Proposal “decision-vote-improve-proposal-system-mn“ (Closed)Back

Title:Decision Vote: Improve Proposal System [MNO-Plan]
Owner:DashTrustProtectors
One-time payment: 5 DASH (192 USD)
Completed payments: no payments occurred yet (1 month remaining)
Payment start/end: 2020-11-13 / 2020-12-12 (added on 2020-11-02)
Final voting deadline: in passed
Votes: 427 Yes / 630 No / 40 Abstain
External information: app.dashnexus.org/proposals/decision-vote-improve-proposal-system-mno-plan/overview

Proposal description

1. Introduction

This is a decision proposal to increase the proposal system’s spending limit (i.e., its flexibility) and incentivize increasing the value of funded proposals (i.e., its efficiency). Similar to the visual identity / rebranding proposal from 2018, two proposals are being submitted for evaluation. These two proposals are mutually exclusive; only one may be implemented. Further detail about the voting process is found in the next section.

In preparing for this proposal, two alternatives emerged with enough interest and support for network-wide consideration. One option originated from Dash Core Group (DCG), the other from a group of masternode owner/operators (MNOs). The Dash trust protectors (TPs) are submitting both proposal options as a neutral third party. Apart from the proposal submission itself, individual TPs may choose to express their personal opinions non-neutrally.

The primary objective of both proposal system upgrade options is to provide the network with greater flexibility over proposal spending, while better aligning MNO incentives to avoid spending network resources on low-value proposals. The options differ in their approach and the resulting implications. The differences will be detailed in subsequent sections.

After this introduction, and the proposal process section that follows, further details about the background will be presented. These three sections, as well as the appendix at the end are identical in each of the two proposals, so you will only need to read these sections once. The only section that differentiates the two proposals is section 4.

Cross-reference links for each proposal:
[DCG Plan] - 
https://app.dashnexus.org/proposals/decision-vote-improve-proposal-system-dcg-plan/overview
https://www.dashcentral.org/p/decision-vote-improve-proposal-system-dc
[MNO Plan] - 
https://app.dashnexus.org/proposals/decision-vote-improve-proposal-system-mno-plan/overview
https://www.dashcentral.org/p/decision-vote-improve-proposal-system-mn

Link to Dash Forum proposal discussion thread -
https://www.dash.org/forum/threads/decision-proposal-increase-proposal-system-flexibility-efficiency.50873/

2. Process

The voting and proposal process consists of two phases:
  • Phase 1 - the two proposal options are evaluated against each other
  • Phase 2 - the favored option from Phase 1 is evaluated against our current system
In Phase 1 (this phase, this month) you are asked to vote for which option you prefer. Regardless of degree, the option with the most net (yes minus no) votes will proceed to the next phase (next month). DCG will implement the Phase 2 upgrade option if it exceeds the normal 10% net vote criterion in Phase 2. In the unlikely event the higher ranked proposal exceeds the 10% net yes votes during Phase 1, Phase 2 would not be necessary.

Edit for clarity: "net vote" means "yes" votes minus "no" votes.


In an effort to reduce the need to post and respond to comments and discussions in both proposals, we have created a Dash Forum thread we hope the community will leverage, particularly for any debate and comparisons. If you have comments or questions specifically related to one proposal, those could be posted on the Dash Central / Dash Nexus proposal itself. This will help reduce the workload for the proposal owners (POs) and others that would otherwise need to reply to the same comments in multiple locations.

3. Background

Dash Core Group identified several issues with network economics and incentives, and presented its initial findings in December 2019 at DCG’s Open House, available to view as a presentation titled “Improving Dash as a Store of Value”.

The presentation explored a number of unique attributes of the Dash network’s incentives and economics, and presented a hypothesis regarding the impact those attributes have had on Dash’s market performance and long-term price volatility.

These issues were addressed partially through an independent, but related proposal (passed in the July voting cycle), which approved a reallocation of the block subsidy. The changes were incorporated into v0.16 of Dash Core, which was released to mainnet on September 30, 2020. That proposal did not address any changes to the proposal system itself. Proposal system upgrades are the subject of this proposal.

Dash’s current proposal system allocates up to a fixed 10% of the block subsidy toward proposals on a cycle of 16,616 blocks, which approximates one calendar month in duration, through a “superblock”. Proposal funding is dispersed in a coinbase transaction to the address specified in the proposal if the proposal receives enough support from the MNOs. The proposal system prioritizes payment to the highest ranking proposals until the available funding is exhausted for each superblock, subject to the constraint that each proposal must reach 10% “net votes”. Proposals meeting these criteria are funded with newly created Dash. More information on the functioning of the current system is found in the governance section of the Dash documentation.

