Cardano News

On January 29, 2025, Cardano transitioned to full community governance with the Plomin hard fork, approved by stake pool operators and the interim constitutional committee. This historic event marks the first community-driven hard fork in blockchain history, stemming from CIP-1694 developed over two years with extensive community input. Ada holders can now propose and vote on governance actions directly or through delegated representatives (DReps). Post-Plomin, staking rewards continue as usual; however, withdrawing them requires delegation to a DRep or selecting a predefined option. This milestone signifies a new era of decentralized decision-making for Cardano.

Cardano is transitioning into a community-governed blockchain, emphasizing scalability, usability, and interoperability. The roadmap focuses on advanced scaling solutions like Hydra state channels, layer 2 rollups, and the Ouroboros Leios and Peras protocols to support billions of users by 2030. Enhancements in usability aim to improve the developer experience and broaden decentralized application capabilities. Interoperability efforts include integrating partner chains and sidechains to foster a diverse ecosystem. Community involvement is crucial in shaping this future.

The January 24, 2025, development report highlights consensus team progress on security, documentation, and Peras workstream improvements. The UTXO-HD branch achieved successful local chain synchronization. The performance team benchmarked node v.10.1.4 and introduced a tracing Discord channel. Plutus added the Fix construct and CLI tool guides. Hydra completed custom ledger experiments and restored hydra-explorer. Mithril advanced incremental database certification. The Leios team benchmarked efficient VRF cryptography.

The Plomin hard fork is a key upgrade for Cardano, enabling full decentralized governance under the Voltaire era. It allows ada holders to delegate voting power to DReps for decisions on protocol updates, treasury withdrawals, and hard forks. SPOs must upgrade their nodes and achieve a 51% majority vote for activation. With 78% of nodes upgraded as of January 22, 2025, Plomin marks a milestone for community-driven control.

The January 20, 2025, Cardano Community Digest urges all node users, especially Stake Pool Operators (SPOs), to upgrade to node version 10.1.4 to prepare for the Plomin hard fork. As of now, 85% of blocks are produced using this version. The Interim Constitutional Committee (iCC) is assessing the governance action's constitutionality, requiring a two-thirds majority by January 25, 2025. The Digest also introduces Cardano Delegated Representatives (DReps) on the Cardano Forum and discusses the network's minimum pool cost.

The January 17, 2025, development report focuses on final preparations for the Plomin hard fork, including bug fixes and code simplifications. Stake pool operators are urged to upgrade to node v.10.1.4. Lace v.1.18.2 improved crash recovery and fixed CIP-95 bugs. Mithril certified stake distribution on the mainnet and upgraded to node v.10.1.4. The Ouroboros Leios project progressed simulations to enhance network throughput. Voting for the Plomin hard fork continues.

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The January 10, 2025, development report highlights the release of Cardano node v.10.1.4, preparing for the Plomin hard fork with enhanced mempool safeguards. The consensus team improved time management and block-fetch synchronization. Plutus Core is finalizing the data-backed ScriptContext API for better script performance. Hydra advanced incremental commits and multi-version support for its explorer, while Mithril released distribution 2450.0, supporting Cardano node v.10.1.3.

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The January 6, 2025, Cardano Community Digest calls on SPOs to vote on the Plomin Hard Fork, which introduces Protocol Version 10 for governance and technical upgrades. With 83.13% of staked ada yet to vote, 51% participation is needed. The Digest also spotlights LOGIC, a stake pool supporting projects like NEWM and Aiken, showcasing community and technical contributions.