The deal is signed. The governance dispute is resolved. We can now focus on execution.
This post introduces the Bootstrap board to the community and outlines our near-term priorities.
What Bootstrap Retained
Bootstrap remains a funded nonprofit organization. Through the IP sale and the return of corporate control assets, Bootstrap retains meaningful financial resources. Per its mission of financial freedom, Bootstrap will continue funding work to improve Zcash.
Bootstrap’s Roadmap
We are not here to duplicate what other organizations are already doing well. We will focus on gaps in the ecosystem to improve the Zcash experience. As a non-profit, Bootstrap can take on tasks without expectation of financial return.
One urgent topic we’re considering is mining decentralization.
Zcash mining has trended towards centralization. Mining pool protocols for Zcash have not been upgraded since ZIP 301 in 2016. ViaBTC made 67% of the blocks today. And, we all want scaling and faster block times.
Bitcoin considers Foundry’s ~28% hashrate share a serious centralization risk. On average, Zcash’s largest pool sits at 46%, and has already breached 51% once (September 2023, prompting Coinbase to restrict ZEC trading). No other major network tolerates this level of concentration.
Meanwhile, F2Pool at ~24% has been censoring shielded transactions since 2017.
We all want faster, big blocks and overall scaling to take full advantage of Tachyon and quantum resistance. The mining infrastructure for ZEC needs an upgrade.
This is an attack surface Bootstrap can likely mitigate. Bootstrap will build infrastructure to address it directly. We will share specifics at the right time.
Beyond mining, we will evaluate other areas where Bootstrap can contribute to the ecosystem. Suggestions welcome.
Who We Are
We’ll keep this short. We’ve been around a long time.
Alan Fairless — Over a decade in the Zcash ecosystem. Consistent, long-term contributor to Zcash governance and community development. Serial entrepreneur in the privacy and encryption space.
Christina Garman — Privacy and applied cryptography researcher, TEE breaker. Co-founder of Zcash, through foundational papers on privacy-enhancing technologies and pioneering the usage of the zero-knowledge proof systems that underpin Zcash. Faculty at Purdue University.
ml_sudo — Business and product person. Private equity investor and mergers and acquisitions professional. Special consultant to CEOs of TradFi organizations looking to transform. First business employee at Anchorage Digital. First Zcash Community Grants panel (then called the Zcash Open Major Grants).
Zaki Manian — Protocol engineer and ecosystem builder. Deep technical background in consensus systems and cross-chain infrastructure. Zaki has been interested in privacy since 2016. He mined Zcash on Genesis day. He contributed to Signal at various points. He was in the Sapling trusted setup.
How We Operate
We are not interested in performing governance. We are interested in doing governance.
You will not see lengthy posts about values and passions. You will see outcome-focused actions.
Bootstrap went through a difficult period. We are aware that trust is earned through action. We intend to earn it.
Looking Forward
We look forward to working with the Zcash Foundation, Shielded Labs, ZODL, and the broader community. The ecosystem is stronger with multiple independent organizations contributing. We will collaborate openly with anyone who is building, and we will stay out of the way of work that doesn’t need our involvement.
If you have proposals, capabilities, or ideas relevant to mining decentralization or other ecosystem gaps, reach out to us directly.
On behalf of the Bootstrap Board,
Alan Fairless, Christina Garman, ml_sudo, and Zaki Manian