While this system has been effective at funding Dash’s development, there are several issues and concerns that emerged over the years. The current proposal system lacks incentives for MNOs to focus on value-creating proposals, resulting in approval of high-cost proposals that deliver limited long-term value. In addition, MNOs lacked the flexibility to increase proposal funding beyond 10%, potentially forcing valued teams to disband due to even temporary price declines.

The root-causes of these issues are as follows:
  1. There is no personal and immediate cost for MNOs to approve low-value proposals, as it has no impact on their Dash-denominated rewards.
  2. The monthly budget is relatively small and has no ability to increase capacity if needed for large proposals or to accommodate price declines.
Community discussions revealed support for expanding the budget, maintaining a proposal cap, and introducing incentives for MNOs to restrain spending. Both decision proposals carry these features, but differ in the approach and specific effects on miners, masternodes, and proposal owners.

4. MNO Plan

This proposal is sponsored/paid by a group of MNOs: @Rion, @hilawe, @TroyDASH, @xkcd, @unchained, @MastermIned, @macrochip, @MoKa, @kanuuker, @Bridgewater, @Sequal, Anonymous1, and Anonymous2. The plan represents the preference of a larger group of MNOs who made up the majority of respondents to a 4-question poll conducted by Ryan Taylor on July 4th, 2020 on the Dash Talk Discord #mno channel.

Like DCG, we propose to increase the proposal system limit from 10% to 20% and allocate unused proposal funds instead of not creating them. Our plans differ in how unused proposal funds are allocated. DCG’s plan proposes a fixed 60/40 MNO/mining allocation ratio, regardless of proposal funding. This results in variable MNO allocation and variable mining allocation. Conversely, our plan maintains a mining reward that is fixed with respect to proposal funding. This results in only a variable MNO allocation (see Table 1 below). Further details regarding guiding principles, proposed changes, benefits/rationale, and risk management are provided in later sections. 

The remainder of this section is background regarding the poll mentioned above, given for those who aren’t active members of that particular Discord channel.

This proposal addresses questions 1-3, which deal with proposal funding and MNO/miner reward allocations. Question 4 (which dealt with timing) has effectively been decided by the recently approved reallocation proposal.  

Note in the following figures (Discord screenshots) that Ryan Taylor (@babygiraffe) voted for each poll option of all questions, in order to give MNOs options to click.

Question 1 showed that a clear majority of voting MNOs preferred “proposal funding [to] increase or decrease the amount of block subsidy rewards allocated to masternodes only”, as follows:

https://i.imgur.com/1sUJ6Zp.png
Figure 1 - Poll question 1

Question 2 showed that a clear majority of voting MNOs preferred the final state mining reward allocation to be a fixed 35%, as follows:

https://i.imgur.com/fa5pffK.png
Figure 2 - Poll question 2

Question 3 showed more evenly distributed voting regarding proposal system limits, as follows:

https://i.imgur.com/LhslEFp.png
Figure 3 - Poll question 3

Regarding proposal funding limits (question 3), we propose a 20% limit (same as DCG), which roughly aligns with the median preferred amount from the poll. Regarding the reallocation strategy (question 1) and the prefered mining allocation (question 2), polled MNOs gave a strong preference, with the winning option in each case garnering more votes than all other options combined. DCG’s proposal does not represent these preferences, which should be presented to all MNOs as an option, hence this proposal.

4.1 Guiding Principles

Our plan is guided by the following principles:
  1. The purpose of mining is security and coin distribution. Any funding allocated to mining in excess of security needs and/or which doesn’t distribute coins in a desirable manner is wasteful, lowering overall security by reducing non-mining security.
  2. The purpose of masternodes is security, coin distribution, interest-bearing savings, incentivized service provision, and a means to assess value. MNOs have the most at stake in Dash; decisions regarding what constitutes value (and values), and the best way to achieve such should be in their hands.
  3. The purpose of the proposal system is security, coin distribution, and value creation. Proposal owners (POs) create value when the benefits of their work outweigh its costs. Currently, MNOs experience no immediate, personal costs when funding proposals, so it is easy to fund low-value proposals. The proposal system will create more value with MNOs funding proposals from their own pockets.
MNOs define value, POs create value, and miners secure value.  

Each group provides an important form of security and coin distribution. Miners primarily secure against one form of computational attack, i.e. the 51% attack. MNOs and POs (which can both be simply considered “users”, particularly when trustless masternode shares arrive) secure against social attacks more broadly, e.g. government crackdowns. Users protect the things that provide them value; the more users and value we have, the more security we have. Dash can gain more users through interest-bearing savings (MNOs/savers) and general-purpose value creation (POs/workforce) than through mining. Overpaying for mining security may compromise other forms of security and coin distribution. Therefore, it makes sense to increase incentives for MNOs and the proposal system.

