Meeting between Justin Sun, Korean Stakeholders, Steem Witnesses and Steem Foundation 12/03/2020
This is the raw chat log from todays meeting held in the Steemcoinpan discord tonight.
- Steemit Rep. : @justinsunsteemit
- Witnesses Rep. : @roelandp
- Steem Foundation Rep. : @guiltyparties
- Korean Rep. : @glory7
- Moderation : @jayplayco
There is no audio in this video, it was purely a text meeting (to my surprise)
[12:03 AM] jayplayco: Now that we have all Reps together I would like to welcome everybody and thank you to have the time to join this open meeting.
[12:03 AM] jayplayco: To give a short overview.
[12:04 AM] jayplayco: We would like to have the Kor. Rep. ask some key questions and would like to answer Steemit (Justin), Rep. for Witnesses and a majority for Stakeholders (Roelandp) and also the Steemfoundation (Guiltyparty) to answer that question.
[12:05 AM] jayplayco: If we find the time after the questions I would also like to have each Rep. to ask Justin a question.
[12:05 AM] jayplayco: If everybody is ok, I would like to start.
[12:05 AM] glory7: shall I begin?
[12:06 AM] jayplayco: @Justin Sun @roelandp @GuiltyParties [.com] are you ok?
[12:06 AM] Justin Sun: yes please
[12:06 AM] glory7: First of all, I would like to thank you for joining us today, on behalf of the Korean community
[12:06 AM] GuiltyParties [.com]: Yes.
[12:06 AM] glory7: there will be 3-4 questions, and let me start with the 1st one
[12:06 AM] glory7: 1. Do you agree to change the current voting system (1 steem power 30 vote) to 1SP 1vote?
[12:06 AM] Justin Sun: 시작하자
[12:06 AM] glory7: (1SP 3 or 5 votes is also an alternative option)
[12:07 AM] jayplayco: Please Justin, you may start with your answer. Thanks!
[12:07 AM] Justin Sun: TRON is 1 TRX 1 vote and it works very well.
[12:07 AM] Justin Sun: I think we can definitely explore this idea.
[12:07 AM] jayplayco: @GuiltyParties [.com] please wait for your tunr.
[12:07 AM] Justin Sun: Also we won't rush to conclusion depend on the discussion of community.
[12:08 AM] jayplayco: Ok, as far as I understood, you keep it as an option but would not decide it alone, as far as I understood as you would like to have the voice from the community on it.
[12:09 AM] Justin Sun: yes
[12:09 AM] jayplayco: Thanks a lot.
[12:09 AM] jayplayco: @roelandp May we have your opinon on it.
[12:09 AM] roelandp: Good evening Steem community, Korean community, Steem Foundation, Steemit Inc, fellow talkers. My name is Roelandp and I am representative of the Majority of the Steem Stakeholders by elected voteweight. Tonight i will try to answer any questions you might have, although I might not be able to answer everything representing the whole "Steem Stakeholders" group, but only those questions related to the stances we discussed together prior to this meeting.
[12:09 AM] roelandp: No one person can speak for the steem blockchain or for all of the steem Witnesses at once, but I will do my best today to answer and ask questions, and if anything needs more clarification then we can organize a follow-up meeting.
[12:09 AM] jayplayco: Thanks a lot and understood.
[12:09 AM] roelandp: We hope the Korean community values the newly chosen path of the Steem community which started with the introduction of the Steem Proposal System feature. This was namely a hardfork requested by community choice (and even built by community members) instead of Steemit Inc being the sole developer of and instigator of changes to the blockchain.
[12:10 AM] roelandp: As we are united for Steem.
[12:10 AM] roelandp: Regarding the 1 SP 1 VOTE specifically:
[12:10 AM] roelandp: Although interesting, we would like to abstain from choosing any specific requests by the any part of the community in order to potentially “win their vote” in the current state of situation, as we feel the community as a whole needs to decide about certain matters proposed by the parts of the community. Our mantra is the blockchain mantra: “Move slow, don’t break things”: Discuss, vote, code, test, discuss, code, test, implement.
[12:11 AM] roelandp: Thus we think it is best, to discuss, and ultimately vote on blockchain related changes through the SPS
[12:11 AM] jayplayco: Ok. understood and thanks for your input.
[12:11 AM] jayplayco: @GuiltyParties [.com] may we have your opinion on it?
[12:12 AM] roelandp: Lastly: governance and voting issues came up at steemfest and have been something that the witness Community was looking to discuss until they were derailed with defending the network in the situation we're in now.
[12:12 AM] roelandp: (sry GP)
[12:13 AM] GuiltyParties [.com]: First, I have to ask everyone to keep in mind that the Steem Foundation is a community non-profit and to remember that we are not governance but we're an advisory role that also promotes collaboration across communities and bridging. As thus, I speak today only for the Foundation and not for anyone else. In respect to the question: This is an idea that has to be thoroughly modeled before even being considered at all and can have serious problems. As thus, we cannot support any such change proposals for the Steem blockchain without a due process with the aforementioned risk modeling, reports of change management, respectable testing, and consensus amongst the existing governance which is our community-selected witnesses.
[12:14 AM] jayplayco: Ok. As far as I can see, steemfoundation does not seeing it in the moment as it is not with a due process.
[12:14 AM] jayplayco: @glory7 second question please.
[12:14 AM] glory7: let me state this first:
[12:15 AM] glory7: I was expecting a lot more detailed answers, or direct YES/NO ones. Repeating such vague, general "it depends" "we may discuss further" would be a waste of time
[12:15 AM] glory7: I expect to hear your opinion, not whether it would be the final decision
[12:15 AM] glory7: that being said, let me move on the the 2nd one
[12:16 AM] glory7: 2. Do you agree to change the powerdown period to 1 or 4 weeks?
