Dear Dusk community,. Recent conversations, both internal and external, have been weighing heavily on my mind.

15 Sep 2024, 16:21

Dear Dusk community, Recent conversations, both internal and external, have been weighing heavily on my mind. About what Dusk is, what we aim to be, and about our current trajectory. We are at a crossroads right now. We promised the community a substantial amount of public testing prior to launch. It was made clear that this is crucial for building trust in the network. While I am convinced that the network is safe from major class of issues, I respect that this is not the only factor to consider. Our internal testing so far has been solid, and everything’s working well. But the community needs more time to get hands-on experience. Things like dealing with Moonlight-Phoenix, setting up a node, and establishing a feedback loop to help the team smooth out any rough edges. Plus, there’s some polishing to do on our web-wallet alongside the CLI one. I have been dead set on “Mainnet on the 20th of September” come hell or high water. But following Friday’s open discussion with the community, I have begun suspecting that my stubborness and pride might be getting the best of me. I had some candid on-on-ones with the core team over the weekend, and they expressed a strong preference for an extended period of public testing. This would involve opening up Lunare (our devnet) to some trusted community members first, followed by at least two weeks of Nocturne (testnet). On top of that, our BD folks mentioned that two of our key prospects want more time to set up their nodes and monitor. They are unlikely to jump on Mainnet at launch without some proper testing under their belt. The main components are done and audited (except for w3sper - the wallet SDK - used by the web wallet and the exchanges). We could go live this Friday, but the consensus within the team is that those two weeks of public testing will pay off in the long run. I don’t take this decision lightly. I know many will be disappointed. But I got convinced by the argument that more testing and more feedback now will better translate to a spotless launch. And I think that the team and community of Dusk deserve the best chance I can give. The plan is to wrap up our devnet stress testing on the release candidate by the end of this coming week. We'll then open up Lunare for a week of broader but still controlled testing, before running the Testnet for a full two weeks. Mainnet launch will follow at the end of that period, with 15th of October as designated launch day. I hope you can understand that we are doing this to provide everyone and our partners a safe and stable Mainnet. The alternative is launching now and hoping that a period of extended testing wouldn't have uncovered any unforeseen issues. But as my own BD team subtly reminded me, this might not be very consistent with the kind of ethos needed for a provider of financial service infrastructure. So, I've resolved to adjust the Mainnet launch date according to this plan. I want to extend my sincere gratitude to the whole community for your continued support and understanding.