4.2 Proposed Changes

We propose the following changes to the proposal system:
  1. Increase the proposal system limit from the current 10% of the total monthly block subsidy to 20%. No changes to the proposal approval process would be made, including the minimum net-vote threshold.
  2. Keep the mining reward allocation fixed with respect to month-to-month proposal funding, as it always has been. Transition to a lower fixed allocation over the next ~4.5 years (the same transition period as the reallocation proposal). The fixed mining transition schedule should match DCG’s proposed transition schedule at 10% superblock funding (see the reallocation schedule in the Appendix, or the live version for details).  
  3. Allocate any unused block subsidy associated with a given superblock’s funding limit toward masternodes.
The following table presents the 2025 end-state allocations (after the transition period described above) for miners and masternodes resulting from an array of hypothetical superblock funding levels (0%-20%). For convenience, we present the allocations resulting from both our plan and DCG’s plan.

https://dash-nexus-production-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/7f65cfe01cb111ebba90ab1fd22b902c
Table 1 - 2025 End State Allocations

4.3 Benefits and Rationale

As the table above shows, both proposals increase the capacity of the proposal system (superblock) to 20% of total block rewards, up from the current 10%.

The fundamental difference between the two upgrade plans is whether the mining allocation is fixed or variable with respect to proposal funding. Like the existing system, the MNO plan maintains a fixed mining allocation. We propose a 36% 2025 end state. This aligns with DCG’s plan and for the allocation ratio to be 60/40 at 10% funding, as called for by the recently-passed reallocation proposal.  

A secondary difference between plans is that the MNO plan places 100% of the ‘variability’ onto MNOs. This is appropriate since MNOs carry 100% of the proposal-funding responsibility. Under our plan, the MNO allocation varies between 44% and 64%. DCG’s plan results in a lower MNO variability by shifting part of the variability to miners. That makes the mining allocation unpredictable from month to month.

The goal of making MNO allocation dependent on proposal funding is to increase the value of funded proposals. Currently there is no personal and immediate cost for MNOs to fund proposals. A consequence of this proposed change is that MNO rewards increase with judicious proposal funding.  

As shown in Table 1, for proposal funding <10%, the MNO plan provides a higher MNO allocation as compared to both the existing system and DCG’s plan. For proposal funding >10%, the MNO plan yields a lower MNO allocation than DCG’s plan, but higher than the existing system up to 19% proposal funding where it breaks even with the current 45% MNO allocation.

Note that in both plans, no portion of the block subsidy goes unused. This provides certainty over Dash’s projected supply, and it increases the overall amount of outstanding Dash compared to the status quo where superblock outlays are always less than 10% (even if by a small amount). If the extra Dash goes to MNOs who either hold or reinvest it into masternodes, this would raise Dash’s market capitalization. Conversely, extra Dash rewarded to miners who place market sell orders on public exchanges tends to reduce the price of Dash, partially or fully offsetting potential market capitalization gains.

4.4 Risk Management

We believe this plan is low risk. In this section we briefly discuss the economic and security risks, and those posed by migration and implementation of the plan.

4.4.1 Economic risks 

The main economic risk we see in this plan is that it may not go far enough in maximizing proposal value. As stated above, the problem with the existing system is that MNOs bear no personal immediate cost for funding proposals; funded proposals are essentially paid 100% by ‘other people’, i.e. the costs are socialized. Even with our proposed improvement, proposal cost will be socialized by up to 99.98%.  

An example to illustrate this: Consider an MNO who operates one node and a Dash network of 5,000 nodes. Now assume this MNO plan proposal has been implemented. When this MNO votes he only bears 1/5000th of the actual cost. In other words the proposal is paid by 99.98% (4999/5000) other people’s money. This makes it relatively easy to still justify funding low-value proposals. Proposal funding from even our largest whales with 100 nodes is 98% (4900/5000) socialized.

The following table presents the costs that a single-node MNO would pay for various proposals/scenarios, showing that funding costs are low, even for our plan in the most extreme scenario:

https://i.imgur.com/x9agKNT.png
Table 2 - MNO Proposal Funding Costs

Necessary and valuable proposals are not at risk. They will continue to be funded. The incremental cost (between DCG’s plan and our MNO plan) is minimal. Even the most extreme case where an individual MNO wants to fund the entire expanded 20% proposal system, it would only cost him $45 more under our plan as compared to DCG’s (lower-right field of Table 2). Typical funding decisions (like a 100 DASH proposal) have a $0.56 incremental cost. This is all to say that only marginally valuable proposals are at risk.

