Join the Trustless revolution! Vitalik and others published "The Trustless Manifesto," calling on the open source community to sign the pledge.

In today's world where Blockchain is increasingly deviating from its original goal of Decentralization, “The Trustless Manifesto” co-authored by Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin and developers Yoav Weiss and Marissa Posner redefines “what is trust minimization” and emphasizes that this is not only a design principle but also a belief that every participant in the ecosystem should collectively uphold.

Not only that, they have also opened a smart contract, allowing anyone to sign this declaration on the blockchain and become a part of the guardians of decentralization.

The core message of the declaration: Trustless is not an option, it is a bottom line.

The declaration states that “trust” is an uncontrollable reliance, and once intermediaries and privileges are introduced, it can easily become a new focal point. True decentralization should be built upon the following principles:

Autonomy: Each user controls their own actions.

Verifiability: Everyone can view and confirm the operation of the system.

Anti-censorship: Valid transactions should not be blocked or delayed.

Substitutability: Any node or executor can be seamlessly replaced.

Anyone can participate: the threshold should not be so high that only professional teams can play.

Incentive Transparency: System behavior is driven by open rules rather than a black box API.

These conditions are indispensable; otherwise, “Decentralization” is just a facade.

Centralization is not a conspiracy; it is the consequence of habit.

The Trustless Manifesto warns us: the failure of decentralization is often not due to malicious takeover, but rather a gradual degradation caused by “preset reliance.”

Using hosted RPC has become the norm.

The sorting rights of the rollup are held by a few.

“Self-custody” is actually CEX custody.

The convenient UI hides the centralized operational logic behind it.

These all lead the system from trustless to gradually slide into “habitual trust.”

Signing Declaration: A Commitment Action That You and I Can Participate In

The most special thing is that this is not just a white paper shouting slogans, but a public invitation:

“Sign this declaration to show that you support a true trustless system.”

Currently, anyone can go to the Ethereum mainnet's smart contracts and write your commitment on-chain, becoming a practitioner of the decentralization concept.

I sign, I pledge: Summary of Core Beliefs

The following are the key commitments of the signed declaration:

Choose trustless, even if it's harder.

Reject irreplaceable infrastructure.

Reject agreements that only allow privileged participants.

The measure of success is “reducing trust,” not TPS.

Do not outsource neutrality to intermediaries that can be bought or shut down.

In simple terms: trust not in people, but in code and consensus.

The road ahead: agreements can be upgraded, but principles cannot be shaken.

Ethereum is evolving, including Layer 2, account abstraction, and ZK technology, but the “Declaration” reminds everyone: regardless of how the design updates, the following principles must not be discarded:

Users take the initiative to take action.

Verification and participation rights belong to everyone.

Cannot silently exclude certain users

Logic is written in code, not in policy.

Incentives determine participation rights, not reputation and trust.

You can participate now: Go to the mainnet to sign the “The Trustless Manifesto”

Vitalik and his team provided a smart contract that allows everyone to “write their promises into history,” permanently recording them on the Ethereum mainnet.

How to participate?

Connect to the website using your commonly used wallet (e.g., MetaMask).

Sign transaction (may require a small amount of Gas)

Your signature will be recorded in the contract, becoming a witness to the declaration.

Click here to sign the Trustless Manifesto contract

This article joins the Trustless revolution! Vitalik and others published “The Trustless Manifesto,” calling on the open-source community to sign a commitment first appeared in Chain News ABMedia.