# Berlin Ethereum Day Opening Remarks | Eniko and Martin (June 2026) - Channel: [Berlin Ethereum Meetup](https://streameth.org/berlin-ethereum-meetup) - Date: 2026-09-09 - Duration: 13:30 - Watch: https://streameth.org/watch/yt-XQ2R2LsyRV8 - YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQ2R2LsyRV8 ## Description Eniko and Martin (Ethereum Foundation) opened the event, sharing the vision, and a brief history of the Berlin community and its events. The Berlin Ethereum Day was a one-day event held on June 15, 2026 during the Berlin Blockchain Week. The full-day program brought together speakers from the Ethereum Foundation and the broader FOSS, privacy, and security ecosystems to explore the future of Ethereum and self-sovereign technologies - from technical direction and core values to the challenges and opportunities ahead. Future Meetups and Events: https://www.meetup.com/berlin-ethereum-meetup/ More information on the speakers and the agenda: https://berlinethereumday.com/ ## Transcript Good morning. Thank you so much for being here today with us. You could be at many other places, but you choose to be here today, which is really cool, I think. And I think you should give yourself more credit. Um You're building technologies communities that can tremendously impact humanity, society, and I think that's really really cool. Um we are building technologies that are not necessarily the easiest, the most trendy, the most popular things. Um but it can create a lot of value and impact. So, I think it's it's really important to remember this, no matter what. I also wanted to say thank you for all the contributors, the volunteers, everyone who helped to make today happen. If you've been participating at Berlin Blockchain Week in the past, you probably know that there are a lot of usually there's like a flagship event around Ethereum, the Eat Berlin Hackathon or Protocol Berg conference and other events. But the organizers this year have some other important commitments. Which you will actually hear more about at later talks today. So, some of us thought that it would be still nice to organize something around Ethereum. But initially we were just thinking about like a an extended meetup setup or or like a longer meetup. Um and then Chris from the Futuro camp team offered us to to host us here actually at Funkhaus. So, this meetup idea can be extend expanded to this whole Berlin Ethereum Day. So, thank you so much Chris for hosting us here today. And again, thank you so much for everything who contributed. If you You noticed that this is like a very grassroots event. Um we don't have many add-ons. It's really just focusing on the content, on the community, on the connections. Um so and it's only possible because of all the contributors who are helping us today. So, thank you so much again. Um quick uh run through of the agenda. Um I had a slide on the agenda, but so you can find them the the schedule on the website. Uh it's just berlin.ethereal.com. Um but roughly this is how the day is going to look like. We're going to have some sessions until about 1:15, then we will have a quick lunch break. Um and at 2:00 p.m. we will continue the sessions. Make sure you will be back after lunch. I know it's a short time. Um there will be some food served downstairs at the bar. There will be also food served down by the river at the boat. I believe ceviche. There will be um a barbecue set up and there are also some food um like small restaurants at Funkhaus a little bit further um back where you were coming from. So, there are multiple uh options for food. Um and yeah, make sure you will be back. We will continue the afternoon uh with Nico from the Ethereum Foundation who will uh be talking about hash tree signatures and future-proofing Ethereum. So, make sure you come back in time. And then the afternoon will be focusing more on the ecosystem-related talks. As I already shared that, you know, we are building things that are very impactful and very important for society. Um but I also wanted to share a little bit of my thoughts and my motivation and and why I think it's important to to be here and why I wanted to organize this. Um so yeah, we are living in a time with rapid technological, social, and political change. So, the question who gets to shape the system that that influence our lives is becoming increasingly important. The internet is changing, the systems that we are using are changing. Um So AI is changing the way we interact with technology and each other and the world. So and we are relying on technology more and more even without noticing it. Um And there are also questions and concerns around privacy, surveillance, digital sovereignty, freedom of expression, concentration of power. And I think more and more people are actually realizing that these are very pressing issues. Um And on top of that, our ecosystem also experience some competing narratives. So I think in times like this it's easy to be distracted by conflicting um opinions, get a little bit lost in our own ego, and just be a little bit unmotivated and often times we become divided. Even though we are working on the same things and towards the same goals. So my hope is for today is that we can refocus on our shared challenges, opportunities, values, long-term goals. It doesn't matter if you're working in the IT ecosystem or in a privacy tool or other freedom tech or in the fast space. We are all working towards the same goals. And in the end of the day, we all care about freedom, open access and censorship resistance, open source and free software and public digital infrastructure, privacy, security, and in the end of the day creating systems that empower people instead of controlling them. Um And yeah, there is one more point which is human agency in an increasingly technological world. It's not Okay, but we cannot just be hopeful. We cannot just be optimistic about this. There are a lot of other things that we need, especially in times like this. So, we need imagination, the ability to envision alternative futures and systems that doesn't exist yet or maybe they are not the mainstream way of doing things. We also need purpose, a shared sense of mission. We need agency, the belief that we can