👾 MythBusters - Governance

[infu]

Myth: Dfinity is controlling it all and has too much voting power. Needs to be decentralized

Patient attackers will follow the Dfinity neuron up until the last moment when they need control, it will appear to have a lot of voting power.
They will send people to complain on the forums and make proposals to reduce Dfinity’s voting power while following it, like the periodic confirmation proposal 55651 - Wenzel’s biggest work, which ended up reducing their power slowly, and also a way to clear Dfinity and everyones followers for 1 sec if someone gets to 51%

Myth Busted - We don’t know how much voting power their neuron will have during a 51% attack

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Myth: Voting power is all that matters in governance, stake doesn't matter

Stake distribution matters the most during a 51% attack, since anyone can just follow random neurons or increase their dissolve delay to get more voting power when needed.

Myth Busted

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Myth: Following CodeGov means you are following the aggregated decision of the 5 voting members

CodeGov is controlled by one neuron, and no known verified canisters. It can add and remove followees at any point during 51% attack. 133891

Myth Busted

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Myth: Following Synapse means you are following the aggregated decision of the 14 voting members

These voting members here appear to also have votes on managing the neuron, which is good, but Synapse follows CodeGov on code proposals, and CodeGov is controlled by Wenzel, so he can instantly vote with both neurons on that topic if he wishes.

Myth Busted

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Myth: Node Providers are decentralized

The selection process was as shady as it can be. It appears ~70% of the nodes are controlled by a small group. Currently under review.

Myth Busted

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Myth: Waterneuron is decentralized

It’s not. All voting power is held by 3-5 anon entities. What’s bothersome here is how they tried to cover it all up and make it look like the community was voting and send people in the forums to spam and spread disinformation. Drain the swamp had to spend a month and a half building tools to figure it out and find that there are connections to Node providers, CEXes, Synapse, and CodeGov.

Myth Busted

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Myth: Waterneuron represents everyone in WTN

It doesn’t. Whoever holds 51% in WTN casts all the WTN neuron votes in the NNS.

Myth Busted

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Fact: WTN voting history gets cleared shortly after a proposal is complete

A few weeks ago, we noticed an SNS change started wiping history.

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Fact: 5mil liquid ICP in wallets connected to WTN

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Fact: A lot of CEX user assets can end up in nICP in a few seconds

All users who have clicked ‘ok’ to auto earn yield with no risks and convert their wallets into ‘virtual crypto wallets’ can get nICP instantly. CEXes are probably not aware of possible attacks, since ICP is the only platform that gives voting power when using liquid staking solutions. Also, the only L1 where voting power is the ultimate authority.

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One possible 51% attack:

1. Millions of user assets instantly get converted to nICP
2. WTN votes to upgrade canisters and increases 6mo neuron dissolve delay to 8y
3. Attackers propose a malicious NNS upgrade and ‘accept’ it using

• Few anon whale neurons
• Synapse & CodeGov code upgrade topic controlled 100% by Wenzel
• WTN’s user assets neurons

4. Once the upgrade is installed, it covers up all tracks and removes proposals like it never happened. Since nobody can see what’s inside the NNS, the upgrade can change its state. WTN’s 8y neurons get converted back to 6m. Only a few people will know what happened, but they will hardly prove anything.

This attack will possibly take a few seconds and may not result in anything that can be observed.
The result may be neurons stolen or new ones minted.

That’s not the only possible attack scenario.

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@wpb You have been supporting all of the myths and orchestrating some, leaving security vulnerabilities on the way (CodeGov, Synapse, Periodic confirmation); no wonder the community is coming after you. Your and WTN’s mission to decentralize the IC looks like it’s overdoing the job and may end up centralizing it. You have to be defending against 51% attacks, not appear to be supporting or leading them, and discard evidence as conspiracy theories. If people didn’t come and complain in the forums, CodeGov, Synapse, and WTN would have 2-3 times more voting power already, and the small group would have a higher % of total nodes. These leave us with two options: You are either not fit for the job of defending IC from attacks, or you are knowingly supporting the attack - both of which mean you shouldn’t be entrusted with a lot of voting power.

The safest way to decentralize the IC is by buying ICP, not by neurons amassing followers with promotions and bribes, and taking as many nodes as possible while utilizing the most shady practices there can be. Another approach is to establish new foundations, fund them, and employ people who work there, and improve the IC. Having skin in the game and doing something valuable. That will convince others to follow them.

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Once such an attack is executed, there will be social network “FUD” and then life will move on, and very few people will care, but the IC will be centralized and owned by the attackers. These takeovers seem to be something common in crypto, not an exception. In other chains, they start from miners/validators and end there, because that’s the governance system. On the IC, the NNS is an on-chain governance system that needs to be taken over as well after the nodes.

