Request for Comments on Draft Member Proposal

[allancto]

Benefit to RChain

The purpose of our Cooperative is to cause the creation of the RChain Platform and provide for its governance. A healthy and well functioning bounty system provides a model for governance within our Cooperative. A healthy and well functioning RChain Cooperative will serve as a model for blockchain governance.

Description

As of today the Bounty program lacks a proper mandate and budget from our membership. The attached proposal to our membership addresses that. The member proposal, or “IOB”, is intended to be submitted for consideration in the October 24 elections. I am requesting your feedback and comments both here as issue comments and in the draft as suggestions, as new and longstanding contributors familiar with our history and our current processes and operation, and a stake in our future.

The bounty system has been championed since the creation of our Cooperative, by many in our community, including @lapin7. My view which I hope many of you already share, is simple. Our bounty system is the beating heart of our Cooperative, the place where we are developing the technology and culture of blockchain governance, the place where voting systems, cooperation at scale, voted budgeting, all come together.

What is the purpose of our Cooperative? To provide governance for the RChain platform. What is the purpose of our bounty system? Testnet for governance. We need broad and continued participation and broad and stable support. I will propose a member mandated budget 6 times higher than the “Marketing” budget used to cover the bounty system last year. I will propose the Bounty system be split into two collaborating and competing systems, with similar but not identical charters, with significant areas of collaboration and significant areas of competition. As we have both Reflective Venture Partners and Pithia both driving investment in dApps, as we have both the RChain Official Blog and the RChain Unofficial Blog seeding media with RChain oriented content, we will have two contributor systems attracting talented members to support the work of our Cooperative. Why do we need redundancy, overlap, competition? Exactly because each of these areas are THAT IMPORTANT.

The Bounty system we already have, the system we have rebooted to become more focused, more directed, more connected with the community at large, will be provisionally funded at 3 million usd for the coming year. The new RContributors system will be able to take on bold projects, some of which may be controversial within the community, all of which will have budgets voted in a weighted voting system open to all members. It will be provisionally funded at 3 million rhoc for the coming year.

As I describe the nuanced differences between Bounty and RContributors please keep one thing in mind: these differences are differences of style. Yes, the differences will allow for cooperation and collaboration in many areas. But these systems will also overlap and compete in many areas. As I’ve pointed out in arguing for the Official and Unofficial blogs, competition exists by design. Planned economies work. Free economies work better. Monopoly works. Competition works better.

I will continue posting github issues, some potentially more suited to Bounty and some to RContributors. These may serve to highlight some differences in approach and style between the two systems.

Here are some of the nuanced differences: Bounty works on clearly defined Cooperative needs and objectives, RContributors includes bold speculation. Bounty budgets are voted by a trusted set of voters, RContributor votes will be open to all members (with higher weights for highly respected and experienced “elders” within the RChain community). Bounty rewards are denominated in usd, RContributor rewards are denominated in rhoc (potentially with “lockups”). Bounty contributors may have clearer and more “bite sized” goals. RContributors may require higher levels of engagement.

The draft proposal is here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/10sIdcl5N5CWSbQPHi4NUmwVNkpxYTHBJTryonV1waug/edit?usp=sharing

Budget

Suggested Reward for Task: $[5000] This is the suggested reward I request for my time, commitment and effort in developing this proposal. My time and skills are intended to be contributed, not donated. Please vote in line with the suggested reward; a bit more if you think I have done do an outstanding job, a bit less if you think I have done low quality work or selected a not very useful issue. Please reserve votes of $0 to indicate if you find my work to be dishonest or explicitly harmful or dangerous to our Cooperative (and if you do please comment that). Please be aware our trusmetric voting system is currently still in “reboot” mode and your vote may not carry explicit weight, but it will certainly provide guidance. Estimated Timeline Required to Complete the Task: [Oct 7 submission deadline] How will we measure completion? [submitted]

Legal

Task Submitter shall not submit Tasks that will involve RHOC being transacted in any manner that (i) jeopardizes RHOC’s status as a software access token or other relevant and applicable description of the RHOC as an “asset”—not a security— or (2) violates, in any manner, applicable U.S. Securities laws.

[allancto]

I’m especially and explicitly requesting comment by longstanding, respected, full time members within our community including (but not limited to) @lapin7 , @leithaus, @kennyrowe, @ian-bloom, @MParlikar, @dckc, @Jake-Gillberg, @jimscarver, @GregH, @mrinalmanohar , @llerner , @Navneet, @pyrocto, and our many many other members who have made committed, significant, full time contributions within our bounty system and within the RChain Community.

