Today I would like to announce the creation of the Winston Fund.
The Winston Fund will be an operational fund that provides grants to open source projects that empower individuals at the expense of centralized institutions. Shareholders will put forth motions to select recipient projects and donation amounts. Worthy projects could include Tor, BitMessage, The Invisible Internet Project (I2P), Open Bazaar, and others. The fund will be shareholder-driven and flexible in its mission. In accordance with these principles, the Winston Fund could expand its focus in the future through shareholder consensus to include humanitarian aid or micro-finance lending.
I would like to request your help in building the Winston Fund. Shareholders will have the option of pledging to regularly donate a portion of the Peercoin dividends they receive from owning NSR to the Winston Fund. For example, Shareholder ABC may pledge to perpetually donate the PPC dividends received from 100,000 of his or her NuShares to the fund.
If you are willing to contribute a portion of your dividends to the fund, pledges should be made in this thread or sent by BitMessage to BM-2cUAGM1gh1GYNJePnhFXWFvvg2JxLmmBt2. Public recognition of donors and amounts will be made on www.nubits.com. Donors will have the option of being listed by their forum user name, by their real name, or by “Anonymous” if they so choose. Additional recognition methods should be discussed by shareholders if they feel it is merited.
It is important to note that pledges are not enforceable by the fund and donations will be entirely voluntary. A donor can always discretely request to end their public pledge on a specific date. Note that being a NuShareholder is not a requirement for donating to the Winston Fund; a public PPC address will always be made available for donors to make one-time contributions.
Fund assets will be held by multiple trusted persons in a public multi-sig address. Team member identities will be kept secret to prevent any attempted threats or coercive actions against the fund. However, public accounting of capital intakes and distributions will be regularly provided to maintain integrity and transparency. We are still finalizing the details of who will hold a multisig key, but we will hurry so donations can begin.
This is an exciting time for us. Nu is a tool for advancing the peaceful values that are held sacred by most global citizens. If we succeed we will see a world with more wealth and better distribution of it, less senseless violence and war, and reduced centralized power. I want Nu to change the world, and I want our shareholders to lead the way in Nu doing so. The Winston Fund will be one of our main contributions to making the world a better place to live.
Based on preliminary discussions with prospective donors, I am expecting that we will be able to get dividends from between 100 and 150 million NSR. I would enjoy being proven wrong about the upper limit.