Self-sustainable Decentralized Governance by Blockchain

[JGCMiner]

Aaaghhrrr, I wanted to let this go but this contrived bullshit makes me sick.

Call a fucking spade a spade. You want to slurp money off every infrastructure provider whether any of us want it or not, and whether there even exists a credible value adding project for it to be spent on or not. And we're never getting any of it back.

Because MN ops are all too stupid and short sighted to approve any value adding project at all. You know best!

It's all for our own good, right?

Where have we heard that before? Ah yes, every bankrupt and corrupt government and central planning committee, ever.

Taking from people without their consent is theft, plain and simple.



Funding should be approved first, then diverted. Taking it regardless leads to ruin, every single time. You are all going to get fleeced if you don't insist right now on NOT automatically funnelling money into the pockets of freeloaders who know that they'll be able to railroad cash into their own projects because nobody can be bothered voting nay as your vote is effectively toothless.

No. This argument is the one that is contrived. And in every single one of your posts you seem to ramp up the ad hominem attacks. That is really not necessary.

Look, unless the masternodes vote for the freeloaders then they won't get one single duff. And since you seem to think that MNs owners are smart enough to vote for only for good projects then they MUST be smart enough not to vote for money to go to freeloaders, right? Seems obvious.

Furthermore, any unused money is held by the network in escrow and no one person -- not Evan, not Masternode, not Fernando... nobody -- Let me be clear, no one single person can spend that money. Only the masternodes can decide which projects(if any) to fund with the remaining money.

So where do the freeloaders come in? They don't.

 

[crowning]

Call a fucking spade a spade. You want to slurp money off every infrastructure provider whether any of us want it or not, and whether there even exists a credible value adding project for it to be spent on or not. And we're never getting any of it back.

Here you had me...

Where have we heard that before? Ah yes, every bankrupt and corrupt government and central planning committee, ever.

...and here you lost me.

Let's assume with "corrupt government" you mean the typical Western democracy.

How does (in a nutshell) modern (ahem) democracies work in most cases? There are democratic elections every couple of years, and after that, we live in a totalitarian (better: authoritarian. But totalitarian sounds much more dramatic :smile state till the next elections happen...the voters have NO vote during that time, the government can decide whatever they want.

In our model here, the voters can disagree whenever they feel it's necessary or against their interests. For each single decision the "Government" proposes. Every time. In almost real-time.

It sounds like a small difference, but in fact the difference is HUGE.

 

[thelonecrouton]

Here you had me...



...and here you lost me.

Let's assume with "corrupt government" you mean the typical Western democracy.

How does (in a nutshell) modern (ahem) democracies work in most cases? There are democratic elections every couple of years, and after that, we live in a totalitarian (better: authoritarian. But totalitarian sounds much more dramatic :smile state till the next elections happen...the voters have NO vote during that time, the government can decide whatever they want.

In our model here, the voters can disagree whenever they feel it's necessary or against their interests. For each single decision the "Government" proposes. Every time. In almost real-time.

It sounds like a small difference, but in fact the difference is HUGE.

But we can't vote NO to begin with. Money gets taken anyway and we have no say about it. And because every voter knows that this 15% is going to end up spent anyway, hardly anyone is going to bother voting nay to any given project, making it very easy for the project proposers and their buddies to fund whatever they want.

Surely the onus should be on those wishing to spend collective money to convince enough of us to vote yay in the first place? It's a simple but critical distinction.

The argument that "we need an ever-replenishing uncapped stockpile to get stuff done quickly" is bogus. Approval by vote would still take time. 15% of the daily supply is ~$1400/day at current price. How may projects are going to need more than that upfront? Those that do can be catered for by a capped reserve.

 

[alex-ru]

Because MN ops are all too stupid and short sighted to approve any value adding project at all. You know best!

I completely don't agree with it.

All MN ops:
1. Have enough brains to earn at least 3000$. And they are interested to multiply it.
2. Have enough vision and plans to freeze their money in this project long-term.
3. Some of them can have some unique competences, knowledge in specialized areas, or specialized markets, local markets - none of us (even current development team).
They ("minority") must have some possibility to affect the project also. This is the source of additional effectiveness decentralization can give us.

