Is the eosDAC airdrop a form of vote buying?
This video assumes knowledge of blockchains, EOS, DACs, DPOS, and more, so please keep that in mind. The intended audience is mainly EOS holders who are making decisions on which EOS block producer to support and specifically those who have concerns about vote-buying and the eosDAC token airdrop.
I'm not trying to convince you to change your mind with this. That's probably not possible. I'm just sharing my thoughts as they are today. This is a very important topic of discussion (which is why this turned into a long video). My request: please don't comment with your strong opinions about my opinion (and that's what this video is, just my opinion) unless you've first done me the courtesy of understanding my opinion by watching the full video.
Yes, I know, it's 22 minutes long. I know I'm asking a lot for you to watch it all. You're free to post your own videos or discussions on your views, but this post is about my views.
Since I mentioned I'd link to it in the video, here's something I highly suggest watching, especially if you think "human nature" will always cause negative voting patterns to dominate block producer voting: Is the world getting better or worse? A look at the numbers. TED Talk by Steven Pinker.
I think the world is improving and DACs will be an important structure for managing the new world.
Stay tuned for more education and content about EOS, DACs, and eosDAC from the @eosDAC team.
Previous eosDAC related posts:
- A Big Step Towards Our Decentralized Future: I've Joined the eosDAC Launch Team!
- Reminder: the eosDAC Airdrop Happens on April 15th at 01:00 UTC!
- The eosDAC YouTube Channel Was Taken Down and We Need Your Help!
- The eosDAC Airdrop Day 2 is Underway!
I love what you and the EOSDac team are doing. Great to see you are really considering all ethic components to the DAC organization.
I still hope that my central critique to EOS is unfounded (uneven wealth distribution). What occured to me during your videos is that actually, EOSDac is the organization to prove me wrong by actually becoming an EOS BP.
Following my logic, even if you secure 99% of votes of EOS token holders, but fail to get any votes from the top 1% EOS whales, EOSDac won't be a BP. You must know you're actually competing for these positions with EOSFinex and the likes, with deep pockets. The stakes are somewhat higher than what we've witnessed with Steem or Bitshares.
So I'm rooting for you guys! Be the community champion, remain a block producer in the top 21 for more than 6 months!
Because in that case, I'm wrong and the world is in a better shape than I thought.
That sounds like a great challenge I'm certainly willing to take. :)
Okay, it took me some time to reach a point in video where I can make informed comment. I'll type as a I listen to the rest.
There is perhaps a debate that is going on POW and POS but I fail to see it as debate because for me POW represents how human beings have traditionally seen wealth (to be earned by labor) while POS represents modern aspect of money(stored wealth need not be in circulation for it to produce more).
Both are competing systems which until DPOS were seemed in a reasonable equilibrium. DPOS changed all that. The fear of concentration of wealth with time in a POS based platform is now gone because of DPOS.
Delegation is obviously the key advantage the POS needed over POW that it got with Bitshares, Steemit and now EOS. I am still learning and thus might be wrongs on some counts.
With EOS the DPOS has become even more mature and we have something that could possibly outlast all similar previous projects. The vote buying aspect............the definition of vote buying as you stated in the video does not apply to this DAC distribution. On the other hand if the team provides incentive for people to choose them - then that is a fair play in a free market. Rest would depend on how people judge the team based on their future work.
Great video, thank you @lukestokes. I don't think that eosDAC has any malintent.
That said, the distribution of EOS tokens as dividends isn't the only way that this could be considered vote buying. Dropping the tokens, thus enriching people financially, while crediting this newly found wealth to eosDAC aligns their incentives to increasing the value of these tokens by voting in eosDAC as a BP. The success of eosDAC is now aligned with the token holders. It, imo, is an attempt to persuade people to not only pay attention to, but strive for their own financial success by voting for eosDAC. It's definitely not directly vote-buying since eosDAC token holders aren't required to vote at all, for anyone, and they can still keep/sell their tokens.
Issuing these tokens directly aligned the interest of potential voters (who hold these tokens) towards the success of eosDAC. I can see this in myself. I am more inclined to see eosDAC be voted in and successful now that I have a chunk of capital that could appreciate. If voting for either eosDAC or a diff eosBPC increased the price of EOS by the same amount, but voting for eosDAC could also increase the value of my eosDAC tokens by 20%, then i'm more incentivized to vote for eosDAC
Thank you for addressing this point in the video. I know that you guys are trying to "set the bar for what is acceptable", but I think it sets a bad precedent of offering financial gains for people to support a specific BP whereas using the EOS token to vote for a BP would create financial gains for the entire ecosystem.
Can you clarify this point?
sure. Since I have 2 tokens (eosDAC and EOS), i want both of them to increase in value and have a better chance of doing so by voting for eosDAC. The DAC token could appreciate (%-wise) much more than the EOS token b/c the marketcap is so much smaller.
It benefits me much more, financially, by voting for eosDAC rather than voting for the BP that may be better positioned to increase the overall value of the EOS token price (better team, better tech, more experience, better location, etc) thus increasing the overall system's value.
Voting for a "normal" BP aligns the value to increase for all EOS holders, a vote for eosDAC skews this to potentially place the incentive to increase it's token value over the main EOS token.
tl;dr - voting for EOSNY may increase the value of the overall token (than voting for eosDAC), but voting for eosDAC could increase the value of my dac tokens moreso.
again, this is just theory and I have no proof that any of this will actually happen. Just looking at it from an economics and incentive perspective.
