Regarding the Bitcoin Foundation.......

[bitcoinstarter]

The Bitcoin foundation is sorely needed. Keep plowing away Charlie!

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[n8rwJeTt8TrrLKPa55eU]

Thank you for your confidence (and to the others as well). As one of the representatives of the Individual Membership Class, I take my board responsibilities very seriously. When Zimmermann resigned from Network Associates because they were trying to backdoor PGP, I took him in at Hushmail as Chief Cryptographer which is when OpenPGP was launched (2000-2002).

Regarding your 3rd concern above, how do you respond to the points that I make in this reply to theymos https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=113400.msg1227798#msg1227798 ?

I recognize the potential financial dependency issue, but how does your proposal mitigate clandestine, non-transparent compensation from malicious actors and how does it address succession planning for lead developers?

Jon I think anyone who has been following you over the past couple of years (as I do on Twitter & Forbes) is likely to agree that you are a principled individual, not only very knowledgeable about socioeconomic topics, but also well-aligned ideologically with the original spirit of Bitcoin.

You make valid points in your other post, and I agree that the Foundation could do a lot of good as a sanity check, sounding board, buffering mechanism, and supervisory entity versus the development team.  And undoubtedly, in the long term, an enlightened oligarchy is less risky than a hereditary Gavinistic monarchy.  My main fear in going from a known state where the developers control the priorities (currently) to an unknown state where possibly the Foundation dominates, is related to the first bullet point: essentially, I don't think that the announced board composition fairly represents my own perception wrt. Bitcoin's ideological and cultural makeup.  I think it needs one extra seat assigned to someone who loves Bitcoin purely for ideology, has lived outside the USA, and has a track record of defending freedom and privacy under political pressure.  Hence the two names I proposed.

Thus, the third bullet, trying to get the development schedule crowdfunded, was simply an attempt at a safety valve in case the Foundation gets dissolved or goes astray, a possibility that seems nonzero given my misgivings regarding the board composition.  I can follow your thesis that a Foundation structure should be more stable and less risky than unsupervised developer control, but that thesis has, as an assumption, a Foundation board which is trustworthy.  At this point, the devil I know (the current dev team) has a very good multiyear track record of self-governance and respect for Bitcoin's privacy features; whereas wrt. the Foundation, yourself and Gavin (a minority) are the only people that I would trust to shepherd Bitcoin not just as a public transactional medium, but also, just as importantly, as a private store of value and private means of payment.

So basically my position is that I'd accept (or at least be willing to try out) the governance premises in your post, and support the Foundation more unequivocally, if the board composition was adjusted to guarantee a stronger ideological commitment to monetary freedom and privacy.

[kwoody]

The "Foundation" has been met with so much skepticism since the announcement of its conception. I believe the reason for this is simply that the community as a whole was not made aware of its existence until it had already become a full blown entity, complete with boards members and so on. I believe the community would've had a much more positive outlook on the whole thing if Gavin had come outright with the idea as a proposal. What we got instead was a vague announcement about an announcement(lol?), and many of the people in this community feel like Gavin and others went behind the backs of the majority. Those who would automatically assume that it aims the community towards centralization are going to believe so with good reason, albeit for the wrong reasons. The "Foundation" is a double edged sword, in that while you give the press and general media a face to attach the word "Bitcoin" to, you also paint a bullseye target on the whole "experiment". You have provided Luke Skywalker with the air duct needed to blow up the Deathstar.

[Yankee (BitInstant)]

I think the name is wrong. Why not call it the "Foundation to tax free pay people to develop bitcoin (in the pay the people who pay want)" ?

Huh?

Look, you don't have to join. If you don't your money won't be used to fund new projects or pay dev's.

It's not a tax if its opt-in. This is a member driven organization.

Also, not sure if your English has been diminishing, but I really don't understand your post above. (Not being sarcastic, I really don't understand what you wrote)

-Charlie

[Yankee (BitInstant)]

I think the name is wrong. Why not call it the "Foundation to tax free pay people to develop bitcoin (in the way the people who pay want)" ?

Huh?

Look, you don't have to join. If you don't your money won't be used to fund new projects or pay dev's.

It's not a tax if its opt-in. This is a member driven organization.

