Charge a fee to list assets

[ghost]

This is a Bisq Network proposal. Please familiarize yourself with the submission and review process.

This proposal writing was suggested by @manfredkarrer after a short exchange on slack.

Proposal for listing fee policy - step 1 (general)

Listing fee policy is imo important for Bisq. Up to now, free listing has been the rule, see https://docs.bisq.network/exchange/howto/list-asset.html

Bisq has more than 130 altcoins listed (https://bisq.network/faq/#altcoins), which costs Bisq BSQ, dev time, promotion time (and reputation). (Actually, Bisq does promotion for altcoins ... while altcoins do quite few promotion for Bisq).

If we look at the statistics on several months (see https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1o-I5fAx7DJRVqYjW8fPbo0ztlGIhIZ1EM2iLc5aEHnA/edit#gid=1000435171) there are less than 10 altcoins having effective trades. And ~80 altcoins having day after day simply absolutely no offers at all.

Not only does this lead nowhere, but it doesn't help conveying the image of a dynamic market place. (For a (too) big part of the listing, it looks more like a kind of an altcoin cemetery. Imo it has a negative reputation effect.)

Considering this situation, this proposal has as object to change the current listing fee policy.

The proposal as a whole, if we accept the proposed directions, will need to go into technical details. However, I don't want to mix general direction with technical details and numbers, so I proceed here with a first simple an general proposal.

If there is no consensus for the general direction, no need to propose technical details.

So here are the first suggestions :

1/ I suggest that Bisq continues to apply a "no politics" rule for listing altcoins. Listing/unlisting should be only a matter of numbers. This means also that the same rule should apply for all altcoins.

2/ End free listing : By asking nothing in order to be listed, we encourage numerous altcoins communities to just do the listing job ... and absolutely nothing after this point. Listing process ended, there is no incitative for the altcoin promoter to do anything on Bisq. By asking some fees, maybe even very small, we could stop this "list me and see me never again" attitude. Asking some fees should help the concerned altcoin community to think about doing something on Bisq in order to help to generate trades. And this will be positive for everybody. Listing may still continue to be free for a limited time, under certain conditions. But free listing forever policy will end.

If there is consensus about those simple general lines, I can deepen things in a next proposal. The goal being however to have a proposal having in mind to do things as smoothly as possible and avoid also massive and/or brutal unlisting.

[ManfredKarrer]

Here a quick input from my side:

• Listing should have a fee as it creates some costs (reviewing, merging)
• We are getting too many coins listed - most of them are never traded or have very low volume
• We have already the policy that if a coin is not traded that it gets removed (https://docs.bisq.network/exchange/howto/list-asset.html#inactive-assets-will-be-de-listed)
• We have also the policy that a controversial coin can be requested by DAO voting to get removed (https://docs.bisq.network/exchange/howto/list-asset.html#controversial-assets-may-be-put-to-a-vote)
• We don't want to add more dev effort to deal with the management of coins, specially we don't want anything that coin communities start to make advertising at our channels to get listed.
• With the DAO we will have several options (BSQ fee for listing, automatic checks for trade volume and if not reached certain threshold it gets delisted, if delisted it can get listed again by paying a fee,...). But as said we don't want to invest too much dev effort into that area.
• We could use the Bisq donation address for paying a listing fee.
• There might be legal implications, which should be thought out well.
• Another option might be an auction: We add 3 coins each release. Best offer will be taken.

All those points are more brainstorming points and nothing is decided yet. But current state is not satisfying, so some action is required....

[sqrrm]

I support the general direction of at least requiring that the coins getting listed pay something. At a minimum for the effort it requires from devs in terms of reviews and such. That could typically be a good starting point to see what more could be done in the future, but to keep it simple and low effort to begin with better just have a very simple requirement.

@ManfredKarrer some of those points are great but as you say, let's not make it too complicated and waste effort on it until we start with a simple requirement of covering costs.

[Bitc2org]

If you charged any significant listing fee, you'd almost stop getting new coin listing requests due to how difficult it is for most people to trade a buried alt-coin on Bisq compared to centralized exchanges. At the moment most of your users are really good with computers and/or privacy oriented.

It is doubtful that devs list here just for the heck of it. They would most likely let their community know when they get listed at Bisq, thus letting new people know about Bisq too. As things are, any new altcoin listings get buried in the app anyway, causing very little nuisance to people who aren't interested in it and the user needs to specifically add it to the list of displayed crypto currencies.

You could require that a link to Bisq is displayed prominently on the project's website and possible other social channels. Also if Bisq gets listed at the Markets section of a coin in sites like coinmarketcap, that drives some extra traffic to Bisq.

[ManfredKarrer]

Many altcoiners listing at Bisq never used Bisq as it is visible from some of their questions or comments (they often think we integrate their wallets and update us about forks or whatever, so they are not aware that the altcoin transfer is out of system in Bisq). So if even those who ask for the listing and doing the PR often don't even read about how Bisq works, beside that they never do any trade, I doubt that we get any community support from them in most cases. The synergies are very limited and can also be negative as many of the coins have not a solid reputation to say the least, thus bringing Bisq in the relation to them will add probably more negative value then positive. But anyway I don't want to interpret too much as I also don't know much about 99% of the coins. Fact is from trade statistics that >90% are nearly never traded and they cause some effort.

[AvanteVandaleur]

One of the many beauties of Bisq is that it has a beat on the free market ground like no one else. Charging a fee to list won't solve the problem....I'd imagine it would only spawn another set of greater problems. As the great philosopher Notorious B.I.G, said, "more money, more problems."