I had really never gotten that deep into considering it vote buying but I could see your point. I think it is still too early to tell as the EOS year long ICO was based in the concept to provide better distribution to create more balance and decentralization on the network when launched. Unfortunately, I think there is a large numbers of EOS token holders who have it for their own benefit to sell at a higher price and based in speculation instead of what it can actually achieved. It will take time after launch to see if the goals of balance will be achieved.
One strategy in business is to expect the worst thing will happen and then what is your answer? If there is some loophole then there is always someone who exploit it, period. That happens every day on Steemit as well. People have always a reason to do something which will harm their own system in the long term for a short term profit. You'd explained your position well and what you'll do. I was surprised by eosDAC tokens in my wallet and slowly begin to understand the incentives behind.
From my understanding all cases you'd explained will happen and between.. some take profit asap others like me searching for answers of the unexpected airdrops falling on my head 😉
I'm enthused by the developments on the blockchain with all the uncertainty, with the opportunity to design new governance backed by a community. In my company we also support flat hierarchies, non monetary incentivized actions for the long term success against the standard systems of the past, but.. in the end we do also expect a greater benefit. Coins and tokens are a symbol for the paradigm we live in. We collect them as form of value (voting, appreciation, cash,..)
I know it depends also on the socio-economic status of an individual how he/she behaves based on Maslow's pyramid. If someone lives in a shelter, hungry and threatened by bombs, without money to invest in something like EOS, which you cannot eat or drink then the question is how such human being will act as community member? Will he/she do things for the short or the long term? I think the answer is quite clear in 99% of cases.
I believe your long term idealistic approach is the right but it is almost eternal fight for true liberty of most people in the world. (Intentionally) Educational gaps are so huge between western and other countries it needs decades or centuries to get on par or even near.
Internet, Blockchain, DAC's are a chance to accelerate the process by orders of magnitude if not hindered.. and that's the fascination for me, eventually it cannot be stopped by a single person or organization..
Now i'll learn what eosDAC exactly is because i see a bright future for EOS.
Thanks for your efforts!
I'm not 100% sure what EOS DAC is all about but I will agree that the airdrop is not vote buying.
Unlike you, I don't think that vote buying is that bad. Even if you view vote buying as a virus, killing the virus will make the host stronger. Viruses are absolutely necessary to create a strong platform. They identify the holes so we developers can plug them.
It sounds like you're doing your darndest to bring the most value to the space. Much appreciated.
Well, "that bad" and "bad" are different. I wouldn't wish a virus on my children or people I care about. If it's my job to protect something, I wouldn't purposefully introduce something destructive to do that. Vote buying has a long history we can look at to see how negative it can be (turns signal into noise). Yes, some of it may happen anyway, but if it does, we should be working to fix it, just like we'd work to remove a virus.
I'm all about evolutionary stable strategies and I think there will be plenty of opportunities to stay resilient within the EOS ecosystem.
Honestly, I think vote buying is a natural part of Steem's evolution. It gives me the opportunity to get noticed in an environment that I was feeling very drowned out in. Vote buying allows one to artificially manipulate curation, showing that the way curation works doesn't really make sense.
Once the artificial scarcity from the Steemit trending tab is negated, buying votes will become much less relevant to exploiting the system and may even play a healthy part of the ecosystem. I fairly sure of this.
The future of Steemit will give it's users the ability to create their own filtered tabs and moderate their own comments. Buying votes will soon™ become an antiquated tool for getting noticed.
Promoting content and purchasing influence is different than buying governance votes in DPOS (Delegated Proof of Stake). I plan to do another post on vote bots at some point. I think promotion makes sense, but I think the way it's being done now, prior to Hivemind ("Communities") is quite broken. I'd prefer actual promotion much like Facebook and Twitter do (inline posts users opt in to and maybe even get paid a little to see) over false popularity.
@lukestokes this was really fascinating to listen to. You guys are leading the charge, and I love that you share your logic as deal with the ethical situations you face.
I really like the idea of EOSdac helping create other DACs. When you talked about the possibility of the launch team being voted out - is there a way to minimise that risk?
The world is lucky to have people like you fighting the good fight. This is my favourite video of yours so far.
Also, how do EOS holders vote for Block Producers?
Maybe. We airdropped 75% of the tokens. The rest are talked about here:
If those who are involved early really get it, that may be enough to keep the control and set the DNA for the DAC to thrive.
There is no easy interface for this yet, that I know of, but we'll definitely be talking about this more once the tools are available and the chain launches.
i did my best to get through this video and absorb as much as I can! It sounds like you made the right choice after some serious thought. I tend to trust your judgement thus far lol... you've been nothing but a role model for many of us. I wish i got into this a bit sooner so these terms would be a bit more familiar to me but it's never too late for me to start learning. thankyou for being such a great leader and i will continue to stick close by and learn as much as i can from you. Chat with you soon luke.
Thanks Steven. I really enjoyed your latest song. Thanks for sharing that with me.
As a team we have to thank you for supporting us by delegating voting power to us, from now on, you will appear in all our publications, to thank you for your support, thank you very much, greetings from Venezuela... We are going to grow more and more.
I hope you use it well to increase the value of STEEM for everyone.
I had genuinely in no way gotten that deep into considering it vote shopping for but I could see your factor. I think it is nonetheless too early to inform because the EOS year lengthy ICO was based totally inside the concept to provide better distribution to create extra balance and decentralization on the community when launched. lamentably, I suppose there may be a huge numbers of EOS token holders who've it for his or her very own benefit to promote at a better rate and based in speculation rather than what it could genuinely finished. it will take time after launch to see if the goals of stability will be done.