Ethereum Foundation sued over ex-staffer's firing

Kayleen Fulton, former Protocol Support lead at the Ethereum Foundation, has sued Stiftung Ethereum, Vitalik Buterin and others. The complaint alleges she was fired after disclosing a cancer diagnosis and organising opposition to a "suicide pledge."

In February the foundation circulated a draft of its new mandate to staff. It contained a so-called "Source Seppuku License," which included a promise to take one's own life with a sword on failing to uphold the pledges, or on modifying or removing any part of the licence.

Fulton claims 79 employees voted to remove that section. One cited a colleague lost to suicide the year before. Buterin allegedly promised "significant changes."

The version published on the EF website kept the Source Seppuku License, according to the complaint. The foundation also recorded it permanently on the Ethereum blockchain with the pledge intact.

The complaint alleges co-executive director Bastian Aue said every employee had to commit to the mandate or be treated as having resigned. Fulton and colleague Trent Van Epps then sent the board a letter signed by 53 members of the "Protocol cluster". It declined to affirm the mandate "under coercion" but said they had not resigned.

Fulton's employment was then terminated. In a later conversation, Buterin is said to have raised what dynamics the EF wants to reward, and concern that rewarding "making a stink" would show such a show causes outcomes inside the EF. Protos emailed the EF for comment; it did not immediately respond.