Its understandable to look first to fees/money for the solution. I suppose its all about what your end goal is. If its only to be a top 20 Coinmarketcap fill up station, then that...sounds perfect. ( currently only 45% )

It sounds like to me that the problem is more a lack of volume on the Bisq platform. Notice that it is a platform wide issue. Not just the unpopular altcoins. I agree it can be a nuisance to see listed coins that have not even a single sell order...much less a buy.

So...one quick & easy vetting sweep for unknown altcoins applying to Bisq would be:

Are they listed on another Centralized exchange?

If they are, you can forget about traders choosing inconvenience over convenience. Even if it means holding their own keys and protecting their wealth like Bisq enthusiasts understand. Unless its users already understand and practice these principles. For LESSER KNOWN altcoins, those based from Monero/CryptoNote would have a higher probability of its users already understanding this - and thus valuing BISQ for its strengths. Just sayin.

The other thing I would say for new altcoins would be remove them quicker. Place higher & tighter trade volume requirements on them. Rather than "more than none" - set a minimum. Give em 30-40 days to hit it, if not pull the plug, and move on. Stay fresh.

There are WAY too many smart people behind and using BISQ to just think charging a fee will solve this issue. And I do hope BISQ continues to find intelligent solutions to the issues that arise. -AV

[cbeams]

I am for the proposal except where noted below and have reacted to the description accordingly. There are only two reactions there so far. Please add yours if you haven't.

Specifically, I would like to see the following minimal set of changes happen first. I believe nothing more complicated than this is necessary for a start, and we don't need a 'second proposal' to 'get into technical details'.

1. Purge all un-traded assets per existing documented policy, and do it in the forthcoming v0.7.2 release.
2. Update the asset listing documentation to indicate that there is 1 BTC listing fee. Instruct the user to pay the fee at PR submission time and to include a the ID in a Listing fee transaction ID entry of the PR description.
3. Indicate that the fee is non-refundable.
4. Retroactively apply this policy to all current open asset listing PRs. i.e. add a comment to each PR letting the submitter know that if they get their fee paid before Aug X, their asset will make it into v0.7.2. And that if not, it can make the next release.

Note that I differ from the concerns of the proposal as written in the description above, in that for me, this has nothing to do with getting more engagement from asset promoters. I see plenty of promotion every day with asset teams mentioning Bisq on Twitter to let everyone in their circle know their asset is now listed. There is plenty of promotion going on out there, and even if there weren't, it wouldn't be a problem that needs fixing from my perspective. Bisq maintains a policy that anyone can list a coin if you follow certain instructions. What you do with that listing is on you afterward. Note also that we (Bisq) do not promote the assets we list other than mentioning them in release notes, and again, I wouldn't want to do anything more than this. As Manfred mentioned above, every asset we list is reputational damage waiting to happen. That's why we maintain total neutrality and don't 'promote' in any way. We officially have no interest in one coin over another. An notable exception to this is when a given asset is doing a lot of volume on the exchange. We do often mention this (and it's almost always / only XMR), because it is of broad interest to users, always gets positive engagement and is unlikely to incur the kind of reputational damage I'm talking about.

In the interest of executing this change quickly to align with the v0.7.2 release, please weigh in as to whether you're aligned with the minimal set of changes proposed above, and please consider volunteering to carry out the changes yourself. Thank you. (note: I believe @ManfredKarrer will need to do the purging step himself in any case).

[cbeams]

@BTC2CoreDevs wrote:

If you charged any significant listing fee, you'd almost stop getting new coin listing requests

That's the idea. Charging a nominal fee (1 BTC is nothing compared to what centralized exchanges charge) is fundamentally an anti-spam measure to keep low-value / unserious assets out. If we keep getting dozens of time-wasting asset listing requests after this, we would likely raise the fee.

The asset projects out there that are really serious will blow past a 1 BTC, 2 or 10 BTC fee if they think it's worth having a presence on Bisq. I'm interested in deterring those asset projects who are simply taking advantage of Bisq and Bisq dev time as cost-free resources. It's our job to arrange incentives correctly to avoid this sort of thing, and charging nothing for asset listing has clearly not been the correct arrangement. Thus time for a change.

[blabno]

I like the rule of delisting if volume is not met. Together with some listing fee it would encourage asset team to provide liquidity.

[ghost]

In answer to @cbeams.

1. I may be wrong, but I heard that Manfred targeted v0.7.2 released for this monday august 20th. (Has it changed ?) ... if this is the case, this will let today + tomorrow for open PR submitters to read the comment in their asset PR (... if they do it) and to react. This is very short notice (and maybe a bit rude). Maybe it will be more diplomatic not to appear to put them back to the wall and simply tell them that their PR will not be treated for v0.7.2 (too late), and also that rules have changed.

2. Due also to the v0.7.2 release being due very shortly, some contributors/small+big stakeholders being probably quite busy, have even not told their opinions about this proposal. I'm not even sure they know this proposal is running. Can something be decided so fast without their opinion/vote being known ?

3. What is '1 BTC listing fee' ? it's 1 BTC forever, for one release, for 2018, for one year ?

4. ok for mentionning the fees are not refundable. But maybe the fees should also be, for a period of time, and modifiable (for the next period)

5. as @manfredkarrer mentionned

   There might be legal implications, which should be thought out well.

Have we fully taken the possible legal implications in consideration ? (If yes, fine).