Another risk: MNO reward variability could impact the decisions of current and prospective MNOs, potentially affecting the number of masternodes that are enabled on the network. Periods of lower rewards may discourage masternode operation, whereas periods of higher rewards may further incentivize masternode creation. We believe the risk to the network here is low. The masternode count in Dash has remained robust despite a turbulent market and the price of Dash having declined 95% from its all-time high.

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/wTw19d-TOAC9N4rJgK0cT4uh88qz8_L36NFldnyPCiCy3_3lbilLA2xibxtltm32gAIIOqhOgPsYYdiGBSDrgn-Kaoa_4FrgZyzeKqXJfruA8bTZjbL9L4U3QK4_QNtHAz2h6RYo
Figure 4 - Active masternodes (source: [i]http://178.254.23.111/~pub/Dash/Dash_Info.html[/i])

Any decreases in the masternode count will naturally increase the rewards for the remaining masternodes, mitigating the effect of any extra buying or selling of collateral.

4.4.2 Security risks

This plan proposes a fixed mining allocation, which has a long history of working securely. Specifically, this plan places the minimum allowable mining allocation at 36%. If DCG is comfortable with a minimal 32% mining allocation, we are comfortable with a fixed 36% allocation.

4.4.3 Migration risks

Migration refers to the process of miners adopting changes implemented and activated through a hard fork. Both plans (DCG’s and ours) will require a hard fork. Miner support is required. There is a risk with both plans that miner support may not reach the threshold required to safely activate the changes on the network. Technically, this isn’t a “risk”; it’s giving miners their due voice in the adoption process. Miners need to be persuaded that adopting the proposed changes is in their interest. We believe it is.

At a hypothetical 10% proposal allocation, both plans have a 36% mining allocation. Proposal funding >10% yields a higher allocation to miners under our plan than DCG’s (see Table 1 above). If miners only want a higher allocation they just have to ask themselves whether they expect more or less than 10% proposal funding. In trying to predict this, one should consider that there are two “forces” pulling in opposite directions, and it’s uncertain which force will dominate.

The force that might cause MNOs to increase spending to >10% is the psychological urge to treat the limit as a target (“let’s use as much as we can”). In either plan, the proposal limit will be raised to 20%, so spending above 10% becomes possible. MNOs will be getting a higher allocation compared to the existing plan all the way up to 19% (see Table 1 above - our plan yields 45% to MNOs at 19% proposal funding), so if this force dominates we’ll likely see >10% funding.

The force that might cause MNOs to decrease (or maintain) spending <10% is that in both plans MNOs will have a slightly higher personal cost to funding proposals. But as pointed out above, even in our plan proposals are paid by up to 99.98% ‘other people’s money’ from the perspective of the individual. It’s still easy to spend, so this force seems relatively weak.

Consider also that DCG typically claims 6% of total block rewards (60% of 10%), making that the effective floor. Miners will only get a higher allocation under DCG’s plan if MNOs keep non-DCG funding to less than 4% of the total block reward, and we typically spend ~3% on non-DCG funding already.

In the pessimistic view where miners don’t like either plan, they should ask themselves whether they prefer the devil they know (a predictable 36%) or the devil they don’t (a variable rate as low as 32%). We have precedent that miners have accepted pay reductions to lower, but still fixed, predictable levels. For example, when they accepted a reduction from 100% to 50% allocation to accommodate masternodes, and from 50% to 45% to accommodate the proposal system. We have never asked miners to accept a variable rate, let alone one over which they have no control. From both historical precedent and the interests of miners, this plan seems to be more likely to be adopted by miners than the alternative.

4.4.4 Implementation risks

The required changes to the proposal system should be relatively straightforward from a coding perspective, and we have full faith that DCG can implement either plan.

4.5 Summary

This proposal is effective, conservative, and safe.  
  • It is effective in that it increases the value of funded proposals while offering MNOs an increased ROI to compensate for yearly reward reductions and increasingly attractive alternative risk-adjusted returns outside of Dash.
  • It is conservative in that it maintains Dash’s historical mining economics, i.e. it gives miners a reliable, fixed allocation not subject to monthly superblock funding decisions by MNOs.
  • It is safe in that the associated economic, security, implementation, and migration risks are minimal.
5. Appendix

DCG introduced the idea of “Improving Dash as a Store of Value” on December 11, 2019. DCG then engaged in a series of Q&A and discussions held through various communication channels such as Discord, The Dash Forum, Zoom and Telegram from June-July 2020. The following links document these interactions, as well as other relevant information:
Related Discord polls:
Side by side decision proposal example from 2018 - Visual Dash Rebrand / Logo proposals (process reference):

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Discussion: Should we fund this proposal?

