Quick summary: “Zcash Explained” is a free 12-week educational content series — 12 articles, 12 YouTube Shorts, and 4 live show segments — teaching retail crypto users what financial privacy is, why Zcash’s shielded technology matters, and how to use it safely. I’m the founder of BlockDesk News (blockdesk.news), a daily crypto, stocks, and AI publication with a weekly live investment show on YouTube (4,000+ subscribers).
Why this project: Zcash has some of the strongest technology in crypto and some of the weakest retail-level coverage — most users can’t explain a shielded transaction, and major developments like the shielded-first direction and post-quantum work get almost no accessible coverage. I want to close that gap with accurate, hype-free content from a news outlet rather than a promotional channel.
The ask is $6,000 across three milestones, paid only on verifiable published output, with $0 upfront. All scripts and research notes will be open-licensed for community reuse and translation.
I’m new to this community, so I especially welcome scrutiny, questions, and feedback — and if there are topics or recent developments you feel most need accurate retail coverage, I’d genuinely like to hear them and will fold them into the editorial plan.
Hi all, Edward here from BlockDesk News. Hope everyone’s well.
While the application’s under review, I figured the most useful thing I could do is show you the actual work rather than just describe it — so I’ve published a pilot article for the series:
Shielded Zcash, Explained: How Private Transactions Work — and What Ironwood Changes
It’s aimed at retail readers who couldn’t yet explain a shielded transaction — the transparent/shielded distinction, zero-knowledge proofs in plain English, and what Ironwood actually changes for supply verifiability.
I genuinely welcome corrections — especially on anything technical, like how I’ve framed the turnstile / supply-integrity piece or the wallet guidance. Producing this as a pilot first is deliberate: I’d much rather calibrate against people who know the protocol better than I do before scaling up, than get something subtly wrong at volume and before I start doing actual short and long form videos.
Just read through the roadmap and your grant application and dropped it a like.
The shielded-by-default, no-T-address approach and building on Zebra is a strong privacy angle. That privacy-first design is exactly the kind of thing my series should highlight, so I’ll keep an eye on your progress and would be happy to discuss a review or mention it in future content as it develops — I’ll make sure to cover it accurately as it matures, feel free to reach out to me directly for any advice.
Thanks’ looking forward to it, if you are running Zebrad you can test it out. It’s fully private just added NYM mixnet which making it full privacy powerhouse privacy not just holding and transactions but over IP’s etc. as well.