[12:16 AM] jayplayco: @Justin Sun a clear answer on your thoughts would be appreciated.
[12:17 AM] Justin Sun: yes. I definitely agree to short the powerdown period
[12:17 AM] Justin Sun: TRON is 3 days
[12:17 AM] Justin Sun: it works well
[12:17 AM] Justin Sun: We can also collaborate with exchanges on staking
[12:18 AM] Justin Sun: Binance has supported TRON/Tezos/Cosmos staking
[12:18 AM] Justin Sun: I think STEEM can be one of them
[12:18 AM] Justin Sun: But it is important we should have a short period
[12:18 AM] Justin Sun: 13 weeks is too long for exchanges to stake
[12:19 AM] Justin Sun: also for everyone
[12:19 AM] Justin Sun: it will reduce the participation rate
[12:19 AM] Justin Sun: because people will be rather keeping liquidity in exchange
[12:19 AM] Justin Sun: than staking
[12:19 AM] jayplayco: Would be a 4 week powerdown an option as first step?
[12:20 AM] Justin Sun: I definitely think we can be shorter.
[12:20 AM] Justin Sun: But of course it depends on discussion.
[12:20 AM] Justin Sun: But most of the blockchain TRON/EOS/Tezos/Cosmos is short
[12:21 AM] jayplayco: Ok, it is understood that 1 week or 4 weeks would be both an option for you with a preference for rather 1 week.
[12:21 AM] Justin Sun: yes
[12:21 AM] jayplayco: Ok.
[12:22 AM] Justin Sun: TRON is 3 days. So we get lots of exchanges and wallets supported on staking, like binance/huobi/kucoin/poloniex
[12:22 AM] Justin Sun: we are working with more exchanges and wallets to support on that
[12:22 AM] Justin Sun: the more supports we have the better prices we have
[12:22 AM] Justin Sun: bithumb supports TRON staking recently
[12:23 AM] jayplayco: Yes, I think investors can understand that point of your view.
[12:23 AM] jayplayco: @roelandp an very important feedback here, if there would be a common ground also from the witnesses or not.
[12:24 AM] roelandp: Hi Jayplayco, thx for your input Justin, let me get the answer to question 2
[12:24 AM] roelandp: As i said, no one witness can decide on these matters by one-self.
[12:24 AM] jayplayco: Yes, that is understood.
[12:25 AM] roelandp: So... blockchain is a complex technology and so is a decentralized community, sometimes that requires complex answers :slight_smile: Especially when negotiating with a lot of people
[12:25 AM] roelandp: I understand this may sound vague.... But hey... We've been together 4 years. And did move on. Albeit slow at times, this change can be a catylist for great new things
[12:25 AM] roelandp: getting back to the 1 / 4 weeks pd
[12:26 AM] roelandp: This is not a representation of the Majority Steem Stakeholders by consensus, but rather my opinion:
[12:26 AM] roelandp: I am open to discussions to lower it further (mind you the powerdown had changed from 2 years to 13 weeks) however I want to prevent too much "fast food voting" where investors come & go and just move to steem for some botvoting for a week and move out again. I'd consider that raping the reward pool and destructive to the community.
[12:27 AM] roelandp: And I find Steem is yes ofcourse a blockchain for supporting decentralized apps like botted Casino apps and for example games which can use it to trustless run their plays.... But steem is mainly THE blockchain of REAL people.
[12:27 AM] jayplayco: @roelandp could we please focus?
[12:27 AM] roelandp: with raping i meant abusing.
[12:28 AM] roelandp: again: personally I am open to lowering the powerdown if the community desires such a thing. Personally I would not like to see stacking as an interesting business model and therefore requirement of quick power up power down...
[12:28 AM] roelandp: Because what could be the result: Exchanges running voting bots.
[12:28 AM] jayplayco: As representative of the witnesses, do you think that the witnesses would support a 4 week powerdown for a next hardfork? And a 1 week powerdown?
[12:29 AM] jayplayco: A I don't know is also ok.
[12:30 AM] roelandp: As representative of the witnesses we would like to have that being the result of community consensus through an SPS vote which has a major tendency into a decisive direction.
[12:30 AM] jayplayco: Ok. understood.
[12:30 AM] jayplayco: @GuiltyParties [.com] how is the steemfoundation looking into the powerdown timing.
[12:30 AM] GuiltyParties [.com]: This is my personal opinion as not only a Steem Foundation Director but as also the person who deals with most of the phishing/hacking here: No to 1 week, yes to 4 weeks. 1 week produces an immence risk to accounts should they become compromised. They will be emptied, including any official or exchange accounts, should they be hacked. Hacking and phishing is so paramount on the Steem blockchain that we have well over 1000 accounts currently under hacker control from phishing alone. There are between 250-500 which are hacked in addition through unknown means. 1 week is not sufficient to secure an account.
I do realize that this is something the exchanges want. However, I personally don't see a need for exchanges to power up in the first place. The only reason for this is a mistake on their part, as what occurred. I see this as a one-off incident that will hopefully not be repeated and should not be repeated as it put the credibility of the exchanges into question.
More so, what worked on one blockchain may not necessarily work best on another blockchain. See my points regarding hacking above. Steem is a blockchain that has widened mainstream audience. It is not the same as a crypto-enthusiast blockchain where the majority know best practices of wallet safety. It is also a blockchain with governance and due buy-in processes for every such alteration.
