Ripple Engineer Reveals Why Codius Project Failed Years Ago
A former Ripple senior engineer, Steven Zeiler, has reignited a long-forgotten dialogue within the XRP group by explaining why the once-promising Codius venture quietly light from view years in the past. Zeiler argued that the venture lacked a token, and with out one, it failed to realize traction. His declare drew sharp debate from validators and caught the eye of many group members.
Why The Codius Project Failed
On March 8, Zeiler, who now serves as a developer evangelist at the Yellow Network, took to X to offer a frank reflection on why Codius, the decentralized computing platform, by no means gained the traction its creators anticipated. Zeiler and his workforce constructed Codius after leaving Ripple, and looking out again, the previous senior engineer famous that the venture was lacking an important piece that he believes doomed it from the beginning.
According to Zeiler, the expertise behind Codius was stable, and the imaginative and prescient was clear. Still, the venture lacked a native token to bootstrap the community or incentivize early adopters, the individuals who took the chance to deploy the software program. He drew a direct comparability to the Ethereum blockchain, arguing that the “genius” of the ETH token gave folks a tangible motive to become involved earlier than the community proved itself.
Zeiler linked this lesson on to the launch of the Yellow token, framing native belongings as important for rewarding the risk-takers who deploy software program, contribute to code, and construct early momentum. He famous that regularly enabling self-executing purposes that don’t depend on third-party brokers will increase the worth of the underlying community. The former Ripple senior government concluded his put up with a pointed remark that each nice expertise wants highly effective incentives to scale.
Community Pushes Back Against Zeiler
Vet, a dUNL validator for the XRP Ledger (XRPL), pushed again towards Zeiler’s reasoning, arguing that the choice to create Codius with no native token was fully intentional from the start. He famous that Codius was constructed to be token-agnostic by way of the Interledger Protocol, with no Initial Coin Offering (ICO) and no insider benefit, framing the absence of a local asset as a function somewhat than a flaw.
A group member challenged Vet by mentioning that Codius continues to be lifeless whatever the unique intent, suggesting it could have wanted an extra element to outlive. The similar member famous that as XRP surged from fractions of a cent to over $3, the venture’s imaginative and prescient appeared to shift away from a ledger designed for all types of worth towards one centered on XRP dealing with every little thing. In their view, the unique imaginative and prescient was the stronger strategy.
Vet disputed the characterization, sustaining that Codius will not be lifeless. He referenced an Interledger Foundation podcast from two years in the past that recommended the previous Coil workforce had been redirected to work on Codius improvement. Vet additionally rejected the framing round XRP, insisting it was all the time purpose-built as a best-in-class settlement layer and there was by no means any pivot in its meant function.
Adding one other layer to the story, a group member reminded others that Ripple’s former CTO, Joel Schwartz, had signaled again in 2023 that he was actively working to revive the Codius venture, noting that latest technological advances had crammed the gaps and addressed the challenges the venture as soon as confronted. However, Schwartz stepped down as CTO at Ripple in September 2025, and no additional updates on a possible Codius revival have emerged from his finish.