5 Takeaways on Ethereum 2.0 From Vitalik's 'Beast Mode' Blog Posts

Moving ETH from the Ethereum 2.0 blockchain to the old ethereum blockchain may be possible in the early months after launch, new research suggests.

Coupled with one additional post written shortly before the Devcon conference, Buterin's five blog posts addressing concerns and long-held unknowns about the ethereum 2.0 network have become highly popular reads in the cryptocurrency community.

Moving ETH from the ethereum 2.0 blockchain to the old ethereum blockchain may once again be possible in the short term.

As the current ethereum 2.0 design stands, it's likely to be years before the old ethereum PoW chain is fully merged into the new PoS network.

"The assumption is, in the first few months of the ethereum 2.0 chain, it's going to have a limited number of and potentially will have lower security than the current Ethereum 1.0 chain," said Ben Edgington, blockchain protocol engineer at ethereum venture studio Consensys.

"That potentially provides an attack vector. If someone wants to generate free money on the Ethereum 1.0 chain, they could try to attack the ethereum 2.0 chain and then persuade the Ethereum 1.0 chain of their [fake] funds," said Edgington.

Ethereum 2.0 may function as its own separate blockchain from the original ethereum blockchain for years before the two are fully merged.

Thereafter, the full infrastructure of ethereum 2.0 will be configured such that the present ethereum mainnet can safely and securely be merged into the new network fully.

Blockchain researcher Mihailo Bjelic says a complex system such as Ethereum 2.0 should not replace the present ethereum mainnet until developers are sure of its reliability.

All said, ethereum 2.0 is still a work-in-progress and Vitalik Buterin's word is not law.