That being said, in regards to 4 weeks, this is something that has been discussed before within the community. I would suggest that for the real answer of whether this is plausible we should refer to the appropriate SPS proposal for it and look for input there from seasoned Steem developers and witnesses. But in my personal opinion and experience, 4 weeks would be an acceptable minimum providing this alteration is approached with due change management approaches.
[12:31 AM] jayplayco: Ok, the reason why we have Reps here is because they should talk as Reps and not represent their personal opinion.
[12:31 AM] jayplayco: But the issue is understood.
[12:31 AM] jayplayco: @glory7 please proceed with your next question.
[12:31 AM] GuiltyParties [.com]: The Steem Foundation is not designed for the position of proposing governance changes. Thus personal opinion.
[12:32 AM] glory7: let me put the remaining questions at once
[12:32 AM] glory7: and please state your conclusion/answer first and details later
[12:32 AM] glory7: 3. Do you agree to remove free downvoting mana or make it mandatory to specify the downvoting reason?
[12:32 AM] glory7: 4. Hot potato: Justin's witness voting rights. Justin: under which condition would you like to give up your voting rights (if you ever would like to). Other paricipants: how can you guarantee that softfork or hardfork like 22.2 would not happen again if Justin removes witness votes, according to your request?
[12:32 AM] glory7: that's it for now.
[12:32 AM] jayplayco: @Justin Sun you may start.
[12:33 AM] Justin Sun: sure
[12:33 AM] jayplayco: Thanks a lot.
[12:33 AM] Justin Sun: for 3, Yes. I agree to remove free downvoting.
[12:34 AM] Justin Sun: Free downvoting is hurting lots of people
[12:34 AM] jayplayco: Thanks that is a clear answer.
[12:35 AM] Justin Sun: For 4, we are willing to give up the voting rights under the condition everyone's STEEM should be safe on the STEEM blockchain.
[12:35 AM] Justin Sun: Including our STEEM, exchanges' STEEM, everyone's STEEM
[12:36 AM] Justin Sun: all witnesses should respect the sanctity of private property
[12:36 AM] jayplayco: Ok, this is indeed a very important point and I would like to get a bit into detail.
[12:37 AM] jayplayco: It means that you would give up your votingrights (which as far as I understood also includes the witnessess that are currenty running) when you can be sure that no Steem is going to be frozen (which would mean the safe aspect)
[12:37 AM] Justin Sun: yes
[12:37 AM] jayplayco: What have the witnesses to do be able to prove or gain the trust?
[12:38 AM] Justin Sun: I believe trust should be earned. I think it takes step by step.
[12:39 AM] Justin Sun: First step all witnesses should publish an announcement that they respect the private property and they won't freeze anyone's assets anymore
[12:39 AM] jayplayco: OK understood.
[12:39 AM] jayplayco: That would a possible step to start with.
[12:39 AM] Justin Sun: yes definitely
[12:40 AM] Justin Sun: also retract all the frozen assets codes in github
[12:40 AM] jayplayco: Ok, understood what you see as a step by step trust gaining.
[12:40 AM] jayplayco: Thanks for your input.
[12:41 AM] jayplayco: @roelandp Could you give us your insights as Rep.?
[12:41 AM] roelandp: Yes I will try... we are having a backchatter together so I hope I represent the Majority of Steem Stakeholders, at least I share this also as my opinion:
[12:41 AM] jayplayco: Ok.
[12:41 AM] roelandp: Question 3 - Free downvoting and/or obligatory reasoning.
[12:42 AM] roelandp: No free downvoting hurts every stakeholder through abuse. Reasons are good procedure but cannot be enforeced realistically (people enter blank or rubbish) .
[12:42 AM] roelandp: However...
[12:42 AM] roelandp: Reasons are UI - based, for example any frontend can make those obligatory!
[12:42 AM] roelandp: Downvotes is the base of the Steem, written to the whitepaper.
[12:43 AM] roelandp: Obviously the community should be open to enhancements in this and prevent abuse of the abuse-preventing system
[12:43 AM] roelandp: And should be open about alternative well designed model of abuse fighting...
[12:43 AM] jayplayco: So when I understood it right, downvotes should be free as now but there should be some solution implemented into the UI, right?
[12:43 AM] roelandp: lmk if this is an ok answer?
[12:44 AM] roelandp: Yes we see downvoting as integral part of fighting abuse. However it should not be abused... Then for example making "reasons"-field obligatory could be implemented in each frontend' pretty easy.
[12:44 AM] jayplayco: OK, we should move to Q. 4.
[12:44 AM] roelandp: Question 4: Softfork222 and will it happen again
[12:45 AM] roelandp: According to us it would be admirable if Tron would respect and understand the Steem community values and four years of history regarding the ninja-mine stake.
[12:45 AM] jayplayco: Please let us focus on the answer for it.
[12:46 AM] roelandp: Ok: i will share my opinion, I'm sure many witnesses can agree:
[12:46 AM] roelandp: Dpos is decentralized software. Running on a network. Anyone can run any software and it depends on the consensus of whether transactions forwarded by one's machine get accepted by another.
[12:47 AM] roelandp: I can therefore not guarantee what server or software anyone runs. Unless I make this decentralised network, centralised and run all the witnesses myself.
[12:47 AM] roelandp: But i would need a lot of stake for that.
[12:47 AM] roelandp: To vote my own computer to run the same software.
[12:48 AM] jayplayco:
I can therefore not guarantee what server or software anyone runs
Yes that is totally right.
[12:48 AM] roelandp: To summarize: because no one in an ideal Dpos chain can control any other actor, i cannot guarantee that software with same behaviour as softfork222 will not be ran in the future.
