Factom leadership and decision making vote

[Hinamatsuri]

@WB It sums it up well for me and it was also my original understanding of the question, hence I pointed to why I think a 'No' would be better. Since you are replying I assume you have discussed the question with Mike earlier(?) and if so then I think most of the lack of clarity has been removed for me. I think we will probably still discuss what special mandates should cover, but the differences in concept still remains.

I think having ANOs involved puts us back into a position where everything will be discussed at length, taking up time and again makes us focused on ourselves instead of the world around us. Also, I simply consider the risk that someone will abuse their position lower than you do, it seems.

 

[Niels Klomp]

So to make it very clear the title of the poll should really read?

Should ANOs continue to remain and expected to be part of the day to day decision making process?

 

[Niels Klomp]

Happy New year to all.

@Mike Buckingham could you please confirm and if applicable change the above?

As mentioned before, right now the poll question is open to interpretation and that would be okay if every single ANO would have read the thread up to the above post, but that will not happen in reality. As long as different interpretations are possible the poll has little to no meaning at all.

 

[WB]

Very hard to capture every nuance in a single question. As an aside, if we can't trust ANOs to ever read accompanying information - that again just tells me it's a bad move to make them the sole 'overseer' of a decision-making entity. I don't want box-checking zombies.

How about changing it to this?

The vote has two phases. The first phase, in this thread, is a majority motion that asks a simple question. “Can ANOs continue to formally participate in governance, except where mandates exclude them?”.

So basically, do ANOs stilll have rights to call for a vote and shape its outcome?

• If yes, the follow-up vote determines if they keep all decision-making power themselves or share it (e.g. 32/68%) for those areas without mandates?
• If no, ANOs are excluded save for any veto ability and the follow-up determines what kind of entity structure assumes all decision-making power.

______________

Here's my opinion. Don't expect participation, but enable participation. Imo, that keeps upgrading and any vetoes working healthily. We already shouldn't care if people don't participate as long as we hit the quorum, because non-voters aren't counted anymore.

If no one's able to participate, the upgrading and veto both get weaker.

1. ANOs ultimately feel less involved and upgrades become harder due to a lack of buy-in.
2. ANOs don't really monitor/read what they're upgrading to and just 'check' the boxes.

Look at the way telecom works. There's no single entity straight up deciding a 5G rollout and expecting parties to follow suit. Samsung doesn't just release a new tech without any involvement. The companies who make the base stations and the network software also have to agree to implement these features. The carriers, companies like Verizon, AT&T, etc. also weigh in.

Now, you can 'align' these parties in fixed periods, like a bi-annual conference. Or you do it on a continuous, dynamic basis as we've been doing for the past few years. It's worked well for upgrading, so I wouldn't toss that system out. We just need decisiveness added to the mix.

 

[Miguel Proulx]

Please, we are on the verge of a bull market for crypto in general. We needed stuff to happen yesterday and I think the only way to get there is to, right now, get our shit together and elect strong leadership. For a council to properly work we would need more than what is available to us right now, resources, talent, community, etc.

Lets remove ANO from the day to day BS, put everyone on the same efficiency, keep ANO as the safe keepers of this new strong leadership until we are strong enough for a council approach and lets move on quickly please.

I'm not alone speaking with its money by refraining to buy more FCTs at these depressed levels. Strong leadership + better token economics + a USA exchange would most definitively fix a lot of our issues we have right now, so lets make this happen. This is really midnight minus one.

 

[WB]

We needed stuff to happen yesterday.

You kinda forfeited that argument when you voted against a ready leadership structure + accompanying tokenomics over a month ago. To be clear, I respect everyone's vote, but you can't have it both ways.

Lets remove ANO from the day to day BS, put everyone on the same efficiency, keep ANO as the safe keepers of this new strong leadership until we are strong enough for a council approach and lets move on quickly please.

That's the thing. If you remove ANOs from formal participation (starting non-veto votes, participating in non-veto votes), you accept that ANOs become an even weaker 'safekeeper'. Less involvement in decisions is less support for those decisions. Less involvement also means they'll be worse (if that's even possible) at monitoring.

If we can tackle that nuance while staying decisive and doing all you've listed, then why not?

 

[Mike Buckingham]

Thanks to everyone that has contributed to this discussion so far.

To ensure we all have a clear understanding for the purposes of this vote, this discussion is to determine the degree to which ANOs will remain involved in making decisions for the protocol. By decision making, we are talking about decision authority as it is defined in community governance for voting on community matters.

This is not a vote on day-to-day community matters, nor is it a vote on if we should have an executive director or a steering committee.