5. Which BTC address will be used ? the donation address as suggested by Manfred ? Or better not to mix donations and charges ?

6. I will browse thru the asset list to point which assets have not been traded in the past 4 months. And pass the list to @manfredkarrer .If it's not necessary please tell me. (I didn't make the count yet, but there will be probably some altcoins with trades in the past 4 months, but although not profitable for Bisq.)

7. I had in mind that of course we may charge BTCs, but maybe we could also propose alternatives means.

I submitted this proposal on august 14th, after a 5 lines discussion with Manfred on slack on august 11th. In my mind I didn't imagine we would apply it for v0.7.2 which was targeted for mid-en august.

I fully agree that there is a need to change the actual listing fee policy, but imo we should take the time necessary for that. Listing fee policy was unchanged for months/years, if it takes us some days now, this wouldn't hurt.

[rex4539]

I am absolutely not in favor of listing fees.

These are tactics of centralized platforms.

[cadayton]

I would say assets not producing a trading volume on Bisq after X amount of time be candidates for a listing fee. It would seem reasonable to factor in trading volume from other markets before delisting an asset on Bisq too. I think the trading volume is greatly influenced by the quality of the the offers being made. There were some altcoins I wanted to trade for on Bisq but the offers were so ridicious there was no way I was going to take the offer.

[cbeams]

I may be wrong, but I heard that Manfred targeted v0.7.2 released for this monday august 20th. (Has it changed ?)

Introducing a listing fee is something Manfred and Christoph and I discussed and basically agreed on a week or two ago. It's helpful that you added this proposal, but we planned to do it in any case. @ManfredKarrer, I leave it to you whether 0.7.2 is too tight a timeline. Again, it's going to be you doing the purging of untraded coins, so it's mostly your time here.

... if this is the case, this will let today + tomorrow for open PR submitters to read the comment in their asset PR (... if they do it) and to react. This is very short notice (and maybe a bit rude).

The worst case scenario is that existing PRs don't get listed until v0.7.3. We have dozens of requests coming in now, and we want to do something about this as soon as possible.

Maybe it will be more diplomatic not to appear to put them back to the wall and simply tell them that their PR will not be treated for v0.7.2 (too late), and also that rules have changed.

I'm sure it would, but it's also all more work for us to merge them, add them to release notes, etc.

Due also to the v0.7.2 release being due very shortly, some contributors/small+big stakeholders being probably quite busy, have even not told their opinions about this proposal. I'm not even sure they know this proposal is running. Can something be decided so fast without their opinion/vote being known ?

The major stakeholders are agreed on this change. I understand this seems abrupt, but there's not a lot of sense in waiting otherwise, unless it's just too much a hassle for us to get this in for 0.7.2.

What is '1 BTC listing fee' ? it's 1 BTC forever, for one release, for 2018, for one year ?

One-time fee. Has to be repaid if you get de-listed due to inactivity.

ok for mentionning the fees are not refundable. But maybe the fees should also be, for a period of time, and modifiable (for the next period)

Acknowledged. No change from my side on this.

as @ManfredKarrer mentionned

There might be legal implications, which should be thought out well.

Have we fully taken the possible legal implications in consideration ? (If yes, fine).

Which BTC address will be used ? the donation address as suggested by Manfred ? Or better not to mix donations and charges ?

Probably a good idea to to use a different address, @ManfredKarrer I leave that to you. On the legal front, none of us are lawyers, and we're not going to hire any for this decision. It's just a requirement for getting listed. Follow the instructions to create a correct PR, list your block explorer, send 1 BTC to this address. If we're paranoid about it, then don't ever spend the bitcoin until somebody talks to a lawyer. None of us plan to spend it on anything any time soon anyway. This is just to reduce spam and workload.

I will browse thru the asset list to point which assets have not been traded in the past 4 months. And pass the list to @ManfredKarrer .If it's not necessary please tell me. (I didn't make the count yet, but there will be probably some altcoins with trades in the past 4 months, but although not profitable for Bisq.)

Again, I think this will be on Manfred. He's the one that's purged un-traded assets before, probably makes the most sense to do it again.

I had in mind that of course we may charge BTCs, but maybe we could also propose alternatives means.

There are no other means, e.g. fiat bank account.

I submitted this proposal on august 14th, after a 5 lines discussion with Manfred on slack on august 11th. In my mind I didn't imagine we would apply it for v0.7.2 which was targeted for mid-en august.

I fully agree that there is a need to change the actual listing fee policy, but imo we should take the time necessary for that. Listing fee policy was unchanged for months/years, if it takes us some days now, this wouldn't hurt.

Yeah, again, it's all a bit of a coincidence. We had discussed this at some length more than a week before, and debated whether to do a proposal at all because we were already pretty clear about it.

@ManfredKarrer, with all the above said, please just nix this if you don't want to do it for v0.7.2. I'm in "just get it done mode", but it's mostly an ask on your time to actually execute it. If we wait, we wait, and that's fine with me too.

[ghost]

Ok. Thanks for the above precisions. If there is help needed for the list of unlisted (ah ah), peek me.

I did some rapid counting in the #analytics slack channel. If I'm not wrong and we apply strictly "the 4 months without trades" rules, (which we very probably haven't done for several consecutives previous releases), this will unlisten ~120 altcoins among the actual 130 listed. The list of altcoins to keep is much faster and easier to do then the complementary. (For august : DAC_BTC, ZOC_BTC, BCHC_BTC, ZEN_BTC, LTC_BTC, BCH_BTC, ETH_BTC, XMR_BTC)

Abrupt moves have sometimes unintended consequences. I personnaly advocate to do things smoothly, for example by taking into account if there were at least offers. If we scalp the 30 worst performers this time, this would be a significative first step and signal. Next release, we could scalp another bunch of bad performers. In 3 months, we have already a more serious list. But of course the vote of the stakeholders majority is the decision.