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0 points,3 years ago
I fear both proposals will either allow MNOs to just keep more money even incentivizing funding nothing at all or just give more money to the over funded core group.

A better plan would be to reduce the mining rewards to say 35% and adding those to the potential treasury budget. (Since Dash miners are responsible for only a small part of the network) MNOs should not be rewarded for funding nothing at all.

Voting no x16.
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6 points,3 years ago
I like this proposal Masternodes pay for what they vote for, makes a lot of sense, I am surprised we didn't do this sooner!
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4 points,3 years ago
Thank you for your support. It's been an uphill battle to convince voters to look past who is proposing the plans and compare the two plans on merit alone.
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-5 points,3 years ago
Wasn't this EXACT IDEA voted down by the DAO in a recent proposal? Can anyone provide the link?.

The fact that you blockheads would waste five Dash and a month of our time on this demonstrates your lack of good judgment IMHO.
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-2 points,3 years ago
I just watched the podcast and I apologize for calling you names. That was childish. You obviously have good intentions.

I started in your camp, but after I listened to RT's arguments I ended up changing my mind.

You should not feel cheated that RT did not present your proposal as a DCG proposal. If he feels strongly that his idea is better, then that information is relevant and should be shared with the community.
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-2 points,3 years ago
Also, as the CEO of DCG, it's his prerogative that a proposal is "DCG approved."
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-7 points,3 years ago
Nonsense. Who is proposing each plan is perhaps most important of all. I trust Ryan's judgement more than I trust the judgment of this ragtag MNO confederacy.
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-2 points,3 years ago
This is why it's so VERY important for all eco-system participants to ENSURE that they are not acting in bad faith or cannot be legitimately accused of being bad actors. It is incumbent on ALL OF US PERSONALLY to constantly prove we have the best interests of the network in mind.

Allowing criminals/bad actors to convince you to 'just compare their behavior on merit alone' is suicide and crazy behavior. As the old saying goes, 'You must avoid even the appearance of evil'. OTHERWISE, NO ONE HAS TO TAKE YOU SERIOUSLY!
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3 points,3 years ago
Voting definite NO to both proposals. We should definitely not be increasing the budget to 20%. The reasons are as follows:

1. The DAO is still currently not making sound business decisions on the right projects to fund. It is not a matter of the funds that will help MNOs to make good decisions it is clear to me that the great majority of MNOs voting do not have sufficient business experience to be making wise decisions on projects. What happens is the MNO keep voting in useless projects that bring little to no value in to Dash such as KuvaCash and Alt36 etc etc all of which I warned the community not to vote for from the very beginning. However MNOs kept voting these useless projects in. Wako Drako of KuvaTrash just kept asking for more and more funds and the MNOs just kept voting in this useless project again and again. I shudder to think how much greater damage would have been caused to the network if the budget would have gone up to 20% for that useless project and others like it.

One MNO that was dead set against my feedback on KuvaCash was a massage therapist for god sake. That was the extent of their business experience! They were dead set against my feedback but as it turns out everything I stated to the community has happened with the KuvaCash project. I've also had others who vocalised why I was so wrong with Kuva. Again, none of them came across as having real world business experience. I have had several thousands of face to face business interviews and been in business for 30 years compare that to some programmer or massage therapist. Yet I'm debating with these types of people! Its simply crazy.

Increasing the budget to 20% should definitely not happen in my opinion until the MNO network has put procedures in place to be able to make sound business decisions.

2. DCG would be the main beneficiary for the increase budget. I have made several valid criticisms on the spending of DCG being inefficient e.g. their office space at 55K which has been proven to be empty on every time a trusted member of the DASH community had made spot checks on their office. I have raised this point many times in the DCG funding proposals however they have not responded. These concerns were raised before the coronavirus. Paying 55K for an office space is pure waste when office space could be purchased as needed by the day or even by the meeting. When there were plenty of funds available to DCG CMO wanted to spend 1 million on google ads. This money could have been spent in a much more effective way that google ads. I raised concerns of this spend at the time in the DCG proposal. My concern is the more funds available the more the funds will be seen as available to use however DCG wants. The reality is 200K per month is more than enough for DCG. They just need to learn to be more thrifty with the money.