Just imagine: some theoretical 100 chineese MN ops know some unique approach to Chinese market. But for some reason they can't convince majority of MN ops to finance it. Why there is no possibility for them to finance corresponding efforts with their part of (RD&Marketing) budget - this is the source of decentralized competence. And we have to use it.

But it is necessary to provide some mechanism of protection from cashing fund through affiliated projects

 

[crowning]

But we can't vote NO to begin with. Money gets taken anyway and we have no say about it.

And that's exactly the GOOD thing about it.
If everyone could decide whether money is "taken away" or not we would be exactly where we are now, a couple of enthusiasts donate and 99% of the rest is doing nothing,

And because every voter knows that this 15% is going to end up spent anyway, hardly anyone is going to bother voting nay to any given project, making it very easy for the project proposers and their buddies to fund whatever they want.

I could also say that the project-trolls and their buddies could block whatever they want. That's the beauty about it, mobilize enough people and you'll get what you want.
I agree that there will always be people with the mindset "my money is taken away anyway, so I don't care". But those would vote neither yay nor nay, so it will still be up to you to convince enough voters to say nay.

 

[thelonecrouton]

And that's exactly the GOOD thing about it.
If everyone could decide whether money is "taken away" or not we would be exactly where we are now, a couple of enthusiasts donate and 99% of the rest is doing nothing,

That's not how it works. Enough yes votes and the money is diverted from everyone, not just those who voted yes.

I could also say that the project-trolls and their buddies could block whatever they want. That's the beauty about it, mobilize enough people and you'll get what you want.
I agree that there will always be people with the mindset "my money is taken away anyway, so I don't care". But those would vote neither yay nor nay, so it will still be up to you to convince enough voters to say nay.

This doesn't answer the question of why money should be siphoned off regardless of whether it's deemed needed or not. Only taking what the consensus deems needful is a simpler, cleaner and safer approach.


Since Ed Moncado is proposing hypothetical scenarios, here's one of mine:

Imagine for a moment that instead of crouton-the-abrasive-asshole saying this, Evan posted the following: "Before any money is taken collectively from infrastructure providers, those wishing to spend that money must present a credible enough case to convince x% of voters that it's in their interests, and in the interests of DASH as a whole." I suspect there would be landslide agreement.

 

[raganius]

I would like to add my views on the subject, after all the news and opinions that I have read here. I'm really glad to see these debates. It's very important and healthy: a sign that we have the potential to find the best solution after all.

First of all, I've read some comments of people referring to an entity, the "freeriders", and I found it to be a little vague... What is, or who are the "freeriders"?

IMO, the miners are no "freeriders", because we are bringing a very important service to the network, and our "remuneration" is not a favour, it is due and necessary (lest no miners remain);

The same with the the masternoders. We are no "freeriders" because we are bringing another important service to the network, and our "remuneration" is not at all a favour, it is also due and also necessary;

The investors, as well, are no "freeriders", because we are bringing our fiat money inside the game;

All the volunteers (there are great people here volunteering for DASH, including the DEV team), we are also no "freeriders", because we have been donating our time and efforts to the DASH community;

All those entities above must be respected, and the fact that a person is not "donating" money directly (through a Masternode or to an address or to a specific project) does not turn this person automatically into a "freerider" (if I have correctly captured the meaning of this entity). So, I've started by disregarding all arguments that tried to make me feel guilty for eventually not being a direct money donator.

As I see here, in our community there are no "freeriders" (yet). Everyone is contributing with what they can. And all of us, we want DASH to be the best.

As some of you here may know, I live in one of the most corrupt cultures countries in the world. You cannot leave money laying around easily here because it will surelly be robbed. There are not many libertarians around, people want to have advantages, but does not want to work for it. In such environment, it's not hard to become skeptical, and careful. That's why I see the opinions brought by thelonecrouton and camosoul to be VERY important to be taken into account.

We must not leave this hatch of easy money open, because that's how the real "freeriders" will arrive.

I LOVED the Self-sustainable Decentralized Governance by Blockchain idea, and I know that THIS will bring a new paradigm to the world. I'm really proud to be here and I believe we will do our best. But let's start small, and flexible. And make adjustments always when necessary as we go. That's all I can suggest right now.

