The Ethereum Foundation (EF) recently formed the “Silviculture Society,” an external advisory group tasked with upholding Ethereum’s core values. The action coincides with several significant events that have lately occurred in the Ethereum ecosystem.
JUST IN: @ETHEREUMFNDN FOUNDATION ANNOUNCED THE FORMATION OF THE SILVICULTURE SOCIETY, A GROUP OF EXTERNAL INDIVIDUALS WHO PROVIDE INFORMAL COUNSEL TO THE FOUNDATION AND TO SUSTAIN THE CORE VALUES OF OPEN SOURCE, PRIVACY, SECURITY AND CENSORSHIP RESISTANCE
— BSCN Headlines (@BSCNheadlines) February 28, 2025
**Silviculture Society: Keeping Ethereum’s Ideals Intact**
The Ethereum Foundation aims to ensure that open source, privacy, security, and censorship resistance are maintained in a world that is becoming increasingly centralized. They have thus assembled a team of professionals from various backgrounds to provide advice and guidance.
Along with developers, the group comprises project founders and researchers who have demonstrated a commitment to these principles.
Matthew Green, a cryptography professor at Johns Hopkins University, is among the members of this group. Additionally, involved in the project is Lefteris Karapetsas, the creator of Rotki—a program designed to safeguard user privacy in decentralized finance. With leaders like them, the Silviculture Society is expected to offer an objective perspective on the various EF policies moving forward.
**Donations for Legal Defense**
On the other hand, EF has recently shown support for developer freedom by sponsoring Alexey Pertsev, one of the Tornado Cash developers, with a $1.25 million donation. Pertsev is currently facing legal scrutiny regarding the usage of the platform for cryptocurrency transactions. This action reinforces the Ethereum Foundation’s stance in protecting the rights of developers in the crypto world and ensuring user privacy.
The Tornado Cash case is quite controversial. By mixing funds from multiple sources, the platform is designed to enhance transaction privacy, making it difficult to trace. Meanwhile, authorities view it as a potential tool for money laundering. This situation serves as a reminder to the crypto community that existing regulations often conflict with technological innovation.
**Leadership Shift at the Ethereum Foundation**
Furthermore, the foundation is undergoing a leadership transition as well. Aya Miyaguchi announced her resignation from the Executive Director position on February 25, 2025, and will be transitioning to a new role as the President of the organization. For years, Miyaguchi has been the face of the Ethereum Foundation, helping to guide several community projects.
This new leadership raises the question of whether the Ethereum Foundation will undergo significant policy changes. Although a clear answer is still unknown, many hope that her new position will continue to benefit the Ethereum community.
**EF Fund Movement**
Apart from internal dynamics and external policies, the Ethereum Foundation maintains careful management and distribution of its resources. According to our prior report, the foundation had deployed $120 million worth of ETH to several decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols, including Spark, Aave, and Compound.
Using a multi-sig wallet, the Ethereum Foundation transferred 30,800 ETH—valued at $81.6 million—to Aave out of that total. Two stages of the transfer were completed; the main market of Aave received the largest share, 20,800 ETH valued at $55 million. Aave Prime received 10,000 ETH, or $26 million, in the meantime.
This move indicates that the foundation is actively optimizing its assets in the decentralized finance ecosystem rather than merely passively holding them. This could also suggest that they wish to support various initiatives or experiments they are conducting using DeFi lending services.
Meanwhile, as of press time, ETH is trading at approximately $2,181.43, up 2.78% over the last 24 hours, but still experiencing a 7-day correction of 20.16%.