Topic: Anonymity and Funding (Read 1698 times)

additional note:  See also https://github.com/ABISprotocol/The-Bitcoin-Foundation-Legal-Repo/commit/f8890546d64ebeb08253cb500981c490482db405 (pull request, responsive to issue #19 ("Anonymity and Funding"), for Bitcoin Foundation Bylaws).

Thank you Peter, it's great to hear you weigh in on this.  Myself and many others are definitely looking forward to the progress on this.  I'm also curious to hear your thoughts on "Output Distribution Obfuscation" and BRS as elucidated on fairly recently (July 16 2014 if I am not mistaken) by gmaxwell and Andrew Poelstra, at http://download.wpsoftware.net/bitcoin/wizardry/brs-arbitrary-output-sizes.txt and the possibilities that the BRS-based solution may have for future bitcoin development as well.

And if you have time please also add any thoughts you have on this Github issue:
https://github.com/pmlaw/The-Bitcoin-Foundation-Legal-Repo/issues/19
The thread on Github is getting rather long but the proposal is fairly simple.

Cheers,

ABISprotocol

I've been hired as an advisor to the Zerocash team, and likely will be doing development work as well. There's not very much need for Zerocash developers to be working closely with Bitcoin at this stage, although in the future that may change.

As for "ability to make commits" - there is no need to try to "grant" that ability, and in any case, those with commit access the https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin repository have no special powers in practice. If anything I personally would consider that access an annoying burden, not a useful thing to have.

I really don't see how the Foundation can just stare slack-jawed at the developments in NY (USA), not to mention China, the Russian Federation, and apart from that, the transnational effects of TISA, and do nothing in the way of funding anonymity in bitcoin development.

The Foundation forum, you say?  You have to be joking.  There is almost zero support in the Foundation forum for ideas related to anonymity.  There are a lot of reasons for that, but some of them have been discussed quite a bit in Issue #10 on the Bylaws repository ~ my initial remarks on it can be found here:
https://github.com/pmlaw/The-Bitcoin-Foundation-Legal-Repo/issues/10#issuecomment-45282288
I've opened a pull request which is being considered by the Board on that issue, #16 (and as I understand it, #17 will also be considered by the Board).

I do agree with you that there might be more success elsewhere with less effort.  But I haven't entirely given up on the idea of a Foundation that could be more responsive to user needs and concerns, including the obvious need for anonymity across the network.

Regarding your ideas that you linked to in your comment at
http://download.wpsoftware.net/bitcoin/wizardry/brs-arbitrary-output-sizes.txt
on "OUTPUT DISTRIBUTION OBFUSCATION"

I would greatly like to see this (or something like it) become part of people's everyday bitcoin transaction experience.  

You're right about Zerocash being untested (it's anticipated to have a release in November or December), although I'm confident that when it is released the issues you've discussed with it will at that point have been addressed more than satisfactorily by the developers.

You mentioned also that you "spent a bit of time making recommendations about how it could be integrated in Bitcoin with them in email and in person— but the people involved seem to be very interested in creating an altcoin specifically as an altcoin."  It's my understanding that they felt that they felt an altcoin path was more reasonable because it would be unlikely that the bitcoin development team would ever integrate their anonymity work (even if refined) into bitcoin itself, but perhaps I'm wrong, for as you say, you have e-mailed them and met with them in person about it.  So then, what is the obstacle to this happening?  I would love to be proved so completely wrong in my assumptions about this matter and have someone from the zerocash team show up on this thread and say in reply somewhere here, "Oh, hey ABISprotocol, you are wrong, we _were_ actually invited to gradually work zerocash into bitcoin, and we're actually confident that there's an opportunity for this to happen at some point down the development road!"  However, that's not the sense I get at this time, but it does prompt some questions:

1) If there is an avenue for zerocash developers to work more closely with bitcoin, what does that look like?  Does it mean that @imichaelmiers & @matthewdgreen (on github) could be invited to work directly on the bitcoin protocol, and have the ability to make commits along with yourself, Gavin, and others?

