Dear Vahid @ADA4Good thank you for your input,
I hope it will provide a good spark for further discussion here. I must admit I was not aware of your linked visual tool until now. Nice work. I will try to breakdown my thoughts in regards to your contribution:
- The poll took place before the Voltaire era, and there is no established formula to decide the votes. Therefore, it remains undecided whether we should consider stake-based results, number of SPO votes, number of delegators, amount of pledge, or a combination of these metrics. Any arguments based on using one or a combination of these metrics overlook this fact.
- Even if we knew which metrics of the poll results would determine the outcome, there was no quorum to decide if the poll could be used at all.
- Additionally, there were no threshold rules in place to determine when a certain outcome would prevail over others, like requiring K=1000 to have x% more votes than K=500.
I agree wholeheartedly here, the vote worked well technically but very few guidelines (if any) had been provided regarding the interpretation needs after the vote.
I must say I was not expecting the amount of participation that we saw: the number of voting pools amounted to nearly 800. Referendums get passed with as little as 50% of voters voting, so whether this is a quorum or not would have to be determined based on how you count the total number of pools. Do we count the total registered? Do we count the ones which have minted at least one block in their lifetime? Further, as others have pointed out, this good participation might struggle to be maintained if voters feel like their votes were for nought.
However, the case for increasing K was not as straightforward. The poll results did not show overwhelming support for this change from all aspects. Moreover, there have been multiple compelling arguments against increasing K, which I personally support. I provided an elaborate and quantitative analysis to illustrate why increasing K might not be the obvious choice. You can find the analysis on the forum here:
Your visualisation of the effects of k changes is quite something: A visualization of Pools and effects of K=1000 and everyone should be encouraged to take the time and have a look. Nevertheless, like all analyses, it contains an inherent bias once interpreted. This is not a criticism, merely an observation coming from someone who’s livelihood has been scientific research for years. The bias is human, as we often bend data and stats to align with the question we are asking. To your credit you did acknowledge the potential for bias in your write up.
I won’t go into MPO vs SPO at all, but consider k as what it represents and has the potential to do to the network. It’s effects naturally assume redelegation, absence of further pool splitting and many other human behaviours which are hard to predict. However, I think just because affected (only from the perspective of becoming oversaturated) pools are fewer than non-affected ones, this does not mean it would be an change without value. Your tool shows 139 pools would be affected, which is a pretty large number.
Further, as k determines the saturation level of pools, it follows that its value represents the ideal number of saturated pools. Given that currently more than 1000 pools have minted at least one block in their lifetime, IMO k should be set at 1000 in one go, as it is not a parameter that likes to change gradually (every time one changes it, delegates have to do something). This has been illustrated quite well by domain experts:
https://iohk.io/en/blog/posts/2018/10/23/stake-pools-in-cardano/
https://iohk.io/en/blog/posts/2020/11/13/the-general-perspective-on-staking-in-cardano/
https://iohk.io/en/blog/posts/2020/11/05/parameters-and-decentralization-the-way-ahead/
Looking forward to your thoughts, with love and respect 