[12:48 AM] jayplayco: Ok, understood
[12:48 AM] jayplayco: I know it is very complicated and you can't actually answer with a yes no or maybe.
[12:49 AM] jayplayco: Thanks for giving a deep insight of it.
[12:49 AM] roelandp: However... the vote for the other version was by a majority rejected and at the moment as far as i can tell there is no intention of running another softfork nor the versions published by one developer on any public github repositories
[12:49 AM] jayplayco: Yes, that is also true.
[12:49 AM] jayplayco: Thanks a lot.
[12:50 AM] roelandp: yw
[12:50 AM] jayplayco: @GuiltyParties [.com] you waited long time.
[12:50 AM] roelandp: 아니에요
[12:50 AM] GuiltyParties [.com]: To question 3: No and Yes. Downvoting mana was put in place to encourage more downvoting to balance out pay. I understand that the Korean community, which has higher rewards on posts, saw stakeholders reducing these rewards to be on par with other similar posts. The downvote mana isn't the issue, the issue is the need to promote open understanding and communication. Yes. Definitely everyone who downovtes should put a reason in order to tell the person who wrote the post or comment why. This is something that can easily be done on any frontend such as Steemit without chain changes, maybe with a special field for the reason right beside the downvote button (idea!). I hope to see such a change to the Steemit frontend soon. (On a personal note, I run one of the biggest anti-exploitation/anti-abuse projects on Steem and am free to consult about downvoting as required in detail.)
[12:50 AM] jayplayco: Ok. that is a clear answer. Thanks.
[12:51 AM] GuiltyParties [.com]: To question 4: The SF happened because there was no open communication. @Justin Sun Justin, you have taken advice from Ned and that advice caused mayhem and turned the entire ecosystem into a humiliation. The Steem Foundation proposes that you opt for honest and open communication with the witnesses without any malicious side influence.
If you read the SF code, it did not touch any account and merely made the chain reject transactions that were deemed hazardous for its secure operation. If you had spoken to witnesses right from the start, potentially even before the Feb 14 announcement, and applied proper change management, I doubt we would have this circus on our hands.
Additionally, the Steemit 'stake' was always 'zoned' for development following its illicit origins, which is why the governance (witnesses and community stakeholders) allowed it to remain. This is something that should have been communicated to Justin right away upon his purchase. It was also promised by Ned and Steemit Inc to the Steem Foundation for management as a donation before. Those promises were largely lies. Everyone in this room was equally as mislead by the same party.
The Steem Foundation has no place in deciding anything to do with a SF but we can offer some contextualization as above.
[12:52 AM] jayplayco: That is not an answer.
[12:52 AM] jayplayco: hope it is coming now.
[12:52 AM] GuiltyParties [.com]: Yes it is. The Steem Foundation has nothing to do with Soft Forks but we are an observer and this is what we have observed.
[12:52 AM] jayplayco: That is true.
[12:53 AM] jayplayco: Ok.
[12:53 AM] jayplayco: It is already really late and we can see that even this kind of short questions can take a lot of time.
[12:53 AM] jayplayco: @Justin Sun do you still have a view minutes?
[12:54 AM] jayplayco: If yes I would like to start with @GuiltyParties [.com] with a question to Justin.
[12:54 AM] Justin Sun: sure
[12:54 AM] Justin Sun: please
[12:55 AM] GuiltyParties [.com]: Justin, this is based on my last point, to what degree are you still accepting input from Ned who evidently caused this entire mess?
[12:56 AM] Justin Sun: I believe this chance is more for the communication of the future of STEEM
[12:56 AM] Justin Sun: We will have dedicated team in the future to communicate with different parties in the future
[12:57 AM] Justin Sun: because of the NDA we can't talk to anymore
[12:58 AM] Justin Sun: Since now we have purchased Steem inc and all the assets with it, we can have a more comprehensive communication in the future
[12:59 AM] roelandp: Thx. Why are the sock puppet witnesses still there?
[12:59 AM] Justin Sun: because of the NDA we can't talk to anyone else at that time
[12:59 AM] GuiltyParties [.com]: Thank you for answering. Based on what you said, the NDA is now no longer an issue I'm assuming and instead of being mislead by Ned you and your team will start speaking directly to the community members and witnesses that are the governance.
[1:00 AM] Justin Sun: First of all, it is not sock puppet. Lots of community vote voted for it.
[1:00 AM] jayplayco: Ok. Thanks. I guess @roelandp has already had his question.
[1:00 AM] roelandp: oh only one. ok
[1:00 AM] Justin Sun: Also we can protect the network from being frozen again
[1:01 AM] Justin Sun: Yes Gulityparties
[1:01 AM] Justin Sun: you are right
[1:02 AM] Justin Sun: I think our plan for the next step is to have a dedicated team to discuss with different parties about their ideas
[1:02 AM] GuiltyParties [.com]: Justin, to interject, but you do realize that if you accidentally cause the actual chain to stop you will have a very hard time of restoring it. This is why communication, communication, communication and real witnesses are a must.
[1:02 AM] roelandp: I wanted to amend about the downvotes: One can remove downvotes when Steem removes the reward pool, and allow them to control fully on anyone's own smt
[1:02 AM] Justin Sun: I believe discussion breeds understanding
[1:03 AM] jayplayco: Yes indeed.
[1:03 AM] jayplayco: We may still not be there where everybody wants to be.
[1:03 AM] jayplayco: but small steps are also steps.
[1:03 AM] roelandp: When will you share the proposed roadmap for Steemit and/or Steem?
