$ETH 100 wordsEthereum, commonly referred to by its ticker symbol ETH, is a prominent decentralized platform that enables developers to build and deploy smart contracts and decentralized applications (dApps) without any downtime, fraud, control, or interference from third parties. It was proposed by Vitalik Buterin in late 2013 and development was crowdfunded in 2014, with the network going live on July 30, 2015. Ethereum provides a cryptocurrency token called "ether," which can be transferred between accounts and used to compensate participant nodes for computations performed. Its flexibility and wide range of applications have made Ethereum one of the leading and most influential blockchain platforms in the world.