Thank you for posting that here as well, in case people miss it. We've maintained a list of community questions in post #634. Is it possible to get some direct answers on these at one point? I think it covers most of the concerns people have here.
We've done two things. First, we have hired a director of communications to help address as many questions as possible and he will be coming online as soon as possible (most likely Friday). Second, we are going to hold some form of AMA and build a complete FAQ.
Vitalik and I will also be trying to do some sort of regular Q&A session to fully address everyone's concerns. I'm really sorry for the delays in communication. Most of the team was in Miami and we were hit so hard down there with work it was nearly impossible to regularly check things here.
The best part about the bitcoin community is that they are very smart and have great ideas. I really do value a lot of the feedback we've received here and I make a promise we'll answer as much as we can as soon as we can. This said, it will take some time as the queue is really long, but hopefully we can at least address a lot of the core questions within the next week or so.
We are also releasing the centralized proof of concept testnet on Feb 1st and making an announcement about how we plan to better engage the cryptocurrency community on Feb. 20th or so. Please check out the code, look at the protocol specs, the high level language and the compiler we have, and write some contracts. Costa and co are building a full clearinghouse on top of the testnet.
Anyway, thanks everyone for your enormous patience and I look forward to hearing from you all soon.
Hi Charles,
Excellent and sensible move with the delay. That will give a time for a breath for everyone because the rapid time schedule was a press for many.
Keep up with the excellent and constructive attitude. The spirit of cooperation is one of the highest values and will lead to a major success and easier solution to different issues.
I'm as a quality engineer can recommend the following approach:
"Doing the Right thing, Right, Right the First Time"It's the most effective and straightforward way to achieve any goals with minimum time, energy, money and effort.
Things should be done from the start in the Right manner because you never may have the time or opportunity to fix them later, you never know. This is why unjustified haste leads to errors and waste of time, money, reputation. This should be avoided as much as possible.
What do you think about improving the decision making process to include the community in a more direct way? Some kind of system for voting on proposals and maybe a road-map with milestones? that way it's managed more democratically and the level of participation will definitely improve considerably, benefiting everyone involved.
May the Ether bless us! In Ether we Trust!