All of the following is composed of my personal story and facts. I’ll let everyone be their own judge for the rest.
2023
ICPCC started as a conference series from the place I worked at in the past (Code & State). After running several successful meetups, we realized there was a strong need in the community to connect, exchange ideas, and create trust through in-person events. That’s why we decided to organize the first conference in 2023, in Miami, at the famous Hard Rock Cafe.
I remember it as one of the best moments of the past years. I met many builders for the first time in person, which helped me understand everyone’s perspectives—what they were building, their struggles, their needs, and their outlook on the future. And of course, doing business with someone you can look in the eyes is invaluable.
I didn’t participate much in organizing this edition, as my main project, Motoko Bootcamp, required 100% of my time, and I had just run one bootcamp the week before this conference. So I basically fully enjoyed this edition, didn’t worry too much about the organization, just got to discuss with everyone I could find, vandalize the buffet and enjoy the talks - the dream. It was a bubble of support in the harsh reality of the bear market.
One notable drawback was the total absence of support from DFINITY. Not only were we denied sponsorship or marketing support, but there was also a complete absence of DFINITY employees at the conference. I will not speculate as to why—I’ll let everyone form their own opinion. But the reality is that it was a sad absence, especially considering that DFINITY employees represent a major part of this ecosystem.
2024
For the second edition, we tried a completely different format: instead of a fancy conference at one location, we decided to organize a livestream and support local hubs to organize watch parties.
This time I got much more involved. I spent my last two/three months at Code & State supporting the conference preparations, notably with the Galactic Airdrop (which I believe is the biggest airdrop to date, in terms of numbers/diversity of tokens). This was a fully on-chain platform that rewarded the most active watchers of the livestream with ecosystem token projects. I put in many extra hours making sure the code would appear in the stream, ensuring codes wouldn’t leak, building the platform to be bot-resistant, and creating enough logs and statistics to prove the initiative’s worth—while also pinging projects to participate. All the stats are still accessible on-chain through the indications of the README in the respository.
The notable drawback from this edition came again from the DFINITY side. Through weeks of efforts, we had onboarded several ICP hubs to join us and organize watch parties, but a few weeks before the conference, we learned that all ICP Hubs were pulling out at the same time. The explanation we received was “order from above” and “we can’t associate with you.” Again, I will not speculate as to why, but I’ll let everyone form their own opinion.
What is not speculation is the impact on our team and the organization of the conference. We had to change plans last minute and reduce the scope of our ambition. You can imagine the impact on our morale. We still held the conference, with 20+ meetups around the world and a 9-hour livestream with 1000+ viewers. It was incredibly cool. Sure, there was some amateur vibe to it all and many things we could have done better, but all in all, I would say it was still a success.
At the same time, we launched the SNS DAO. The SNS DAO was structured as a non-profit from the start. I decided to join the council as a part-time job. My idea was to support the effort through educational initiatives, aligning with what I was doing at Motoko Bootcamp. I had in mind that hackathons and conferences would go hand in hand.
2025
After the SNS DAO officially launched, things turned radically different. First, there was no support from Code & State anymore (either financial or in man-hours), and the council of the SNS DAO took on the full responsibility of moving the DAO forward through proposals. The transition was harsh. In retrospective it could have better prepared.
The council was composed of Kyle Stoflet (The Swop) and me. It was supposed to include more individuals, but potential names pulled out to focus on their personal projects, which I can totally understand.
Kyle took on the responsibility of socials and hosting the monthly X space. He also took charge of organizing the next conference and working on partnerships. Meanwhile, I took on the responsibility of technical/educational leadership and organizing a hackathon for the next conference.
We were combining a lot of difficulties:
- Only two council members.
- Low treasury (2,733 ICP at the time of speaking)
- Almost all of the SNS DAOs that could potentially sponsor us were under the control of one major investor who clearly expressed he wouldn’t support any of ICPCC’s initiatives.
