Core devs especially isn’t sexy work, and they are very neutral/conservative in the protocol. Important for funding to exist for folks who work on the world’s most import open source protocol. Also people come and go from the work, so important to have resources for training, support, and beyond.
Discussion
That makes sense. Do you think there is any risk that if too much money goes to devs they will pursue “upgrading” bitcoin?
No, and these decisions aren’t funding, rather the consensus of nodes, miners and devs. The block size wars show this as well.
Funds had little to do with it in an “upgrade/evolution” regard. BUT funds are helpful, particularly legal funds, to support open source dev work should this work, or their identity, be attacked