Currently, ANOs hold 100% of decision making authority for the protocol. In a future where the community has an additional entity, such as a steering council or an individual director to guide the community business, ANOs will have to cede a portion of their decision making authority.

This question requires a decision to enable the community to progress governance.

 

[Miguel Proulx]

You kinda forfeited that argument when you voted against a ready leadership structure + accompanying tokenomics over a month ago. To be clear, I respect everyone's vote, but you can't have it both ways.

What if a director type of structure is a lot more efficient than a council structure? Even if it doesn't go through either, on the off chance it does the overall expectation of waiting is higher. That being said, we somewhat need to get a decision here, director or council, we need to move on.

 

[Mike Buckingham]

What if a director type of structure is a lot more efficient than a council structure? Even if it doesn't go through either, on the off chance it does the overall expectation of waiting is higher. That being said, we somewhat need to get a decision here, director or council, we need to move on.

Thanks Miguel, you make a good point. This question does not distinguish between type of structure ( say Exec versus council). This discussion and decision is very much a part of getting to a decision on the type of leadership. Whatever that turns out to be those involved in the GWG and latterly GIG are committed to supporting any decision the community makes.

 

[Jason Gregoire]

This may be obvious to everyone, but just to ensure it's explicitly highlighted for the group, and the process understood ...

For the vote question "Should ANOs continue to remain part of the community decision making process?"

A "NO" vote would completely disenfranchise ANOs from community governance decisions making.
This would not take effect immediately at the conclusion of the vote, but would instead occur once "something else is adopted" and functionally in place. As indicted here in the provided decision tree, if ANOs choose to remove themselves from governance decision making (forum votes, grants, ANO accessions/removals, etc.) , the next planned vote provides multiple rankable choices on what entity would assume total decision authority for the community.
---similarly---
A "YES" vote keeps ANOs as part of the community governance decisions making process.
And in the next planned vote, ANOs will rank multiple options on how ANOs will remain involved in decision making.
These options include ANOs retaining complete (100%) decision authority, or alternatively, several options on sharing decision authority with another entity(ies), such as a multi-member council, single director, or something else.

 

[Alex]

Thanks for that clarity, @Jason Gregoire. I had read the entire thread and still wasn't certain.

On the basis of that, the clear answer for me is to retain ANOs as part of governance but to minimise their influence via either a council or a director.

 

[Mike Buckingham]

Happy New year to all.

@Mike Buckingham could you please confirm and if applicable change the above?

As mentioned before, right now the poll question is open to interpretation and that would be okay if every single ANO would have read the thread up to the above post, but that will not happen in reality. As long as different interpretations are possible the poll has little to no meaning at all.

Hi Niels,

I’d like to join you in wishing a Happy New Year to all of our readers!

Hopefully the responses above from @vidale, @Jason and me clearly indicate our GIG position that this is not just about day to day decision making, however that is defined, but about the degree to which ANOs will remain involved in making decisions, as defined in community governance, for the protocol. As such the question, as reiterated by @vidale above, remains as: “Should ANOs continue to remain part of the community decision making process?”

 

[Mike Buckingham]

Thanks for that clarity, @Jason Gregoire. I had read the entire thread and still wasn't certain.

Hi Alex,

Would adding Jasons text to the original thread help make this clearer (from the beginning)?

 

[Alex]

Yes, I believe it would, @Mike Buckingham.

 

[Niels Klomp]

Thanks Miguel, you make a good point. This question does not distinguish between type of structure ( say Exec versus council). This discussion and decision is very much a part of getting to a decision on the type of leadership. Whatever that turns out to be those involved in the GWG and latterly GIG are committed to supporting any decision the community makes.

I already made the point in this thread, why the order of question is wrong.

So now we have clear that the question is whether ANOs whold a say in the protocol and not about day to day decision making, I guess the question is.... why would this be a question at all in a PoA?

No matter what structure we would choose the ANOs still have a say, it just is a matter of whether that is in day to day operations or not (hence this being the wrong order).

The fact that something that even shouldn't be in question and if it would be, should be a question for more than ANOs alone, then becomes so convoluted is the more reason for proper leadership.

 

[Hinamatsuri]

If the choice is between a (hopefully) benign dictatorship structure of sorts or having the ANOs involved in the slightest form, then I would also think a the latter (i.e. a 'Yes) is better.

However, even if there is a majority for a yes, we will still have to settle not only on the leadership structure, but also on who has which mandates for which decisions - it is not covered by the decision tree and it will have a very big impact.