Case study: Solana

Hidden Token Supply and “Secret” Minting Claims

One of the most prominent criticisms of Solana that resurfaced in 2021 was the allegation that the project had secretly minted or unlocked a large number of SOL tokens beyond what was publicly disclosed. Critics pointed out that in early April 2020, the Solana team stated the total circulating supply was about 8.2 million SOL, but in reality the circulating supply was above 20 million – implying that roughly 13 million extra tokens were hidden in a wallet ambcrypto.comambcrypto.com. These undisclosed tokens were loaned to a market maker by the Solana Foundation prior to launch, but this allocation was not made clear to investors during Solana’s token sale and exchange listings. Community members eventually discovered a single wallet holding over 13 million SOL, more than the entire reported circulating supply at the time unboundedcapital.com. This discovery sparked accusations that Solana’s team lied about the circulating supply and stealthily increased the supply, causing token dilution for holders.

Critics on social media and forums described this as fraudulent or deceptive behavior. For example, crypto fund manager Justin Bons posted a detailed Twitter thread in November 2021 calling it “a long series of lies, fraud & deception” by Solana’s teamambcrypto.com. He noted that investors were excited about the low initial supply, only to find out it was actually over twice the stated amount ambcrypto.com. Similarly, a widely-shared Reddit post titled “Solana’s team lied about circulating supply and had hidden wallet with 13M tokens” echoed these concerns (the thread became one of the top posts in r/CryptoCurrency in November 2021).

The hidden allocation of ~11–13 million SOL was not the only supply shock that concerned the community. Solana’s circulating supply jumped dramatically within its first year, exacerbating dilution worries. Notably, a major “cliff” unlock in January 2021 released 320 million SOL (early investor and insider tokens) into circulation, increasing the circulating supply from 151 million to 470 million SOL in one go coinbase.com. While this massive unlock had been scheduled in Solana’s token release plan, it underscored how quickly supply could expand. Nonetheless, episodes like the early market-maker loan and large unlocks fed a narrative that Solana’s supply was fluid and could be increased unexpectedly, whether through undisclosed loans or rapid vesting of insider tokens. Many in the community felt blindsided by the “stealth minting” and the sudden appearance of tens of millions of SOL, which they argued eroded trust.

[Thyassa]

Thank you for this well structured and reasonable post. It certainly presents a concerning scenario. Maybe you could have left out the bad W word, but hopefully this post will lead to constructive analysis and solutions to mitigate risks rather than the “he said, she said” that tends to derail 99% of posts these days.

[Mico]

Dfinity has 25% vp (source the dashboard)

Ica has 6% vp (source vp geek)

Adam has 8% vp (source Adam)

Is 39%vp a threat?

[wpb]

@infu

Fact: WTN voting history gets cleared shortly after a proposal is complete

A few weeks ago, we noticed an SNS change started wiping history.

This is not unique to WaterNeuron. It’s a fact that all ballots for all SNS projects get cleared after the results of the proposal are processed. There was a recent forum topic discussing this if you want more information. @aterga has noted that several people in the community, including me, have requested that SNS ballots are stored for much longer. It seems safe to assume that you would like to add your name to the list @infu.

@infu

Synapse & CodeGov code upgrade topic controlled 100% by Wenzel

Synapse and CodeGov do not trigger anywhere close to enough voting power to upgrade anything in the NNS or SNS by ourselves. We are one of many voting neurons and individually we trigger voting power that is well below the threshold required. We’ll just keep doing our due diligence on the proposal topics where we are committed to voting credibly and reliably. People are welcome to follow us or not follow us, but we have no ability to accept or reject who follows us. Ideally we will remain modestly sized contributors to decentralization in a governance system where there are many other credible and reliable followee options to choose.

@infu

@wpb You have been supporting all of the myths and orchestrating some, leaving security vulnerabilities on the way (CodeGov, Synapse, Periodic confirmation)

I still haven’t seen anyone present a credible case for this kind of claim. Would you please provide additional clarification on what myths I support or orchestrate? I’m happy to explain, but I need additional context to understand what you are talking about.

@infu

no wonder the community is coming after you

Surely you can see that it’s the same degen crowd that has always been coming after me. They haven’t succeeded before and they aren’t succeeding now. They are just making themselves look bad again and this time they are eroding credibility of @borovan in the process.

@infu

Your and WTN’s mission to decentralize the IC looks like it’s overdoing the job and may end up centralizing it.