Adding to that was the uncertainty of where the ICP price would be, where the ecosystem would stand in 2025, what kind of events we should target, and so on. Still, Kyle and I were working toward this event. The idea was to reduce the scope of our ambitions and organize the event in Milwaukee during July, where Kyle has his studio. That way, we would benefit from Kyle’s local connections to reduce costs while maximizing impact. On my side, since last year I’ve been working on the R3boot platform, which is an alternative to the SNS Launchpad—a new take on what DAOs can look like. I was getting ready to reveal it there and was looking to invite builders to start building around it.
On April 9th, I woke up to this proposal:
https://dashboard.internetcomputer.org/sns/l7ra6-uqaaa-aaaaq-aadea-cai/proposal/64
The DAO was under attack. I tried to gather voting power from investors and even reached out to Code & State. At one point, I thought the situation would be under control, but more voting power was bought on the market (which is why the price pumped at the same time). I was not prepared at all for that situation. I had many other things on my agenda this week, and I was mostly surprised—reacting too late and I was behind at all points. All my tokens were looked 8 years, but I don’t have much tokens, so it didn’t matter. I ended up not vote No on some proposals because I knew it wasn’t going to matter and it was just humiliating.
The rest of the story is simple: the SNS was renamed and completely lost through more modifications to the voting power and other parameters. Today, there is no chance to get it back.
The original proposal came from the neuron of Windoge98 (EXE), which bought a large stake during the initial swap. Originally the idea was to let the EXE community vote on this neuron, and I remember back then to really like the idea. I talked with the people who initiated those changes, and the answers are the same: “you are part of the swamp” and “I’m following Adam because he’s always been kind to me,” and so on.
What I Did Wrong
I did a lot of things wrong. Here are a few:
- A certain naivety around voting power. We didn’t synchronize to get enough voting across council members; the reality is that we were struggling to pass proposals even from day one. I also never considered that an SNS would be bought off to be renamed—I had only considered internal divergences (like where the next conference would be hosted, what sponsors to pursue, and so on), so I was completely surprised by this “attack”.
- I advanced personal funds to the SNS to pay for the MINS annual fee since the deadline was approaching, and I have not been refunded to date. I’ve also worked for 3 months for free. In total, I’ve lost $5,500 to the DAO. That’s painful, but it’s also my fault for not setting boundaries and trusting an SNS DAO with my funds where I don’t have voting power. You won’t catch me doing that again.
- I didn’t communicate as much as I could have during the past few months. I was constantly moving forward, hoping that more alone work would solve all my problems, instead of pausing and communicating that I was clearly struggling. From the beginning, this has been a part-time project for me. But a part time project that has absorbed enormous amount of energy. The reality is that between all the proposals, requests, and workload, it took much more time than I had expected, and I was struggling to put boundaries.
All in all, I would say this has been a failed experience and a lost battle. ICPCC DAO has been nearly impossible to carry on and manage from the SNS.
What’s Next?
Right now I feel completely burned by this whole story, I’m moving in circles and soon to be in financial troubles. Generally the past years I’ve been in the middle of incredibly toxic dynamics due to conflict of powers in this ecosystem, I’ve tried to avoid them by working harder, but I’m starting to realize it has took a drain on my health, motivation and spirit. I’ve got to make drastic changes: focus on my personal health for some time, stop trying to play the hero, and be more realistic about what I can accomplish.
I don’t believe ICPCC 2025 will happen - at least I can’t continue leading it. Kyle expressed similar struggles in our last X space but I will let him speak for himself. To give you an idea of the level of where I am at right now, I’ve just voted Yes on this proposal, where I wanted to vote No. My brain is just off at the moment and I’m struggling to turn it on again.
I’m invested in this at levels I can’t seem to understand, which is why it hurts so much when things go wrong. This is a conception I have of a DAO—I don’t see it as just a job I can quit. This is my life now and I’m not running away - I’m not giving up. But I really need to take a step back to recharge and refocus. I’m pretty inefficient right now anyway.
I might answer more questions or I might close this computer and go touch some grass.
8YearGang Non Dissolving