ZIP 1016 Author Josh Swihart Calls for Completely Ending Zcash Development Fund

The architect of Zcash’s current funding model now wants to deactivate it. In a new message on the forum On Friday, October 30, ZODL CEO Josh Swihart, who authored ZIP 1016, argued that the entire Zcash Development Fund should cease before it expires in November 2028, rather than only reducing the 8% share allocated to Zcash Community Grants (ZCG).

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• Mission accomplished: Swihart says he designed the current model back when it was difficult to find money for Zcash development. Since then, privately backed teams have emerged, he notes, and ZEC’s rally has pushed the combined value of the two funds above $300 million, according to his calculations.

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• No half measures: He opposes ZCG-only cuts, which he says would give coin holders sole control of the 12% flow. Issue-weighted votes can be bought, he claims, citing the 2020 fork of Steem, and some community members have told him privately that they fear speaking out could cost them funding. According to him, large holders who wish to support manufacturers can simply finance them directly.

• His own issue: Responding to criticism in the thread, Swihart said ZODL was unprofitable and removing the fund “also hurts us financially.”

• The compromise camp: Less than an hour later, Sean Bowe, Zooko Wilcox and Jason McGee of Shielded Labs launched a postal code draft this would divert ZCG’s 8% to a new vault “Future Development and Legal Defense Fund”, require ZCG to send 50,000 ZEC into Zcash’s Network Sustainability Mechanism (NSM) and keep the 12% coin holder flow intact.

• Zoom out: Swihart’s post is the latest entry in a crowded field that has been growing all week since our first look at the debate over development funds, including that of ZCG. conical offer. That said, none of these plans can accompany NU7, which will be activated around November 5, so there’s still plenty of runway left. As forum participant Emersonian said in Swihart’s thread: “There is no rush.”