3. Extra money = downward pressure on Dash price.

If we could be making sound business decisions on projects then I would consider voting in a 20% flex increase in proposals but right now I do not have confidence in the DAO to make sound governance decisions.

People are under the impression that the Governance system decisions should me made under a purely democratic system. I disagree with a pure democratic approach because it is clear the people making the voting decisions don't have the experience to do so reliably. What I believe is better is to use the democratic process to vote in experienced Business MNOs who have proven business experience and also have the time to assess projects properly. MNOs would then vote who the business MNO making the decisions would be. The decisions and reasons would be published before voting ends so that MNOs can support it or not if it is based on sound decisions.

The only drawback I see from my suggestion is that MNOs like myself may not have the time to fully assess projects because this would take a considerable amount of time away from my current business.

Surprisingly Socrates was also against democracy in the pure sense – see this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fLJBzhcSWTk

Socrates rationale was that if you were to take a boat trip across the ocean would you hire inexperienced people to run the ship or would you hire people with experience in navigation, and how to operate a ship?

I have been developing a series of strategies on how better governance decisions can be made which you can read on the forum. These were:

1. Overview to improving the Dash Governance system. Highlighting the issues we currently have.

https://www.dash.org/forum/threads/01-decentralised-decision-making-steps-to-a-better-solution.50309/

2. Defining and Agreeing Dash Core Values, Goals and Objectives. What do we stand for and what don't we stand for?
https://www.dash.org/forum/threads/02-decentralised-decision-making-what-are-dashs-core-values.50310/

3. Dash's target markets:
https://www.dash.org/forum/threads/03-decentralised-decision-making-what-are-dashs-target-markets.50371/

4. Dash decentralization charter:
https://www.dash.org/forum/threads/04-decentralised-decision-making-the-dash-decentralisation-charter-ddc.50379/

5. Dash masternode association
https://www.dash.org/forum/threads/05-decentralised-decision-making-the-dash-masternodes-association.50390/

I had planned to write some further posts to these series but I stopped due to some derailing posts.

I wanted to write the following;

6. A requirement that a full Business plan must be submitting with each funding request.

7. Video interviews need to be made that are submitted with the Governance proposal owner to answer qualifying questions from MNOs directly with the proposal owners. This gives an opportunity to get to know what the proposal owner really is like and if they would fit with the Dash project.

8. Dash Watch PreValidation of the proposal owners to determine the following:
8.1 The proposal owners can validate they have the skill set they claim they have
8.2 Background check on each proposal owner to ensure they have no criminal background. This information can be kept confidential but checks need to be made to ensure we are not dealing with crooks.

If we had these steps we would have weeded out many of the low quality projects that just wanted to take our money and return nothing of value in return.

The above steps are steps that can actually lead to better Governance decisions.

Therefore I'm voting NO for both proposals until such time we have a decent governance decision making system in place to weed out low quality individuals and projects. That includes disruptive individuals who are intent on destabilising the Dash decentralized project.
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2 points,3 years ago
If you don't like either plan your best bet might be to choose the lesser of evils this round, and then vote for status quo next cycle.

If your view is that MNOs don't have the business experience to make good decisions then the MNO plan is a better fail safe. Why? Because under that plan MNOs have to pay more out of their own pockets to fund proposals. You don't have to have business sense to want to keep your money, when in doubt. The MNO plan leverages that natural tendency more.

(p.s. I read your posts about "decentralized governance" and replied there regarding those aspects)
Reply
5 points,3 years ago
Here's a good summary of the MNO & DCG Plans:

**MNO Plan** (i.e. Fixed Miner Allocation):
Miner allocation fixed, MNO allocation varies w/respect to proposal funding

1) Proposal funding comes from MNOs
2) Unallocated proposal funds go to MNOs
3) Fixed miner schedule shown is defined by 10% proposal funding (had to do it this way based on first reward allocation decision proposal that was passed)

**DCG Plan** (i.e. Variable Miner Allocation):
Miner and MNO allocations both vary w/respect to proposal funding

1) Proposal funding comes from both MNOs and miners
2) Unallocated proposal funds are split between MN / miners
3) This MN / miners split is proportional to reward allocation

MN/Miner Allocation table: https://dash-nexus-production-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/7f65cfe01cb111ebba90ab1fd22b902c
Reply
1 point,3 years ago
First I want to say that this should not be called the MNO-Plan, I am an MNO and this does not represent me. I like the idea of introducing a cost to decision makers in order to make the DAO more prudent, I think this is an improvement over the current system. My bet is once this is introduced we will seldom go above the 10% maybe we will remain in something like 6%-8% for most months, because it will be coming out of our pockets. Costs and savings should be for both miners and masternodes. Miners are already doing their part adopting and running v16, there is absolutely no reason why we should approve this "MNO-plan" the DCG plan is way better and considers the interest of all important actors on our network. This proposal option would be a big mistake and I encourage all MNOs to vote NO on this one and YES on the DCG plan.
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-4 points,3 years ago
Indeed. Calling it the 'MNO-plan' definitely makes it sound like it speaks for the masternodes. Like, its DCG vs the MNOs, even though more MNOs favor DCG's plan than the one from these particular MNOs.