[ghost]

https://deadcoins.com/ lists ~900 deceased altcoins. Some of our listed altcoins are on this RIP list. We can await a long time before 1st trade.

[blur-network]

If I may, I would like to weigh in on only the portion of this debate that affects Blur Network and the other currently proposed PRs that are in Limbo, at present i Specifically with reference to applying a retroactive 1BTC fee, in the manner @cbeams has suggested:

Retroactively apply this policy to all current open asset listing PRs. i.e. add a comment to each PR letting the submitter know that if they get their fee paid before Aug X, their asset will make it into v0.7.2. And that if not, it can make the next release.

This seems to very partial to Conceal $CCX. While somewhat understandable due to the thorough nature of their PR... to leave approved ones "Open" and then charge 1 BTC, does seem very odd. I would ask, in fairness, if a 1 BTC fee is to be applied retroactively... That those parties required to pay the fee, should include all assets who have submitted PRs since the last release 0.7.1.

The specification of "open PRs" is troublesome. Especially if one looks at the fact that the only non-paying party, in the last 1.5 months, would include CCX. How would this apply to BLUR, as an asset? A simple unwillingness to merge the final PR, when 2/3 PRs have been merged for listing of BLUR (see: bisq-network/bisq-desktop/pull/1617 and bisq-network/bisq-core/pull/142) seems a poor reason to be required to pay such a fee.

@ManfredKarrer noted that conventions were followed, and the only PR remaining is bisq-network/bisq-assets/pull/58. Such practices will cause many projects, Blur included, to wonder why there is a single man acting as the gatekeeper on a Decentralized Exchange... that is now charging a 1 BTC fee in a way that so clearly favors a single party.

[ManfredKarrer]

@blur-network There is not a single gatekeeper that's why we discuss it here, but fact is that most work is done by a relative small group of people and following our principle of meritocracy they have a higher weight in making decisions. Anyone welcome to join the forces. Lots of work waiting for helping hands... Talk is easy, work is hard...

I understand that your case might require extra treatment if we have already merged the other 2 PRs. An open question just our of curiosity: Are there other exchanges where BLUR is listed? If so what will you do to bring volume to Bisq to make BLUR different to the 120 of 130 altcoins which never have been traded in the last 4 months? I don't know BLUR so please apologize if I compare you with any other altcoins, I know that not all are the same, but unfortunately 90% seem to bring zero value (or at least zero volume) to Bisq and we don't have time to invest time to validate a given coin - too many out there.

@cbeams I would prefer to not rush it into that release as it is just not such an important issue IMO. We can leave the pending PRs for the next release (or until we have a clear decision) and then write down the new rules and get to some wider consensus what exactly we will apply. I personally would prefer if we postpone it to the DAO release and the payment will be done by burning BSQ, I think that has lower legal risks and it will give more time to prepare, and it would be done anyway once the DAO is out. My current preferred model would be: There is a fee of x BSQ to be burned before a PR gets reviewed. There is no guarantee that if review does not pass that the coin will get listed. Review has max. 2 back and forth cycles. If people are not able to follow very clear instructions they have to hire a better developer for doing the listing. The fee is for reviewing a coin and if it passes the review to get listed and to stay listed for 4 months. After that 4 months the coin will get removed automatically in the application by checking trade volume. Which metric we use here is open for discussion. I would suggest we require 10 BTC in trade volume.

People have to understand that relations are not one sided and if they are they should not be surprised if those relations are considered worthless and get terminated. It was always a part in the initial listing policy that synergistic effects should be triggered, so that the coins bring new users and volume as well to spread the word about Bisq. We did not had time to verify that assumptions due lack of time so we only applied a cleaning once at the latest big update at v0.5 where not traded coins got removed. But to look back of 2 years experience I think it is valid to say that > 90% of the altcoins did never match our initial listing criteria.

To not add extra work load to @cbeams as maintainer, I would suggest we just make a freeze until we have a clear decision. So no reviews from @blabno and merges (exceptions might happen if they are well reasoned).

[blur-network]

Please don't misunderstand my tone... I do genuinely feel as though all of your maintainers are doing something with Bisq that is very unique and impressive. I really appreciate the work that has been put into what I think is something of a revolutionary idea. Your documentation is second-to-none in the exchange space, in particular. I remain thoroughly impressed with the ability of your group to work together with structure and efficient discussion.

That said, the point of my post was not to throw a dagger -- please allow me to apologize if it came off a bit too abrasively. I do understand the meritocracy inherent in these things, and I'm in no position to argue with your decisions, ultimately. That is why I chose to speak to only the area that affects BLUR, directly. I do not feel as though I am in a place to speak elsewhere.

First, to answer your questions @ManfredKarrer :

Are there other exchanges where BLUR is listed? If so what will you do to bring volume to Bisq to make BLUR different to the 120 of 130 altcoins which never have been traded in the last 4 months? I don't know BLUR so please apologize if I compare you with any other altcoins, I know that not all are the same, but unfortunately 90% seem to bring zero value (or at least zero volume) to Bisq and we don't have time to invest time to validate a given coin - too many out there

BLUR is currently being traded only on MapleChange (CCX is also listed here), apart from the PRs to Bisq. To that point, our Discord server has had open dialogues about Bisq's proposed changes from this thread, the platform in general, and members of our community have been educating others on how to use Bisq. While our community is only about 2 months old ... it is growing quickly, and actively seeking to educate others. All while doing our best to lower the barriers to entry in the Crypto space for both mining and trading.