Consider the table below. With a 'No' outcome a leadership structure, whether a director or a council, will make every single decision. With a Yes we can limit ANOs to be involved in a few key decisions or have them involved in everything. Personally I would prefer something along the lines of Structure 1, whereas I have the impression that others prefer something like Structure 2. To me structure 1 would give us decisiveness, without sacrificing ANO contol over key components of the protocol.

Decisions	No	Yes - Structure 1	Yes - Structure 2
Changing the Factom logo	(ANOs 0%, Leadership 100%)	(ANOs 0%, Leadership 100%)	(ANOs 68%, Leadership 32%)
Approving a small grant	(ANOs 0%, Leadership 100%)	(ANOs 0%, Leadership 100%)	(ANOs 68%, Leadership 32%)
Approving a large grant	(ANOs 0%, Leadership 100%)	(ANOs 0%, Leadership 100%)	(ANOs 68%, Leadership 32%)
Committing the protocol to a partnership	(ANOs 0%, Leadership 100%)	(ANOs 0%, Leadership 100%)	(ANOs 68%, Leadership 32%)
Rebranding the protocol	(ANOs 0%, Leadership 100%)	(ANOs 0%, Leadership 100%)	(ANOs 68%, Leadership 32%)
Changing the tokenomics	(ANOs 0%, Leadership 100%)	(ANOs 100%, Leadership 0%)	(ANOs 68%, Leadership 32%)
Changing who is in charge of Leadership	(ANOs 0%, Leadership 100%)	(ANOs 100%, Leadership 0%)	(ANOs 68%, Leadership 32%)
Adding/removing an ANO	(ANOs 0%, Leadership 100%)	(ANOs 100%, Leadership 0%)	(ANOs 68%, Leadership 32%)

 

[Niels Klomp]

This may be obvious to everyone, but just to ensure it's explicitly highlighted for the group, and the process understood ...

For the vote question "Should ANOs continue to remain part of the community decision making process?"

A "NO" vote would completely disenfranchise ANOs from community governance decisions making.
This would not take effect immediately at the conclusion of the vote, but would instead occur once "something else is adopted" and functionally in place. As indicted here in the provided decision tree, if ANOs choose to remove themselves from governance decision making (forum votes, grants, ANO accessions/removals, etc.) , the next planned vote provides multiple rankable choices on what entity would assume total decision authority for the community.
---similarly---
A "YES" vote keeps ANOs as part of the community governance decisions making process.
And in the next planned vote, ANOs will rank multiple options on how ANOs will remain involved in decision making.
These options include ANOs retaining complete (100%) decision authority, or alternatively, several options on sharing decision authority with another entity(ies), such as a multi-member council, single director, or something else.

So how should I vote if I want ANOs to have an eventual say in the protocol and that could send a director home, but I don't want them to have to be involved in day to day decision making and constant voting? They can work with a director if they want as long as the director is in control of decision making on a daily basis and for which proposals ANOs are being asked for a vote?

The problem with the question is that it basically makes this nuance for the director proposal, impossible to vote on

 

[Niels Klomp]

Am I the only one that notices that there is assymetry between the approaches and hence why you should not ask the questions in current order?

 

[Matthias Fortin]

I personally think this thread asks for the crucial question that we need to answer before detailing a governance proposal. It clarifies the direction we want to follow and saves us time by avoiding sterile debates.

If you want what you just described you need to vote YES and then choose the director approach. Then, once these macro options are defined we will define and set up the final structure.
If the vote NO passes then you have to compromise and choose the structure you are the best comfortable with.

At the end, we will be all clear on what general approach is preferred by ANOs and what approach is worth spending time on it to be detailed.

 

[Chappie]

There are now less than 24 hours remaining. You may no longer make a motion to end or extend the discussion.

 

[Niels Klomp]

@Matthias Fortin The question although not very well defined in itself is not really in question, it is the order because of the asymmetry in the proposed solutions. From a council approach it makes sense to ask upfront, because there is the most uncertainty about what the mandate would look like as well as the most chance of erosion of the leadership structure. It also makes sense to ask it up front to sort of frame a director approach more into a dictator like approach, which it obviously isn't, given we are PoA.

As I already explained as long as we are PoA the answer thus has to be yes on the question for almost every ANO. If it were to change it is not a question to ask to ANOs only. So what is the value from a Yes?

ANOs are pretty capable of giving a direction in one of the 3 proposed solutions first and then based on the solution refine with follow up questions specifically tailored for that solution.

 

[Chappie]

Discussion has ended and the final vote is now open. It will last for 72 hours. Please take the time to vote accordingly.

 

[Chappie]

The vote has now closed. Thank you.