why aren't we, the community, regularly paying the lead developers of bitcoin?

[imsaguy]

That said... stay tuned, and I'll say more when I can.

Where have we heard that before? 

[bg002h]

Hopefully the devs have a stake in Bitcoin from being early adopters...thus, they work to increase the value of their own coin. Also, it's not just devs that make Bitcoin valuable. Perhaps we should pay magicaltux, Charlie at bitinstant, coinabul, Casascius, Matthew, etc.

[epetroel]

That said... stay tuned, and I'll say more when I can.

oh my god we just figured out the announcement!

My guess would be that the project is going to be picked up by some OSS foundation - Apache maybe?

[istar]

The point I clearly didn't make is that it's no surprise that Starbucks accepts things like Square because those are just improved technologies propping up the status quo.

Bitcoin is helping to build an entirely new economic model from the ground up.

Square plans to disrupt the retail payments market.  Merchant acceptance is what will bring users onboard.  There's no expensive infrastructue so merchants can adopt it with little risk.  It's becoming a common strategy.

Bitcoin will only ever be a niche currency until it's user-friendly - no matter how sound it is.  It could be being used as a leap frog technology in developing nations right now if it wasn't so cumbersome.  More user-friendly systems requiring only a smartphone already exist - Bitcoin needs to lift its game if it wants to compete in the payments market and not just be a speculative commodity until something shinier comes along.

Bitcoin creditcards? Bitcoin wallets like Bitcoinspinner for Android, super easy to use webwallets like coinbase and mywallet at blockchain.info.
Sending Bitcoins, via twitter, email, facebook...

[paulie_w]

I've said that I think the download-and-install-software-on-your-PC is a mostly-dead way of using software, and that the vast majority of people using Bitcoin in a year or three will be using it via a web application or on their smart phone. That's half of the reason why I don't think improving the UI is a high priority right now (the other half is because I think solving wallet security and backup issues is critical).

people have been saying that for years and years already. i hope it isn't true.

I think Gavin's essentially right about the future of software but has over-estimated the time-frame.  People want the same kind if usability on their smartphones and tablets that they have on their laptops and PCs but they want it now, not in 2 or 3 years.  People don't their computing to be tied down by location any more than they want their telephony to require physical proximity.  There may be congestion issues with mobile computing at the moment, but people are still abandoning fixed internet connections in favour of mobile broadband and phone and tablet computing in droves. All many people need to make the switch total is some killer apps, and that will happen sooner rather than later.

i don't know. if what we're talking about is download-and-run vs download-and-run-in-browser, apple, google AND microsoft have shifted the game back to the latter, and it's probably going to stay that way for a good while.

(although frankly given the increasing restrictions you can almost count the app stores as 'browsers')

[paulie_w]

The point I clearly didn't make is that it's no surprise that Starbucks accepts things like Square because those are just improved technologies propping up the status quo.

Bitcoin is helping to build an entirely new economic model from the ground up.

Square plans to disrupt the retail payments market.  Merchant acceptance is what will bring users onboard.  There's no expensive infrastructue so merchants can adopt it with little risk.  It's becoming a common strategy.

Bitcoin will only ever be a niche currency until it's user-friendly - no matter how sound it is.  It could be being used as a leap frog technology in developing nations right now if it wasn't so cumbersome.  More user-friendly systems requiring only a smartphone already exist - Bitcoin needs to lift its game if it wants to compete in the payments market and not just be a speculative commodity until something shinier comes along.

Bitcoin creditcards? Bitcoin wallets like Bitcoinspinner for Android, super easy to use webwallets like coinbase and mywallet at blockchain.info.
Sending Bitcoins, via twitter, email, facebook...

i shouldn't speak for him/her so much, i don't think that is what was meant exactly.

we're just talking about the very first experience here. you download, you run, and what happens? how many people assume that it is broken or not working because of a simple thing like the app not explaining that the blockchain has to download first?

[Severian]

Perhaps we should pay magicaltux, Charlie at bitinstant, coinabul, Casascius, Matthew, etc.

You pay them by using their services or buying their products. For instance, everyone has bought some physical bitcoins from Casascius, yes?

[paulie_w]

yes i think the distinction needs to be made between already operating-for-profit companies and core bitcoin TEAM or related projects.

[Fluttershy]

If the developers wanted to and were able to get Mt Gox and some of the larger mining pools on board, they could roll back the block chain to zero, claiming that since bitcoin was out of beta, they'd need to restart the whole thing. You should be polite to the devs so they don't do this.

[Mike Hearn]

I agree with Steve that the right way to do this is to post assurance contracts (they don't have to be dominant) for concrete, well planned out and achievable goals.

"Assurance contract" is just a fancy term for what Kickstarter does. People make pledges. The money doesn't leave your wallet unless enough money is pledged collectively. With Bitcoin it can be done middleman-free.

The reasons this hasn't happened yet are:

• Most core developers are either already able to devote a lot of time to Bitcoin, or have stable jobs that they want to keep for now.
• The infrastructure for doing Bitcoin assurance contracts doesn't exist.

I suspect in future somebody will set up a company that implements highly desired features using ACs as a funding mechanism.

[Elwar]

Who is "we" and what are the requirements to be part of "the community"?

[MatthewLM]

I'm putting a lot of time into cbitcoin at the moment. The motivation is not only to support bitcoin but because it leads onto some business ideas I have. Business sponsorship of bitcoin development would be one way forward.

[paulie_w]

why do we need business sponsorship of bitcoin when we are literally making money?

[paulie_w]

another idea: paying translators.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=106233

[molecular]

I'd rather see people on the dev team that do that awesome work because they believe in bitcoin and are crypto-geeks at heart rather than people who code for money.

[MatthewLM]

why do we need business sponsorship of bitcoin when we are literally making money?

What do you mean? Who's making money for what?

[molecular]

why do we need business sponsorship of bitcoin when we are literally making money?

What do you mean? Who's making money for what?

he means we are mining it

[paulie_w]

yep

[MatthewLM]

Since when were miners sponsoring bitcoin development?

[paulie_w]

i'm not saying miners have to support developers, i'm saying we are literally manufacturing money with this platform, so we don't really have a problem figuring out where to get it, and we don't have to go to "businesses".