Absolute Majority Weight Proposal Draft

Governance
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Goodmorning @ZackDS ! I hope you are well today.

I want to start by saying I don’t think is an accurate characterization of Andras comment. From my observation, she is not “picking on” Wenzel in anyway, but rather attempting to redirect the conversation towards actionable ideas.

Wenzel directly demanded within this thread that I had two days to generate a conversation otherwise he’d propose the premature proposal. I don’t think it’s fair to say the “timing is off” when people join the conversation after such a statement.

Since I have stated that I am willing to write the code, the issue regarding the enactment of the reset has shifted from resources, to a design flaw, to questioning the credentials of the person willing to write the code.

This has certainly turned into whether or not alternative sources are allowed to contribute code based changes to the NNS, on behalf of governance proposals that have already passed.

Furthermore, I can understand that my age raises questions for you. This was included within my named neuron for transparency, for this very reason - people should know what they’re “signing up for”. However, I believe if you take a deeper look into the ecosystem, and founding teams, you’d be surprised to learn how many young developers & entrepreneurs there are.

I don’t think it’s a valid criticism to say “well you’re too young to be contributing code”, as I have personally asked for my work to be reviewed by the foundation.

I’m not asking you to simply trust that I am capable of doing the work - I am asking that you verify it with code in hand.

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God day to you too, talking about beating a dead horse, kicking a cat uphill and so on. We all heard you, people not using the forum heard you, Elon is working on a new badge just to try and shut you up. Joke aside the topic Dfinitly moved up the priority list so please be patient, will be resolved any year now.

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Dear DFINITY,

I’m placing this here in this forum post because I see this as a pivotal moment for the Internet Computer blockchain. Please excuse me if I speak in an impassioned manner, but I am passionate about this blockchain due to my respect for the vision of its founder, @dominicwilliams , as well as my appreciation for the technology of the chain and the talent of the team of chain key cryptographers who have been assembled by the Foundation.

This proposal discussion may be the most important thing ever to appear on this forum, and yet it appears to both be ignored or brushed aside by the loudest voices. And yet, I believe, when we look back at this moment, it could be when the future of the World Computer is decided.

This is no longer a post about “Waaah, DFINITY didn’t implement the thing the DAO asked for.” It is now about the future of the blockchain.

By DFINITY’s own admission, one of the primary arguments against ICP being an unregistered security is that “ICP is the utility token of the Internet Computer, which is created by a fully decentralized protocol and network.” (See the article here: DFINITY Thoughts on the SEC’s 6 June Complaint Against Coinbase | by DFINITY | Jun, 2023 | Medium). And at the same time, DFINITY has stated that it is a security issue if the Foundation cannot make decisions rapidly without any inhibitions to their voting power. They have also proven (with this issue now being discussed - the periodic reset) that they will simply NOT IMPLEMENT any decisions that the DAO passes that they later decide they don’t like for one reason or another. So, in other words, the blockchain is actually FULLY CENTRALIZED and is run like it is a private corporation rather than a DAO with a non-profit foundation as the major contributor.

@wpb proposed above that since he was the one who made the periodic reset proposal, not fully realizing the consequences at the time, he will simply create another proposal to reverse the one that has not been implemented (“I think the solution to this problem is to submit a new proposal to rescind the original proposal”). Somehow, the idea is that this will make things all better. If DFINITY doesn’t like what the DAO decides and doesn’t want to implement it, the DAO can just pass another proposal to reverse the decision and bow to DFINITY’s will. I’m not crazy, right? Everyone should be able to see through this thin smokescreen of “decentralization” to see the man behind the curtain. This is merely a Wizard of Ozian trick to provide the appearance of choice while remaining centralized. And yet, I somehow doubt the SEC will fail to see through it.

So here is the main point:

Either the Internet Computer blockchain is decentralized (as DFINITY claims), or it is not, and it is an unregistered security.

