Ethereum’s DanKradFest Joins Eigenlayer, Facing Community Backlash

Ethereum researcher Dankrad Fest has announced his decision to join EigenLayer as a consultant. Following in the footsteps of fellow researcher Justin Drake, Fest said the move does not represent the Ethereum Foundation and “focuses on risks and decentralization.”

“Along with Justin Drake, I recently decided to become an advisor to Eigenlayer, similarly — I take this position personally. […] So it's fully expected that I'll take the opposite view on Aigenlayer.

Fest's announcement sparked outrage and support from the community over potential conflicts of interest and the fact that Fest receives “a large amount of tokens from this space.”

Fest stated that he does not believe the allocation of tokens will “change or influence” his position on how the underlying protocol should be developed. Instead, he believes that the new role will be “a person with a high level of integrity who will be of great benefit to Ethereum.”

“I believe the current leaders intend to do that, and I plan to hold them accountable for it. I will not hesitate to speak up and/or resign if I believe this is not the case.”

Amid the community backlash, one community member praised the reveal, suggesting that the eigenlayer that “Angst” Fest and Drake are embracing could be considered “bad.”

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Lefteris Karapetsas, the founder of Rothkiap, expressed his displeasure among “EF researchers”. He made a vague comment on X's post on May 21st.

“This is a clear conflict of interest for key decision makers in the development of the Ethereum protocol and should not be tolerated at all.”

Karapetsas described Fest and Drake's decision as “shocking” and “even though.” [they] “Rose Pledge” is “impossible” for the compensation to hinder their judgment.

On May 19, Drake posted about his decision to take on his paid EigenLayer advisory role, which will pay him “millions of dollars” worth of EIGEN tokens.

Drake admitted that taking the role would put his “personal reputation” at risk and explained that he would “run EigenLayer from the inside.”

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