It seems to me that there have been some very good conversations about this in recent weeks. Unfortunately, they are overshadowed by all the degens that have been allowed to roam free around the forum, but for those of us who take these discussions seriously we have still been able to focus through the noise and get something out of them.

@infu

If people didn’t come and complain in the forums, CodeGov, Synapse, and WTN would have 2-3 times more voting power already

This is exactly what should happen. We can have an intellectually honest conversation about it. I don’t mind if Synapse or CodeGov voting power goes down because I’m not here to gain an oversized amount of voting power. I would rather we are one of many known neurons and will continue to offer credible and reliable Followee options to people in the community.

@infu

These leave us with two options: You are either not fit for the job of defending IC from attacks, or you are knowingly supporting the attack - both of which mean you shouldn’t be entrusted with a lot of voting power.

OK, fine. If you don’t trust CodeGov, then don’t follow CodeGov. If you don’t trust Synapse, then don’t follow Synapse. I advocate for people to vote independently with their own convictions as much as possible, or to find a known neuron that they trust if they prefer to delegate their vote. I just hope that they don’t pencil whip their votes or vote randomly.

@borovan

I just vote no and sometimes yes depending on how i feel. If the vote mattered I’d give it more than 1ms of thought.

It’s disgusting to see whales like @borovan who controls 8% total voting power in the NNS and 7% total voting power in WaterNeuron shirk his responsibility for voting in the long term best interest of the IC on every proposal. This is way more voting power than what Synapse or CodeGov controls, but what the hey, let’s worry less about @borovan and more about @wpb. Priorities???

@infu

The safest way to decentralize the IC is by buying ICP, not by neurons amassing followers

I’ve had enough public and private conversations with you lately to realize that this is one of your central concerns. I think what you really have an issue with is liquid democracy and this is a fair concern. I wish you would start a forum thread focused on that topic.

@infu

Another approach is to establish new foundations, fund them, and employ people who work there, and improve the IC. Having skin in the game and doing something valuable. That will convince others to follow them.

This is a great idea. I believe that was the original plan. It was called the Internet Computer Association (ICA) and half the neurons configured at genesis and for the first year after genesis were configured to follow them by default. I never understood why ICA never became an independent organization. The token allocation that was set aside for them still exists. The non-profit status of DFINITY and tax implications of the token transfer were given as an explanation, but is seems those issues could have been worked out. Regardless, having another foundation that can grow to be a contributor to the internet computer is an excellent idea. That would definitely help advance decentralization.

[wpb]

@Mico

Adam has 8% vp (source Adam)

Is 39%vp a threat?

Yes, Adam is a threat at this time because he is irresponsible with his voting power and he does not always follow DFINITY. He votes randomly sometimes and he develops conspiracy theories and acts on them at other times. Unfortunately, he has other whale friends in his social circles who have been willing to trust his poor judgement and they often cast their vote according to his recommendation. If he were more judicious with how he votes, then it wouldn’t be a problem that he wields so much voting power. However, anyone who directly or indirectly controls as much voting power as he does should be held accountable to a higher standard.

@borovan

I know WTN is controlled so I just vote no and sometimes yes depending on how i feel. If the vote mattered I’d give it more than 1ms of thought.

Me voting on NNS : 8%
Me voting on WaterNeuron : 7% of 1% where the 7% means nothing.

@wpb

You antics on forum proposal threads like “Drain the Swamp”, “Remove 32 Node Providers”, and “SYBILing Nodes…” seem more like a rich man throwing a temper tantrum and putting a target on peoples back just because you can get away with it. It’s unprofessional and I believe will eventually prove to be a harm to the internet computer when people outside the forum start to realize just how much power and influence someone like you has on this ecosystem. You are an insider who knew the founder before the idea of the internet computer existed and you became one of the very first investors. This gives you a lot of power and influence that everyone in this ecosystem has to live with because you own your massive voting power. Yet your proposals and forum posts come straight from the playbook of a meme coin or NFT Discord server. How can businesses and governments take the internet computer seriously when they see you throwing your weight around like this and recognize that you literally own 7% of the NNS voting power and can influence up to 15% of total voting power in the NNS to follow your lead on proposals like 135750 that are 100% opposite of the core principals that make blockchain decentralization valuable.

[Thyassa]

Your cherry picking is quite remarkable Wenzel.

@wpb

he does not always follow DFINITY.

The entire point of having the option to follow Dfinity (or not) is rooted in the concept of free will. If all voters were required to follow Dfinity’s lead, two things would inevitably happen:

1. The system would become fundamentally centralized.
2. You personally, Synapse, Codegov (and others) would forfeit a lot of revenue streams. Why pay a grant to evaluate something if you know the result anyway?