In that case, the only hope for US citizens would be to sell their tokens as fast as possible at a massive loss before the token is forced to be delisted. Better to sell at $4 and take a hit than at 4 cents, which is where the token will end up if it is declared an unregistered security and has to be delisted from exchanges like Coinbase in the US.

@diegop , you can decide to hide this post using any of the usual arguments (ad hominem, straw man, bad faith, intellectually dishonest, toxic - feel free to pick any philosophical reason you like). Or DFINITY and everyone else can simply choose to ignore the problem and hope the dissenting voices dissipate over time – I certainly have no more time to give to the forums here.

But you can neither negate nor negotiate reality or the importance of this moment.

Someday, we will look back, and there will either be a World Computer, or there will not be, and this will be one of the defining moments. And if the World Computer exists, I won’t try to take any kind of credit. I’ll just enjoy it. And if it does not exist, I won’t say, “I told you so!”

I won’t have to because I just did.

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67

Please don’t read this as passive aggressive or condescending. It’s an honest question and I’d like to know your opinion…

How does this proposal make ICP decentralized?

Here is my opinion in hopes that it sparks deeper consideration of the consequences of this proposal…

Even if @Accumulating.icp develops the code and it is adopted, which I think would be an incredibly awesome badge of honor for him and the community, there is no net change regarding decentralization. I think the optics of decentralization will go from bad to worse. In my opinion, decentralization of ICP means there are multiple choices of who to follow. Governance and SNS have already been decentralized. What other entity is there to choose besides DFINITY on any other topic? The only topics this proposal will affect are the technical topics. How and why would any group exist that is competent to contribute to ICP at the protocol level on these other topics? If these groups existed and were known to be reliable Followee selections for people to choose, then this proposal makes a lot more sense. What mechanisms do you think exist that will lead to the formation of these competency groups? How would removing default following on All Topics lay the foundation for the formation of these competency groups?

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Thanks @lara. I will postpone my plans to submit a proposal to the NNS on this topic. I’m interested in knowing what DFINITY has to say just like everyone else.

I’m also appreciative to @Accumulating.icp. He showed a lot of integrity last night when reaching out to me via DM offering to talk on a more personal level. I’m looking forward to that conversation and will reconsider my intentions for submitting a proposal after giving time for all this new information to play out.

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I’m going to respond to this, as I know @FGhostwriting doesn’t intend to.

I’ve touched on why I personally believe this contributes to the decentralization of ICP a few times, however I believe it seems to get convoluted with the concept that this proposal should simultaneously incentivize independent contributors.

That’s not to say that I don’t believe it would be beneficial to have a way to reward contributors (nor do I believe it is necessary), if explored responsibly, with funding coming from the right places. Just trying to make the point that these are two different topics - one being the incentivization of named neuron contributors, the other being the decentralization of liquid democracy.

To me, decentralization means a few things depending on the context - in relation to the governance of a traditional DAO, I would define decentralization as the lack of a central decision making entity.

However, due to the fact we utilize Liquid Democracy, the “decentralized” aspect, is the choice in followee itself, as central decision making entities are baked into the protocol (regardless of the fact that these parties may or may not change over time). To which the grand majority of neurons have not consciously done, ever.

Given this, I’d define decentralization within liquid democracy a bit differently, being; “the conscious reaffirmation from neurons that they’re content with the actions of their liquid democracy representative, and the assignment of their voting power”.

Which is something we currently have never seen, as DFINITY assigned all voting power to themselves upon Genesis - without means set in place to see it relinquished.

This kind of ties back into the introduction of this post, but I want the opportunity to go a bit more in-depth with this explanation.

The objective of this proposal is not to inspire the creation of foundational alternatives & independent contributors - although it would be an amazing side effect. However, this is not something that will be achieved through a single proposal, but rather, is something that has to be prepared for overtime.

While it may not have been originally intended, the core benefit of the Periodic Followee Confirmation is the reaffirmation from neurons in regards to their liquid democracy delegate - which is something that contributes to laying the groundwork for true decentralization of liquid democracy.

