Optimism Special Voting Cycle #12a
Special Voting Cycle #12a
This cycle features five active proposals spit into the Protocol Delegation Program Renewal and four Collective Intents. The Carnegie Mellon Governance Team reviewed each submission, noted the additional information provided in the comments of the discussion page, and discussed the benefits and drawbacks of each proposal until concluding how to vote. Below you will find our voting decision along with our reasoning. Please don’t hesitate to contact blockchain@cmu.edu for any questions, comments, or concerns about our evaluation process.
By: Emma Kwan, Ram Potham, Victor Rodriguez, Tanay Venkata, Khushi Wadhwa
Protocol Delegation Program Renewal
https://gov.optimism.io/t/protocol-delegation-program-renewal/5883
Voting: AGAINST
Reasoning: The Protocol Delegation Program aims to recognize important stakeholders and allow them to participate in governance because protocols, as the proposal puts it, “value having a voice in the development of the ecosystem.” However, 60% of eligible protocols, which were delegated tokens, did not participate in governance and were subsequently disqualified from Season 4 token allocation. Although protocols may have perceived last season’s voting proposals as relatively uninteresting (an Optimism upgrade and a delegate suspension), they are given two seasons to participate in voting. Therefore, protocols lack interest in protocol governance participation, and we do not believe the current requirements to be eligible for the Protocol Delegation program benefit Optimism.
We agree that giving a 1.25x multiplier to Optimism native protocols and ongoing participants in the Protocol Delegation Program is a strong idea. These multipliers further incentivize protocols interested in Optimism governance. Some changes that the Optimism Team should consider are delegating tokens to protocols that participate in forums, discussion, and governance even without tokens. This change shifts the governance power from prominent protocols distant from the ecosystem’s well-being to active community members.
Only 12 out of 23 participating protocols provided feedback for Optimism governance. Lavande stated that the primary reason protocols did not participate was a lack of clarity on how to add value and time constraints around other obligations. Asking protocols to create a branch in their team for governance, having the Optimism governance team ping these deadlines to protocols, and funneling more time into protocol governance isn’t a reasonable allocation of resources or tokens.
Therefore, we will be voting against this proposal at its current stage.
Collective Intents:
Collective intents lay the groundwork for the entire community to align for directional goals. These are near term targets. The following proposals outline these intents and budgets.
Intent #1 Budget Proposal — Progress Towards Technical Decentralization (1M OP)
Voting: FOR
Reasoning: This is necessary for the community to have valuable input on the direction of Optimism and ensure that the mechanisms in governance are inherently correct by reducing vulnerabilities. It is also the collective’s highest priority.
Intent #2 — Council Intent Budget Proposal — Innovate on Novel Applications (6M OP)
Voting: FOR
Reasoning: We believe this will be important for onboarding projects and applications useful for humanity. We agree with the high delegation towards this.
Intent #3 Budget Proposal — Spread Awareness of the Optimistic Vision (1M OP)
Voting: FOR
Reasoning: We have to spread awareness to attract more aligned users and builders and create a “brand name” as an ecosystem for public goods and regenerative finance.
Intent #4 Budget Proposal — Governance Accessibility (3M OP)
Voting: FOR
Reasoning: Optimism governance should be easier to understand for aligned users, and it should be more transparent to the general public, so we agree with this proposal.
LINKS:
In order of Collective Intent Proposals
- https://gov.optimism.io/t/collective-intents/5874#intent-1-progress-towards-technical-decentralization-2
- https://dev.optimism.io/decentralization-roadmap/
- https://gov.optimism.io/t/draft-season-4-council-intent-budget-proposal/5925
- https://gov.optimism.io/t/council-framework-and-renewal/5884
- https://gov.optimism.io/t/collective-intents/5874#intent-3-spread-awareness-of-the-optimistic-vision-4
- https://gov.optimism.io/t/collective-intents/5874#intent-4-governance-accessibility-6
