sequishers, but for Ethereum itself they are merely less bad than competing L1s, and Ethereum increasingly has to stand on its own rather than lean on the halo effect of Robinhood and Base.
- L2s that are not Stage 2 are not true users of Ethereum but merely users of ETH, and even that is temporary or will be balanced against other assets such as SOL, BTC and stablecoins.
- DA should stay at the current level and is not worth increasing or decreasing at this point, and without Stage 2 there is no guarantee of exit to L1 at all.
For — Without rollups, there would be no Ethereum
ً, vitalik.eth, donnoh.gwei 💗, soispoke.eth, Vicki.hl, binji, 🤖DR 🇺🇸, Pedro Gomes
- If building a better experience for users is bad for Ethereum, I do not know what any of this is for.
- You decided in advance that "rollups are bad" and badly misread Derek's post.
Neutral — Blobs are a shared resource, not an L2-only one
Derek Chiang | Ethlabs, Mislav | Ethlabs, NaoX | Post-Quantum Chain, ً, donnoh.gwei 💗, tim-clancy.gwei
- If Ethereum also converges on the same scaling strategy as L2s, namely proving every block with ZK, blobs become a shared resource used together by L1, L2s and potential apps.
- Blobs have many underused use cases outside L2s, because blobs are so large that they are only usable with a batcher that brings in trust and latency, and because wallets do not support blob transactions, so apps have to run relayers.
- Blobs are not the exclusive property of L2s, and the more blobs there are, the better it is for everyone else.
Other — The CROPS slogan is empty and the process is illegitimate
Tay 💖, conall.gwei
- The process is incoherent: frame transactions were conditionally SFI'd on the premise that developers would reach consensus with the L2s, and now that consensus has become impossible, they are being pushed through anyway.
- Even as the people building the protocol shout CROPS, wallets are becoming more centralized and monopolized and are locking users in, so that ideal is detached from reality.
Other — Isn't it that no proposal is abstract enough?
conall.gwei
- If the abstraction were truly sufficient, one proposal could simulate the rest. The fact that several competing abstraction proposals remain says the opposite.
- This raises the possibility of a separate world where the EVM becomes far more general. It is a question that takes neither side between 8130 and 8141.