Meaning this specific set of proposals, does not have the responsibility of seeing out the generation of community contributors - as it’s goal is to ensure the decentralization of liquid democracy, through the reaffirmation of voting power to named neurons.

I hope that helps convey why I believe this directly contributes to the decentralization of the network.

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What is code? Is code lines of writing in Rust and or in Motoko; or is it consciousness moving through space and time.

When you speak of periodic timely following; what exactly is the definition of time in your code? Are you referring to every month, every 28 days, every 31 days, every 90 days (once a season)… what exactly measures the periods that you desire? A further question to you why I care about time is an ontological question; if code is consciousness traveling through space and time; is your code driven by something that happened in the past, present incentives from private entities or military fear of the future.

To a farmer and a short time investor, a view time is totally different. A farmer is more inclined to observe the natural movement of the sun to meet their need of time while a short time investor would focus on social influencers to get the right timing. How do you plan to bridge the different needs and view points of time from these vastly different perspectives. And it is not as easy as having automatic following at your or their desired time frames. The prior mechanism that was formulated by dfinity perfectly encouraged liquid democracy as users would follow who their ideologies align to; and if their beliefs ever changed they had an option of following someone else or another entity. Working class people in general are too busy to be checking who they would follow this month and keep up with your desired mechanism of active following….

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Unless you have a DMC DeLorean it is just text written that eventually gets compiled to Wasm. FYI you know I had to :wink: also short term investor as in can’t vote is not staked locked for 6 month is a tad bit overstatement, but I get where you are coming from. Not sure where you headed though :grinning:

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@AndraGeorgescu I think it is reasonable and natural you tag me, so I did not want to ignore your query with silence. I can only say that I am not working on this project. @lara ,the DFINITY Team Lead, Governance & Formal Methods, is working on this so I will let her answer. I know she is actively reading this thread and is the expert in this domain. Hope that is helpful.

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Hello @JxBrian , I appreciate you’ve taken the time to formulate your ideas & opinions regarding this proposal.

The time period in which Periodic Followee Confirmation would occur, was defined within a seperate proposal, which was not written by me.

The proposal referenced, passed with a periodic reset occurring on a semi-annual basis. As such, the code would be written directly aligning with the proposal that has passed via the NNS.

Some countries choose to do their taxes on a monthly basis, others choose to do it quarterly, while many choose to do it annually.

There won’t be a timeframe that everyone agrees with, for various reasons, however I don’t think it’s unreasonable to ask for two governance contributions a year, in exchange for a years worth of governance rewards. Because at the end of the day, the ICP distributed via NNS maturity is not a staking reward, it is a governance reward - meaning it’s distributed in expectation for contribution to liquid democracy - which currently doesn’t occur for the most part.

This is not the case - at genesis, DFINITY self-assigned all voting power to themselves. Meaning users did not choose to follow who their ideologies aligned with - they had it chosen for them.

I am a working class person, as are many of the other contributors to governance. When we staked ICP into neurons within the NNS, we all knowingly made the commitment to delegate time to the governance of the Internet Computer (if we wanted to continuously receive our governance rewards).

Furthermore, I feel as though the frequency of the reset is being exaggerated - it does not occur on a monthly basis, but rather a semi-annual - which gives more than ample notice to neurons that a reset will occur.

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If you are trying to maintain the original scope of the proposal, then Followee reset would only occur if a user doesn’t reset a 6 month countdown timer before it expires. The intent was to have an easy button that shows current followee selections and asks if they want to keep or change their selections. They could perform this action as often as they log into the NNS dApp account if they want. For some it may be every 6 months and for others it could be weekly. To each their own. Hence, the frequency of confirming followee selection is up to each individual, but the automatic reset action would occur if they let the timer expire.

Another important note is that followee selections for all neurons controlled by the same principal would be confirmed at the same time so people with multiple neurons don’t have to go through these steps for each neuron.

