Bitcoin is the best money. It should be used like it. We build and fund free, open-source projects aimed at making bitcoin the planet’s preferred currency.
FOSS Bitcoin Grants
Get paid in bitcoin to work on bitcoin. Our open-source bitcoin grant program supports developers and designers in over a dozen countries.
Considered the most important and necessary bitcoin software, as the foundation for its security and consensus, Core is the reference implementation that makes bitcoin tick.
There’s a lot we could say about LDK. But why bother when a talking hoodie with a beard already said it better? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOT78Bgy1Qw
Are you a wallet dev with a design question? Judging by what many wallets look like, you should. The BDC does for design what open-source has done for bitcoin since day 1.
BTCPay Server
Not just our first grant recipient, but our first to receive two more. BTCPay Server is an open-source payments processor that squanders money on ironic business cards.
Validating Lightning Signer
Really basic LN infrastructure project that improves security by enabling signed transactions within enterprise HSMs, mobile phone secure elements, and hardware wallets.
The Eye of Satoshi
LN-focused watchtower that monitors blockchain transactions for malicious channel peers attempting to take off with other people’s beautiful coins.
CoinSwap
An evolution of the techniques pioneered by CoinJoins, CoinSwap helps you stick it to the man by substantially improving bitcoin’s privacy and fungibility.
Summer of Bitcoin
Global summer internship program focused on introducing university students to bitcoin and open-source development. In addition to funding the program, interns receive $2,500 in bitcoin and cursed jewelry.
Wallet Scrutiny
Not everyone has the time to painstakingly check what’s running on their wallet against public source code. But somehow, everyone at WS does.
Our first grantee working on bitcoin ZK proofs, a mechanic which allows nodes to quickly sync compressed blockchain data instead of countless potentially embarrassing transactions.
Bitcoin Developer Grants
Vasil Dimov
FOSS veteran (since 2005) with a focus on P2P and privacy. He's helped add support for Tor V3, I2P, and CJDNS in Bitcoin Core. Pretty nice of him.
Gary Fuches
Passionate advocate for SegWit 2x and blockchain technology, Gary was our intern only a year before receiving our largest developer grant ever. God only knows what he did with it.
Bitcoin Zavior
Contributor to LDK and BDK. Photon project maintainer. Developing a React Native version of BDK. One of those grantees who’s tough to sum up without a) going over the word count, and b)
Ruben Somsen
Spacechains developer and owner of no fewer than three iguanas. This probably isn’t true but the truth has never stopped us before.
Justin Moellar
There's a lot to be said about Fedimint dev Justin Moellar, but this unintentionally hilarious line from his proposal says it best: "I have had exposure to almost every kind of database."
Sebastian Kung
Developing libbitcoinkernel, which extracts Bitcoin Core’s consensus engine. This only sounds complicated because it is. But not to Sebastian, who is smarter than you and I.
Matt Morehouse
Like many ex-Googlers, Matt Morehouse is doing penance via bitcoin by taking on important Lightning security work. Whether this will save his eternal soul, who are we to say?
Johannes Hofmann
Bitcoin data scientist specializing in on-and-off-chain analysis. Easily the most professional headshot on this page. Just look at that swoosh. Swoosh!
Joschisan
There’s no evidence to suggest that anything we write here will be read by anyone, so we can probably say anything we want. Giraffe refrigerator. Rainbow spaghetti. Tuxedo forest.
Esraa
Esraa is a pseudonymous dev, so there’s nothing we can say about him except that he works on PayJoins with Dan Gould, and you should never say his name three times in front of a mirror.
Dan Gould
I misspelled Dan’s name both as “Gold” and “Gourd,” which made me wonder how much a gourd made of gold would be worth. According to ChatGPT, roughly $33,500. Congratulations, Dan.
thesimplekid
If you’re reading thesimplekid’s spiral.xyz bio instead of the tweet we did about their Cashu Dev Kit grant, you’re missing out. It’s in our Twitter feed somewhere. Go fish it out. It’s worth it.
siv2r
People keep wanting Spiral grants despite our contract stipulating that every bird they encounter will eavesdrop on them until eternity. They’re birds, so they won’t be able to share anything, but they will know.
Nick Johnson
Improving privacy with a BIP 324 Rust library that enables light client encrypted messages, and BIP 000, which muffles the screams you hear whenever you sell bitcoin because you "need to eat".
spacebear21
Contributor to the incredibly important PayJoin Dev Kit, which brings privacy, fungibility, scale, and Evil Knievel caliber stunt work to bitcoin.
Bob McElrath
The more people with palindromes for names in our grantee roster, the better. Kayak. Deed. Rotator. Noon. Racecar. Bob.
l0rinc
Exactly who you imagine when you think of a prolific FOSS dev, L0RINC is pseudonymous code chameleon with his hands in more pies than someone trying to ruin a birthday party.
