Institute of Free Technology hiring Senior Blockchain Systems Engineer (Protocol Architecture & Specification) • Remote (Work from Home) | Himalayas
Institute of Free TechnologyIT

Senior Blockchain Systems Engineer (Protocol Architecture & Specification)

The Institute of Free Technology (IFT) is a mission-driven tech startup studio that supports the development of open-source projects focused on safeguarding civil liberties in the digital age. They provide financial, technical, legal, and operational support to a portfolio of projects including Status, Logos, and Waku.

Institute of Free Technology

Employee count: 201-500

About Nimbus

Nimbus is a research team that focuses on developing an Ethereum client and library. We believe that the largest deployment of Ethereum will potentially be on embedded systems and Nimbus is designed to perform well on embedded, mobile and generally resource-restricted devices.

Building the stack from the ground up, we’re translating the latest Ethereum research into practical, performant and reusable libraries to provide a fertile exploration ground for further R&D.

About Nomos

Nomos is a new blockchain designed from the ground up with the original cypherpunk ethos: decentralisation, censorship resistance, permissionless-ness and privacy. It will serve as the trustless agreements layer of the Logos stack. The forthcoming Nomos network will provide a common infrastructure layer upon which communities and aspiring network states can build social, governance, and financial services that uphold their community members’ fundamental rights and values.

The role & responsibilities:

You will join the Nimbus team but work closely with Nomos to consume and provide feedback on specifications, ensuring a deep understanding of both projects. As a founding member of the Nimbus-Nomos team, you will also contribute to early architectural design and foundational decision-making.

You will:

  • Develop a deep understanding of Nimbus and Nomos, including their architectures and designs.
  • Consume specifications from Nomos and provide feedback where necessary.
  • Collaborate with the Nimbus team to address complex, non-incremental challenges in the specifications, rather than relying on scoping smaller tasks to learn the codebase.
  • Participate in shaping the initial architecture and design principles of Nimbus-Nomos, aligning them with decentralisation, privacy, and censorship-resistance goals.

Requirements:

  • Strong understanding of blockchain technology and its underlying principles.
  • Senior-level experience in the blockchain industry (several years), with a proven background in technical systems analysis and design.
  • Technical background (Software Engineer or similar) and expertise in documentation, specification review, and architectural prototyping.
  • You are proactive and communicative - making things happen comes easily to you.
  • Commitment to privacy-focused, decentralised protocols and applications.
  • Ability to work in early-stage, undefined environments where foundational contributions are critical.

*Note*
This role may evolve to involve architectural input beyond specification review. While the current focus is on analysing specs, your involvement in early design decisions will be an expected and integral part of the position, not a surprise or additional responsibility.

Bonus points:

  • Experience working in an open-source organisation.
  • You've used Nimbus Client or have worked in a privacy-focused project/organisation.

Hiring process:

  • Intro call with our People Ops team
  • Interview with Nimbus Team Lead
  • Interview with Logos Program Lead

[The steps may change along the way if we see it makes sense to adapt the interview stages, so please consider the above as a guideline.]

Compensation:

We are happy to pay in any mix of fiat/crypto.

About the job

Apply before

Posted on

Job type

Full Time

Experience level

Senior

Location requirements

Open to candidates from all countries.

Hiring timezones

Worldwide

About Institute of Free Technology

Learn more about Institute of Free Technology and their company culture.

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We are the Institute of Free Technology (IFT), a mission-driven tech startup studio that emerged from Status, which we, Jarrad Hope and Carl Bennetts, founded in 2017. Our initial goal with Status was to enable the free flow of information and protect the right to private, secure conversations. However, as we delved deeper, we recognized gaps in the existing infrastructure needed to fully realize these values. This realization led to an expansion of our project's scope and ultimately, the formation of IFT and the startups it now incubates. Our core mission is to support the development, adoption, and accessibility of solutions to digital age problems. We are guided by a strong set of principles: liberty, censorship resistance, security, privacy, and inclusivity. We actively seek to connect with and support innovators who are dedicated to defending our digital rights.

At IFT, we provide comprehensive support to take ideas from the drawing board to market. This includes financial backing, technical expertise, legal guidance, people operations, and brand-building assistance at every stage. We empower our startups to concentrate on their core strength: building public goods designed to safeguard civil liberties in the digital age. Our portfolio of open source projects is continually growing and currently includes prominent names like Status, Logos, Codex, Waku, Nimbus, Nomos, and Keycard. As a team, IFT has been completely distributed since its inception. We boast a strong core of over 220 contributors from diverse backgrounds, spread across the globe. We are deeply passionate about open source, and our organizational structure reflects this with minimal hierarchy and no fixed work hours. We champion a high degree of autonomy, encouraging our team members to work independently while aligning with the organization's overarching priorities.

Employee benefits

Learn about the employee benefits and perks provided at Institute of Free Technology.

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Co-working space

Access to co-working spaces is provided.

Unlimited vacation

We offer unlimited vacation to our contributors.

Entirely remote

Our team is completely distributed since inception.

Flexible working hours

Our organizational structure has minimal hierarchy and no fixed work hours.

View Institute of Free Technology's employee benefits
Claim this profileInstitute of Free Technology logoIT

Institute of Free Technology

Company size

201-500 employees

Founded in

2017

Chief executive officer

Jarrad Hope, Carl Bennetts

Employees live in

View company profile

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