Ethereum closer than ever to ETH 2.0 with Spadina Launchpad live on September 29

• The long-planned ETH 2.0 upgrade is now closer than ever after the announcement of Spadina Launchpad.
• Eth2 will introduce proof-of-staking, shard chains, and other measures to improve scalability and speed. 

The main idea behind the Eth2 upgrade is the shift towards a PoS consensus algorithm as the current Proof-of-Work algorithm is energy-intensive and not sustainable in the long-run. Additionally, ETH's current speed limitation, which can only handle around 15 transactions per second, is simply not enough considering Visa can process more than 1,500. 

Investors have speculated that the successful launch of ETH 2.0 would most likely push the digital asset price to new highs, or at least to $1,000 in the near-term. The initial launch of Eth 2.0 was actually scheduled for January 2020 but has been delayed several times. The roadmap for Eth 2.0 Serenity has four goals.

Phase 0 is the Beacon Chain, which will transform Ethereum into a Proof-of-Stake coin. Phase 1 is shard chains, aimed at better scalability to enable the network to process more transactions. Phase 2 intends to upgrade the current Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), which is used to launch contracts into a better version called eWASM. The last Phase is simply for more improvements. There are no fixed dates for any of these phases. 

The Spadina Launchpad is set to be launched on September 29 with a three-day end-of-life. It allows users to test out deposit and genesis chops 'one last time before mainnet launch.' 

Is the Eth 2.0 upgrade really that beneficial for the digital asset?

While many investors are excited about the upcoming upgrade, there has been some criticism running around. In a recent Twitter thread, Chase Wright, crypto enthusiast and participant in other test networks states that he will not stake Ethereum at launch.

On August 21, the Ethereum's multi-client testnet, Medalla, experienced a critical bug. Prysmatic Labs, a huge client staking on the testnet, reported the eventually fixed failure but still led most Medalla validators to be in red. 

According to Wright, the teams in charge of fixing a bug like the Medalla one have 'demonstrated their lack of ability to fix a situation like that.' No one has been able to fork an ETH2 beacon chain successfully. Wright thinks that the ETH2 team should be able to prove their ability to actually fork ETH2 before claiming it's a solution for upcoming potential problems.  

These issues certainly put into question the profitability and risk of staking Ethereum 2.0. Although some online calculators can show the potential rewards of staking, the APY is still heavily dependant on many variables and should be taken with a grain of salt. 

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