Also, not sure if your English has been diminishing, but I really don't understand your post above. (Not being sarcastic, I really don't understand what you wrote)

-Charlie

Is the foundation not for profit? Or is it a taxable corporation?

Edit: Meaning you can pay the developers with a tax write off... Or am I wrong about this??

Edit 2: Anyway it is not really a "bitcoin foundation"   It's a private club were the BTC rich get to pay the main developers to do what they want.

I'm not anti your club but I think the name is not fair and that is why you guys are getting so much hate. If you called it the bitinstand and mt gox software development foundation no one would care at all.  But because with your name you claim to represent us all many people are upset.

I don't think you are anti anything, I was just asking a question- no need to get defensive.

But because with your name you claim to represent us all many people are upset.

Tell me where we claim to represent you? We are a member driven organization and represent its members.

Anyway it is not really a "bitcoin foundation"   It's a private club were the BTC rich get to pay the main developers to do what they want.

Wow, you just made alot of assumptions and claims here which are blatantly wrong
It is not a 'private club', anyone can join for as little as 2.5 BTC
'BTC Rich' ? - Thats another fallacy. Individual members that pay 2.5 BTC and corporate members that pay 5000 BTC have the same voting rights and power. It works the same way the US Senate does, where small states and big states have the same voting rights.
'Pay the main developers to do what they want.' - The foundation has no right to tell the devs what to do, i've explained this many times.

The name 'Bitcoin Foundation' seems to me where your issues lie, and I can understand that.

However, in the future please make sure you use accurate claims and when making an opinion, make sure people understand that its your opinion and not a fact.

Thanks

Charlie

[Yankee (BitInstant)]

I think the name is wrong. Why not call it the "Foundation to tax free pay people to develop bitcoin (in the way the people who pay want)" ?

Huh?

Look, you don't have to join. If you don't your money won't be used to fund new projects or pay dev's.

It's not a tax if its opt-in. This is a member driven organization.

Also, not sure if your English has been diminishing, but I really don't understand your post above. (Not being sarcastic, I really don't understand what you wrote)

-Charlie

Is the foundation not for profit? Or is it a taxable corporation?

Edit: Meaning you can pay the developers with a tax write off... Or am I wrong about this??

Edit 2: Anyway it is not really a "bitcoin foundation"   It's a private club were the BTC rich get to pay the main developers to do what they want.

I'm not anti your club but I think the name is not fair and that is why you guys are getting so much hate. If you called it the bitinstand and mt gox software development foundation no one would care at all.  But because with your name you claim to represent us all many people are upset.

I don't think you are anti anything, I was just asking a question- no need to get defensive.

But because with your name you claim to represent us all many people are upset.

Tell me where we claim to represent you? We are a member driven organization and represent its members.

Anyway it is not really a "bitcoin foundation"   It's a private club were the BTC rich get to pay the main developers to do what they want.

Wow, you just made alot of assumptions and claims here which are blatantly wrong
It is not a 'private club', anyone can join for as little as 2.5 BTC
'BTC Rich' ? - Thats another fallacy. Individual members that pay 2.5 BTC and corporate members that pay 5000 BTC have the same voting rights and power. It works the same way the US Senate does, where small states and big states have the same voting rights.
'Pay the main developers to do what they want.' - The foundation has no right to tell the devs what to do, i've explained this many times.

The name 'Bitcoin Foundation' seems to me where your issues lie, and I can understand that.

However, in the future please make sure you use accurate claims and when making an opinion, make sure people understand that its your opinion and not a fact.

Thanks

Charlie

You are A bitcoin foundation not THE bitcoin foundation.

You should have picked a better name.

Fine, we can discuss that point.

However, my issue with you is that you made unfounded claims in your post above which is personally insulting. I've responded to them, but you did not.

Please be careful what you write. You are not a troll, and woldnt want anyone thinking you are.

Like I said in earlier posts, anyone is free to start their own Bitcoin Foundation, we are not claiming to be THE Bitcoin Foundation.

The only time we use 'The' is when addressing the current foundation.

If you have a problem with the name, join the board and change it.

-Charlie

[Yankee (BitInstant)]

Edit: Like it or not you do not represent the whole bitcoin community. With the name that you picked it pretends to. There for you and your club are just pretenders. I know you did it for media flash but it is why you are getting the hate on the forums you are getting.

