The Scalability Trilemma and Rollup-Centric Ethereum

For years, the blockchain community has grappled with the scalability trilemma—balancing decentralization, security, and throughput. Ethereum’s answer? A rollup-centric roadmap. But here’s the catch: most rollups rely heavily on Ethereum’s ability to function as a data availability (DA) layer. Enter EIP-4844, or Proto-Danksharding—a game-changer designed to turbocharge Ethereum’s DA capabilities.

Why Rollups Need Data Availability

Rollups promise execution integrity at lower costs by moving computation off-chain. But without DA, users can’t verify state transitions or withdraw funds independently. Optimistic rollups depend on fraud proofs, while ZK-rollups use cryptographic proofs. Both, however, require the underlying data to be available—not necessarily stored forever, but accessible long enough for verification.

The Cost of Calldata

Currently, rollups embed transaction data in Ethereum calldata, which is expensive (80% of rollup costs!). EIP-4844 introduces blob-carrying transactions, offering cheaper storage for DA-specific data. Blobs are temporary (~18 days), but that’s ample time for validity checks.

EIP-4844: A Technical Leap

1. Blob Mechanics: Each blob holds ~125 KB of data, committed via KZG proofs. The EVM can’t access blob content directly—only commitments—reducing gas costs.
2. Dual Fee Market: Blob gas prices are separate from execution gas, shielding rollups from L1 congestion.
3. Future-Proofing: The design paves the way for Danksharding, where nodes sample blobs instead of downloading them entirely.

Challenges Ahead

While EIP-4844 boosts capacity (~100 TPS across rollups), it’s not a silver bullet. Full-scale Danksharding is still needed for true scalability. Until then, rollups must juggle blobs and calldata—or risk relying on external DA layers.

Thoughts? Let’s discuss how this impacts your stack.