[ddayan]

Hi Allan, this issue needs sponsorship. I'm not sure which RChain entity would want to sponsor it so maybe it could be sponsored by community members. (I'm adding the discussion label until we get a clear idea of who will sponsor it).

[ysgjay]

I don't believe there should be a budget for time spent writing an IoB. Accepting a bounty for this would encourage anyone to create proposals for the sake of the bounty, regardless of legitimacy.

[allancto]

@ysgjay so you're expecting me to donate the month I spent working for you and our Cooperative? Are you a socialist? Why am i working for you without reward?

@ysgjay you speak of the tragedy of the commons. Stealing peoples time because it's a "common" and not a metered resource, is the tragedy of the commons. You do an honest job for our Cooperative and you're rewarded for it, just not by vote. I do an honest job for our Cooperative and I expect to be rewarded for that. Stop freeloading.

Thanks! -@allancto

[luigidemeo]

You should not get paid to write a proposal. Who will pay for it? Can we honestly say the coop can afford to pay people for proposals, will that idea scale? There are many people working on IOBs, @barneycinnamon submitted many, who do not get paid for simply submitting a proposal. @ysgjay @ddayan and myself have been working on others devoting over 10 hours a week with no expectation of pay. When you are looking to get hired as a contractor and you bid on a job, do you charge people for the time to propose a bid? @allancto I am the one who spoke of tragedy of the commons. Nobody is stealing your time, you chose to spend it working on a proposal. Tragedy of the commons refers to the depletion of a resource when individuals are focused on their own self-interest rather than the greater good - this is exactly what the bounty system encouraged.

As discussed, this issue will require sponsorship.

Thanks

[ysgjay]

@allancto the reward of your IoB being voted on and approved should be enough. If this 5k budget for proposals goes through, what is stopping anyone else in the coop from issuing 5 separate proposals and lock in some easy RHOC?

[allancto]

Thanks @luigidemeo . In fact I do think your activities should be supported. Will you publish your proposals here? I'd certainly like to see them. You're honest, you're smart, I think the work you do is valuable to our Cooperative. I disagree that good work isn't scalable, quite the opposite, good work creates value, value creates economic benefit. More good work will grow our ecosystem, less will put us at risk. Having said that, I agree that within this system, which I support, if there is no sponsorship for this issue it will not be budgeted.

@luigidemeo I'd like to get back to requesting feedback on this draft member proposal. Would you agree to interpret your comment above as applying directly to the proposal, perhaps something like this?

The proposal for a member voted budget for the bounty system is unnecessary, because budgets will already be sponsored by the departments which see direct benefit from their successful completion.

The proposal for an RContributors system is unnecessary and not scalable. Coalitions of members will form and deplete the budget while at the same time producing no value for our Cooperative.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/10sIdcl5N5CWSbQPHi4NUmwVNkpxYTHBJTryonV1waug/edit?usp=sharing

[allancto]

@ysjay: If this 5k budget for proposals goes through, what is stopping anyone else in the coop from issuing 5 separate proposals and lock in some easy RHOC?

@ysgjay this is a great question. My answer is that "democracy" is hard but works. It's the job of an informed electorate to distinguish between work which supports RChain and work which does not. Are we up to the level of being able to vote budgets wisely? My answer is absolutely, yes.

@ddayan, you mentioned "community sponsorship", can you elaborate a bit?

[allancto]

@luigidemeo when I say you, @ddayan, @ysgjay, @barneycinnamon have done work for our Cooperative that is deserving of support within a system like Bounty or RContributors, I'm not just trying to get into your good graces, I'm absolutely serious.

@ddayan started a project on competitive analysis of RChain among blockchain projects. This didn't get much traction, imo mostly because it just wasn't funded adequately to get past the phase of initial discussions and into the phase of productive analysis.

@ysgjay started a server on monetary policy. In my opinion this is a huge area of vital importance to our Cooperative and has never gotten properly budgeted or adequately studied. If as GregM says, we should be planning for success and not failure, monetary policy is crucial for stabilizing market fluctuations in rhoc valuation and in realizing my statement above that we need more contributions not fewer, we need more activity and growth in the rhoc economy not less. I believe we need to build the kind of data analysis tools used by the Fed/ ECB/ PBoC. I believe we need budgets that are stable and significant enough to hire real economists, professionals who have worked at PBoC and understand how to fund economies at growth rates of 8% like China has been able to support, and growth rates likely much higher if I'm correct about the future of RChain.

