A proposal for the next Zcash Dev Fund

Electric
Coin
Co.
(ECC)
has
posted
a
ZIP
for
consideration
in
ongoing
discussions
about
the
Zcash
Development
Fund.
Our
CEO,
Josh
Swihart,

published
it
today
on
the
Zcash
Community
Forum,
and
we
are
looking
forward
to
hearing
feedback
from
the
community.

If
you
are
reading
this,
you
probably
know
that
the
current
dev
fund
will
expire
in
November
of
this
year,
and
if
the
community
opts
not
to
extend
it
or
institute
a
replacement,
the
dev
recipients,
including
ECC,
Zcash
Foundation,
and
Zcash
Grants
Committee,
will
stop
receiving
a
portion
of
mining
rewards
to
support
our
Zcash-related
initiatives.
This
may
force
some
or
all
of
us
to
either
find
new
funding
sources
or
begin
to
ramp
down
operations.

As
we’ve
stated
previously,
ECC
believes
letting
the
dev
fund
expire
is
one
acceptable
option;
instituting
a
new
non-direct
funding
model
is
another
path
we’d
endorse.
We
will
not
endorse
or
accept
direct
allocation
from
another
four-year
Zcash
Dev
Fund
proposal
that
directly
distributes
to
any
formal
organization,
including
our
own.

However,
our
ZIP
provides
an
up-to-one-year
extension
to
the
current
dev
fund
to
allow
time
for
the
creation
of
a
new
non-direct
funding
model,
mentioned
previously.
If
this
idea
could
be
established
and
approved
by
the
community
at
any
point
within
the
one-year-extension
period,
the
non-direct
funding
model
would
supersede
and
terminate
the
one-year
extension
of
the
current
dev
fund.

From
our
May
1
blog: 

And
so
we,
the
community,
have
a
critically
important
decision
to
make:

• 
  
  We
  can
  simply
  let
  the
  development
  fund
  expire.
• 
  
  We
  can
  create
  a
  new
  development
  fund,
  with
  more
  or
  fewer
  recipients
  who
  directly
  receive
  future
  funding,
  by
  embedding
  the
  addresses
  of
  those
  organizations’
  wallets
  directly
  into
  the
  protocol,
  as
  we
  have
  today.
  Several
  members
  of
  the
  community
  have
  proposed
  such
  options.
• 
  
  We
  can
  consider
  a
  funding
  model
  in
  which
  no
  organization
  is
  guaranteed
  funding
  with
  its
  address
  coded
  into
  the
  base
  layer.
  That
  might
  look
  like
  a
  decentralized
  grant
  model,
  similar
  to
  what
  I
  described
  here,
  or
  an
  alternative
  where
  funds
  are
  allocated
  through
  a
  DAO
  or
  other
  mechanism.

It
should
be
noted
that
the
decision
needs
to
be
made
soon.
Depending
on
the
community’s
desired
path,
implementing
changes
to
issuance
in
Zcash
could
take
up
to
5
months,
which
means
we’ll
need
clear
consensus
on
the
path
forward
by
early
July.

We
believe
another
four
years
with
the
same
or
similar
model
is
fraught
and
that
the
community
deserves
a
bigger
voice
and
direct
participation,
increased
accountability
for
outcomes,
and
greater
resiliency
for
Zcash.
We’re
looking
forward
to
the
continuing
conversation
over
the
next
few
weeks.

Link
to
ZIP