2) Because (as I mentioned in my issue in the Bylaws repository on this, issue #19), "basic development of the bitcoin protocol, so as to increase the number of persons who are paid to clear basic development backlog and maintenance, (should be) the highest priority,"
isn't there a way where teams (such as the bitcoin development team and the zerocash team) could join forces to help get funding for this to occur?  It seems like the development team has been very vocal about the fact that basic development and maintenance of bitcoin is not well supported or funded (at least not as much as it should be).

3) You suggested that there are other avenues for funding that involve less effort than trying to get the Foundation to change its Bylaws in a way that would enhance such funding.   What avenues do you have in mind?

thanks in advance for your answers and for engaging this topic so thoughtfully.

Of course not. The zercoin code— though very interesting was a technical non-starter for our applications (20-30kb signatures, very slow validation, trusted initialization). As of now it's been abandoned by its developers and not adopted by any altcoins (AFAIK). Of course, techniques improve with time— thus…

Zerocash  (which is unrelated technology to zero-coin) is expected to improve validation speed (signing is still tens of seconds), and get transactions down to only ~5+ times larger than current ones, but will still require a trusted initialization also very new and largely untested cryptography (some of which includes assumptions which are provably non-falsifiable) which, if compromised, grants unbounded undetectable inflation. This isn't exactly a good fit for use as Bitcoin yet. I'd like to use the technology in a side-chain when made available, where the risk could be more contained,— I spent a bit of time making recommendations about how it could be integrated in Bitcoin with them in email and in person— but the people involved seem to be very interested in creating an altcoin specifically as an altcoin. (Which goes along with not publishing an actual implementation of the complete zerocash cryptosystem, e.g. what was benchmarked in the paper).

I have an implementation of bytecoin ring signatures suitable for our system but if I publish it at this time, it will just result in more altcoins... All these cryptographic anonymity proposals are very immature and come with high costs attached (resource usage or cryptographic risks), and are rapidly developing science, some of which I've been directly contributing to. Bitcoin core— under live fire in a consensus system— is precisely the wrong place to be developing them, but a reasonable place for them once they're mature, tested, and have some of the ugly compromises engineered out of them (e.g. trusted initialization (for zerocoin), transaction bloat, or imperfect privacy (BRS)).

There are several other cryptographic approaches which have been invented (some by me), but all have unfortunate tradeoffs so far... but the technology seems to be rapidly improving.

Schemes which provide improved privacy in a safe and compatible way like CoinJoins (e.g. see darkwallet) are already being developed by multiple parties now and are flourishing. They aren't where we need ultimately but they do have good tradeoffs for the short term.

This isn't my experience, but if you'd care to point out any specific instances where something was unfriendly— I'll be glad to go work to resolve it.

I was referring to the donors themselves making a condition as part of their donation (obviously this wouldn't cover dues), other funds— the bylaws wouldn't say anything about this.

As a member you're free to ask— though a better forum might be the foundation forum.  Since this isn't the foundation's current area of interest I'd expect you'd see more success elsewhere with less effort though.

I would also encourage you to go to Github and post your thoughts there, on the issue.  After some time passes and I have substantial comments, I will craft a pull request. 

The issue is on Github at:  https://github.com/pmlaw/The-Bitcoin-Foundation-Legal-Repo/issues/19

You cannot bury your head in the sand and say "the only thing we can do is donate to the developers!"

It is simply untrue.

Time to step up our game, folks.

You are right, they don't... but they do fund a Chief Scientist position, amongst other things, and they regularly make decisions about what to commit grant monies to.  I understand that they don't control the core implementation, but I think that the funding decisions they make need to support better both basic development as well as prioritizing for anonymity.


There is nothing in the bylaws that currently requires the Foundation to support bitcoin at all with member funds. As a member, I'd like to see that change.


Without something in the Bylaws requiring it, there is nothing that would motivate the Board to do so.  It has begun lobbying in Washington, D.C., as an example of the use of its funds.  I believe the funds would be better spent on development than lobbying unreasonable organizations (such as governmental ones), so I do think the bylaws should single this out.  In addition, even if I do a pull request on it and it is shot down at the Board of Directors level, they'll be on the record with respect to their position on it.