[1:03 AM] jayplayco: @Justin Sun We have now already took 1 hour of your time and I don't know if you may willing to answer a second round of questions or have to move?
[1:04 AM] Justin Sun: I have to go
[1:04 AM] Justin Sun: but really thank everyone for taking the time today
[1:04 AM] jayplayco: Could you still give ashort input about the roadmap maybe?
[1:04 AM] Justin Sun: yes. I think the most important thing is to get a team
[1:05 AM] Justin Sun: so now the most time we have is the recruit a dedicated team working on steem/steemit
[1:05 AM] Justin Sun: we have lots of progress on that
[1:05 AM] jayplayco: Sounds like you are already looking for people.
[1:05 AM] Justin Sun: also for exchanges collaboration we have some great progresses too
[1:06 AM] Justin Sun: yes teamwork is important
[1:06 AM] jayplayco: Do you have any questions to the Reps? @Justin Sun
[1:06 AM] roelandp: Justin before you go, as the Koreans and anyone really in Steem community really cares a lot about the rewards pool:
The rewards function is already being negatively impacted because of the price feed by the dangerously centralized and improperly run witnesses.
It needs to be updated on a continueous basis. Not once every 3 weeks.
[1:06 AM] Justin Sun: I think I'm ok.
[1:06 AM] roelandp: this is very important. Sorry to bring this up
[1:06 AM] roelandp: please communicate this with your tech dept
[1:07 AM] jayplayco:
this is very important. Sorry to bring this up
@roelandp This is indeed needed @Justin Sun
[1:07 AM] Justin Sun: @roelandp I will build a group with you and our team. Thanks for the input.
[1:07 AM] jayplayco: Thanks justin for that. @roelandp will get contacted from your team about that.
[1:08 AM] jayplayco: As Justin said that he is no leaving I would like to thank everybody on this discussion for their valuable time.
[1:08 AM] jayplayco: We may not have got all answers or been able to get our questions shoot out but as said, small steps are also steps.
[1:09 AM] jayplayco: Thanks @Justin Sun @roelandp @GuiltyParties [.com] @glory7 and the whole community for their time.
[1:09 AM] GuiltyParties [.com]: You're welcome and thank you for hosting this. All communication always helps.
[1:09 AM] glory7: @jayplayco , @Fredrikaa [Steempress] would like to say something. can you spare a min?
[1:09 AM] roelandp: thank you @jayplayco and @glory7 - Lets stay united and continue our discussions.
[1:09 AM] glory7: thank you very much for your time, @GuiltyParties [.com] and @roelandp
[1:09 AM] jayplayco: The room is now again free for chatting.
[1:10 AM] Mobbs: Boo
[1:10 AM] Justin Sun: Really appreciate your efforts
[1:10 AM] Justin Sun: @jayplayco and @glory7
[1:10 AM] jayplayco: Thanks for your time @Justin Sun
[1:10 AM] jayplayco: It is appreciated.
[1:10 AM] will_richards_ii: Thanks everyone
[1:10 AM] Fredrikaa [Steempress]: I just wanted to say that many witnesses have clear answers to many of the 4 questions asked. But it is difficult if not impossible to have 1 rep share them all. I would hope that each gets the opportunity to share their own stance on each issue.
[1:10 AM] dobartim: Thanks for this small and great steps in our communications
[1:11 AM] abdulmanan: @Justin Sun we love you Justin
[1:11 AM] flysky: Thank you all for participation great news and good positive changes
[1:11 AM] glory7: @Fredrikaa [Steempress] it would be nice to hear your opinion
[1:11 AM] Fredrikaa [Steempress]: Will I consider 1SP 1 vote:
Yes I am open to such a change, but I think reducing witness votes to 5 is a better idea. The end goal should be to reduce the control that 1 stakeholder has on consensus rules.
Will I consider reducing power down time?
Yes. I think necessary power down time should be as short as possible, but where the option is there to lock one's tokens for a longer, specified time if desired for improved security.
Will I support removing free downvotes?
Yes. But only after the SMT hardfork where different communities can have their own tokens with their own rules, and where STEEM is instead a utility token and medium of exchange between different SMTs. (As stated earlier, downvotes is currently needed to fight abuse, but if different communities can have it's own token, then other stakeholders may not need to worry about abuse in other communities they are not a part of anymore)
My stance on the freeze and property rights:
I absolutely respect private property. 22.2 was a very hard decision about one party's right to vote with their stake versus the community's right not to have their property on Steem irreversibly changed. It was a very special case, the first of it's kind in blockchain history. And I hope we can all learn from it to build a better and more secure chain going forward.
We needed an answer from Steemit, and an opportunity for Steem stakeholders to react to a significant change in the new owners plans for their use of the Steemit stake from previous owners. I will be happy to say that we will not run any fork that limits the rights or access to those funds when there is no longer a security threat to the blockchain.
so fucking true.
What a waste. He doesn't comprehend - or pretends to not understand - that the chain cannot be changed without consensus from the witnesses at large and so therefor no guarantees can be made.
I can't see this going well at all. He wants all these concessions but gives absolutely none in return. He wants downvoting gone, powerdowns to be in line with Tron, his stake to be given full rights with no guarantee that he won't use them to centralize the chain unless the witnesses can guarantee what they cannot. It's a poison pill.
I wish I had an answer or a horde of cash to unlock this stalemate.
For what it's worth, Justin is the one making the demands and he's asking big, making the witnesses come to him with concessions.
Witnesses / the community should reverse this tactic and make the big asks (demands) or the chain forks by a certain date, even if it's a year from now. We should put forth everything we want out of this and make him come up to our level. If we keep at this game, either an eternal stalemate or a gradual capitulation of the community will occur.
