Ethereum Hit by ‘Blobscriptions’ in First Stress Test of Blockchain’s New Data System

The
Ethereum
blockchain
just
a
couple
weeks
ago
completed
a
landmark

upgrade
to
create
a
dedicated
space
for
storing
data
–
known
as
“blobs,”
under
a
plan
to
reduce
fees
while
also
relieving
congestion.

But
already,
a
new
project
has
come
along
to
jam
up
the
so-called
blob
space,
sending
fees
soaring
and
providing
the
nascent
blob
market
with
its
first
big
stress
test.

Ethereum
gas
fees
for
blobs
spiked
Wednesday
after
a
project
called

Ethscriptions
created
a
new
way
of
inscribing
data,
or
minting
inscriptions,
on
the
data
blobs,
called
“blobscriptions.”

According
to
the
Dune
Analytics

dashboard,
the
blob
base
fee
soared
to
at
least
582
gwei
($266)
on
Wednesday.
As
of
writing
on
Thursday,
the
blob
base
fee
had
subsided
to
around
18
gwei
($8.69).

“As
widely
predicted,
it
looks
like
March
27,
2024,
will
be
remembered
as
the
day
that
the
‘blobs
are
free
EIP-4844
launch
discount’
party
came
to
a
close
–
courtesy
of
Blob
Inscriptions,”
Matt
Cutler,
the
CEO
of
Blocknative,
wrote
on
X.

EIP-4844
is
the
name
of
the
proposal
that
ushered
in
the
new
blob
market,
incorporated
as
part
of
Ethereum’s
landmark

Dencun
upgrade
completed
on
March
13.

The
blob
space
is
especially
crucial
for
the
myriad
layer-2
networks
like
Arbitrum,
Optimism,
Polygon
and
Coinbase’s
Base
that
have
been
built
atop
Ethereum
to
process
transactions
more
quickly
and
cheaply
than
is
possible
on
the
main
chain.
As
part
of
the
process,
the
layer
2s
need
to
park
reams
of
data
on
Ethereum,
accounting
for
a
huge
portion
of
their
overall
costs.

In
a

blog
post
on
Thursday,
Ethereum
co-founder
Vitalik
Buterin
acknowledged
that
the
Blobscriptions
episode
had
pushed
the
new
blob-fee
market
into
“price
discovery
mode,”
but
he
added
that
the
data
fees
still
remained
far
cheaper
than
they
would
have
been
under
the
old
system
of
parking
data
as
“calldata”
in
a
regular
Ethereum
transaction.

“Blobs
are
not
free,
but
they
remain
much
cheaper
than
calldata,”
Buterin
wrote.
“From
here,
important
scaling
work,
both
in
increasing
blob
count
and
in
improving
rollups’
ability
to
make
the
best
use
of
each
blob,
will
continue
to
take
place,
but
it
will
be
more
incremental.”