And BTW seems you forgot about the tax free issue eh? And yea you don't tell them what to do but they know where their pay check comes from.

Again, Bitcoin Foundation does not represent the whole Bitcoin community With that name, we do not pretend anything, you just make more and more assumptions, all day. Thats all you do. Please stop it.

I've said it 4 times, but you dont listen. Foundation represents its members. If you dont join, we dont represent you.

No, the foundation ensures it is one of many paying for development.  (if nobody else pays anyone else, then, yes, it is the only one paying)

Anyone can
- Join the dev team
- Hire your own dev team

and participate in the open source process.

Regarding taxes, I'm not sure how tax law works but this is a non-profit entity.

[vess]

Thank you for your confidence (and to the others as well). As one of the representatives of the Individual Membership Class, I take my board responsibilities very seriously. When Zimmermann resigned from Network Associates because they were trying to backdoor PGP, I took him in at Hushmail as Chief Cryptographer which is when OpenPGP was launched (2000-2002).

Regarding your 3rd concern above, how do you respond to the points that I make in this reply to theymos https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=113400.msg1227798#msg1227798 ?

I recognize the potential financial dependency issue, but how does your proposal mitigate clandestine, non-transparent compensation from malicious actors and how does it address succession planning for lead developers?

Jon I think anyone who has been following you over the past couple of years (as I do on Twitter & Forbes) is likely to agree that you are a principled individual, not only very knowledgeable about socioeconomic topics, but also well-aligned ideologically with the original spirit of Bitcoin.

You make valid points in your other post, and I agree that the Foundation could do a lot of good as a sanity check, sounding board, buffering mechanism, and supervisory entity versus the development team.  And undoubtedly, in the long term, an enlightened oligarchy is less risky than a hereditary Gavinistic monarchy.  My main fear in going from a known state where the developers control the priorities (currently) to an unknown state where possibly the Foundation dominates, is related to the first bullet point: essentially, I don't think that the announced board composition fairly represents my own perception wrt. Bitcoin's ideological and cultural makeup.  I think it needs one extra seat assigned to someone who loves Bitcoin purely for ideology, has lived outside the USA, and has a track record of defending freedom and privacy under political pressure.  Hence the two names I proposed.

Thus, the third bullet, trying to get the development schedule crowdfunded, was simply an attempt at a safety valve in case the Foundation gets dissolved or goes astray, a possibility that seems nonzero given my misgivings regarding the board composition.  I can follow your thesis that a Foundation structure should be more stable and less risky than unsupervised developer control, but that thesis has, as an assumption, a Foundation board which is trustworthy.  At this point, the devil I know (the current dev team) has a very good multiyear track record of self-governance and respect for Bitcoin's privacy features; whereas wrt. the Foundation, yourself and Gavin (a minority) are the only people that I would trust to shepherd Bitcoin not just as a public transactional medium, but also, just as importantly, as a private store of value and private means of payment.

So basically my position is that I'd accept (or at least be willing to try out) the governance premises in your post, and support the Foundation more unequivocally, if the board composition was adjusted to guarantee a stronger ideological commitment to monetary freedom and privacy.

Jon sent me by here and asked for my comments.

I don't know if I fit your ideological requirements personally, but my first reaction is that I think you'll get what you want -- the individual member seats seem pretty well situated for trustworthy (from your perspective) representation right now, with Gavin and Jon. In other words from your own description, we have your two favorite people representing you at the Foundation. That said, I anticipate that members might want someone different in those seats at some point; it's why we settled on a term limit and elections.

I think if there's agreement that Corporations should also participate in this opt-in process of protecting, promoting and standardizing Bitcoin (and I understand that many here do not believe that should be the case) then they should also have some say in choosing who they wish to represent them.

Anyway, I drill down what you're saying to be that individuals as a membership class should have more influence than Corporations over the Foundation. I'm not sure I agree with that, partly because of the time and capital investment these businesses make as compared to most of the individual members, and partly because I can't think of strong arguments for it that couldn't be turned around to argue for more corporate influence instead, and partly because I think it's less important to tweak any initial representation than it is to just forge ahead and try and get something done with the members we've got, and let the community at large decide if they want to join, denigrate or hamper us.

