Hi Zeeps,
What a week! I spent my days in Dubai in meetings and at events in the evenings. The city was just starting to warm up for the summer with mild 100-degree Fahrenheit days. It wasn’t too bad in the shade. It felt like Zcash was warming up as well. I can’t share everything or all the people involved without their consent. What I can tell you is that I’m seeing more new energy in Zcash-land than I have in years.
Several Zcashers and friends from Shielded Labs began our time in Dubai with a workshop to brainstorm ideas for more substantial alignment, collaboration, and community scaling. During the week, several of us Zcashers met with various investors, potential investors, press, and projects and companies, including other L1s, interop partners, and enablers.
People were buzzing all week. Project Tachyeon was a frequent topic, Zashi was mentioned as a game changer multiple times, and some in the community used the time together to bring some fresh fun to Zcash marketing (1, 2, 3).
I was all talked out by the end of the week. So much conversation! So much quality conversation and follow-ups, unlike the standard conference fare. A lot of good is coming our way. And people are looking at Zcash again with fresh eyes.
“Back at home,” ECC celebrated the first birthday of Zashi by shipping Zashi 2.0 on Monday, the 28th. The UX is fantastic. It eliminates unnecessary friction while guiding users with helpful status updates and instructions. Please check it out and let us know what you think.
Oh, and then there was the massive funding decision made this week by the community. Coinholders (over 1M tokens voted!), Zcash Foundation ZCAP members, ECC ZAC members, and the ZecHub DAO all weighed in. The results are posted in the forum. The consensus is clear: The community is in favor of the Community + Coinholder model and prioritizing its implementation above everything else. We posted a summary on our blog.
This is a big deal because of the outcome and because this decision is a milestone in how development funding is allocated. In about a year and a half, we’ve gone from an ECC/ZF 2-2 multi-sig governance structure with guaranteed funding to a new model that empowers coinholders with a significant voice in who and what, if anything, is funded. Power has shifted and decentralized. I’m elated.
Someone told me this week they can’t believe how fast the Zcash project has been progressing of late. I can. The sands are shifting.
Here’s what else ECC was up to this week:
Zashi
We shipped Zashi 2.0 
Zashi Design
- Reorganized all current Figma designs and set up new design files: Zashi Blueprint with all final app designs, PR Designs (2025) - a new design file for this quarter
- Tweaked the Receive screen UI
- Continuing in-depth cross-chain payment and swap design research
- Implementing ad hoc changes requested by the team
Q&A and Dev Support
- Massive Zashi 2.0 release testing & support
- Release announcements, socials management + feedback sharing with the team
- Email/Discord user support issues
- Bug Fix release testing
Zashi iOS
Zashi 2.0:
- Implemented final changes to the shielding flow
- Investigated and fixed several issues, some reported by users
- Fixed an issue with SDK initialization sometimes failing after Reset Zashi!
- Zashi 2.0 Release + Zashi 2.0.1 Bug Fix Release
- Pushed an updated PR with tx submission over Tor
- Supported marketing with video promo
Analytics Update:
- Unique Installs: 7.57k
- Total Downloads: 9.11k
- AppStore Rating: 4.9*
Zashi Android
- Implemented final changes to the Shielding flow
- Investigated and fixed several issues, some reported by users
- Zashi 2.0 Release + Zashi 2.0.1 Bug Fix Release
- Release process & documentation hand-over with Honza
- Hand-over & discussion of tasks in progress
Analytics Update:
- Total Install Base: 3.79k
- Total Installs (incl. Open Beta): 18k
- PlayStore Rating: 4.509*
Zcash Core
- Reviewed Namada airdrop protocol.
- Added OpenRPC support to Zallet.
- Contributed a bunch more work to the zewif and zewif-zcashd crates.
That’s all for this week.
Surfing the sands,
Onward.