Jack Dorsey, former CEO of Twitter and founder of Block, announced his plans to form a Legal Defense Fund for bitcoin developers. It is being established in association with Alex Morcos, the cofounder of Chaincode Labs and Martin White, an academic associated with the Sussex University. This announcement was received by the bitcoin developers in the mailing list bitcoin-dev on Wednesday. The email address appeared to show it belongs to Dorsey.
A Fund to Protect Bitcoin Developers
This email is not confirmed yet by the board members. The reports say the goal of this fund will be to provide legal support services to bitcoin developers who have been facing litigation from multiple fronts. The threat of litigation is having a detrimental effect on the developers. Without legal support, many times, they have decided to capitulate. The email cited these reasons to provide support to bitcoin developers, most of whom work independently and are unable to defend their legal cases for long on their own.
Minimize Legal Headaches for Developers
The announcement describes this fund as a nonprofit effort. Its aim is to reduce legal troubles for these developers so they can work independently and actively on bitcoin and associated projects. This fund will help them defend themselves from lawsuits that target their bitcoin activities. They will be able to find and retain defense counsel, develop litigation strategy and pay legal bills.
The defendants and lawsuits eligible to receive money from this fund will be decided by the board. The fund will be initially operated with support from volunteers and lawyers working part-time. The initial help will be provided to 16 developers facing a suit from Craig Wright, a computer scientist from Australia who claims to have created bitcoin.
