Flipstarter is a non-custodial p2p crowdfunding platform built on Bitcoin Cash. It provides a way for any project to engage with potential funders in a way that encourages accountability for projects and fairness for funders.

Political tool is the process and system that helps you to carry out the actions you need to perform. It could also be someone or something that is used for political purposes.

"Flipstarter is a political tool" Myth History

Bitcoin Cash was so fine back then. We welcomed 2020 with cashfusion in the news. The debate all started after the announcement of "Infrastructure Funding Plan for Bitcoin Cash" by Jhiang Zhuoer of BTC.TOP on medium. Most of the people in the community was clearly against the IFP proposal. Twitter, Reddit and especially read.cash had become the places for debate with massive amounts of facts about rules of miners and developers in cryptocurrency, incentives and nature of economics.

During this time, Bitcoin Unlimited, Bitcoin Verde and a group of miners made announcements not to go along with "the IFP," some have also discussed the alternatives. The second version of IFP was announced by Jhiang on February 1st and the third version was also published on February 15 by Bitcoin ABC. On the same day, Flipstarter was introduced. If you only think of it, February 15 was a showdown. As days passed, more people had publicly announced their stand as "against IFP" (Josh Ellithorpe, Jonald Fyookbal, and Mark Lundeberg). On February 20, Bitcoin Cash Node was announced and around March, the IFP was already dead after Jhiang voted against it and ABC shifting towards voluntary funding model.

April 17th, 5 independent node campaigns (BCHD, Bitcoin ABC, Bitcoin Cash Node, Knuth, Bitcoin Verde) were launched on flipstarter. Two days after that, @MarcDeMesel who is a big supporter of BCH and an investor tweeted,

Marc clearly opposes IFP, so he only donates "his money" to the campaigns that does not support it. This is the same to the people who does not support it too. By May 8th, BCHN, Verde, Knuth and BCHD flipstarter campaigns were successfully funded. ABC's flipstarter was not funded during the deadline for node campaign last May 9, 2020 and ABC's fundraiser campaign was only at 55% complete during its deadline (May 15).

A month after that, BCHN made an announcement to remove the Automatic Replay Protection (a.k.a. the Poison Pill) from BCHN in November. Things started to heat up again. Meanwhile, Hayden Otto, the CEO of bitcoinbch.com launched a flipstarter campaign last August 10. Only two weeks before the deadline of the campaign, Hayden tweeted,

And after the campaign failed, he clearly pointed out on his tweet that,

Then it spread...

From then on, "Flipstarter is a political tool" became a myth.

Debunking the Myth "Flipstarter is a political tool"

The accusations against Flipstarter were not supported with facts, therefore it is not true. Let's discuss it...

• Used to further the agenda of ABC removal

It is true that Flipstarter was presented as a solution to solve the lack of funding for Bitcoin Cash common infrastructure but it was NEVER USED TO REMOVE BITCOIN ABC. There are several reasons why ABC's flipstarter campaign failed.

#1 Bitcoin ABC lacks transparency, accountability, and a history of making real progress

Aside from Amaury's behaviour, this is the most common problem addressed by the BCH community against Bitcoin ABC. It is also a bit difficult to track ABC's work in real time. That being said, people don't know what they are funding when they donate to ABC so it is only a common sense that they would no longer donate.

#2 Bitcoin ABC refuses to remove IFP code despite the community's disapproval to it

George's tweet was on April 22, 2020 and during this time, ABC's flipstarter campaign is still active. In fact, it is 5 days old. There's no doubt that Bitcoin ABC failed to gain community's trust and donations because they did not listen to the community. Well, I really thought they already shifted gears...

...but, why is the IFP code still there?

• Anti-IFP does not donate to Pro-IFP

This is certainly not true. Flipstarter is for everyone. Anyone can start a campaign or donate on a campaign. In fact, Hayden's flipstarter did receive donations from people like RogerVer, btcfork and a lot more which clearly stands against IFP too. See btcfork and Jonathan Silverblood's support for Hayden's campaign

It may want to drive people into confusion that no anti-IFP supports his flipstarter but it wasn't successful.

• MarcDeMesel uses it to drive away Bitcoin ABC and IFP supporters

On Hayden's tweet, he strongly claims that Marc and Jonathan Toomim are sabotaging his campaign and if he wants to be funded, he needs to pledge allegiance to BCHN. And again, this is not true. Only an exaggeration.

On Marc's tweet,

I did not donate to Hayden Otto his flipstarter because he has been fighting for a devtax in #BitcoinCash and very supportive of Amaury Sechet his mismanagement. Same for Tobias Ruck his flipstarter.

@MarcDeMesel is an investor and he clearly wants to help built successful businesses or projects around BCH and one way to do that is through signaling with his BCH via flipstarter. In other words, help projects get funded through his donations. Marc did no harm to Hayden's flipstarter. He just clearly stated why he did not support it. Everybody is on their own and Marc do not control them. If Georg cancelled his donation, it was his own decision. It were Marc and Georg's money so they are free to do whatever they want to do with it. It was like "Marc is not entitled to tell the community where to use their money because it was their money" as much as "Hayden is not entitled to Georg's money." You may guide them but you can't really control them.

The same logic applies here. Marc does not want to support IFP-related projects. We cannot blame him for that. But on the other hand, he is generous to projects that he thinks deserves it. In fact, during these campaigns, Marc donated a total of 753.94 $BCH.

BCHD was also running a flipstarter campaign but Marc did not support it for his own reasons.

But everything was really proven when BCHD was successfully funded. There were 77 contributors who helped it funded.

This only proves that when "the community" sees the project worthy to be funded, they will all help contributing to the fund with their best.

Conclusion

Flipstarter was introduced as an alternative solution to IFP and during those times, Bitcoin Cash community was in a search for the best option to fund Bitcoin Cash common infrastructure. Flipstarter offered the BCH community the power to fund the projects that they think deserves best. Meaning, it is the community that decides to let a certain team, project, or individual to shape BCH's image. By community, it means the pro and anti-IFP supporters.

Donations comes when you prove to create value and more would come if you are grateful when you receive them. The success of a flipstarter campaign does not depend on whether you have a history of supporting IFP but depends on the community's decisions and donation.