Official answers for masternode related questions
To Eximchain community members:
We have discovered that there have been inaccurate information about Eximchain masternode spread around. We would like to summarize official answers to those questions here. Please make sure to check our whitepaper and official announcement channel instead of other sources.
A. How do I set one masternode up?
The setup doesn’t require anything special hardware. One masternode requires 1000 Eximchain Native Tokens as collateral, a dedicated IP address, and ability to run 24 hours a day without a more than a 1 hr connection loss. However, having those setup doesn’t guarantee you a masternode. As we explained in the whitepaper, the 1000 Eximchain Native Token is minimal requirement to participate in consensus mechanism. You have to be voted in by the network through Quadratic Voting mechanism to become a masternode. The network will start with a few hundreds of centralized nodes and during each voting cycle, which is every month at the outset, registered voters may nominate themselves to become a masternode or nominate an existing masternode to be voted out, this will follow a Quadratic Voting mechanism to conduct the vote. In the end of each cycle, all the Eximchain Native Tokens used for voting will be equally distributed to everyone who participated for the vote. And during each cycle only one master node will be voted in or voted out. The visual UI of the voting process will be released by the end of next month. The full instructions of token conversion, KYC and vote registration will be announced closer to mainnet launch. Give it about two months of time for all those information to be released.
B. Why Quadratic Voting and why governance cycle?
We’re using a Quadratic Voting based governance mechanism to bootstrap the network and achieve decentralized voting while preventing a single group from quietly taking over the network. This is one of our key innovations in blockchain design to discourage majority collusion and build a more robust blockchain for enterprise use.
Beside the whitepaper, you can also check out our official Medium article , Forbes feature and Vitalik Blog explaining the Quadratic Voting mechanism.
C. Why masternodes? What do I get?
The design of our blockchain allows consensus participants sharing and rent of computing power amongst the users of the ecosystem. “Master nodes” are in charge of proposing new blocks and claim all transaction fees of transactions included in the block. The block rewards will vary based on the size of the network and the level of participation from everyone, and of course your own cost. The goal to introduce governance mechanism is to achieve a decentralized voting system that everyone has chance to voice themselves and show how strong their preference is while preventing a single group from quietly taking over the network. We don’t believe that there is a formula to forecast all the factors in an accurate way and we would not suggest anyone to attempt making guesses at this stage.
D. Can anyone have a masternode?
Master nodes are either voted in or voted out of consensus during each governance cycle. All the nodes have to pass KYC as well besides getting voted in and meeting the minimum setup requirement. At this moment, we’re working with our legal counsels in a few different countries to understand the jurisdiction risk. We don’t plan to include US residents at the beginning before we get a solid legal opinion. But rest assured that we’re actively working with US legal counsel on the blockers.
E. Will the one month of governance cycle be changed?
One month is the initial setup. The network can change the cycle through a quadratic vote down the line. We expect the cycle gets faster in the future.
F. Who will be the initial set of a few hundreds master nodes?
The initial set of nodes pre-configured in the genesis block. Once the governance cycle starts, this will begin to change based on the Quadratic Voting result.
G. Can I find more information about the design of your governance model and the different roles defined for Maker, Validator and Registered Voter Nodes?
Yes, you can refer to the Governance session in our whitepaper.
We hope those answers help to clarify some questions. Please stay engaged with us and receive updates through our official channels!
About Eximchain
Eximchain enables businesses to connect, transact, and share information more efficiently and securely through our blockchain utility infrastructure. Using Eximchain blockchain technology, enterprises can eliminate traditional supply chain barriers and integrates actors big and small into an efficient, transparent, and secure global network.