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That is indeed the goal :handshake:

Thank you for denoting this @wpb - I imagine this will be reassuring to people with similar concerns to @JxBrian .

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That is a fair point.

However what option did they have? If you were at genesis what would you have done different? What formulas and logic would you have initiated to prevent a hostile takeover or what sequence of actions would you have taken to nature the network to its prime?

If you ever started a company; you would be aware how the process of weaning power in benefit of a project or company works. You start with 100%, share that with founders and leave room for investors. As you bring more investors into the company or project you want to keep a close eye on the trajectory and evolution of what is going on. Otherwise a small mistake would initiate a cascade of unforeseen events.

A great project stays in the realm of mathematics, science and openness. Changes that are made to a protocol have to be studied intensively before being adopted; in particular what downstream effects would active followees have on the network. Is that any different from a subscription service? Having an idea and rushing to implement on an idea is not good enough; more research is needed. What do polls suggest; do majority of the users of IC prefer periodic following or do they prefer following someone/ entity and changing their priorities as needed. There is no need of voting on a proposal just for it to be changed in a short time frame.

Time expire? Why would their time expire when they have someone voting for them on a liquid democracy basis? Or is the new mechanism under construction eliminating liquid democracy? Does the person they follow have an option of automatically resetting the follower’s priority when the time expires? I am inclined to believe that most people would prefer just following someone and only change their choice if the person they follow starts voting on what they don’t agree on. Otherwise the notion of active followers having an impact on voting is redundant.

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This is actually a common misconception - I’m not criticizing DFINITY for their choice of actions. For the most part, I’d agree with you (we’ll set aside the fact they also assigned themselves 40% of voting power, in which they directly owned), it was probably the best case scenario, that they maintained some degree of control over the network in its infancy stages.

However, with that being said, we still need to see a system set in place, that will ensure the gradual decentralization of this self assigned 98%+ super majority.

This topic (The Periodic Followee Confirmation) has been in discussion since April 2022. It had been followed up upon multiple times, which are documented within these forums. This is certainly not rushing to implement the feature, as it’s been in discussion for over a year, and is still in active discussion, with the community & foundation - ensuring any code based work aligns with previous proposals, and defined “Design Flaws”.

Regarding a poll, this is something that has been passed via the NNS Governance topic - so yes, a “poll” has been taken, and the NNS made its decision (being to vote in favour, and ultimately execute this proposal successfully).

I think you’re misunderstanding his comment. The “expired time” referenced, is the timeframe in which neurons must reaffirm their followees, to avoid having the followee outright reset (no active followees).

So no, this does not harm liquid democracy. It’s enforcing the decentralization of it (being the conscious decision from the neuron, regarding who their followee is).

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First time I seen the topic and discussion.

Anybody know if topics on the forum filtered by geolocation?

Could you elaborate more on the above statement.
What I’m asking is, let’s say that someone is already participating in liquidity democracy. Under the proposal they would have to confirm that they are still following the person after 6 months…? After 1 year? What about 2 years. Would it be better if it was after 8 years?

Is what you are referring to a confirmation from the user that they still are voting through someone?
And if so; what is the point of that considering the fact that they would choose the same person/entity in liquid democracy. I think I’m might be missing on the relevance of active followees….Could you please re-state on the problem at hand that is being solved? If it is voting power… doesn’t locking ICP on the NNS solve the problem; the more ICP you lock into the NNS the more voting power you have.

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No, the forum is not geo-blocked to my knowledge.

If you review the proposal, you will find reference links to a few of the many dialogues regarding this matter.

Yes, “Periodic Followee Confirmation” implies that it is a recurring functionality. So, yes, neuron’s would have to reaffirm their participation in liquid democracy at a minimum of once every 6 months, to continue delegating their voting power, and in turn collecting governance rewards.