@barneycinnamon started a project here last spring, which was "shot down", concerning ethics and disclosure of interests and potential conflicts of interest. Had we had the ability to support that issue then, would we be better off today? Absolutely. I happen to have my own personal views on what do and don't constitute actual conflict of interest and what disclosures should and should not be required. But it's clear to me that having the financial resources to vote support for that and other discussions would have been then and will be in the future of great benefit to our Cooperative.

[luigidemeo]

@allancto sorry i am not following what the question is.

[allancto]

@luigidemeo the question is this proposal. As a member familiar with our bounty system and the workings of our Cooperative, your opinion will be informed and well considered.

If the membership is allowed to vote on this proposal, would ratifying it benefit or harm our Cooperative? Does the proposal need correction or refinement? Are there aspects that haven't been well thought out or could be articulated better? If you're in favor of the proposal, what would you recommend be done to encourage our Board actually submit it for vote by our Membership? I'm arguing strongly for support, trying to address reservations you or others may have, hoping to convince you that this is an important and beneficial proposal.

[dckc]

My first reaction was: I'm not aware of any critical mass of the coop that's likely to sponsor any one person to the tune of $5K to compose an item of business, so I should let @allancto that the TAC is unlikely to approve this. But the annual meeting is pretty important, and it's not implausible that the coop would get a lot of benefit from effective proposals.

I don't like the proposal. I'm willing to reserve judgement on a competitive structure, but if I thought the RContributors process was a substantial improvement on the bounty system, I would be putting my time into it already.

But have something of a conflict of interest: this is a proposal to compete with the job that I'm doing the best way I know how. So I'm standing by to see what level of support emerges.

@allancto as to where to look for mandate / sponsorship, the #items-of-business channel is where the coop officers and staff have directed discussion of items of business; it's not clear that any one officer or staff member is who you should contact; if a critical mass of members (15ish?) express their support for the proposal (or the proposal otherwise generates substantial benefit to the coop such as engaging a critical mass of the membership in a particularly productive discussion), I'll see about getting it rewarded. I make no promises about the $5K requested amount or any hourly rate.

15ish? is based on the 15 supporting reactions I got in #board2coop in response to my renewed request for agendas in advance. It's one piece of data about how much of the membership can be expected to pay attention to something in discord.

[ddayan]

@allancto "@ddayan, you mentioned "community sponsorship", can you elaborate a bit?" We the members should be able to help with sponsorship if we want to. There several bounty issues that I would have gladly helped with the sponsorship. At the moment it will be based on community trust but in the future I would like the sponsorship to be on chain, where people will send contributions to a smart contract and the voting system will distribute the funds based on votes. I'm discussing it with Ned to see if solutions could sponsor it.

[allancto]

@ddayan thanks for reaching out to Ned on behalf of this.

We the members should be able to help with sponsorship if we want to. There several bounty issues that I would have gladly helped with the sponsorship. At the moment it will be based on community trust but in the future I would like the sponsorship to be on chain, where people will send contributions to a smart contract and the voting system will distribute the funds based on votes.

Wow, that's exactly what RContributors is supposed to do: projects funded by our membership. Projects will have a detailed "pitch deck" and be subject to vote by ALL members. We'll use a voting system I'd like to call Trustmetric EE (Elders Edition). ALL members get to vote. More experienced and more trusted members will be able to vote with higher weight (if they wish, but also with ordinary weight if they just want to "express an opinion"). I also want to sponsor game theoretic research on failure modalities of Trustmetric style (weighted) budget voting systems, because we're relying on them increasingly and we NEED to sponsor research the mathematical, economic game theory of these systems which we are placing our budget voting into. I've been working on an issue statement with @casparlusink and I'll post that today so that you can see the details of the proposed voting system and at least one approach to how we can design for attack resistance.

@ddayan, the RContributors voting structure is designed to allow exactly what you said: responsibly fund projects which capture the imagination and trust of our membership, though a voting system. These are the systems we'll need for our members to sustainably support RChain projects like Kayvan + Greg = RSong, projects that our membership feels have "moon shot" potential for RChain.

[luigidemeo]

i cannot in good conscience vote to approve a $5000 or any dollar amount budget to submit a proposal when there have been over 12 done for free. What makes this one special? If you care about it, write it. If you don't, don't imho.