We should be pushing for what we want, not asking how we can get him to let up. We might as well be crying uncle.
Reminds me of my relationship with my daughter's mom. MGTOW is the only solution I've found, and it kind of destroys the current relationship with daughter, but allows her emotional freedom from conflict, and opportunities for more wealth / security when she's older.
Be Tron's Bitch, or Fork it.
If Fork -- then, prepare to suffer for a few years, but ultimately hope for a more resilient chain and community.
Long term conflict and stalemates just drain energy.
Justin had the right idea -- in a detached from consequence / strategic analysis sense.
Go for a coup.
If you can't coup, then you enter war of attrition, which drains emotional and financial resources from all parties.
It's the old baby and bathwater routine, mixed in with a toxic power dynamic.
Seems like the best thing to do might be to not act -- HODL and continue onward, and wear out his patience.
That makes no sense. Justin is not asking people who might one day become consensus witnesses to announce that they won't freeze his stake, he is asking the current consensus witnesses to promise not to do it.
Saying that they must give a vague answer about decentralization is bullshit. These individuals cannot promise others will not produce blocks for a soft fork that freezes his assets, but they absolutely can promise to not do it themselves. And they most certainly can announce that they would refrain from adopting a soft fork that froze his stake.
I'm not saying I'm on Justin Sun's side here, I'm just saying I'm calling out the bullshit answers.
I'm sorry, but that's untenable promise and I think that's exactly what he's asking. he wants to ensure that he can do whatever he wants, and while I believe he should have his stake, he needs to make promises to the community that he won't use it in certain ways, namely to take almost total control.
The top witnesses may be able to "promise", but like you said, that doesn't mean the rest of the community will allow it. I would for one remove my vote if the power down was reduced too much. The exchanges deserve the bed they've made and reducing the power down time too much puts the entire network at risk. That's the witnesses point when they say they can't really promise that now or ever. They can promise to try. That's really it.
I would also remove my vote if they took away the free downvotes. I was wrong to oppose them in the beginning, and have seen their use better the network overall so far.
My larger point here is that Justin is making the demands, when it should be the other way around. I've done some investigating on Tron and it's filled with junk apps overall. Nothing but gambling apps and Sun controls something like %40 of the network. There's no reason to really believe it would be any different here. With Sun being able to move exchange stake in and out rapidly, I have a feeling the same kind of apps would spring up on Steem and ruin it.
EDIT: Also, I believe that the witnesses have said they would unfreeze it so long as they could come to an agreement about what he would do with it, which he refuses to do. So...
We're on the same side, I agree with a lot you said, except for the free downvotes, I'm with the Korean community on that.
Still, I really believe the best move here is peace. We should never freeze people's stake, freezing stake by 17 consensus witnesses will result in Steem losing all respect by the rest of the crypto industry. There is absolutely nothing fucking decentralized about 17 people deciding to freeze someone's assets.
We might as well let the current witnesses state that they themselves will not accept a fork that freezes his assets. He is fine with a soft fork that takes away his voting rights! That is a big concession. We will not get that without giving something else in return.
Its time the children stop being allowed to make decisions for this chain. Business involves compromise, and we need to give a little in order to get anything. Having the current consensus witnesses announce that they won't freeze the Steemit stake is a reasonable compromise.
It can be an "if" statement involving a prerequisite, but the consensus witnesses should give him that.
Everybody needs to understand how this will go. His stake is non-negotiable. Sue Ned if you want, but he feels he cannot just reverse his deal with Ned, which means he is stuck dealing with the Steem community. He will not simply give up his stake as a dev fund. That's not in the cards.
Also, Ethereum Classic is not a fraction of Ethereum, and Steem does not have a fraction of the pull with the top exchanges that Justin does. We can get seriously screwed here. I'm talking next to no liquidity... Will you care about a crypto platform with no liquidity?
Even if you say you will, I sincerely doubt you actually will.
Agreed! "We should never freeze people's stake, freezing stake by 17 consensus witnesses will result in Steem losing all respect by the rest of the crypto industry. There is absolutely nothing fucking decentralized about 17 people deciding to freeze someone's assets." 👍
No, I care about liquidity, but I do think it's okay to banish an exchange that acts irresponsibly or one the presents a serious conflict of interest, especially Poloniex, considering Sun owns a stake in it. That exchange, plus his stake is far too much power. I can accept a little LESS liquidity if it means taking exchanges out of the staking equation. We already have other exchanges hopping on board.
I agree his Steem should be unfrozen and that we have to contend with the faults of dPOS and I can safely say that as much as the witnesses jumped the gun, Sun has blasted trust out the window by using the exchanges to vote himself into power, which is what I think he would have done to begin with. He's demonstrated that he is far less trustworthy than he proclaims. He claims to want to protect the "sanctity of private property" but is more than willing to violate EVERYONE'S if it means getting what he wants. He claims to not want to be involved in governance, but won't remove a single sock puppet.
I'll believe he's willing to give up voting rights the minute he relents on some of his sock puppets. The witnesses have already said they'd unfreeze his stake, so we need to see him act in good faith to let the witnesses govern. They've been voted in and we need to see it through with them at the helm for now.
Doubt it, most of the crypto industry seems to be behind us atm. Plus in the early days of steem we were the laughing stock of the crypto industry BECAUSE of the existance of the ninja mined stake. You can find any nunber of articles calling Ned a scammer back in 2016 and 17.
if you are ok with no downvotes you are ok with this account https://steempeak.com/@indicate just scroll a bit and look at the comments.
