

Bitcoin Foundation Launches to ‘Standardize, Protect and Promote’ Bitcoin - nitashatiku
http://betabeat.com/2012/09/gavin-andresen-launches-non-profit-bitcoin-foundation-to-standardize-protect-and-promote-bitcoin/

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kiba
_Of course, the Linux Foundation is about promoting an operating system that
has been largely marginalized_

Bollocks. Linux has not been marginalized. It is dominating the server market,
embedded devices, and smartphones in the form of android.

 _whereas the Bitcoin Foundation will work to promote a cryptocurrency
sometimes used for blackmarket activity._

Haven't you heard? The dollars are used for black market activities too.

~~~
javert
I just want to clarify that kiba is criticizing the betabeat article, not the
bitcoin devs.

Given that some core Bitcoin devs are also Linux kernel devs, they would not
make the big mistake of saying that Linux is marginalized.

~~~
batgaijin
That kernel/bitcoin link is something I haven't heard of and pretty
interesting, do you have any sources?

~~~
wmf
Jeff Garzik, Con Colivas. Anyone else?

~~~
javert
Those are the only ones I can think of (and likely the only ones).

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tokenadult
A while ago I wrote that perhaps the greatest contribution the Bitcoin
experiment will make to humankind is to teach you and me and our neighbors
more about the realities of economics. And now I will add that the Bitcoin
experiment will also contribute to greater understanding of how nonprofit
industry associations are organized to protect the economic interests of for-
profit businesses. A lot of new industries have discovered that a few bad
actors who screw up early can damage the reputation of the entire industry,
and there are many previous examples of "competing" companies in a new
industry banding together to promote consumer protection, as they say, and to
promote the growth of their market. We'll see how this goes for Bitcoin.

~~~
andrewljohnson
"A lot of new industries have discovered that a few bad actors who screw up
early can damage the reputation of the entire industry"

Please cite some examples. I can't come up with any, and this is intuitively
false to me. Productive industries steamroll over bad actors and indiscretion.
Railroads, gold-mining, and arguably social gaming were propelled by bad
actors.

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volts
I think an encrypted currency base managed only by computers and the market is
fairer than a system run by a few men. Also I like privacy.

~~~
wmf
I think it could be fairer or it could be a way to get stuck with a broken
monetary policy forever.

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
Bitcoin can easily be forked and changed though.

~~~
wmf
I am not sure that is true. As small as the ecosystem is, I would not want to
try to duplicate it.

~~~
barmstrong
In a very literal sense it can be forked: <https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin>

You wouldn't need to try and duplicate an ecosystem. People with nodes on the
network would "vote with their CPU power" to support the version they liked
the best - so the best one would naturally get the most support.

~~~
wmf
_the best one would naturally get the most support_

I don't think so. A "better" Bitcoin fork that has no MtGox, no BitInstant, no
BitPay, no blockexplorer, etc. would probably have very low adoption.

~~~
mkramlich
agree and disagree. if a fork is demonstrably, significantly better, then
adoption will grow and eventually, in general, the better will win. this is
how evolution works.

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TazeTSchnitzel
Here's their website:

<https://www.bitcoinfoundation.org/>

~~~
runeks
Looks down from here :( (and here:
<http://www.isup.me/www.bitcoinfoundation.org>)

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
So it is. They also have the domain <http://www.bitcoinfoundation.com/> \- but
no luck.

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olalonde
Here's a list of all the anonymous donations they have received so far
(doesn't include membership donations):
[http://blockexplorer.com/address/1BTCorgHwCg6u2YSAWKgS17qUad...](http://blockexplorer.com/address/1BTCorgHwCg6u2YSAWKgS17qUad6kHmtQW)
(currently 26.5 BTC)

~~~
vessenes
I hope we'll be publishing first-day membership numbers as well. My goal is to
publish all our public keys. How cool would that be? Total financial
transparency.

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jboggan
Ah, the long-storied September announcement. Pretty good idea overall. I'd be
happiest seeing a set of security best-practices agreed upon and some sort of
mechanism for organizations and businesses to elect for auditing.

~~~
vessenes
Totally agreed; this and paying Gavin were my two main motivations upfront.

I really desire bitcointalk'ers to have some objective way to assess business
quality when they consider how many percent per week return is a reasonable
no-risk promise.