In a P2P system what is good for the network must always be good for each single peer.

Well, that's how I see things... and, please, let's not hate each other just because of our own opinions.

I love you guys, we are making history here!

 

[alex-ru]

As I see here, in our community there are no "freeriders" (yet).

We speak about Research-Development-Marketing ("RDM") here.
So everybody who don't spend their money or time for RDM now - are RDM-freeriders.

I think >80% of DASH holders now are RDM-freeriders (but in Bitcoin >90% :smile and it has to be changed somehow.

After reaching 0% RDM-freeriders Dash will be 10 times more effective than Bitcoin!

 

[crowning]

Imagine for a moment that instead of crouton-the-abrasive-asshole saying this, Evan posted the following: "Before any money is taken collectively from infrastructure providers, those wishing to spend that money must present a credible enough case to convince x% of voters that it's in their interests, and in the interests of DASH as a whole." I suspect there would be landslide agreement.

I fully agree, Evan WILL always have the eduffield bonus on his side...we can't change this.

But do you know what my VERY first though was when Evan sent me this paper 8 days ago for review?

My first thought was : "WOW, this guy is giving away a lot of his power voluntarily!".

Until now in every crypto-currency the option always was "follow the developer(s) or fork your own coin" (actually that was one of the reasons XCoin/Darkcoin/Dash got started).

Now you have to convince the people that your proposal is good for Dash. Easier to do for Evan than for you and me, yes, but if he crosses a certain line enough people will start to say NO. I'm pretty sure the Darkcoin / Dash re-branding would have been a VERY close case.

 

[thelonecrouton]

We speak about Research-Development-Marketing ("RDM") here.
So everybody who don't spend their money or time for RDM now - are RDM-freeriders.

I think >80% of DASH holders now are RDM-freeriders (but in Bitcoin >90% :smile and it has to be changed somehow.

Everyone who spends money on mining hardware and mines is supporting DASH (albeit crappily via centralised pools :tongue and being directly rewarded, everyone who spends money on owning a Masternode is supporting DASH and being directly rewarded, every non-infrastructure investor is out for their own interests and traders do what traders do, these groups should not be directly paid from the block reward.

Currently there are no freeriders - where do you get "80%" from? - but a lot of people who do vital work that aren't being directly compensated at all - Flare, Udjin, Crowning etc. and the testnet regulars and PR folk. You're right, this should be fixed, but I see no free lunches being handed out currently and I'd like to see that continue.

I'd like funding to be justified before infrastructure providers get skimmed from, that's all.

 

[TanteStefana]

Aaaghhrrr, I wanted to let this go but this contrived bullshit makes me sick.

Call a fucking spade a spade. You want to slurp money off every infrastructure provider whether any of us want it or not, and whether there even exists a credible value adding project for it to be spent on or not. And we're never getting any of it back.

Because MN ops are all too stupid and short sighted to approve any value adding project at all. You know best!

It's all for our own good, right?

Where have we heard that before? Ah yes, every bankrupt and corrupt government and central planning committee, ever.

Taking from people without their consent is theft, plain and simple.



Funding should be approved first, then diverted. This one simple change of approach would turn this from the worst thing possible for DASH into something that could help make DASH unstoppable.

Taking it regardless leads to ruin, every single time. You are all going to get fleeced if you don't insist right now on NOT automatically funnelling money into the pockets of freeloaders who know that they'll be able to railroad cash into their own projects because nobody can be bothered voting nay as your vote is effectively toothless.

Are you 100% against a flat 15% diversion of funds to the DAO, and if not spent, returned idea? It's just that I see raising the funds upon approval of a project to be difficult to do. Especially if it'd be nice to get a project going asap. I know what you mean, I don't want funds blown out our ass to con artists for time immortal either, but it's good to have funds available to take advantage of things when the idea comes up.

 

[thelonecrouton]

Are you 100% against a flat 15% diversion of funds to the DAO, and if not spent, returned idea?

Yes. You don't wander into the supermarket every day and hand them a fistful of cash just in case you might want something later. And you don't expect to ever see it back if you do. Particularly when the people who want this cash off you have repeatedly stated that under no circumstances should you ever get it back, despite the fact that it's coming out of the previously agreed reward schedule that we have based our investment on.