Blur Network runs on a dynamic algorithm called Cryptonight-Adaptive, created by the NERVA Project. The algo changes every block, with the goal of making GPUs/ASICs too resource-intensive to be worthwhile. BLUR is CPU-mined, with each miner hashing on a full node. Mining rigs won't work on our network, nor traditional stratified pool mining software, without a fair amount of modifications. The goal is to enable anyone with a laptop or PC to generate a significant ability to mine blocks ... not just high-end or specialized hardware owners. I believe our mission is very much in line with Bisq's. We are aiming to be accessible, but require a rudimentary amount of technical knowledge.

To return to my initial purpose in joining this discussion: Being that the same conventions were followed as those merged into master, for CCX listing... I do not see the fairness in a retroactive fee for BLUR. We have done our best to make the review easy for your maintainers. Reissued the changes after the most recent commit (CCX listing) as per @cbeams request in another thread (though I can't recall where to find it) regarding the issue of spending too much time reviewing coins. It was mentioned as necessary for developers to ensure that the only piece of the workload to be completed, is the merge by Bisq maintainers. Otherwise, the agreement was to ignore the requests. I do recognize that your plates are very full -- that is why we have followed instructions, as precisely as possible.

[ManfredKarrer]

@blur-network Thanks for your response. Let us a bit more time, we have planned the release tomorrow and I fear we cannot make it to get the open requests merged (Chris who is doing the merge has serious health issues atm). So I think the less friction will be that we try to get the already reviewed coins merged with next release and make a freeze until the DAO is out and we introduce the fees. Just my 5 cents...

[blur-network]

@ManfredKarrer Sure thing. Appreciate you being genuinely interested in what sets us apart. No offence taken at that question, when there are simply so many coins out there. That solution mentioned above, or a similarly fair one, would be something that Blur Network would support with reciprocity. Thanks again.

[ManfredKarrer]

@m52go Maybe we should reference that discussion to the "how to list an asset" doc?

[m52go]

@ManfredKarrer are you suggesting we reference this discussion here?

Perhaps replace this line...

There are no fees involved in this process.

...with something to the effect of "A fee structure for new listings is in the process of being determined. See bisq-network/proposals#35 for details"?

[bitcoinx2]

Instead of hard-coding the coin listings in the source code, would there maybe be a way to evolve Bisq into a distributed protocol where users register their trading pair on the network themselves? That way it would save you guys time having to merge pull requests, and would scale infinitely. I would imagine it like a distributed database (DHT, blockchain, ...) where people associate an ID with the metadata for trading their crypto token and publish it in the network. To trade, other users can do a distributed search to fetch the metadata and do trades with other users. The ID would be freed and removed from the database when there have been no active orders (or trades) for a certain period of time. Coin developers would have to take care for themselves that the associated data is correct and functional, and provide the correct market ID to their users.

A listing fee comes with serious problems for small community projects like the one I am active in, called Wisp. We selected Bisq as our only exchange to be listed on in the future, because it is the only exchange that matches with our vision of decentralization and trustlessness. We are not listed on any other exchange, and we have hardly the funds for paying our own developers, let alone having one "spare" BTC to spend on a Bisq listing. We are all working on it in our spare time. Without being listed on any exchange, there is no way to attract users into the project and build up volume over a period of months.

Such a project depends on being able to join an open network to trade with other users, which I think is what Bisq was originally about. If Bisq was to introduce development fees, I am sure it would be cloned on the long term to build a second network without fees, because some projects simply depend on this possibility.

[ghost]

It seems that a majority of weighted stakeholders voted in favor of changing the listing fee policy. I propose however to let the proposal open 2 or 3 days more. If you're ok, I'll then close the proposal in order to pursue the process and work on a step 2 proposal where I (or anyone) may try to lay down some numbers and pratical decision(s).

[ghost]

Since nobody added comment to the proposal, I now close it as advertized in my previous post. On my side, I'll to pursue the process and work on a step 2 proposal where I will lay down some numbers and pratical decision(s) to vote.

edit : This closing conformes to : https://github.com/bisq-network/roles/issues/30#issuecomment-409284637. Indeed it's just a step which is closed.

[ManfredKarrer]

@bitcoinx2 There is address validation required for any coin, so dynamically loading coins is not enough. Also it would require quite a bit of engineering effort - effort which is not worth it if we see what 99% of the altcoins have added to Bisq (>90% have been never traded, so added value is basically zero). We have a spam and free rider problem here. Listing a coin adds costs / effort / liabilities to Bisq but the costs are very low to the altcoin lister. We tried that path since 2 years now and result is not satisfying. Expectation was that we get some healthy trade volume and promotion from their side and that was basically not the case for the huge majority. There are exceptions but those would probably also not have nay problem to pay a moderate fee.

I understand that there are valid projects like yours (I don't have time to check it out but I assume your intentions are aligned with Bisq's valued). But how should we figure out which 1 in 100 projects is like that without adding a lot of valuation effort (we don't want to get spammed with "why our coins is 100 times better then all the other 1000s altcoins")? If you have any idea/suggestion please let us know. I really would like to support such coins.