Maurice Poirrier
Lead maintainer for the LNDK BOLT12 project, and if he does a really good job, we'll let him rename it anything he wants: BOLT21, BOLT420, BOLT666. Whatever for him, really.
Andrei
Dev working to integrate LDK and Breez the way our forefathers did: with a pick axe, saw, and the steadfast determination necessary to make bitcoin the planet’s preferred currency.
Martin Sapsonic
Inspired by the Chaincode Labs BOSS program, Martin improves mobile Lightning reliability using LSPS5, ensuring that we all get 7,000 push notifications via Zaps every time a joke takes off on Nostr.
Bitcoin PM Grants
Pavlenex
His cred as a bitcoin PM netted him a grant despite the fact that he tried to bribe us by stuffing live carp into our mailboxes. And the Bitcoin Design Guide is better for it.
Will Clark
A Bitcoin Core PM who was PMing Bitcoin Core before we decided that our grant program needed a Bitcoin Core PM to PM Bitcoin Core.
Austin Krauss
Helping develop a programming Lightning workshop that will lead to a programming Lightning book that will lead to a strange, programming Lightning shack on the outskirts of a deserted mining town.
Bitcoin Grantee Alumni
Tankred Hase
UX-focused dev building Photon, a FOSS library that simplifies how new users get coins off exchanges. No more 24-word seeds. Just enter a PIN and go. But where will you go?
Justin Sun
Our most well-known grantee by far, Justin Sun created Moon University, an open-source bitcoin video library. Now he’s helping two other grantees build BDK.
Thorbjørn König
Thorbjørn brings 20 years of design experience to radically rethinking how people manage their private keys. Don't worry. We vetted him.
Jamaal Montasser
Researcher deepening our understanding of how people use (and most likely don’t use) the Bitcoin Core wallet, placing particular emphasis on UX, engineering, and accessibility.
Maggie Valentine
Designer simplifying wallet onboarding flows by reducing technical jargon and increasing user education, ultimately making bitcoin accessible to more people. Even copywriters.
Patricia Estevão
What motivates people to use bitcoin? What do people hope to gain from bitcoin? Is bitcoin a sandwich? Just some of the questions this UX designer and researcher aims to answer.
Riccardo Casatta
FOSS dev building BDK and Firma, didn’t read the grant before signing it and is now condemned to spend eternity aboard a ghost ship where everyone refers to bitcoin as blockchain.
Leon Johnson
The creator of Advancing Bitcoin, Leon is working on so many things that it is kind of hard to capture them all in six lines. So I won't try.
Johns Beharry
Hybrid product designer bringing order to on-chain, layer 2, CoinJoins, BLTs, PayJoins, and PSBTs by helping develop the payments section of the Bitcoin Design Guide.
Gloria Zhao
The first Brink Fellow, Gloria is working on Package Mempool Accept, which makes second layer protocols like Lightning and unlimited breadsticks safer, more reliable, and private.
Lloyd Fournier
If applied cryptography experimentation library, alternative LN payment channel construct, and open DLC-based oracle spec mean anything to you... Lloyd?
Steve Myers
Developer developing the Bitcoin Development Kit, an all-in-one resource that makes it 10x easier for developers to develop on-chain bitcoin wallets. Develop.
ZmnSCPxj
A Lightning and C-Lightning legend, there’s only so much we can say about ZmnSCPxj. But we won’t even say that because no one called ZmnSCPxj is in it for the limelight.
Doc Sharp
Pseudonymous designer focused on adding Lightning UX resources to the Bitcoin Design Guide so that by the time Lightning is ubiquitous, even bankers will know how to use it.
Stephen DeLorme
Designer helping add Lightning Network best practices to the Bitcoin Design Guide. Recipient of the best grant announcement tweet (and perhaps best tweet) of all time.
John Cantrell
Pseudonymous dev named after a character from Neal Stephenson’s Cryptonomicon, a giant book that every developer owns but hasn’t read. John is using BDK and LDK to build a boundary pushing wallet.
Mempool
The recipient of our first-ever bitcoin-denominated grant, Mempool is the only bitcoin block explorer that doesn’t look like it was designed under duress.
Dhruv Mehta
Stick figure and Core contributor working on BIP324, leveraging the bitcoin-seeder to allow authenticated seeds, automation, and fuzz testing coverage.
Raj Maitra
Rust ecosystem and Bitcoin Development Kit contributor. First dev in India doing funded FOSS bitcoin work. Rabbit hole enthusiast. Actual rabbit.
Josh Kitman
Our first grantee working on Fedimints, Josh is also an actor whose credits include Anonymous webcasts and V for Vendetta, a movie about doing karate in a wig.
Chris Belcher
Lead developer of a CoinSwap implementation that massively improves bitcoin privacy and fungibility.
Sergi Delgado
Former Lead Developer for the Eye of Satoshi project. Currently enjoying the vertigo-inducing view from Chaincode’s 38th floor New York office.