It's just that I see raising the funds upon approval of a project to be difficult to do. Especially if it'd be nice to get a project going asap. I know what you mean, I don't want funds blown out our ass to con artists for time immortal either, but it's good to have funds available to take advantage of things when the idea comes up.

$1400/day is immediately available. The voting process on anything would take the same amount of time anyway.

 

[darkwing]

$1400/day

Ok. Sounds a lot. But taking even taking insanely low day rates for contracting devs it sounds like peanuts to me: Split between say 10 projects ($140/day) /20 projects ($70/day) /100 projects ($7/day)

So it would still have to be volunteer/help out on this cool project/ etc ie at todays value it would still be underfunded.

 

[thelonecrouton]

$1400/day

Ok. Sounds a lot. But taking even taking insanely low day rates for contracting devs it sounds like peanuts to me: Split between say 10 projects ($140/day) /20 projects ($70/day) /100 projects ($7/day)

So it would still have to be volunteer/help out on this cool project/ etc ie at todays value it would still be underfunded.

That's the point, we shouldn't necessarily be paying in full for a hundred simultaneously crap projects. We can vote to prioritise spending.

$1400/day is a $4200/month salary for 10 full time devs.

 

[darkwing]

That's the point, we shouldn't necessarily be paying in full for a hundred simultaneously crap projects. We can vote to prioritise spending.

$1400/day is a $4200/month salary for 10 full time devs.

Ok below the average US salary but quite high in other parts of the world

http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Job=Software_Engineer_/_Developer_/_Programmer/Salary

Also there will be more than that let's say you have ten devs working on the core (great!) then there is the android app ios app payment systems branding/marketing/advertising legal etc
Some of which you'd deem to be bollocks. But part of competing unfortunately.
Then $1400 still seems like peanuts. A lot of that could still be done as volunteer work. And as above mentioned above things are often cheaper elsewhere (we have global reach.)

*edit and fixed fee projects with much lower maintenance retainers or similar would be different to salaries

 

[TanteStefana]

Everyone who spends money on mining hardware and mines is supporting DASH (albeit crappily via centralised pools :tongue and being directly rewarded, everyone who spends money on owning a Masternode is supporting DASH and being directly rewarded, every non-infrastructure investor is out for their own interests and traders do what traders do, these groups should not be directly paid from the block reward.

Currently there are no freeriders - where do you get "80%" from? - but a lot of people who do vital work that aren't being directly compensated at all - Flare, Udjin, Crowning etc. and the testnet regulars and PR folk. You're right, this should be fixed, but I see no free lunches being handed out currently and I'd like to see that continue.

I'd like funding to be justified before infrastructure providers get skimmed from, that's all.

The only people right now that are being skimmed are the miners, if you look at it from their point of view. They've been having 2.5% taken away (and they feel it each time) every month. Masternode owners have been gaining 2.5% each month, and frankly, each time the price goes up, more masternodes come on line, keeping the ROI pretty much the same, so except for the advantage of increasing the size of the MN network, MN owners really won't feel any difference. Miners have already come to grips that their share is shrinking. SO:

Basically, we're creating a 3rd entity that hardly changes the status quo (miners know their share is shrinking for a year now, and MN owners have been pretty much getting the same amount and could expect the same amount in the future still) The effect will be fewer masternodes, but if we want more masternodes, all we have to do is lower the collateral to run one.

So the only quiestion, as I see it, is what to do to keep rampant, unwise spending from happening. I still propose the following:

Once essential projects are being funded, and nothing meets the standards according to voters for funding, AND a certain savings is set aside, all funds are distributed to Masternode owners and miners alike. This way, there is an incentive to save, but not a huge incentive, and there is an incentive to spend, if it looks more advantages for funds to be used on a project, they'll vote for it. I think, even if it's just to add infrastructure, because the infrastructure would obviously benefit the DASH network as a whole, which should bring value to the coin.

I still think the idea that masternode owners doing the voting is a good idea because they are interested in the long term view, whereas miners do come and go, with many of them jumping from coin to coin. The rest of the community, who are indeed invaluable, can participate by promoting what they think should be done, giving argument, as we are doing right now, and generally making their ideas or support heard on the proposed project submission website forum threads.