The Bylaws contain no restrictions on what the funds from member dues (or any other funds the Foundation may receive) can be used for. None whatsoever.  My proposal suggests a focusing, with some emphasis on prioritization.  It wouldn't bind the hands of the Board, but it would provide incentive and a reference point in the Purpose of the Bylaws for charting a more serious path forward to protect the users.


I can see from your remarks you may be referring to the Zerocash project.  From what I understand, the bitcoin development community has offered no assurances or support to the zerocash project of the variety that would entail working together to integrate the zerocoin/libzerocoin code (or the refined code of the zerocash project) into the bitcoin protocol.  Thus, the Zerocash project is working on an alternative coin system in which different cryptocurrencies would be basecoin that could be exchanged for Zerocoins.  This convolution would not be necessary if bitcoin development was more friendly to anonymity systems developers.  The kind of anonymity development I'd like to see happen must affect the basic bitcoin protocol.  A failure to do this ultimately will not just doom the Foundation to a subservient role in terms of its relationship to the state, but as well, will compromise the ability of any bitcoin users, anywhere, to be able to use bitcoin without being threatened by malicious individuals, thousands of corporations, and numerous governments (such as, but not limited to, NY State (USA), the U.K., China, and the Russian Federation).  This is not rocket science, it is a fact.  In addition, if basic bitcoin development issues cannot be well-funded and dealt with quickly, then it is much more difficult to move on to more advanced development issues, such as either privacy enhancements or anonymity development (which currently doesn't exist in bitcoin).  If bitcoin (whether through the Foundation's funding of different activities, or through the activities of developers) doesn't find a way and chart a clear and simple path to accomplishing these funding objectives, not only will bitcoin falter as its users are subjected to all kinds of penalties and problems, but people who compare bitcoin to other systems will want to leave it, choosing instead alternative coins or implementations that provide some anonymity, such as Zerocash project or Bytecoin(BCN), and/or similar projects that may emerge in the future.  I wish I could say that bitcoin's future is bright, but if the Foundation and developers alike can't see through this to the other side and start really emphasizing funding of basic bitcoin development as well as charting a clear path to anonymity development, bitcoin users will ultimately decline (or be subjected to penalties in different places around the globe that will compel people to leave bitcoin and choose an anonymous and decentralized system instead).

Well, it's very difficult to actually determine, who's responsible for doing maintenance and development on the bitcoin protocol. It may be easy for us to see who committed something, but how should those figures translate into paying the developers? Effectively, the only thing we can do, is donating to the developers like we donate to p2pools already!

The Bitcoin Foundation in no way owns or controls the Bitcoin core implementation hosted at github.com/bitcoin. The Bitcoin Foundation currently sponsors some of the work there, since that is currently a good way to support the ecosystem— but this may not always be the case, and in the future the Bitcoin foundation may better spend its funds supporting the ecosystem in other ways (including other technical ways).

As such, I don't think the the bylaws should single this out.

I do not know if the BCF accepts restricted donations, some organizations do— some do not—  if they do then thats potentially a way you could better target your funds.  Additionally, there are other groups and indivigual developers working in the ecosystem who's work you could support directly and separately from the foundation. Increased diversity of support is good for the ecosystem and you may be able to support work which better aligns with your concerns and values than the initiatives currently being undertaken by the Bitcoin Foundation.

It may also be that some of the work you'd like to see done would best be accomplished outside of Bitcoin core— because the importance of the software is so high its a more challenging platform to experiment in. It can be easier to prove and refine an idea outside of it using other software on the network and then implement it back in Bitcoin Core once the design is clear.

Hello, I'm going to make this short and sweet.

I've proposed a change to how bitcoin development is funded as a result of member dues (which are significant) paid to the Bitcoin Foundation.  (I have two pending pull requests, and both are being considered by the Board of Directors, which focus on changing Founders' roles, empowering members, and adding transparency to the Foundation.)

I don't have 'Anonymity and Funding' as a pull request yet.  It's currently an open issue on the repository.

See: https://github.com/pmlaw/The-Bitcoin-Foundation-Legal-Repo/issues/19

If you believe that more emphasis should be given to funding basic bitcoin development, and also to anonymity projects, please check out this open issue, and leave your remarks on Github or here (and please share).

Thanks