It quite honestly isn’t my position to determine the frequency at which the Periodic Confirmation occurs, as it has already been passed by the NNS. I am simply attempting to fulfill my role as an independent contributor by seeing out governance proposals - which have been passed via the NNS - in the manner in which they have passed.

I’m going to quote a previous comment to @wpb , regarding why I believe this contributes to the decentralization of liquid democracy - as I believe it accurately addresses this as well.

So, in essence, while yes, neurons are likely to select the same followee - that is okay. It’s about the fact that neurons are taking an active role in liquid democracy, rather than utilizing a set & forget mindset, to simply collect staking rewards (as maturity is a governance reward, not a staking reward).

I find this comment rather ironic, given the scenario😅

This proposal is an amendment to DFINITYs proposed “Design Flaw” within the Periodic Followee Confirmation Proposal. Which is the fact that if followees are reset, they will lose their self assigned 98%+ super majority - with no means to get it back, and in turn control the network.

So, I’d agree - if DFINITY wants more voting power - they should simply buy & stake more ICP.

However, that’s not the situation we’re in, in reality. The foundation has been laid for them to pursue liquid democracy as an alternative, so they are.

This proposal directly addresses their concerns, by doing two things:

  1. Changing the calculation of an absolute majority from Total Voting Power to Active Voting Power (a rolling average across governance proposals)

  2. Changing the threshold of Active Voting Power in which an absolute majority is triggered

The switch from total voting power to active voting power, aims to resolve DFINITYs fear of the inability to regain 51%+ of the entirety of voting power, after a reset. While the adjustment of the minimum threshold, aims to absolve any centralization concerns, for example, DFINITY being able to enact an absolute majority by themselves.

This is depicted within the following math, in the original post;

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I’m guessing this is to pass a Howey test?

I looked further into the topic and found the following quotes interesting.

I think it is absurd that the NNS was configured to adopt the proposal as it makes it complicated for the average investor to keep reconfiguring who they follow in order to maximize rewards. It is totally a pointless repetitive chain of events that has the potential of driving away investors.

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No, this is unrelated, although I’m sure it would contribute towards helping their case against the SEC.

I personally support the Periodic Followee Confirmation, because I think it is absurd that the foundation has indefinitely assigned themselves 98%+ of total voting power, on code based topics.

Everyone’s bound to have different opinions on the matter, and that’s okay.

However, I can say one of the quotes you have referenced, is in response to the claim that this proposal “stops spam”, which has since been solved with the weighting & proposal cost options mentioned. I’d agree with the original poster, it does not solve spam, and that reasoning alone did not justify a followee reset.

However the fact of the matter is that users assets were manipulated at genesis when all voting power was forcefully assigned to DFINITY. This is something that needs to be addressed & decentralized over the longterm.

I’d also say that the second post does not accurately characterized the proposal, nor where we’re at with governance today.

This proposal isn’t requesting that people dedicate hours a day to governance, but rather find the time to log into the NNS twice a year, to reaffirm they’re content with their followee.

Additionally, the NNS is not a “passive income”, it is a governance tool, in which governance participants are rewarded.

If an investor is knowledgeable enough to create an internet identity, a neuron, assign its followees, and spawn the rewards, I don’t think it’s an accurate characterization to say that a UI that dictates a followee reset will occur in 6 months time, if they don’t reaffirm their followee at any time within that 6 months, is creating barriers & driving away potential investors.

I would disagree with your representation of the proposal as “a pointless repetitive chain of events”. As stated, to date, 98%+ of the entirety of voting power has been indefinitely self assigned to DFINITY. There needs to be a system set in place that ensures the gradual decentralization of this voting power over time - as it was self assigned. This proposal accomplishes that by ensuring the reaffirmation from neuron’s, that they’re content with their liquid democracy representative.

If anything, I think the point could be made that the individual vote would matter more after this proposal, therefor incentivizing participation, rather than circumventing it.

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Good afternoon @lara ,

I was just curious when we can expect to see a reply from DFINITY regarding these matters.

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It’s been over a week. Any updates?

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