I think Masternode owners, with long term views of the future of the coin are highly unlikely to vote to distribute excess funds if they think they can increase the value of the DASH project by funding a project. But they will be equally unlikely to let funds sit on the blockchain when the lack of liquidity is a problem, or other issues start surfacing that we can't even envision right now.

 

[TaoOfSatoshi]

That's the point, we shouldn't necessarily be paying in full for a hundred simultaneously crap projects. We can vote to prioritise spending.

$1400/day is a $4200/month salary for 10 full time devs.

This is a good point. But why do you feel we would be difficult to prioritize spending? Some projects are needed more than others and would be easier to get a consensus on.

I've been saying, it should be built into the code that a review takes place after a certain timeframe. That way, if you are right, and Evan's model simply isn't working, we cut our losses and try it your way. If that doesn't work, we try a potential third proposal. Eventually we will be able to fine-tune it because I can almost guarantee mistakes will be made.

I agree with the model as proposed, but if I'm wrong (it's happened before :tongue, we can go in another direction.

Contract terms. Very important. The ability to make adjustments is key. I'm sure the final model will be a hybrid of everyone's valuable contributions.

 

[darkwing]

Once essential projects are being funded, and nothing meets the standards according to voters for funding, AND a certain savings is set aside, all funds are distributed to Masternode owners and miners alike. This way, there is an incentive to save, but not a huge incentive, and there is an incentive to spend, if it looks more advantages for funds to be used on a project, they'll vote for it. I think, even if it's just to add infrastructure, because the infrastructure would obviously benefit the DASH network as a whole, which should bring value to the coin.

I suppose returned funds could go into transaction fees over a couple of 100/1000 blocks. That way both miners and masternode owners get payed proportionately?
Like sending a zero transaction with a portion of the reimbursement as transaction fee every block until done.

 

[TaoOfSatoshi]

And, I would just like to reiterate, that it will be a very long time before we run out of useful projects to vote for.

This fund will take us places that Bitcoin could only imagine.

If someone is misusing funds, cut their support and fund a worthy effort.

And if at some point in time we finally run out of useful contracts, then the ability to make adjustments, or simply stop the DGBB, will be there.

I am very excited at the potential uses for this fund. Masternode owners are going to be busy for a long, long time...

 

[5kmi]

Alright it's time for me to put my 2 duffs in...

I suppose returned funds could go into transaction fees over a couple of 100/1000 blocks. That way both miners and masternode owners get payed proportionately?
Like sending a zero transaction with a portion of the reimbursement as transaction fee every block until done.

This reimbursement method could cause trouble. Think about it... There's a scheduled "bonus" for 500/1000/however many blocks, this attracts multipools and other exploitative miners who are just looking for the best $/day they can get. These miners are the most likely to cash out of their mining proceeds ASAP which could cause a downswing in price. These miners on our network reduce our DASH income and it's fiat value simultaneously. These miners have no interest in the project, just their own immediate profit, so why are we going to give them a piece of the pie that was set aside for the long term good of our currency? These are some of the dreaded "freeriders" we've been worrying about the past few pages. The only way to implement this plan successfully would be to make the disbursement amounts so negligible it wouldn't attract these types of miners, which would essentially just make the remaining balance a "delayed" payment for long term miners and node operators.

In regards to the original debate, I am with thelonecrouton on this one... I see zero reason to allocate funds before we have a purpose for them. There is no need to create any excess funds that we have to worry about returing "fairly" when we could just avoid that situation altogether. Why couldn't we set a premise to allow a maximum of 15% to be diverted if there are enough (a set number) projects to utilize it? Example: fund a maximum of 10 projects that collect 1.5% each. 1.5% gets diverted directly from block reward once the vote to fund it passes, and not a moment sooner. This can be split up to fund smaller projects too... Example 2: 5 major projects claiming 1.5% each, and 10 lesser projects claming 0.75% each. Or 5x1.5%, 5x0.75%, 10x0.375% or something along those lines. With a little prioritization we can negate the whole "fair wealth redistribution" problem every other governing body on the planet has.

If there are any typos please forgive me, I'm on mobile.