This is a problem with the Bitcoin community. I think enthusiastic people come up with a good idea and release a white paper, thinking others will jump on board to help make a prototype.
They forget that Satoshi released a white paper, then put his nose to the grindstone for 2-3 months before releasing a working implementation.
Well, he may have been working on it, but he released the Bitcoin implementation several months after he released the whitepaper. He released the white paper to the public on Oct 31/Nov. 1 2008, and the actual Windows client (the initial client) on Jan 3, 2009.
I don't have time to dig up links at the moment, but you can check the cryptography list archives for confirmation.
They forget that Satoshi released a white paper, then put his nose to the grindstone for 2-3 months before releasing a working implementation.