Notably, the well-acclaimed Ethereum Foundation researcher Justin Drake officially filed his resignation from his advisory role at Eigen Foundation, managing the EigenLayer restaking protocol. He made the announcement on November 2, 2024, in the middle of a storm within the Ethereum community, who viewed him for perceived conflicts of interest relating to his involvement with EigenLayer.
The Background of the Controversy
The controversy about Drake’s role began in May 2024 when he announced his position as a paid advisor of the Eigen Foundation. That announcement did not augur well, since later, the Ethereum community raised questions regarding ethics and the transparency of his involvement in the project, especially considering that he was getting paid for the contribution. This advisory role rewarded Drake with quite a substantial amount in EIGEN tokens, which he openly boasted were more in value combined than all the other assets he owned put together. His role, however, was only to assess the technical, structural, and protocol-related risks that came with restaking and not at all about promoting or marketing EigenLayer.
This became all the more controversial when it was shown that fellow ETH Foundation researcher Dankrad Feist had also taken an advisory role with EigenLayer. Community members began to wonder what it would mean if researchers affiliated with the Foundation took on paid work with outside projects-particularly with rewards of such size and import.
A Personal Policy of Neutrality
Due to pressure from this increasing scrutiny, Drake stepped down from the Eigen Foundation in September 2024 and published an open letter to the Ethereum community thereafter. It was here that he announced a new personal policy-one of neutrality. Moving forward, he would no longer accept any future advisorships, angel investments, or seats on security councils. This, he added, is over and above what the ETH Foundation has done with its new conflict-of-interest policy and a reflection of his commitment to making impartial contributions to Ethereum’s layer-1 network and the consensus layer.
Ethereum Foundation’s Conflict of Interest Policy
The controversies with Drake and Feist’s involvement led the Ethereum Foundation to adopt a conflict-of-interest policy that would make such interests transparent. It set boundaries on outside engagements that could give reason for concern over the integrity of the Ethereum ecosystem, growing in both users and usage. In light of Drake leaving EigenLayer, the Ethereum Foundation is in a quest to try and double down on transparency in the Ethereum community, noting that trust in researchers’ work is paramount.