Anyway, if our members come forward and say that the board structure is broken, I'm sure we'll want to discuss that. I don't think we've given it nearly enough time though, it's been two days! What I've learned so far is the initial board members are passionate, generally kind rational debaters who are willing to put in yeoman's effort talking about this. A good indication for the future, but not as great as getting our list of To-Do's done. :-)

[Yankee (BitInstant)]

Edit: Like it or not you do not represent the whole bitcoin community. With the name that you picked it pretends to. There for you and your club are just pretenders. I know you did it for media flash but it is why you are getting the hate on the forums you are getting.

And BTW seems you forgot about the tax free issue eh? And yea you don't tell them what to do but they know where their pay check comes from.

Again, Bitcoin Foundation does not represent the whole Bitcoin community With that name, we do not pretend anything, you just make more and more assumptions, all day. Thats all you do. Please stop it.

I've said it 4 times, but you dont listen. Foundation represents its members. If you dont join, we dont represent you.

No, the foundation ensures it is one of many paying for development.  (if nobody else pays anyone else, then, yes, it is the only one paying)

Anyone can
- Join the dev team
- Hire your own dev team

and participate in the open source process.

Regarding taxes, I'm not sure how tax law works but this is a non-profit entity.

Thank you for at least responding to the tax issues. I'm shocked you admit your ignorance but yes... This is a way to tax free pay people to develop BTC... Deal with it...   And you wonder why you are getting a flash back??

I was pretty neutral to the whole idea but they way you have dealt with this I'm pretty anti now... There are times not being democratic is fine but if you want to act this way, it is not cool and you will just be further rejected by the community.

I think you are taking this personally, which you should not. I did not insult you, merely asked you to stop making assumptions and ask questions you dont know the answers to.

the Bitcoin Foundation has 5 board seats equally represented by individuals and corporations. No one has any power over anyone else.

No reason to be shocked. Unlike some people here, I easily admit my mistakes and shortcomings.

You can make the same claim to every non-profit. I don't believe the Anti-Whalers should be getting my tax money, but they do anyway.

If your decision changed merely because you feel a little insulted by me, it's hard to believe you were neutral.

You have arguments and points, I will gladly debate them. Once you insult and threaten, I will step back.

Feel free to continue the debate, but Im going to take a nap, so will respond later.

-Charlie

[Technomage]

I certainly feel better about the foundation based on these discussions. Most of the board is actually answering to these questions and answering well, that is a good start to something that is supposed to be a "community supported" foundation. A very good start.

[BkkCoins]

Hmm. I thought it was a 501(c) and hence not tax deductible to donators or members. And as far as the corp itself it would only pay tax on earnings anyway - no corp pays tax on expenses such as wages. So this all makes little sense.

I'm much more behind the foundation than I was yesterday. I think the people involved have about as good motives as anyone probably could in this situation. Well, except Vennes who I don't really know anything about and who seems to feel that these forums aren't worthy of his visiting. But likewise not many here talk about his CoinLab / CoinBase thing, whichever one it is.

[matonis]

Thank you for your confidence (and to the others as well). As one of the representatives of the Individual Membership Class, I take my board responsibilities very seriously. When Zimmermann resigned from Network Associates because they were trying to backdoor PGP, I took him in at Hushmail as Chief Cryptographer which is when OpenPGP was launched (2000-2002).

Regarding your 3rd concern above, how do you respond to the points that I make in this reply to theymos https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=113400.msg1227798#msg1227798 ?

I recognize the potential financial dependency issue, but how does your proposal mitigate clandestine, non-transparent compensation from malicious actors and how does it address succession planning for lead developers?

Jon I think anyone who has been following you over the past couple of years (as I do on Twitter & Forbes) is likely to agree that you are a principled individual, not only very knowledgeable about socioeconomic topics, but also well-aligned ideologically with the original spirit of Bitcoin.

You make valid points in your other post, and I agree that the Foundation could do a lot of good as a sanity check, sounding board, buffering mechanism, and supervisory entity versus the development team.  And undoubtedly, in the long term, an enlightened oligarchy is less risky than a hereditary Gavinistic monarchy.  My main fear in going from a known state where the developers control the priorities (currently) to an unknown state where possibly the Foundation dominates, is related to the first bullet point: essentially, I don't think that the announced board composition fairly represents my own perception wrt. Bitcoin's ideological and cultural makeup.  I think it needs one extra seat assigned to someone who loves Bitcoin purely for ideology, has lived outside the USA, and has a track record of defending freedom and privacy under political pressure.  Hence the two names I proposed.

