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Hi Zeeps!
We love our tribes, the groups of people with shared values with whom we can relate, express ourselves without judgment, and build one another up. Every crypto project is a tribe with its own ideas about what is best. When disagreements happen, there is a split, the chain forks, and a new tribe is born.
The promise of Zcash was a “better Bitcoin,” the solution that Satoshi had intended but couldn’t because zero-knowledge cryptography wasn’t practical. The Zcash tribe was born. Those of us who believed that Bitcoin wasn’t good enough for true financial freedom landed here. And we have been grinding and pushing and innovating ever since. Much of that work has been insular and solely focused on the Zcash L1 and our tribe. But that is changing.
A phenomenon of waves, such as light or sound, is interference. When two light waves come together where their crests and troughs misalign, they cancel each other out. This is how noise-cancelling headphones work. With light, we can observe the canceling out through the double-slit experiment. This is called "destructive interference.”
When tribes attack one another with a zero-sum mindset, they cancel each other out. The sound weakens, and the light grows dim. We see this a lot in crypto. One chain vs another. One tribe vs another. No bueno!
Instead, we can choose “constructive interference.” When waves come together coherently, with aligned crests and troughs, the amplitude of the wave increases. The sound is louder. The light is brighter. When tribes genuinely come together with intention and conviction, the light shines bright.
This week, the Zcash and Flexa / Ampera communities came together with the launch of the integration of the Zashi wallet and Flexa. Some of it happened with the collaboration between our teams. Most of the collective community energy occurred on Twitter.
In case you missed it, this was our announcement. This was theirs. The response from both communities has been energizing and elevating. Zcashers are using shielded Zcash at retail locations, like my daughter did here. And so is the Ampera community, like here and here. Both communities are learning from each other, embracing each other, amplifying each other.
This collaboration has worked so well because we are aligned so well around a common set of ideals and desires: the use of crypto for everyday payments and the importance of privacy and self-sovereignty. It has worked well because we are on the same wavelength and combined our light.
Our community grew this week. So did the Ampera community. And in doing so, we all moved one step closer to our collective vision for the world.
Our future is so bright, Zeeps. Best break out the shades.
Here’s what else ECC was up to:
It was a short week as we had Thursday and Friday off to celebrate Thanksgiving (for those of us who celebrate) and spend time with our loved ones.
Zashi
Zashi 1.2.4 was released with Flexa support for both iOS and Android.
Our focus through the end of the year is mainly on integrating the Keystone hardware wallet.
We began research work on user interest in Zashi Vault.
Zashi Design
- Adhoc engineering edits and requests
- Continued working with third-party animator
- High-priority focus on Keystone Wallet integration designs (final designs + dark theme)
- Continued work on Onboarding redesign
Zashi iOS
- Flexa
- Worked with the Flexa team, adopted multiple SDK updates
- Tested and released v1.2.4 (3) to production
- Keystone
- SDK refactor of Int, Int32 and UIn32 into type safe Zip32AccountIndex and AccountId
- System sheets implemented with dynamic height for the content (required bump of the deployment target to iOS 16!)
- Navigation bar changes to deliver multi-account switch component
- QR Scanner checkers implemented (zcash address, zip321 and keystone animated qr)
- Connect Hardware Wallet flow fully implemented
- Address book multi-account support implemented
- Internal build 0.4.6-1 released for testing
Analytics Update:
Unique Installs: 4.5k
Total Downloads: 5.33k
AppStore Rating: 4.9**
Zashi Android
- Flexa
- Worked with the Flexa team, adopted multiple SDK updates
- Tested and released Zashi v1.2.3 (799) with the latest Flexa version to production
- Keystone
- Analyzed multi-account support requirements
- Account UUID based logic in SDK in progress
- Built the new Keystone UI: feature complete, waiting for final designs to finish up details and copy
- Reworked Zashi’s navigation logic - which saves us time during development
- Misc.
- Made a few UI fixes & code cleanup changes in the Settings screen
Analytics Update:
Total Install Base: 2.46k
Total Installs (incl. Open Beta): 9.69k
PlayStore Rating: 4.622*
Zcash Core
- Support and testing related to NU6 and ecosystem
- Work and reviews of incrementalmerkletree#119, librustzcash#1631, librustzcash#1627, incrementalmerkletree#120, zcash-android-wallet-sdk#1640, orchard#440
- R&D on address rotation
- ZIP Editors meeting for NU7
- Wrote up draft ZIP to make Sapling diversifiers complete
- Full throttle on changes needed for Keystone wallet support including multi account
Other
Speaking of light that comes from collaboration, it has been heartening to see the industry take on the OFAC decision to sanction Tornado Cash. This week, the 5th Circuit Court in the US ruled that smart contracts cannot be sanctioned. This is a massive win for privacy. The fight isn’t over, and Roman Storm is still battling for his freedom. If you are able, please consider donating to his legal fund.
I met with Brave this week to review progress on their work to add shielded Zcash support. The front-end UI is in development. Originally, Brave has planned to store files included in shielded memos unencrypted but has now decided to support file encryption.
Keystone will soon announce the ability to pre-order Zcash-themed hardware wallets.
We received our last ZEC from the now legacy dev fund and are working through our 2025 budget.
I’ll be joining @aquietinvestor and others in a community call the week after next to discuss the next steps for funding and governance.
Nice to see Naval and Balaji talking Zcash again!
We began interviews for a new strategic marketing manager.
We’re looking for someone to join our core team. Check out the job description and apply here.
Interested in helping ECC shape its roadmap? We’re coming together in Mexico this January. Apply here to join us!
That’s all for this week.
Lighting it up!
Onward.