I have absolutely no problem with self-voting and you really should not either. Do the math and you'll realize why I say that. Ultimately Steem was designed to reward in SBD not STEEM in a healthy economy, and SBD rewards is greatly related to supply/demand of STEEM.
Buying a bunch of STEEM to stake for self-voting may be "selfish" but it is still demand that shrinks the overall supply. It would take over a decade for someone to self-vote themselves an equal amount of STEEM than they had to buy to self-vote. That means these selfish voters are paying us all in advance for the privilege.
However, the solution to self-vote "abuse" if one decides to call it that never was downvotes. The best and most effective tool for this "abuse" was the payout threshold put in HF22. The payout threshold did a lot against self-votes. Now it really required the community's collective stake to reward at a good rate, since self-voting rarely got past the payout threshold and would be cut in half.
Don't believe me? I know, I sound like a terrible heretic saying this, but the argument that all that self-voting is bad for Steem because it reduces the quality of content is wrong when you look at the numbers. Since HF22 is Steem more popular online? Nope, its less popular. Because what really draws crowds to Steem is that SBD $$$ number looking big next to everybody's posts.
Like it or not, people staking to self-vote actually increase that number and that can lead to talented content producers coming to Steem to get some of those big SBD $$$ numbers. The self-voters and the bid bots were blamed for Steem's lack of progress, but that's all bullshit. The reason Steem never went anywhere was that nobody worked hard enough at promoting Steem.
100%
but you are going on this from a point that he is losing his stake by self voting. because if he bought steem 6 months ago, self voted full for 6 months and sold yesterday he would have money invested + money from self voting. can't currently load his page to see who much he invested and how much he extracted from rewards.
His initial "investment" would be less worth only if shit like today happen, or everything crashes, or we all start to bot autovote ourselves. As long there is small % of people doing it, they profit and we are the fools for letting them do it. And yes i do agree that HF22 was a good thing to make it less effective. But again, all he has to do is set up bots and set autovote.
could be that self voting is even less effective in the healthy economy. I was getting almost nothing when SBD was really active, and we are in no SBD theritory for a long time, so i can admit i never did a real research of how all that would work.
So to sum it up:
Justin: I want you to tell me you will never freeze my funds again, to shorten powerdown time for me and exchanges, and to eliminate downvoting.
Various individuals: This is a decentralized blockchain. We can't control what anyone but ourselves will do, but [for the most part] we only see freezing funds as an emergency measure to protect the blockchain, shortest powerdown time that will work is still many times longer than you want (3 days), and downvoting is in the whitepaper but notes can be added in the UI and possibly eliminated once SMTs makes the feature redundant.
Justin: So are you going to publicly agree to this or not?
Justin's brain cannot compute decentralization. It has no meaning to him. There will never be a meeting of such minds.
I fear your right, but hope your wrong. 😭
Posted using Partiko iOS
One of the points that came up in the discussion was about how Tron and co. believe that the exchanges should enable staking and voting on their own websites.
This is unacceptable and should never happen.
It's another way for the exchanges to exercise centralized power over the community blockchain.
It's simple, if you want to TRADE then send your tokens to an exchange.
If you want a SAY in COMMUNITY GOVERNANCE you need to have "SKIN IN THE GAME" and stake directly onchain.
They're suggesting a solution to a problem that is non-existent.
I have never heard a single person from the community request this feature.
It is completely made up as it allows for influence and power by exchanges.
CZ even tweeted that this would give Binance more influence.
More disinfo coming from these corporate zombies.
exactly my take on that topic.
It is the only way of token interest he knows, combined with massive shitdrops.
That was also why he wants to increase witness rewards. In his, externally staked world, returns are given for staking but those returns come from the SR's production. The SRs actually reward for voting for then.
In other words: bought votes. Which, of course, is interesting to traders (but wouldn't be with our low interest rate alone).
It is interesting, and absolutely scary too, that for someone operating an almost feeless chain as well... he seems totally oblivious to the need for engagement.
Sounds like a reason NOT to reduce?
We want exchanges to stake?
Exactly! That would be terrible! They'd absolutely dominate the chain if they did. Say goodbye to distributed governance.
Folks need to realize that they have a boot on their collective necks and are 'coming to terms' with parties that have been holding them hostage for nearly two weeks now!
The option to decline transactions is the basis of the consensus mechanism and to thwart (or promise to thwart) that mechanism undermines the integrity of the trust folks have in the blockchain.
Anyone operating a node is free to run any software they want, so thus making promises is unrealistic as @distantsignal indicated in their comment on this post.
The big question that keeps occurring to me is: Why does Justin Sun (@justinsunsteemit) continue to fail at understanding the above mentioned items and that just because he bought Steemit Incorporated that does not magically entitle him to 'controlling' the blockchain nor influencing/disrupting its duly elected governance?
If this behavior was being done by any other company attached to a dApp that operates on the Steem blockchain...what would be the community response?
I know there are extenuating circumstances in this situation but I think that the above question is an important one nonetheless.
Waste of time.
100%
Be careful about pledging anything. Sun is trying to get presumably binding concessions in writing without having to do anything himself. Gradually chipping away the witnesses negotiation tools.
Also if the powerdown is only a week or even 4 weeks and an account should be compromised by a hacker-it would seem that freezing accounts should still be on the table to protect private property. Instead of a week before the account starts being drained by an attacker, it can be drained in as little as 12-48 hours.
You need to lock down his stake. Otherwise he'll come in and powerup again and do what he wants when he wants-including destroying the steem chain when he sees fit. Work to Substitute his steem stake with SMTs that are coded do the same thing as steem-except vote, and burn the ninja mined coins. It'll be Sun's job to find a market for his SMTs.