Thus, the third bullet, trying to get the development schedule crowdfunded, was simply an attempt at a safety valve in case the Foundation gets dissolved or goes astray, a possibility that seems nonzero given my misgivings regarding the board composition.  I can follow your thesis that a Foundation structure should be more stable and less risky than unsupervised developer control, but that thesis has, as an assumption, a Foundation board which is trustworthy.  At this point, the devil I know (the current dev team) has a very good multiyear track record of self-governance and respect for Bitcoin's privacy features; whereas wrt. the Foundation, yourself and Gavin (a minority) are the only people that I would trust to shepherd Bitcoin not just as a public transactional medium, but also, just as importantly, as a private store of value and private means of payment.

So basically my position is that I'd accept (or at least be willing to try out) the governance premises in your post, and support the Foundation more unequivocally, if the board composition was adjusted to guarantee a stronger ideological commitment to monetary freedom and privacy.

Thanks for your rational feedback, n8rwJeTt8TrrLKPa55eU (I can't really pronounce your name though).

Over time, the case that the Foundation has to make is that an independent, transparent body is preferable to the reasoned whims of volunteer coders when it comes to protecting the integrity of open source protocols.

[Yankee (BitInstant)]

Hmm. I thought it was a 501(c) and hence not tax deductible to donators or members. And as far as the corp itself it would only pay tax on earnings anyway - no corp pays tax on expenses such as wages. So this all makes little sense.

I'm much more behind the foundation than I was yesterday. I think the people involved have about as good motives as anyone probably could in this situation. Well, except Vennes who I don't really know anything about and who seems to feel that these forums aren't worthy of his visiting. But likewise not many here talk about his CoinLab / CoinBase thing, whichever one it is.

Ah, thanks for the info on the tax status. I think we are leaning towards 501(c)6 but I dont know the difference.

Actually, Peter responded in this thread about 4 posts ago lol https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=113842.msg1231422#msg1231422

[Yankee (BitInstant)]

I do not think this foundation is supported by nor represents the whole community.

Why do you keep repeating this lol

I clearly wrote 5 times now:

Again, Bitcoin Foundation does not represent the whole Bitcoin community With that name, we do not pretend anything.

I've said it 4 times, but you dont listen. Foundation represents its members. If you dont join, we dont represent you.

You as a board member made defensive attacks and dodged issues.

Where did I dodge issues? The tax question?

Heh, I clearly apologized for missing that question of yours, and I responded in the next post. I also said I dont know enough about it.

You are in defend mode and will not respond rationally. You will not win over the community in this way.

I'm not in any mode, I'm having a fantasic disucssion with Hazek and Atlas about real issues on another thread
All we are doing here is arguing about I have no idea. Something to do with you being insulted or something.
No one is attempting to 'win over the community'. Please stop making false accusations. Why do I have to keep asking you?

Why is everything a battle with you? Is it that hard to have a decent debate.

I'm trying very hard to talk to you here, but your just attacking me.

I'm sorry you feel insulted by me, not my intentions. I've complimented you and have always given you my full respect.

-Charlie

[Yankee (BitInstant)]

My claim was you are getting hate from the community because you picked the name "the bitcoin foundation" when you are only "a bitcoin foundation". Like I said before had you called this something more honest you would not be getting the hate.

And no, I will not pay your club to change its name like you requested.

I'm sorry that you find this to be a battle but the truth shines light in all places wanted or not...

Now we are getting somewhere!

So your problem with the foundation is its name? Thats totally a real issue worth discussing!

I wish you did not waste time with all the extra crap and accusions, we could have spent all this time debating a real issue.

Oh, and like I've said- no one asked you to join, its opt-in.
If you don't like it, don't participate.

-Charlie

[Yankee (BitInstant)]

My claim was you are getting hate from the community because you picked the name "the bitcoin foundation" when you are only "a bitcoin foundation". Like I said before had you called this something more honest you would not be getting the hate.

And no, I will not pay your club to change its name like you requested.

