On the other hand, by your argument – I still don’t buy that at all – staking to single pool operators is very much “overriding the community consensus”. The “community” put almost 70% of its stake into multi-pool operations: https://cexplorer.io/groups It’s clearly “community consensus” that multi-pool operations are preferable, isn’t it? You can “read it on the blockchain”.
You said multiple times that they should “simply” put the money in a fund. I don’t know any reliable enough fund on Cardano. Do you? I already asked in the post you were replying to because then they wouldn’t have to sell their ADA. Otherwise, they would have to move out of Cardano to put it into a fund. That’s your suggestion, so, in that sense, you were saying that they should sell to put into a traditional fund and not disturb the holy “community consensus”.
Where do they “otherwise” earn staking rewards? This whole thread still has the heading: ”CF should abstain from delegating ‘their’ ADA” How do they earn staking rewards when they are not delegating?
You still argue as if “We want to support these people. How do we do it?” is the question. I very much do not think it is! Rather it is: “As ADA holder, we want to stake. How do we do it?” And there they decided to support SPOs they believe are a good choice … as every ADA holder should do it.
Your alternative
is maybe viable to avoid the constant mourning of a few SPOs.
But only maybe. It prevents the envy towards the chosen SPOs, but it still takes away blocks and rewards from all other SPOs and gives them to these private pools, it still “overrides community consensus of block production” in your argumentation (that I still do not follow).
Wouldn’t even affect the Nakamoto coefficient that much. A CF private pool group with the 500 MADA they have would end up between Everstake and Wave among the groups. The smallest groups among the largest half that makes up that coefficient have around 100 MADA, so it would maybe lower the coefficient by 4 – replacing the lowest five by one?
To ensure the organic growth of registered voting power and equitable DRep participation, the Foundation will initially abstain from delegating ada held in its own wallets to its designated DRep.
Since governance voting is analogous with stake pool voting, let’s substitute “stake pool” for “DRep”.
To ensure the organic growth of registered voting power and equitable stake pool participation, the Foundation will initially abstain from delegating ada held in its own wallets to its designated stake pools.
That settles the cognitive dissonance.
Maybe some of the influenceable humans working for CF, that have been given the power to wield the huge lump of CF Ada they don’t personally own, agree with me?
I am trying to understand CF’s reasons for some of the decisions it has made recently. I really can’t see how CF is complying with its duty to act in the best interests of the Cardano community (protocol).
This video today by Charles Hoskinson provides a bit more clarity:
I would really like to see a response video from CF.
I really want to understand why CF individual board members and employees feel it is necessary to vote CF donated genesis Ada against community consensus on staking, constitution voting, catalyst fund voting, …??? What are the precise deficiencies or problems in each of these parts of the protocol where community consensus is clearly wrong and requires urgent correction?
The Cardano protocol is founded upon decentralisation. Decentralised control is such a core value. The staking mechanism for example is how we decentralise block production. Overpowering community consensus by a centralised power swinging its genesis donated Ada however its board members feel, is antithetical to Cardano community values.
This is decentralization at work. This is what decentralized systems are like. Different groups with divergent visions and different levels of influence all pulling in direction they believe it’s best.
If everyone just fell in line with IOG or CF or “Community” that would centralize all the power.
The fact that large influential entities (and there is always going to be some of those) can and do oppose each other in Cardano ecosystem is proof of decentralization.
The moment CF, IOG, Emurgo, CEX / DEX, ETFs and community all start groupthink together, it’s over. Might as well go to Base or BNB.
Trying to conflate CF with the likes of IOG and EMURGO will not work on me. One of these is not like the others.
IOG and EMURGO are private companies and their primary duty is to their shareholders, and their shareholders ultimately own the company Ada. These private companies are free to vote their Ada in whatever way their human shareholders decide is in their best interests. These private companies are even free to vote against the best interests of the “protocol” if they so choose since they only need to act in their own best interests, and their shareholders get to decide whatever they think that means.
CF is a different beast. The board members of CF were not voted in by its stakeholders - IE: who they have been tasked with representing (Cardano community). And, CF has a duty to act in the best interests of the “protocol”. Yet CF’s enormous amount of genesis gifted Ada is getting voted by individuals that do not own that Ada and they don’t seem to be explaining very well why they are voting that Ada the way they are, nor how their voting is in the best interests of the “protocol” (== Cardano community).
Not sure if this is a reply to my comment, but if it is you seem to have completely missed the point. I was commenting on aspects of decentralization from your post above, since you brought it up. Not on any aspect of CF.
You are free to have any opinion you wish on how others should do their jobs and what their job descriptions should be.
My list of CF, IOG, Emurgo, community, etc… was used as proof of decentralization in progress. All different entities with different views moving in different direction. That is what decentralized system looks like. You may disagree on direction that some of these entities are taking, but that will always happen in truly decentralized system.
Just to reiterate my point so you can see it has noting to do with CF specifically:
And you seem to have completely missed my point. I was commenting on the power to vote however one likes.
IOG and Emurgo are separate members of the community and they can have their own opinions, agendas etc. which might move in different directions to others in the Cardano community because they are owned by free individuals who can instruct those companies to vote their Ada in whatever way those owners so choose.
CF is a different class of entity and does not have similar free will to do whatever it likes. CF doesn’t have shareholders that get to determine how to vote the CF Ada however they please. CF must act in the best interests of the protocol (== Cardano community) and they have a duty to bring the community along, which means explaining their actions to the community. CF needs to recognise and respect “protocol” values (== community values) and act in accordance with these.
Choosing a stake pool is a very subjective thing based upon each individual’s value system such as: who runs the stake pool, or what things the operator does, or what causes they donate time/money to, or what content they publish online, or how much they pledge, or what fees they charge, …
Most not-for-profit organisations charged with a similar duty to act in the best interests of their represented community will find it exceedingly difficult to ascertain just what is the consensus on certain community values because it is hard to have a poll or even identify every member. However, CF has some big advantages when it comes to something like staking because such a high percentage of the community is voting their stake keys. CF can read these votes on the blockchain every epoch. They can literally see the community consensus across the endless array of individual value based choices.
We can continue this forever. I don’t see the fundamental difference between IOG and Emurgo on the one hand and CF on the other.
They are all organisations that own ADA and can do with that ADA whatever they want however they see fit.
That one is a foundation that has to pursue a certain cause is an internal affair of that organisation as is the fact that the other two are selfish, capitalistic companies.
From the point of view of the chain they are all just ADA holders. Period.
All have some form of determining what actions they deem appropriate for how to reach their goals and it is in the end not of your or my business to tell them.
We are not entitled to any participation in their decision making, just because you subjectively interpret their goal as being about you.
Cardano Foundation (CF) runs this social media platform and in this topic I have been questioning and criticising CF’s actions.
It is important to realise that there are other community members who are too afraid to voice concerns about CF because they fear that CF might use its power against them. Whether these people are tool building pool operators seeking to attract CF delegation, or people with Catalyst ideas hoping to gain CF’s voting favour, doesn’t matter. The point is that CF’s actions are having a negative effect on culture within the community. Moreover, don’t assume the lack of commentators on this topic is a true reflection of community sentiment.
A question for CF:
Does CF intend to foster a centralised control structure where players must gain favour with CF employees in order to stand a chance of success?
