314159265359879
commented
3 years ago I think it is admirable you put this together. I am not sure if the problem you are trying to solve is worth a 5000$ grant if it is only useful until ~September 2021 (at BTC block 700,000) when the stacks 2.1 upgrade addresses the problem: enabling continuous stacking. I am confident it will be addressed at that time because of the issue #6 mentioned (https://github.com/stacksgov/sips/issues/6) and the acknowledgement here https://github.com/stacksgov/sips/discussions/16.
Perhaps this project will still have value for other purposes after the stacks 2.1. In that case please supplement your grant request with other purposes/examples of how your solution could help the stacks community.
The "re-conceptualize Stacking as a multi-item open auction," issue you mention is not to resolve the continuous stacking issue. It is to address the currently harmful way the minimum stacking amount is increased as explained here https://github.com/blockstack/stacks-blockchain/issues/1846 .
cuevasm
joberding
RaffiSapire
This proposal intends to enable continuous stacking without requiring a consensus-breaking update to the Stacking contract. Stackers will be able to stack during the “cool-down” period thus avoid missing reward cycles.
Background
A major problem in the current implementation of stacking is that stackers lose rewards during a “cooling period” cycle in-between stacking commitments (SIPS issue #6). If they for example lock STX tokens for 2 cycles, they will not be able to stack in cycle 3 but have to wait until cycle 4 before they again can participate in stacking (Hiro's Feedback on Stacking):
The discontinuous Stacking issue is a universal problem/impediment to overall growth of the Stacks ecosystem (@cuevasm 1, 2). Requiring a longer stacking commitment to avoid losing rewards is an additional burden or barrier to entry that may significantly impact the stackers decision about where to place their funds; This limitation imposed on users might encourage them to invest in a different ecosystem (Hiro's Feedback on Stacking #5).
Stacking for short intervals is more helpful to the network than Stacking once for a long interval. Yet the cool-down cycle unfairly penalizes users for Stacking in short intervals, even though they're helping the network more (jcnelson).
Project Overview
Our solution enables continuous stacking by stacking from a credit line of Stacks in place of stacks restricted from stacking due to cool-down requirements.
For example, say a stacker locked their STX tokens for 2 cycles. Their stacks can not be stacked in cycle 3 due to the cool-down requirement. However, STX tokens are fungible, allowing one token to be interchanged for another. In place of the unstackable tokens, we stack STX tokens from the credit line, passing on the rewards to the holder of the unstackable tokens.
The solution will benefit stackers and improve their Stacking experience, indirectly benefitting the larger ecosystem by making stacking more attractive. In the case that continuous stacking is implemented natively in Stacks 2.1 (around August 2021) the ecosystem will have gained experiences and learned valuable lessons that can benefit the design decisions for the technical upgrade.
Related Proposals
A proposal related to enabling continuous stacking is to re-conceptualize Stacking as a multi-item open auction, providing a “STX future” token that can be traded on the secondary market, thereby allowing stackers to practically sell their STX while they are locked up. However, introducing such an auction may have undesirable properties, potentially corrupting mining strategies (comment1, comment2.
Our suggested approach also relates to “a service that Stacks a whole bunch of STX, and rents out the locked STX’s reward slots at a fixed rate to Stackers via a smart contract”, as proposed by @jcnelson in Hiro's Feedback on Stacking.
Scope
The main deliverable is an MVP level Clarity contract that implements a way to stack during the cool-down period, together with a minimalistic interface for stackers to use the service, and supported by an agreement with the Stacks Foundation to have access to a line of credit of unstacked STX tokens proportional to the size of the pool.
Other deliverables include a report analyzing the potential legal and governance considerations relevant to, among other issues, STX credit delegation and continuous stacking.
Success is stackers using the service for continuous stacking, bypassing the current cool down periods.
Depending on the outcome of the first milestone, we may apply for subsequent grants to further build out the user interface for stackers, applying the use of STX credits to solve other problems in stacking, such as:
Budget and Milestones
Grant request: $5000
Team
Juliet Oberding has been active in the Stacks ecosystem since 2019 as an app miner, community evangelist, member of the Governance Working Group, Project Lead of the Stacks Code of Conduct and a community representative to the Stacks Foundation Board. Juliet’s education and experience as a lawyer and law professor complements her work as a founder and in the area of governance.
Terje Norderhaug joined the San Francisco ecosystem meetup in 2017 and has contributed to app Mining with multiple applications while also serving as a community evangelist working with developers building apps within the Stacks ecosystem. He is the creator of Clarity.tools, an interactive development environment for Clarity contracts.
Risks
The solution depends on access to a credit line of unstacked STX tokens from a major stacksholder such as the Stacks Foundation.
A key risks is whether organizations like the Stacks Foundation are legally allowed to provide STX credit. This issue as well as other legal/governance risks will be researched concurrent to MVP development.
If our approach to continuous stacking turns out to be infeasible, we will explore alternative solutions, eventually pivot to deliver a report on our attempt with a discussion of reasons for the lack of feasibility.
Community and Supporting Materials