You can say, "obviously it doesn't" until your blue in the face, but if that wasn't the plan then why not choose a better name? If your first steps are misleading then the rest of your journey probably won't be much better. If you have an honest proposal and want it to pass based on its merits, then the first thing you'd do is get the name right.

Speaking for those who don't agree with you, falsely pitting MNOs and DCG against each other. Maybe in a less hostile environment we could afford to overlook such slights, but not in cryptos.
Reply
4 points,3 years ago
therealdashman21,
Calling it the DCG and MNO plans was not my first choice either, but these were the jointly agreed-upon names of the proposals. DCG had at least as much influence over the name choice for this proposal as we did (if not more so), but ultimately this is what was agreed by both parties. This process was facilitated by the trust protectors. It is what it is - our goal should be to make sure everyone understands the choice to be made here, hopefully the names are not going to be a sticking point.
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-5 points,3 years ago
Nothing wrong with calling it 'the DCG plan'. Can't call it 'MNO plan' because only a couple MNOs came up with and support it, clearly. Regardless of who is to blame, naming the proposals that way was potentially misleading at the least (makes it seem as if the plan has more support than it does) and is thus an error. There is no 'try'. Either do better or hit the bricks. Grown men don't make excuses.
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2 points,3 years ago
Grown men also don't whine about trivial things. Focus on the substance. Calling the other proposal the "DCG Plan" also isn't fully accurate, because I'm sure not everyone in DCG agrees with it. You have no idea what the process was to come up with these (admittedly imperfect) names. Like I already said, most on our team wanted to call them "Fixed mining" vs "variable mining" plans, because that is the fundamental objective difference. DCG would not agree to that, and wanted their name in the title. So if you want to keep bitching about the name go talk to Ryan Taylor.
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-7 points,3 years ago
You call it trivial even though its potentially misleading? That is deceptive. The fact is that calling it the 'MNO plan' is INCORRECT. This is not a 'trivial thing', if you don't complain about things that are actually wrong then your organization/coin/community/whatever will degrade over time while you lazily sit back and watch.

Anyone in DCG who disagrees with that plan can show it and come forward. You have NO EVIDENCE of that btw, you're just telling us to take your word for it. Something a good actor wouldn't do. I don't care about the process, STOP MAKING EXCUSES! THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH THE NAME 'DCG PLAN'. The problem is 'MNO plan' doesn't represent the masternodes and is potentially misleading to those reading. GET YOUR HEAD OUT OF YOUR ASS AND STOP TRYING TO PASS OFF HALFASSED WORK.

The substance of the matter is TO START OFF ON THE RIGHT FOOT OR DON'T START AT ALL!
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4 points,3 years ago
For logistical reasons the two plans needed easy, short names. DCG/MNO wasn't my first choice. I favored fixed miner/variable miner, as I think that is the essential difference. Regardless, MNO Plan clearly doesn't assume to represent all MNOs, it's just that it was introduced by some MNOs, as opposed to DCG.

I think it's unlikely that we'll mostly stay in the 6%-8% range. DCG alone is 6%, and that's cutting back. The incentive and ease to spend (even on relatively low value proposals) is present in both plans, ours to a lower degree of course. If the DCG plan gets implemented I'm guessing it won't be long before we start to exceeding 10%. We'll get use to that as the new normal and eventually we'll start hovering close to 20%. We'll see.
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3 points,3 years ago
So the difference between DCG and MNO proposals basically boils down to size of proposal budget influencing just MNO compensation (MNO proposal) or both MNO and miner compensation (DCG proposal).

The issue is, variable miner compensation definitely introduces unintended incentive for miners to leave the network depending on proposal budget size. Are those two things something we really do want to depend on each other?

I mean, MNO compensation being tied to a proposal budget is definitely a good thing, and a great incentive. But why should network security provided by miners be tied to proposal budget? Do we really need less security when proposal budget is larger, or more security when it's smaller?

And most importantly, do we want MNOs to have to choose between defunding a proposal in order to attract more miners?