[aejontargaryen]

@ManfredKarrer Let the DAO voting mechanism do the work ....as a secondary option to a listing fee. (Just my 2 sats.)

[ManfredKarrer]

@aejontargaryen To vote on coins to be added would lead to the situation that we get spammed by PR from all coins which wants to get listed. That would have the opposite effect as we intend (more work to filter out what is valuable). Though the opposite - to vote to remove a coin (e.g. if it is clear that it is a scam) can be done by voting.

[aejontargaryen]

There is no shortcut to finding quality projects. Thats why the reward it offers is so great. If paying 1 BTC were an actual determining factor of being a serious quality project, then I would have started DRGL over to the very beginning - and removed all heart & soul from it. And for that matter, so should Bisq.

@ManfredKarrer @cbeams @HarryMacfinned @blabno @alexej996 @ripcurlx @m52go @rex4539 @sqrrm @diogorsergio @dsbeasley @Francewhoa @freimair @initCCG @mrosseel @Nolaan @oriolpont @piem

[alexej996]

I personally never saw much use of most altcoins and never cared much about them, but I will have to say that I can imagine this proposal going pretty bad.

I personally think that when it comes to the effort of merging and reviewing altcoins, DAO should have a budget like we might need for other things such as support. Ultimately that would probably look something like the auction idea that Manfred had, but there would be no need for the set number, just for as much as the asked compensation for it seemed reasonable. I think this is the most elegant solution that would be a good way in sorting out all kinds of problems with might have in the future.

I don't see much of a reason for a listing fee policy and sending any BTC to a centrally controlled address seems unsafe to me. If we would really go with something like this and I don't see a real reason to, we could have a sort of BSQ bonding required to stay listed. That would still benefit the DAO in the same way as it would create a significant demand for BSQ, benefits of which would be automatically decentralized. But of course, there is no reason for it if we setup a budget for the efforts of adding these coins.

Only in case of huge demand that people want more altcoins listed then we would be willing to set out a budget for, would it make sense to introduce some kind of a compensation for it and BSQ bonding seems most elegant and effortless to me.

So even though I don't really feel passionate about altcoins and listings of unused altcoins, I would still technically have to disagree with this proposal.

[ghost]

BSQ bonding is indeed one of the alternatives I was thinking on. Among the good points:

• it would of course generate contributions (we feel always we lack)
• and include/involve asset people in Bisq. Which should be mutually beneficial.

Keep in mind that the proposal, as per its first post, is very modest, and proposes only one point : to end free listing. There is atm nothing else on the table about how this could be done. The how or hows will be in the next proposal, and for my part, I think there is perfect room to propose more than one way to pay for altcoin submitters.

[ghost]

In order to pursue, could please the proposal be labelled (not in my attributes I think). Thanks.

[cbeams]

I don’t understand. I don’t think we need a dedicated label for these two proposals to be linked with one another if that’s what you mean. Just paste a link on either issue.

On Sep 7, 2018, at 9:05 AM, Harry MacFinned notifications@github.com wrote:

In order to pursue, could please the proposal be labelled (not in my attributes I think). Thanks.

— You are receiving this because you were mentioned. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub, or mute the thread.

[ghost]

I have seen that quite all closed proposals have a label: approved, rejected, stalled, moved, invalid, etc. So I presumed it's something necessary to pursue (?).

[cbeams]

I see. My preference would be to continue this proposal here in one place, as opposed to creating a second issue as it’s not clear to me that there is a consensus on this proposal and that in any case the particulars of how a listing fee would be implemented are inseparable from merely agreeing that it should be done. Is there some strong reason to close this this and create a second?

On Sep 7, 2018, at 9:39 AM, Harry MacFinned notifications@github.com wrote:

I have seen that quite all closed proposals have a label: approved, rejected, stalled, moved, invalid, etc. So I presumed it's something necessary to pursue (?).

— You are receiving this because you were mentioned. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub, or mute the thread.

[ghost]

1/ My understanding is that there is a weighted majority of stakeholders (>300.000 BSQ) who agree that a change must be done. Which was the basic point of the proposal. There is no 100% agreement, since there is at least one -1 vote. (Is 100% consensus reachable for such a delicate topic ? is it mandatory to go further ?).

2/ The proposal was open for 20 days, so everybody willing to participate could do it.

3/ This thread has already 30 comments and 14 participants. Which is already the max reached by a proposal, and 2 or 3 times the average number of comments than for other proposals.

1/+2/+3/ = strong reason to close. imo it is enough for this basic step.

I'm not sure it's mandatory to have a second proposal. My personal feeling is the subject is a bit delicate, and I would proceed with small steps. And if the steps are really small, maybe simple PRs could do the job (better than proposal which are not meant for small things : https://docs.bisq.network/proposals.html)

For my part, I'll not add a proposal in the proposal, I feel the present discussion is long enough and it would not help to make things understandable. I feel the present proposal must have now a clear labelled status. It's time and it's legitimate.

However, of course, if you @cbeams want to continue in accordance with your will, please of course, just do it. You're co-founder. For me, it's 100% ok so. I don't feel necessary to be assigned to this proposal. I did it at first strictly to help. Btw, I'll be on holidays from monday 10th to monday 17th, so unable to participate. (edit : no more holidays, due to imponderable)

[ManfredKarrer]

We already spent too much time and energy on that area. Lets keep that topic on hold for the moment and delay a decision when we get closer to the DAO launch. To use the DAo for fee/bond is probably the preferred way anyway and we need to find a solution which does not cause lots of effort. Atm there are tons of other important things we need to focus on like the redesign/rebranding, the Java 10 upgrade and the DAO testnet release.

