
TL;DR: Notable business owners within the Bitcoin Cash (BCH) ecosystem, Peter Ng, Joey Wong, and Stefan Rust, formed what they’re calling the SLP Foundation. Its mission “is to provide the needed support and resources for top-tier development, scaling, research, and community building, with the ultimate goal of making Bitcoin Cash the premiere token ecosystem to build on,” press materials claim.
Notable Bitcoin Cash Business Owners Launch SLP Foundation
Without a single doubt, Ethereum tokens are the cryptocurrency industry standard. They dominate by projects, market capitalizations, and nearly every other metric. Up until very recently, there really was no competition. Thanks to the work of James Cramer roughly two years ago, that’s beginning to change.
Cramer’s Simple Ledger Protocol (SLP) became the basis for BCH token iterations, SLP Tokens, leveraging the network’s speed, relative simplicity, and cost-effectiveness. SLP Tokens have since taken-off, spawning a bunch of endeavors, from appreciation varieties to stablecoins (there’s even rumor Tether is looking to make a substantive move in the SLP direction), to exchange listings. What’s more is they’re quite possibly blossoming at the perfect time as Ethereum’s network increasingly comes under scrutiny for over-engineering complexity, “gas” issues, crazily elaborate hacks, and creeping increases in transaction fees.
Still, a foundation model in the spirit of something like Ethereum might be just the shove SLP tokens need in terms of greater exposure. The SLP Foundation team isn’t sharing details at the moment, but outward appearances tend toward setting up what might be akin to a ConsenSys-style hub and spoke arrangement: the nascent SLP Foundation at the theoretical center, spinning off businesses and seeding worthy efforts. One important lesson learned in the Bitcoin Cash community is how developers are most effective when they’re developing rather than having to fundraise, attend business meetings, etc.
Lean in Order to Execute
Three of the men involved in the Foundation’s initial council members are well-known BCH enthusiasts, extending from a mining veteran to token entrepreneur to a business development expert. And, according to sources familiar with its rollout, the SLP Foundation will “evolve to include more voices, without losing the ability of the foundation to execute.” The emphasis, for now, is “on being lean” while encouraging open source development, more participation, and avoiding conflict of interests (for example, someone pledged substantially to the Flipstarter Bitcoin Cash Node campaign last month under the SLP Foundation name, but the team insists it was a private donation and not on behalf of the Foundation formally).
“The SLP Foundation’s primary focus is to provide open-source tools to support the rapid growth of SLP use cases,” the announcement presser explained. “We will also aim to coordinate the common interests of the open source developers working within the SLP ecosystem to foster a healthy environment for growth and innovation. We decided very early to keep the foundation team small to avoid the kind of politics that plague our ecosphere.”

SLP Foundation council member Joey Wong told CoinSpice how, in addition to Non-Fungible Token (NFT) initiatives to further concepts such as staking, Vin Armani’s Simple Ledger Postage Protocol is getting a real look. “The post office was exciting because it would allow an app’s users and customers to make free token transactions or allows users to pay for transaction fees with an SLP token instead of BCH,” Wong stressed, bringing to mind an earlier reference to the “gas” problem on Ethereum. “This provides nearly phenomenal improvement to the user onboarding experience since the user does not need to first acquire BCH. Basically, SLP tokens can be sent without any use of BCH and be sold as ‘gas-less’ vs Ethereum.”
Foundations have a new emphasis this year in light of the Infrastructure Funding Plan for Bitcoin Cash (IFP) and its surrounding controversies. In response to the IFP not activating, for example, lead BCH node implementation Bitcoin ABC recently discussed the formation of a Bitcoin Cash Foundation with Haipo Yang, CEO of mining pool ViaBTC and exchange CoinEx. And while internal enthusiast politics might disagree on how to fund BCH development, clearly everyone is beginning to understand funding development is critical going forward regardless.