I'm sorry that you find this to be a battle but the truth shines light in all places wanted or not...

Now we are getting somewhere!

So your problem with the foundation is its name? Thats totally a real issue worth discussing!

I wish you did not waste time with all the extra crap and accusions, we could have spent all this time debating a real issue.

Oh, and like I've said- no one asked you to join, its opt-in.
If you don't like it, don't participate.

-Charlie

Do you know what a foundation is? It is the base that all things are built upon.

Clearly misleading. 

No, that is only one definition. That applies to a physical foundation my friend.

foun·da·tion
noun /founˈdāSHən/ 
foundations, plural

1. The lowest load-bearing part of a building, typically below ground level

2. An institution established with an endowment, for example a college or a body devoted to financing research or charity

Hazek and I have been having this same discussion regarding the name, and I agreed with him.
See here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=113400.msg1231482#msg1231482

Feel free to join there.

-Charlie

[Yankee (BitInstant)]

Your telling me to pay your club to join and then to try to change it from the inside was more than I needed to hear.

I'm still pretty neutral on this but unless you change your name you will get justified attacks constantly. This will only hurt you and what you want to accomplish.

Ah, I apologize if you thought I was telling you to do anything.

I was merely suggestion that if, instead of debating, you wanted to go a step further, you could join and get the name changed.

Understandably, you don't want to join. Thats fine, no one is forcing you to. Just a suggestion.

-Charlie

[Yankee (BitInstant)]

Your telling me to pay your club to join and then to try to change it from the inside was more than I needed to hear.

I'm still pretty neutral on this but unless you change your name you will get justified attacks constantly. This will only hurt you and what you want to accomplish.

Ah, I apologize if you thought I was telling you to do anything.

I was merely suggestion that if, instead of debating, you wanted to go a step further, you could join and get the name changed.

Understandably, you don't want to join. Thats fine, no one is forcing you to. Just a suggestion.

-Charlie

So if I join I can 100% get the name changed?  That is your word?   If so I will take you up on that.

Thanks.

Goat,

Obviously you know that to note be true. There are members, a board, and a voting process.

Please don't patronize me. I'm trying to debate you here in a civil fashion, but now your just starting to play games.

If you don't wanna debate me anymore, fine, but don't waste my time with games. Im having a real debate about the foundation in another thread

-Charlie

[Boussac]

I am delighted by the birth of the Bitcoin Foundation, a creation I advocated several times on this forum last year (although I envisioned it more like w3c than linux.org).
However I am concerned with the presence of Mr Karpeles as a board member even though it would have been difficult to not accept his money. Here is why.

Paymium, I remember seeing that in my mailbox... Yep, the guys who registered a "bitcoin" trademark in France to steal the bitcoin.fr domain.

How could anyone think it is possible to "steal" a domain name by registering a trade mark ?
This is both defamatory and insulting.
Mt gox registered the trademark first internationally and in most registration classes. Our registration in some classes in France was to prevent troll registration and trolls in general to use the bitcoin name in France. It was also to go against the stronghold that mt gox is building on bitcoin.

Yes the bitcoin.fr is wasted by the current owner who is describing bitcoin on the home page as follows:

"On reproche à juste raison à cette monnaie d'être une aubaine pour les mafias : pas de trace, pas de contrôle. "

Translation:
"This currency has been criticized rightly to be a boon for the mafia : no trace, no control."
I am not talking about the bitcoin.fr wbesite design that would make any mt gox website design look good.

Yes this is problematic for the adoption of bitcoin in France because anyone googling bitcoin in France will get this page FIRST.

So I confirm: we (Paymium) would like to convince the current owner to sell it or otherwise hand over the control to the Foundation.

In my view Mr Karpeles does not belong in the Bitcoin Foundation because mt box dominant market share among exchanges is a threat to the decentralization of bitcoin.
Mr Karpeles may intend to take over the bitcoin.fr domain like a white knight to further his own interests: that's why he does not hesitate to denigrate his competitors with false accusations.
This is totally unacceptable for a board member of the Bitcoin Foundation.

[kuzetsa]

F' the foundation join the country!

Bitrustica - The new virtual democratic country that governs bitcoin

Wow, you just got myself and a few others looking at that thread with some degree of curiosity. Thanks for pointing it out.