I certainly don't. I will be voting yes to this proposal.
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1 point,3 years ago
Yep. Let's boil it down in another way:
The MNO plan says "at any given time we have a fixed security need, so keep the mining allocation fixed"
The DCG plan says "at all times we think masternodes and miners should be paid at a 60/40 ratio". Why? Hell if I know, it's just a magic number that will almost always be misaligned.
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6 points,3 years ago
Firstly thank you to the Trust Protectors, especially Mark Mason, for facilitating the process for this joint submission; and to everyone who's been working on both drafts for the last several weeks.

I agree with the decision to bump the max treasury allocation to 20%, which these two proposals share in common; and I also agree with having MN rewards tied in some way to the unused treasury budget. However I am supporting the MNO plan because I think the MNO plan has a more accurate understanding of the purpose of the entities in our DAO. Miners provide an important service to the network: security through proof of work hashing. We (the DAO) have already voted recently on a block reward allocation in recognition that our original allocation was paying for hashing in excess of what is needed to keep the network secure. This involved directly reducing miner rewards. Even if we grant that miners prefer to have this "variable reward", why should the DAO now move back in the other direction to incentivize more hashing, when we literally just voted that we don't need as much hashing?

I'd like to see the 20% of our block reward carved out for governance/treasury. With the MNO plan, every penny from that 20% will be either used to fund a proposal, or to incentivize better quality voting (in the form of MN rewards from unallocated treasury).

In reviewing the risk assessments from both plans, I believe that the risks associated with both plans are low and I have confidence that either one could be activated successfully.

Thanks again to @Rion, @hilawe, Ryan Taylor and the DCG team for agreeing to work with the Trust Protectors so we can have both of these options available to choose (along with the status quo).
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1 point,3 years ago
I will be forced to vote down both DCG Plan & the MNO plan, as they both allow for extending our budget to 20%.
Extending the budget from 10% to anything higher, is a big NO for me.

My personal opinion :

More then 10% budget --> More selling of Dash on the market by those projects that receive Dash funding --> More Sell Pressure & Reduced Dash Store of Value (by making masternodes less attractive to invest in). It directly undermines our whole blockreward allocation change.

Also there are large masternode-owning entities active on our network, i don't think it is wise to give them influence not only over budget proposals but over masternode blockrewards as well, specially if they can influence it negatively (making the masternode rewards lower by -10%).
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1 point,3 years ago
If the MNOs continue to fund 10%, then nothing changes. If they fund less, the MNOs (and miners in Ryan's plan) would earn more rewards than they do now. Conversely, If they fund more than 10%, then there is less rewards.

The benefits of this plan won't become apparent IMHO until the price of Dash moves. If Dash is $30 we might need that extra funding to survive. If Dash goes to $1,000, then we can maybe spend only 5% of the block rewards and distribute the other 5% as rewards to the network.
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1 point,3 years ago
I understand your perspective here. For you, and anyone who is against raising the limit to 20%, voting down both proposals right now might not be your best strategy.

If your goal is to have less DASH going to POs, you might be better off choosing the option that makes it less likely for MNOs to fund proposals, which is the MNO Plan.
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-2 points,3 years ago
Yes
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-8 points,3 years ago
I’m loving these copypasta proposals! Basically a copy of the main innovation from the Kuva proposal but wow, it’s waaaay improved!

Now MN’s can claw back 20% of the superblock and can allocate the funds to themselves if they don’t like what they see, aaaaaand - DCG will basically get twice the funding available to themselves - two birds with one stone, incredible!

Yep, instead of Kuva this time, it’s DCG doing the bribing because they actually need twice the funds they’re currently getting to continue to operate. This is because the ineffectual Ryan Taylor has created such an inefficient mess of DCG the price has tanked (and continues to tank) and Neverlution is an insipid version of the innovation that was expected by all of us who invested in Dash. Hang on MNO’s! Keep voting in our salaries, while staring at Neverlution - an innovation that is way behind in its market relevance. But let’s pay you all a REAL bribe to shut your collective mouths!

That said, vote YES to something that is at least a spanner in the works and gets MNO’s to think about where they put their money - towards garbage proposals, towards something investable or directly in their pockets.

And YES take the extra 20% ‘bribe’ - its double what Kuva could have offered you last month, and actually the first time DCG is giving you something of value to put directly in your pockets! Forget the ‘ethics’ and all that other nonsense you were bleating about last month with Kuva, and take the bribe! Code is law.

You cannot make this stuff up, I love it! Peace and love to you all!

Thanks,
Drako
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2 points,3 years ago
Parasite!
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-2 points,3 years ago
I’m glad I got you
thinking @bigrcanada.

You can thank me later for the lesson.

Drako
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