Someone just made an NFT of Ethereum’s latest proof-of-work block

Ethereumits final proof of work The (PoW) block was turned into art this morning.

In accordance Etherscanthe closing chapter of the network’s PoW ledger comprises only one transaction: a VanityBlock NFT.

NFT’s creators paid 30 Ethereum (about $50,000) to mint NFT early Thursday, after raising funds from investors. The price is Ethereum’s block the gas limit or maximum block size, meaning no other transactions can fit into the block, which is number 15537393.

“The Last POW Block” NFT is auctioned on Open seawhere it has already attracted a bid of 10 ETH, or $16,118.10 at today’s price.

The final block also contains a message: “You make a commitment and nature will respond to that commitment by removing impossible obstacles. Dream the impossible dream and the world will not grind you down, it will lift you up. This is the trick.”

VanityBlocks founder MonkeyOnTheLoose told Decrypt that they initially contacted Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin to provide the quote because “he sometimes responds […] but joked on this one.”

Not only does block 15537393 represent a true piece of blockchain history, but today is a historic day for Ethereum. Today, the network underwent a general overhaul called the merger. The upgraded network will ditch the PoW consensus mechanism in favor of proof of effort (Bucket).

The second iteration of Ethereum is expected to address several key issues, including energy consumption, as well as lay the foundation for continued scalability improvements.

VanityBlocks: A Short Primer

VanityBlocks started about a year ago, according to MonkeyOnTheLoose, who shared Decrypt via Telegram that the project materialized through “smoking weed and chatting with friends on Whatsapp.”

according to website, there should be many more VanityBlocks. The initial goal was to put out the first collection of 50 to 100 pieces and then around 200 NFTs a year. In the end, they managed 17 blocks before 15537393, according to the founder.

In addition to spending so much on gas, VanityBlocks also targeted blocks with “pretty numbers” to begin with, such as blocks 14114114, 14360063, and 14401440.

But getting 15537393 was a more exhausting process. “We worked day and night for about a month just to get this specific block. We had a 15% chance of getting it.”

“We had to write custom code, tried to work with the big miners,” he elaborates. “Our main collaboration was with bloXroute (they let us use their systems) and raising money to make it.”

VanityBlocks plans to improve over time as well. The current artwork displayed on the website and OpenSea pages are “pre-reveal” images, but the team is looking for artists to go through the images and make them visually arresting metaverse– compatible artwork.

When asked who they’ve got their eye on, MonkeyOnTheLoose named NFT stars Package or mbsjq adding, “maybe they’ll stop joking now we did something big.”