[ghost]

In any case, please know that, from my side, I did continue to work on the question and I have (rather simple) ideas/proposal which I can submit when needed.

[ManfredKarrer]

I just run the trade statistic with the altcoins to see how many are never traded:

Never traded Crypto currencies (only coins added until 0.7.0 since that we added about 40 more, probably most of them also have been never traded): BitCloud (BTDX) BitZeny (ZNY) Bitcoin Core (BTCC) Bitcoin Instant (BTI) Bitcore (BTX) Conceal (CCX) Credits (CRDS) CryptoTari (TARI) DRIP (DRIP) DSTRA (DST) Devcoin (DVC) Diamond (DMD) Exceed (EXC) FuturoCoin (FTO) Graft (GRFT) Kumacoin (KUMA) LikeCoin (LIKE) LitecoinExtreme (LCE) Lobstex (LOBS) MFCoin (MFC) Madbyte (MBYT) Madcoin (MDC) MaxCoin (MAX) MegaCoin (MEC) MicroCoin (MCC) Motion (XMN) Myriadcoin (XMY) NEETCOIN (NEET) Nano (NANO) NewPowerCoin (NPW) Nilu (NILU) Nimiq (NIM) PRiVCY (PRIV) Pix (PIX) PixelPropertyToken (PXL) Tamadcoin (TMC) Triton (TRIT) Wownero (WOW)

All traded Fiat currencies: Euro (EUR): 5167 US Dollar (USD): 3079 British Pound (GBP): 841 Swedish Krona (SEK): 170 Australian Dollar (AUD): 157 Canadian Dollar (CAD): 155 Swiss Franc (CHF): 133 Norwegian Krone (NOK): 92 Brazilian Real (BRL): 31 New Zealand Dollar (NZD): 27 Chinese Yuan (CNY): 15 Costa Rican Colón (CRC): 10 Vanuatu Vatu (VUV): 9 Thai Baht (THB): 6 Israeli New Sheqel (ILS): 5 South African Rand (ZAR): 5 Mexican Peso (MXN): 4 Japanese Yen (JPY): 3 Nigerian Naira (NGN): 2 Bahraini Dinar (BHD): 2 Philippine Peso (PHP): 1 Indian Rupee (INR): 1 Cambodian Riel (KHR): 1 Czech Republic Koruna (CZK): 1 Papua New Guinean Kina (PGK): 1 Polish Zloty (PLN): 1 Hong Kong Dollar (HKD): 1 Russian Rouble (RUB): 1 Chilean Peso (CLP): 1 Omani Rial (OMR): 1

All traded Crypto currencies: Monero (XMR): 1366 Ether (ETH): 316 Bitcoin Cash (BCH): 197 Siacoin (SC): 176 Dash (DASH): 160 Siafund (SF): 98 Litecoin (LTC): 78 Decred (DCR): 49 Gridcoin (GRC): 36 Zcash (ZEC): 19 DeepOnion (ONION): 16 Namecoin (NMC): 16 Ether Classic (ETC): 15 Unobtanium (UNO): 14 Spectrecoin (XSPEC): 12 Mycelium Token (MT): 11 Xuez (XUEZ): 11 Dogecoin (DOGE): 10 Counterparty (XCP): 8 ZenCash (ZEN): 8 Zcoin (XZC): 7 Pied Piper Coin (PPI): 7 Lisk (LSK): 6 PIVX (PIVX): 6 Byte (GBYTE): 6 Nav Coin (NAV): 6 Bitcoin Clashic (BCHC): 5 Pascal Coin (PASC): 5 NuBits (NBT): 5 01coin (ZOC): 4 PostCoin (POST): 4 Burstcoin (BURST): 4 LBRY Credits (LBC): 3 MaidSafeCoin (MAID): 3 Safe FileSystem Coin (SFSC): 3 Obsidian (ODN): 3 Ellaism (ELLA): 2 Aquachain (AQUA): 2 Koto (KOTO): 2 Cryptonodes (CNMC): 2 DACash (DAC): 2 Semux (SEM): 2 ReddCoin (RDD): 2 Internet of People (IOP): 1 Bitcoin Gold (BTG): 1 Mazacoin (MAZA): 1 DarkNet (DNET): 1 Pepe Cash (PEPECASH): 1 Espers (ESP): 1 Sibcoin (SIB): 1 Pranacoin (PNC): 1 Ringo (RIN): 1 Nxt (NXT): 1 Terracoin (TRC): 1 Wavi (WAVI): 1 AchieveCoin (ACH): 1 Creativecoin (CREA): 1 DynamicCoin (DMC): 1 STEEM (STEEM): 1 WorldMobileCoin (WMCC): 1

[ManfredKarrer]

I have tested it locally if a coin was added in a altcoin payment account and the coin gets removed from the Assets resource file it does not cause any issues. The user who has the account can still create an offer but probably nobody would take it. Also the currency list in preferences does not get screwed up if we remove a coin. So I think it is save if we remove those coins added until v 0.7.0 (released May 11), that is more then 4 months back.

@cbeams @blabno What do you think?