Fi3
Another pseudonymous dev. Fi3 is helping develop Stratum V2, a neutral FOSS implementation that can be used by any miner or mining pool in possession of the magic ring.
Okjodom
Pseudonymous robot-faced Fedimint developer helping build Fedimint, a decentralized custody solution for bitcoin that, unfortunately, requires users to have friends.
0xB10C
Prolific developer and grant proposal writer often regarded as a genius by our copywriter, who was too lazy or too incompetent to summarize his project here. Hell of a developer either way.
Jon Atack
Once accurately described as “the bitcoin dev who looks the most like they could body you at Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2,” Jon’s been going ham on Core for a minute now, man.
thunderbiscuit
The Bitcoin Dev Kit expedites how engineers build bitcoin wallets. It’s among the most important projects we support. So, naturally, one of its leading developers is called thunderbiscuit.
Daniela Brozzoni
Completing 'non-core' BDK modules. Writing BDK onboarding docs. Using timelocks and multiple keys to build user-friendly decaying multi-sig. Helping build the BDK Rust Library.
Evan Lin
Grantee helping develop the Bitcoin Development Kit, an SDK that six of our grantees have worked on because of Steve Myers’ undeniable charisma. If only Spiral had such a Steve.
Matthew Ramsden
An experienced iOS developer working on native Swift apps for BDK and a bunch of other stuff that I won’t include here because I have the technical chops of an old shoe.
Christoph Ono
Designer bringing decentralized structure to the 1000+ person Bitcoin Design Community. As the first designer grant recipient, he takes the blame if things don't work out.
Daniel Nordh
A contributor to the Bitcoin Design Community since before it was a community, Daniel is helping create the private key management section of the Bitcoin Design Guide.
Mogashni
UX specialist developing a UX Research Toolkit, contributing to the Wallet Improvement Project, and legally anything else we write here.
Michael Haase
Product designer working on bitcoin inheritance and collaborative custody. So if you kids ever take off with your coins, look no further for who to blame.
John Moffett
Introducing the first Spiral grantee to be selected by an entranced fortune teller. He’s done some Bitcoin Core work but besides that—zero credentials. Lucky for John I guess.
Amiti Uttarwar
Mentor and coach teaching other bitcoin developers how to be better bitcoin developers, all of whom will hopefully go on to do the same.
Alyssa Hertig
Developer doing LNDK work to add BOLT 12 for LND and Eye of Satoshi projects. She’s also a talented and serious writer, which our team hasn’t had until now.
plebhash
They’re working on StratumV2 and are passionate about mining and, in their own words, “biased towards the plebs,” as are we all.
Sean Giligan
FOSS Dev building a Secure Enclave version of VLS, also a Spiral grantee, but one that failed to warn Sean about the Trail of Treats running through the woods.
Rachel Rybarcyzk
Refactoring SRI’s protocol and role logic despite its code debt. Her goal is to achieve production-ready protocols and roles, resulting in a cleaner repo and clearer directory. Or so she says.
Small team. Big mission. Medium-sized everything else.
Steve Lee
Just a regular bitcoin PM who doesn’t cast a shadow for some reason.
Val Wallace
Lightning Network stan and author of our popular Twitter account.
Jeff Czyz
Long-distance runner. Contemplative developer. Online dating profile with a lot to be desired.
Matt Corallo
Dev proficient in HTML and CSS. Known for his diverse sense of style and passive approach to social media.
Haley Berkoe
FUD-busting PM. Advocate for women in bitcoin. First Spiral team member to venture into the basement and live to tell about it.
Conor Okus
Likable guy who thinks he's found his dream job. He doesn't know that his dream job has found him, too. And it's hungry.
Elias Rohrer
He’s been called the greatest bitcoin developer of the mid-19th century. Confused, we hired him immediately.
Greg Sanders
We have high hopes for Greg. Whether he feels the same way about us remains to be seen, but he’d better if he knows what’s good for him.
Yuval Kogman
Our second bitcoin wizard hire. One more and we will rule Middle-earth.
Wilmer Paulino
One of the three most influential Lightning Network developers named Wilmer.
Joost Jager
Joost came aboard with a simple request: world-changing impact, or at the very least, the kind of failure that makes for a compelling memoir.
Ben Carman
Ben once called our grant program the "gold standard." Knowing he wouldn't qualify for one, he smartly applied for a full-time job with the other burnouts.
Leo Nash
In keeping with tradition, this blurb isn’t really meant to tell you anything about Leo. Having said that, Leo is interesting because
Mat Balez
PM who doesn’t like the “PM” label. We spent a week helping him find an alternative, only for him to stick with PM. Great first impression, Mat.
Get paid to work on bitcoin full-time
Seeking funding for an engineering or design project that could benefit bitcoin? Tell us more. Send a detailed proposal to grants@spiral.xyz.