influence outcomes. Hope and optimism is not enough. We also need conviction, the belief grounded in action and evidence. And we need determination, the willingness to keep building despite challenges and this all and stay calm in challenging times and focus on our long-term goals. We also need to be confident in our collective ability to act together. We also need ambition, which is a proactive desire to build something better. We have to be responsible and recognize that the future depends on our actions. We also need commitment, which is a long-term dedication rather than just short-term optimism or hype. And we also need stewardship, which is again responsibility for protecting and improving the digital commons. So, yeah, my advice to you is to stay curious, to stay open-minded, stay critical, but stay united because we can only do this together. Ethereum is just one piece of the puzzle. We need a lot of other institutions, aligned communities, organizations, technologies to build a more open future. And we cannot do this alone. And in the end of the day, you don't have to be perfect. You just have to be brave. You can make mistakes, you can change your mind, Um but it's really important to stand up for your values and stand up for the things that really matters to you because ultimately the freedom our human rights they they won't protect themselves. We have to stand up for them and we have to protect them and we have to share about these things because otherwise it's just going to be eroded. Um yeah, and with that I will pass it on to Martin. Um Martin's been here in Berlin uh for longer than I am. He's been involved in many um events, community initiatives here in Berlin, so he will share a little bit about uh the history of the events here in Berlin at the Berlin Blockchain Week. Um but yeah, I will be also around today. Feel free to come by and to say hi or chat and yeah, have a good day. Thank you. >> Hello everyone. Thank you very much Nico. Okay, this this lightning is really having a bit of a party. Okay, not working too well. Um I would just come in here since it's Berlin Ethereum Day and talk a little bit about the history of Berlin and Ethereum and some key moments in the past because Ethereum and Berlin has a very deep history and a lot of cool things happened here in Berlin that I think helped anything in Ethereum what it is today. Um of course the first thing that I think a lot of people notice which you don't you can't see too well on this picture because it was supposed to show one picture first and then the second one. In the back is a picture from mainnet launch almost 11 years ago at the EAF's first office here in Berlin. Um I think you've all seen this iconic photo. Um And course mainnet launch was a global event, but a lot of developers at the time were based in Berlin or came to Berlin for the for the mainnet launch. Um, then the second big happening, I would say, is Devcon zero. Uh, happened in Berlin. Much, much smaller back then. Later on today, we're going to hear about the next Devcon happening in Mumbai. We'll have a talk about that in the afternoon. Um, but it really started here. So, a lot of roots go back to go back to Ethereum. And since um, some of those events, we've seen um, Ethereum grow a lot in Berlin. We've had important projects like uh, like Gnosis, Safe, CowSwap. We've had places like Fullnode. We've had Ethereum Foundation office, uh, Gelato Network, Centrifuge. So many projects have their roots in Ethereum and have helped um, the ecosystem grow. So, I think it's it's exciting to see how a lot of things started here, it grew here, and it continues to do so. And of course, you're all here for Berlin Blockchain Week. That's a happening that's been growing and growing over the years. Really puts um, Berlin on the map. And I think often times promote some of the some of the values of um, OG crypto and so on. Of course, a marquee event is is Devcon. Also again happening a couple of days from now. Great conference with the several days of content. Um, yeah. Protocol bag is another one that I helped um, put together with the Department of Decentralization. And of course, we're also quite known for EthBerlin, which we put uh, four hackathons together over the last eight years or so. This year, we're switching it up a little bit at the DOD. So, we're collaborating with the Internet Archive and bringing DWebCamp to Europe for the first time ever. Um, there'll be a talk about this in the afternoon as well. So, stay tuned for that. And now, we're here at Funkhaus. A very, very special place, a special venue. Um as far as I know, this room right here is estimated to be the largest recording studio in the world. Um so, I think that's as pretty cool that we get to have our event right here. Um and it was built 70 years ago uh as as the uh to facilitate broadcasting in the DDR. Because when the when the city was split, the broadcasting of of of the city was on the western side, so the eastern side had to uh build a new uh broadcasting radio facility, and that was this right here. It used to be a factory, I think, beforehand. Um yeah, it's a very special place, unique venue for a special day of talks dedicated to Ethereum. So, today, we're going to talk about the future of Ethereum. Now, I told you a little bit about how much of the past has roots in in Berlin, but today we're going to talk about the future. I'm very excited for that. So, without further ado, I'm going to introduce our first speaker, and he is going to tell you about the future of Ethereum, in particularly the next two upcoming forks and the broader road map. How do we test it? How do we deliver it safely? How do we get a lot of this great research and this development that has been done over the last few years? How do we get it to mainnet? That is what Pari's going to tell you about. Pari, when he's not managing a swarm of agents, then he is managing a team of pandas at the Ethereum Foundation, uh the East Panda Ops team, which is uh known for for testing and coordinating with uh with various different client teams, and uh he's going to tell you all more about how that work translates translates into delivering forks to mainnet. So, give it up for party. >> Woo!