[ReidDecentral]

I've been looking through your policies. "How to list an Asset" and I still cannot find a link to request a listing; so I'll go ahead and suggest one on Github. I'm sure you will remove this because it's not the correct way but I've yet to find that way. Anyhow; I'm a fan of your DEX and bet you would find it beneficial to be the first DEX to add Tezos [XTZ]. I've applied to OpenLedger and CryptoBridge but I'd be willing to bet they won't list it until they get a fee. Maybe you require one also; but as I was saying... "Be the First DEX to List Tezos and get some due recognition"... As of Day Seven of the Tezos Mainnet, the following photo is the official list of Exchanges that have added Tezos in the first 7 days [Not one Fee paid and the Tezos Foundation won't Pay a fee]. They are using their funds to give "grants" to places such as Cornell University for Blockchain Research; show the "World of Exchanges and DEX's"it's not ALL about "Money"...

[cbeams]

@ReidDecentral, how to list an asset on Bisq is documented at https://docs.bisq.network/exchange/howto/list-asset.html. Please follow the instructions there.

[cbeams]

@ManfredKarrer and I met via voice on this proposal recently, and agreed that we should revert to the prior status quo of accepting correct asset listing PRs without any fee.

Here's the rationale:

1. On review, it's too contentious and risky to demand an arbitrary BTC-denominated fee. I advocated for this personally, but I admit I was too hasty. There were a good number of complaints about this here, and a few scattered around Twitter, and even amongst the closer team of contributors there was not unanimous agreement about it. Perhaps most importantly, it's just an unnecessary risk to take funds from asset projects that may later be deemed securities or fall under whatever other legal woes. It creates custody issues on our side (who has control of these funds, multisig arrangements, etc.) It's all more centralization and liability in the end.

2. We'll likely have a much more elegant way to deal with this in the future, in which asset listers must burn a specified amount of BSQ, which eliminates the custody issues above, and yet still benefits contributors and stakeholders in a properly decentralized fashion.

3. Simply putting asset listings "on hold" indefinitely or until the solution in (2) above is online is not an acceptable approach either. It'll create (and already has) an endless stream of people asking when asset listings will come back online, or otherwise complaining about the hiatus, generating work for us all the same, but of an even less productive nature.

Thus we come full circle, back to the status quo before this proposal was first floated. We will merge all already-ACKed PRs before the next Bisq release, and we'll work through the current backlog of asset listing PRs as promptly as we can. (@blabno, it'll be most appreciated if you pick back up this effort as you have time).

I'll leave this proposal re-opened for a while to field any additional questions or clarifications or objections.

Thanks, everyone for the effort and feedback you put into this proposal. It's a bit frustrating to have spilled so much ink and spent so much effort on it just to have it all be a no-op, but in the end I'm very glad we worked through this and decided on non-action rather than taking an action we very well may have regretted.

[cbeams]

I've changed the title of this proposal from "Listing fee policy" to "Charge a fee to list assets" to phrase it the language of a specific proposal that can be approved or rejected. I've also changed my vote from 👍to 👎to reflect what I wrote in the comment immediately above.

[Technohacker]

@cbeams I would personally suggest recommending projects to optionally donate some BTC back to Bisq, even if the listing becomes free :)

[sqrrm]

I'm conflicted but @cbeams argument of custody of funds does put me back to not taking a listing fee at this time. I'm still not sure about continue spending time on listing new ones at this point. I have changed my vote on this proposal so by default nothing changes. I agree that it has been good to let the issue get some air and it will surely resurface as soon as BSQ is online.

[krypt0x]

I would like to congratulate the Bisq team for re-open the thread and allowing everybody to participate in this discussion. Personally I have nothing against the possibility of paying fees to get listed if there is consensus' quorum supporting it. I just don't consider fair halting all listings from previous applicants with such a short notice. It feels bad to be hold on uncertain, like in a limbo. A few projects invested time and effort to be complaint with all the necessary listing requirements and had their commits merged before all this controversy. Those coins should be listed for free. In my opinion, before start charging any fees, it would be better to clarify all the new listing terms and do a public announcement with at least a few weeks in advance. I am sure this community will overcome this tough times and succeed. Thank you very much.

[ManfredKarrer]

I close that proposal as it did not find consensus. Thanks for all who participated in the process! The topic will have some follow up proposals like in #41 though.

[aejontargaryen]

Bravo, Bisq. Impressive.

[IttriumCore]

Appreciate this proposal has now been closed, but I wanted to add my 2 cents worth.

First of all, I was a big fan of the Bisq project prior to reading this proposal, and I’m a even bigger fan now! Bisq really exemplifies how all decentralized open source communities should behave and interact. As someone who is currently looking to list on Bisq, I’m not in favour of fees. That said, given the number of coins that get listed which are subsequently never traded, I believe Bisq needs to do something to stop or at least minimize this from occurring.

Imo, Bisq like a large number of exchanges (and a larger number of crypto projects) suffers the dreaded low liquidity curse. Liquidity is the term used to describe the degree to which an asset, such as a cryptocurrency, can be quickly bought or sold in the market without affecting the asset's price.

Rather than charging a ‘listing fee’ per say, a similar much fairer approach, would require coin developers to provide a minimum amount of starting BTC liquidity (or a minimum value of BTC buy orders) to list. Technically speaking, this can’t be considered a fee and potentially mitigates the legal issues outlined above (I’m no lawyer so who knows, if it does)!

Increasing liquidity minimizes negative price volatility, which minimizes investor risk. The project I work on (https://ittrium.io), understands the importance of improving liquidity, and therefore, we’d be happy to pay BTC to improve Ittrium’s liquidity. In fact, that’s exactly our strategy.

I acknowledge, there is nothing stopping the coin developers from simply selling, to get their BTC back, if they did however, at least it would increase Bisq’s trading volume.