IFP TIMELINE THUS FAR
- 01222020 Infrastructure Funding Proposal
- 01222020 BCH devs react
- 01232020 Jiang Zhuoer AMA
- 01232020 Amaury Séchet addendum to IFP
- 01242020 Bitcoin.com releases statement in support of IFP
- 01242020 Jonald Fyookball’s position on the IFP
- 01252020 Justin Bons, Tobias Ruck suggest voting on IFP
- 01252020 Antony Zegers support of IFP
- 01262020 Early market reaction to IFP
- 01262020 Anon dev imaginary_username’s reaction to IFP
- 01262020 Peter Rizun’s reaction to IFP
- 01272020 Opposing Miners Group
- 01272020 BUIP143: Refuse the Coinbase Tax
- 01282020 Bitcoin Verde’s reaction to IFP
- 01282020 Bitcoin.com drops support for IFP
- 01282020 BCHD’s reaction to IFP
- 02012020 Jiang Zhuoer heavily amends IFP
- 02032020 Ethereum’s Vitalik Buterin, Zcash’s Zooko Wilcox-O’Hearn react to IFP
- 02072020 More Miners Voice Skepticism at Bitcoin Cash Infrastructure Fund Proposals
- 02102020 Giving Bitcoin Cash a Fighting Chance
- 02102020 imaginary_username Speaks: He’s Working to Build a Developer Funding Alternative
- 02122020 Lockdown: From Mainland China, Bitcoiner Talks Coronavirus and Fallout for Crypto
- 02152020 Flipstarter: BCH Voluntary Commons Funding
- 02152020 Bitcoin ABC Will Implement Bitcoin Cash Infrastructure Fund of 5% During May 15, 2020 Upgrade
- 02162020 Roger Ver on Bitcoin Cash Infrastructure Fund Update: Too Controversial, Not Worth it at This Point
- 02162020 Bitcoin Cash Infrastructure Funding Update: BTC.TOP Founder Proposes 2/3 Hash Voting Threshold
- 02172020 Bitcoin Cash IFP Author, Influential Mining CEO to Chinese Bitcoiners: Decentralization is Key
- 02192020 Two Notable Bitcoin Cash Developers Announce Opposition to the IFP
- 02202020 Bitcoin Cash Developers Fork ABC Reference Implementation Client, Create “BCH Node”
- 02212020 First Bitcoin Cash Developer Meeting After IFP Proposal
- 02272020 Bitcoin Cash Node v0.21.0 Formally Released
- 03012020 Wrapping Our Heads Around the Infrastructure Funding Plan for Bitcoin Cash
- 03032020 Bitcoin Cash Node Team Releases General Roadmap Through November
- 03042020 Author of the Bitcoin Cash IFP Vows to Vote Against It, Using Personal Hash in Opposition
- 03242020 Brain Drain: BCH Dev Leaves for AVA and Has Choice Words for Community
- 04012020 Bitcoin ABC Launches $3.3 Million Fundraiser
- 04162020 Trustless, Non-custodial Assurance Contract Platform Flipstarter Launches Five Node Campaigns
- 04252020 PODCAST Bitcoin Cash Reference Client Looks to Raise Sustainable Funding
- 04262020 Bitcoin Cash Node is First to be Fully Funded on Flipstarter; $372,000 Pledged Across 5 Campaigns
- 05092020 PODCAST Amaury Séchet, May 2020 Upgrade Part 2: The IFP and Why it Remains in the Code
- 05142020 BTC TOP & CoinEx CEOs Join BCH Community During 3.5 Hour Pre-Upgrade AMA Livestream
- 05152020 Bitcoin Cash May 2020 Upgrade Completed: Controversial Funding Plan Rejected by Miners
- 05172020 Bitcoin ABC, ViaBTC & CoinEX CEO Publicly Consider a Bitcoin Cash Foundation
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DISCLOSURE: The author holds cryptocurrency as part of his financial portfolio, including BCH.