As for WTN voting, it has been repeatedly confirmed that the individual holder’s vote is effectively inconsequential. Their votes simply do not count in any meaningful way. Decisions are made exclusively by the 3 or 4 dominant vote holders (the exact number escapes me at the moment, though there have been numerous posts detailing this dynamic).

That is why Adam is

@borovan

I know WTN is controlled so I just vote no and sometimes yes depending on how i feel. If the vote mattered I’d give it more than 1ms of thought.

I believe this cherry picked gem is from the Swiss subnet thread where it is clearly stated that with his NNS vote (8%) which actually counts, he voted yes.

Until WTN voting is adjusted, there is no point any holders voting unless you are one of the chosen few. The rest of us should just mill around like the good little sheeple they want us to be.

Several proposals have been put forward to address this imbalance, including:

• Splitting WTN into two equal voting groups: One votes ‘yes,’ the other votes ‘no.’ This approach neutralizes the risk of rash decisions by any single bloc, which, incidentally, was one of WTN’s original value propositions.

• Proportional vote casting: WTN would allocate its voting power in direct proportion to its holders’ preferences. For example, if 41% of holders vote ‘no’ and 59% vote ‘yes,’ the total voting power would be divided accordingly—ensuring every holder’s voice is represented fairly.

Anyway, enough time has been wasted replying to your meaningless drivel. We will prove our intentions and beliefs by our actions.

Grifters, scammers and general abusers of the current system, be warned.. Your time is nigh!

[volibear]

@Thyassa

Anyway, enough time has been wasted replying to your meaningless drivel. We will prove our intentions and believe by our actions.

I believe that is the purpose of their meaningless pointless conversation. To create noise and bury the signal. But its becoming obvious to everyone now.

[infu]

The absolute best ideas:

• 8.69% voting power on code proposals, handling 308 million $ in ICP, controlled exclusively by Wenzel on his home PC, who is a governance enthusiast after his full-time chemist job. With control hidden behind a bunch of people, some of whom didn’t even agree to be added, tricking users into following his neurons. Looks like waiting for a bribe a bit too much.
• Random strangers nobody has heard of running IC nodes and securing the network after providing a perforated bed sheet bill.
• Bribing people to get their voting power on the cheap, entrapping other contributors, and using their voting power as well.

Please Wenzel, tell us more about the things you like and support, so we know what has to be deleted for the IC to become great.

[wpb]

Welcome to the conversation @Thyassa. You are the more credible out of you and @borovan, so it’s nice to talk to someone who has something meaningful to say. You have frequently ignored my questions directed at you in the past, so it’s nice to have a direct conversation with you finally.

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@Thyassa

Your cherry picking is quite remarkable Wenzel.

Would you rather that I respond to every line in this thread? I could do that, but I recall you and @borovan and a few others (including DFINITY) complaining in the past that my posts are too long. I was trying to be more selective and respectful of your request. It sounds like I can’t satisfy the concern either way.

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@Thyassa

@wpb

he does not always follow DFINITY.

The entire point of having the option to follow Dfinity (or not) is rooted in the concept of free will. If all voters were required to follow Dfinity’s lead, two things would inevitably happen:

1. The system would become fundamentally centralized.
2. You personally, Synapse, Codegov (and others) would forfeit a lot of revenue streams. Why pay a grant to evaluate something if you know the result anyway?

I agree that people should have free will on who they choose to Follow or to vote independently if they prefer. I’m not advocating that anyone must follow DFINITY. I’m advocating for responsible voting and @borovan has demonstrated over and over that he is not responsible. He even brags about it on socials and the forum, which I have referenced. There is only one entity that I have seen @borovan say he trusts and that is DFINITY. Hence, if I’m advocating for responsible voting in response to @borovan who is making irresponsible choices, then of course I’m going to suggest that he simply follow DFINITY. If you want to know my opinion on Followee selection, then perhaps these two tweets I made yesterday will shed some light on it. They summarize my position reasonably well.

wpb

wpb

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@Thyassa

As for WTN voting, it has been repeatedly confirmed that the individual holder’s vote is effectively inconsequential. Their votes simply do not count in any meaningful way. Decisions are made exclusively by the 3 or 4 dominant vote holders (the exact number escapes me at the moment, though there have been numerous posts detailing this dynamic).

