A number of Ethereum-related tasks — together with StarkWare, Polyhedra, and Polygon — condemned Matter Labs’ efforts to trademark “zero-knowledge” as its mental property in a Might 30 joint assertion.
The assertion was signed by notable trade figures, together with Polygon co-founders Sandeep Nailwal and Brendan Farmer, StarkWare CEO Eli Ben-Sasson, Polyhedra Community co-founder Tiancheng Xie, and Turing Award winner Shafi Goldwasser.
‘ZK is a public good’
Zero Information (ZK) blockchains have gained large reputation as an answer that enhances builders’ safety and scalability. By leveraging the strong safety of present layer-1 blockchains like Ethereum, ZK blockchains permit decentralized purposes (dApps) to realize greater throughput and quicker transactions.
These blockchains shield customers’ private info by protecting it off-chain and scale back prices for end-users by means of batched transaction publishing.
Trade specialists assert that “ZK is a public good that ought to belong to everybody.” They argue that Matter Labs’ try and trademark the time period contradicts the ethos of crypto, Ethereum, and its rules. They said:
“ZK ought to stay a public good. It shouldn’t be a trademark of a company: it ought to reasonably be accessible for all.”
Polygon corroborated this view in a separate social media submit.
The Ethereum layer-2 blockchain community opined that “openness is key to Ethereum and should be preserved, particularly relating to core mathematical rules.” It added:
“[Matter Labs] could declare to do that for the advantage of customers. However ask your self: Will customers really profit if one firm monopolizes zk expertise? Would zkSync as a community even exist with out the zk expertise developed by Polygon Labs? No, a trademark on ‘zk’ truly introduces person hurt by means of confusion.”
Consequently, the crypto leaders urge the neighborhood to demand the withdrawal of Matter Labs’ trademark purposes.
Matter Labs response
In response to the allegations, Matter Labs CEO Alex Gluchowski said his opposition to the idea of mental property. He emphasised that the logos had been designed to guard crypto customers reasonably than the corporate.
He added:
“All of the logos we had ever registered, together with ZK-related ones, are defensive, to stop dishonest actors from deceptive their clients and complicated their services and products with those provided by Matter Labs.”
Gluchowski additionally talked about that Matter Labs had contacted the Ethereum Basis’s authorized staff and provided to collaborate on making a authorized framework for utilizing “ZK” and comparable important tech phrases within the public area.
