Developer Gloria Zhao becomes the First Female Bitcoin Core Maintainer

Developer Gloria Zhao has achieved a significant milestone in the 13-year history of the biggest crypto in the world by becoming the first female Bitcoin core maintainer. Zhao’s entrance corresponds with Belgian Core maintainer Pieter Wuille’s exit.

First female Bitcoin core maintainer

On Thursday, Zhao was elected as the Bitcoin Core maintainer after receiving support from the community of contributors and current maintainers.

These Core maintainers are in charge of upholding the integrity of the blockchain network by continuously improving the cryptocurrency code. They also have the authority to approve any modifications to the Bitcoin program. 

She has been contributing to Bitcoin Core actively for more than two years, mainly with the mempool and validation code. Thanks to her contributions and extensive experience as a developer over the years, Zhao was elected to be a Bitcoin Core Maintainer.

“I know she has a lot of thoughts on how to improve the code around her, and more recently, she also reviewed and helped improve the wallet, “when suggesting Zhao for the position, maintainer Michael Ford wrote.

Pieter Wuille’s departure

Zhao’s appointment as the first female maintainer of Bitcoin Core coincided with Pieter Wuille’s announcement of his departure. Wuille worked on the development of Taproot/Schnorr, SegWit, and BIP 32 seed phrases, among other Bitcoin network improvements.

Wuille clarified that he would continue to contribute to the projects he is already a part of by providing code, reviews, and other support.

To be clear: I won't stop contributing to code, review, and all the projects I'm involved in. It just so happens I'm not doing much maintenance anymore, so it's time to drop my permissions. https://t.co/8OAJaw02MM

— Pieter Wuille (@pwuille) July 7, 2022

He also said that he would no longer be a member of the Bitcoin Core maintenance team and would be resigning his authorization as a result. Wuille submitted a request on GitHub to have his key removed from the trusted key group.

Wladimir J. Van Der Laan, Michael Ford, Hennadi Stepanov, and Marco Falke are the only members of the team left now that Wuille has quit. Zhao will nevertheless become the fifth member.