We can agree to disagree if you want, but I think @borovan has a significant influence in WaterNeuron and his vote absolutely does matter. The largest neurons in WaterNeuron are all owned by different people and they don’t always agree. Of course, most proposals are clearly obvious and most people do agree, but when there are controversies or proposals that require a more nuanced decision, these people do not always vote the same. Every vote counts…always. @borovan should lead by example, and that example should be positive. He shouldn’t be throwing a temper tantrum because he doesn’t own as much voting power in WaterNeuron as he wants. He had the same opportunity as everyone else to buy more voting power and he sill has that opportunity in the future. Regardless, liquid democracy is a powerful force. If he were making any attempt to offer a credible choice as a known neuron in the WTN SNS, then I’m sure more people would follow him. I encourage him to act more civilized and take a seat at the table and try to have a positive influence. He has burned a lot of bridges, but they can be rebuilt.

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@Thyassa

Until WTN voting is adjusted, there is no point any holders voting unless you are one of the chosen few. The rest of us should just mill around like the good little sheeple they want us to be.

Let’s be honest, @borovan has controlling interest in a dozen or so SNS projects. Should people in those SNS projects that are not @borovan have this same attitude? It would be a shame if you think so. We should all be paying attention to SNS governance decisions and always trying to vote with the long term best interest of the SNS in mind.

I’ve also seen you advocate for SNS dev teams having a large share of the voting power. That’s what happened in the case of the WTN team and it makes sense. There are several whale investors as well, including @borovan, which is a good thing. It’s a bit of a double standard to advocate for major VC investment, advocate for large dev team token allocations, and to hold controlling interest in a dozen or so SNS projects, and then to complain about an SNS that has a Nakamoto coefficient of 5 which doesn’t include @borovan among the top holders.

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@Thyassa let’s get real for a moment. You and @borovan are important people in the ICP ecosystem. You set an example that other people follow. If your other half is going to act like a degen nincompoop on the forum, then that gives other people the license to do the same. This forum is supposed to be a safe, professional place for people to learn about the internet computer, discuss ideas, communicate progress on projects, etc. It has turned into a sh!tshow over the last couple of months and that is because @borovan has so much voting power and influence over DFINITY. It’s time to get it under control. He is seriously eroding the credibility of ICP and turning away developers and investors, both existing and new. It’s already showing in ICP token price, developer activity, and the tone of conversation on socials.

Please stop eroding confidence in the ICP ecosystem. We all want the same thing, which is for ICP to be successful long term. Let’s work together toward that goal instead of this continual infighting. You are picking on the wrong projects and the wrong people. There is no conspiracy against you or against ICP. At the end of the day, you will have no choice but to respect the people who you currently consider your adversaries. You have voting power, but you don’t have all the voting power. None of us are going anywhere. We are all invested and have skin in the game, both financial and passion. You are not the only people who have an opinion that matters. We would all be better off if we show respect to each other instead of spending so much energy creating conspiracy theories and defending against false allegations. There are much better ways to spend our time and energy.

[wpb]

@infu

Please Wenzel, tell us more about the things you like and support, so we know what has to be deleted for the IC to become great.

Come on @infu, I still believe you have a lot of credibility, but you keep eroding that credibility with this kind of stuff. I know your livelihood depends on the support you get from @borovan, but you can balance support for him with maintaining credibility in the ICP ecosystem. You are better than this.

[infu]

@wpb

I know your livelihood depends on the support you get from @borovan

I am doing it for free. Everyone’s livelihood depends on IC’s biggest contributors. Not everyone is here, so empirical observations fail to substantiate your hypothesis.

[volibear]

@infu

I am doing it for free. Everyone’s livelihood depends on IC’s biggest contributors. Not everyone is here, so empirical observations fail to substantiate your hypothesis.

You better not get paid for your talents @infu Outrageous!

It angers me that you write thousands of lines of code and so many repositories and libraries and tools and more…

How do you expect anyone to support you making a decent living when you just open sourced DeFi 3.0 Protocol

[Mico]

@Thyassa

I believe this cherry picked gem is from the Swiss subnet thread where it is clearly stated that with his NNS vote (8%) which actually counts, he voted yes

Why would Adam vote no (which pushed the proposal to reject the vote) and then go spin up a narrative on wenzel doing that?

When wenzel voted to adopt the proposal.

This seems like a cherry picked response from you and Adam to attack wenzel and wtn.

[hehe]

Just spread the word, and debunk all of the Synapse crew’s lies.

[hehe]

You are the developer I respect most on ic, and I am glad that you can stand up from a professional perspective and do something for the community. Thank you.

[Thyassa]

How is me using both examples that were used to throw shade on Adam from Wenzel’s post and commenting on them cherry picking. You do know what it means right?

[Mico]

You avoided adam throwing shade onto wtn which prompted the response showing where adam himself voted to reject the proposal.

He can try to spin things however he wants but it takes away from his drain the swamp initiative when he posts false narratives where he was voting to harm the network.