Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has uncovered a significant computing flaw that affects the performance of blockchains and AI systems. His research reveals that the assumption of constant memory access time is incorrect, as larger memory sizes can slow down computing due to increased signal travel distances. This discovery indicates that as systems scale, performance declines, with memory access time determined by the cube root of memory size. Buterin's findings could lead to a reevaluation of how developers design blockchain infrastructure and manage memory for cryptographic operations.