Freezing accounts is an inherent limitation of blockchains. It's nothing more than not processing transactions from specific accounts. While block producers can state commitments to not intentionally do so, the nature of the blockchain leaves that the only possible way accounts might be secured from freezing.
An almost unlimited array of faults might prevent transactions from being processed unintentionally. Since that's all freezing an account actually is - not processing it's transactions - there is no way to make blockchains inherently unable to freeze accounts.
The debate regarding freezing has not revealed that Sun understands this, and he may not grasp that witnesses are restrained by the nature of block production in their agreements to his wishes.
In the discussion of powerdown time, hackers are delivered more power to steal the shorter the powerdown is. Sun has just hacked the whole chain itself, and it is reasonable to conclude it is to his benefit to make hacking as profitable as possible, and his insistence on almost immediate powerdowns supports this, sadly cynical, conclusion.
While both these issues are very important, in fact the 30x weighting of stake the present witness voting mechanism creates has demonstrably centralized governance of Steem since witnesses were implemented. The issue has been vehemently prevented from being resolved for years with highly coordinated responses from the cabal benefiting from it, and remarkable manipulation of community perceptions to prevent understanding how it centralizes governance.
That reveals it's existential import to the Steem community, particularly now, after it has been used to seize control of consensus by one stakeholder with ~1/5 - 1/3 of extant Steem. It is easy to understand how 30x weighting of that stake enables complete control of governance. What is disappointing is that the legacy consensus witnesses that have heretofore benefited from oligarchical power over governance remain unwilling to fix this flaw in DPoS that threatens to completely centralize Steem today.
I have little hope that the choice between an upstart overlord and the legacy oligarchy will enable Steem to actually gain greater decentralization of governance.
Thanks!
Awesome viewpoint. It's good to see that there are down to earth people who are aware of the interest on our planet.
What is the interest so far?
So far the interest is control and less people are easier to... control and time is short so a good question might be:
This has always centralized Steem governance since witnesses were enabled. Stinc had the largest stake and therefore a compelling reason to implement this mechanism. However, the cryptic coordination of the largest stakeholders to implement an oligarchical consensus cabal has heretofore made voting Stinc's stake unnecessary - until it was sold to Tron.
It is this centralizing effect of 30x weighting of stake on governance that made the Stinc stake so dangerous, because that weighting prevented the smaller individually voted stakes from effecting the influence on governance their larger total stake represented. Because it is individually voted from many accounts, it actually influences governance less than the Stinc stake voted en masse.
This can easily be resolved by simply applying the time tested VP mechanism from ordinary voting to witness voting and setting depletion to 100% without recharge. This enables each Steem to influence governance once, and only once. User A has 999,900 more stake than User B, and would then have 999,900 more influence on governance, accurately weighting their stake on governance as a result.
However, both Sun and the historical consensus cabal benefit from 30x weighting of the largest stakes, and therefore neither wants to equalize the influence of stake on governance. In every mention of this problem heretofore those benefiting from this weighting have deflected, affected incomprehension, and dismissed discussion, thus maintaining their benefit from the mechanism by maintaining the status quo. Only now that the community sees the threat of centralization Sun's acquisition of the founder's stake represents has this issue become impossible to ignore, and actually better decentralizing influence on governance a possibility that threatens the oligarchy's extraction of the vast majority of Steem created through inflation.
I am extremely discouraged by my recent grasp of how thoroughly manipulation of the community - and of particular relevance personally, of me - has prevented greater decentralization of governance from being implemented, and the coordination that has been revealed between legacy consensus witnesses as a cabal with the largest stakeholders. The simplicity of applying VP to witness votes belies the duplicitous responses questioning the possibility of fixing the malignant weighting presently securing the consensus positions of legacy witnesses, and the flow of Steem created through inflation to the largest stakeholders it ensures.
The VP mechanism has four years of testing behind it already. There can be little question regarding it's operation and safety, yet whenever the solution is proposed consensus witnesses and relevant stakeholders retreat to puerile incompetence and make bizarre claims of complexity and unknown possibilities that might arise from applying VP to witness voting.
Overall, I am becoming convinced that a new chain that is fully distributed - not beginning with dramatically weighted influence from the outset - is the only possible solution to the dilemma that has now come to a head on Steem. I hope @theoretical is both clever enough to understand this, and intent enough on real decentralization, to undertake to implement both equitable initial distribution of influence and functional mechanisms to maintain nominal distribution in the new development they are beginning.
As a long time consensus witness, you may be aware of how these issues have impacted governance to a far greater degree than my rudimentary grasp, and I would appreciate any comment you might be willing to provide.
I appreciate that obligations and long standing commitments may prevent forthright discussion that might compromise your support from essential stakeholders for your position in the consensus. I do not intend my comments to be misconstrued as suggesting improper influence on you personally, despite appearances. I also very much appreciate your hard work on behalf of the Steem community, this transcript being but the latest example.
Thanks!
One developer making a new chain... doing what a team of developers had years of work that is not really a good beginning I think.
All chains had more then 1 developer.
It's not that he couldn't but a bit realism is in place here.
You're not wrong, but may not realize @theoretical was one of the developers of Steem originally, and that his former co-workers are mostly at large after having resigned from Stinc when Tron instituted the hostile takeover.
Just because the Sun hasn't set yet is no guarantee it won't. Nothing ever started with a committee, but new developments have always been started by an individual with a vision.
You capitalized "Sun". 😄
He got four questions answered, and he dodged each of ours.
The moderator was very biased.
Also, I noticed his questions were more like requests to fall in line. "Will you do what Justin wants?"