Twitter/Square CEO Jack Dorsey is Hiring Crypto Engineers – to Serve Him or the Bitcoin Ecosystem?
Square’s CEO Jack Dorsey has announced that the payments startup’s ‘small way to give back’ to the cryptocurrency ecosystem is to hire up to four full-time crypto engineers and one designer.
#BitcoinTwitter and #CryptoTwitter! Square is hiring 3-4 crypto engineers and 1 designer to work full-time on open source contributions to the bitcoin/crypto ecosystem. Work from anywhere, report directly to me, and we can even pay you in bitcoin! Introducing @SqCrypto. Why?
— jack (@jack) March 20, 2019
Dorsey disclosed that the decision was influenced by Square’s development lead, Mike Brock:
Last week I was considering my hack week project, and asked @brockm: “what is the most impactful thing we could do for the bitcoin community?” His answer was simple: “pay people to make the broader crypto ecosystem better.” This resonated with me immediately, so we’re doing it.
Gift to the Bitcoin Community but Crypto Engineers will be Reporting to Jack Dorsey
In his announcement, Dorsey stated that the crypto engineers and the designer will be reporting directly to him. This raises the question of whose interests the bitcoin developers will be serving – Square’s or the bitcoin community’s? And there are various other concerns that are bound to arise.
For instance, if the commercial interests of Square are threatened by a development in Bitcoin technology will the Square-affiliated developers be given free rein to continue doing their work? Being a wealthy and a high-profile Silicon Valley figure, will Dorsey’s power extend to having an outsized influence in the bitcoin development community via his hirelings?
If so, what steps will be taken to ensure that this does not happen? And will this be harmful to Bitcoin’s anti-centralization stance?
