Is the eosDAC airdrop a form of vote buying?

in eos •  7 years ago 

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:


Luke Stokes is a father, husband, programmer, STEEM witness, DAC launcher, and voluntaryist who wants to help create a world we all want to live in. Learn about cryptocurrency at UnderstandingBlockchainFreedom.com

I'm a Witness! Please vote for @lukestokes.mhth

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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.

  ·  7 years ago (edited)

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.

whereas using the EOS token to vote for a BP would create financial gains for the entire ecosystem

Can you clarify this point?

  ·  7 years ago (edited)

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.

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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?

is there a way to minimise that risk?

Maybe. We airdropped 75% of the tokens. The rest are talked about here:

In order to create an EOS block-producer that is owned by the EOS community itself, BlockMaker Ltd has allocated 75% of eosDAC tokens to be airdropped to the EOS token holders themselves. 25% of the tokens have been given to the Launch Team, Advisors, Community Supporters and eosDAC Ltd. Without their free contribution of time, energy and financial resources eosDAC would not have come into existence.

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.

Also, how do EOS holders vote for Block Producers?

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.

I am ready for more education from you. Don't expect me to understand it in one video, when it took you weeks. So I will just keep learning ;) I think I understand it, but I still not convinced. I also know that these things are more complex that one can see at first. It is good that you start this discussions with an open mind.
If you are so sure, to rise the bar so high, that nothing more than being so good is needed to be voted, which I agree very much with you, then why don't you just remove that third point, and don't distribute , and just burn them or keep them to do something else... There has to be many options to do to start with something less controversial. And maybe in the future when you have proved a good BP, and already have many votes, then you can activate that third point and distribute. But not telling that is going to be a sure thing in the future first. It is hard to change that now. If I say something stupid, don't worry, I will just keep learning. Thank you so much.

Please keep in mind the target audience for this video.

EOS is the best purchase I've done in the crypto space!!!

Hi
I am unfamiliar with the exact meaning of a voluntarist, but I will research this word. I have seen other Steemians who performed good works for the community use this title, so I am sure it is for a good purpose and honorable intent. I will vote for you for witness.

Yes this is so informative video.so thanks for share

You didn't watch a 22 minute video 11 minutes after it went live. Your comment looks like spam and spam should be flagged.

Is your comment spam?

Hello @lukestokes i read your post it's really nice content. I love it and i also love cryptocurrency. Thanks for your post.

Your comment looks like spam. Is it?

No, not at all. Why you call this spam. I am human.

Thank you for replying and proving that. :)

There are a lot of bots here that reply with generic comments without really reading or watching the videos that are shared. Since you posted quickly and this was primarily a video post, I wasn't sure.

Quite an interesting and useful content. It was an enjoyable read. Thanks for sharing

After watching your video I have one word and I agree with your opinion “decentralized”.
When it comes to EOS. If I bought it after April 15th, does it make me less of a EOS holder? I’m a bit confused about this whole air drop thing. I agree with you on vote buying as well. It’s corrupt system, just like on steemit platform. Bots get curation rewards and regular steemiens are being ripped. Hard work always gets rewarded even though you don’t consider it as a job as of now. Anyway keep up the good work, afterall I got into EOS thanks to you.

Glad to hear you got into EOS via information I shared. :)

The eosDAC airdrop is completely separate from EOS, so no, you are no less of a holder at all. That's kind of the point, actually. :) @eosDAC is a separate token which will be used for the governance of the eosDAC block producer. More on that can be found here: http://eosdac.io/

I’ve got some open Steem on Bitshare which I’ve been trying to get use in getting EOS but has proven difficult cause my exchange won’t even open and bitshare is just damn too complicated for me . I don’t understand the concept of this airdrop thing but I will definitely stay tuned for more education on it thanks

I am learning a lot. And, this helps believe me. For many (as me), an entirely new word...thanks again..

To the question in your title, my Magic 8-Ball says:

Very doubtful

Hi! I'm a bot, and this answer was posted automatically. Check this post out for more information.

Thankfully, the answer isn't up to the 8-ball, but to the token holders and voters.

That said, I do like the random answer due to my own views at the moment. :)

.

If you think there are "no ethics in blockchains" then you don't know the cypher punk history of how any of this got here or why people built it. Maybe give this a watch. It's not just about "money."

so far the best usage of the clip i have seen in my life...

...

You've given many (what I would consider) trollish comments in the past on my wall, including this comment:

Farting is very good because it smells nice but only if they are your farts.

I responded in kind this time.

I expect a full rebuttal and defense as to why Blockchains are serving humanity

Your expectations do not dictate my actions. Your comments such as this are what trolls do. I don't feed the trolls.

If you don't believe any value exists here beyond just making money, why bother commenting at all? Just go make your money and leave us alone to do our think who think differently. I sent you a full lecture to watch. Did you watch it? If not, why would I bother responding further?

.

Saying I would "fuck someone up" is not a joke I take kindly to.

"Farting is very good because it smells nice but only if they are your farts."

  ·  7 years ago Reveal Comment

This is true

The speech has been heard...one week from now my bachelors thesis has to be finished...then I’ll give it few days (maybe weeks) and then I’ll try to create a reply, thus starting a discussion (maybe:D)...you addressed so many topics that I will have to choose some of those that i have something to say about with my limited crypto knowledge but still...I love the pro-discussion approach...this shall be fun:)

If you're not in the target audience (EOS holders who are voting on block producers), you may not need to worry about it much. :)

Well I’m EOS holder and I’m eosDAC holder as well...+ you addressed plenty of interesting topics regarding crypto world + you have been encouraging us to continue the dialog:D I don’t worry about it but I love discussions:) Why did you even assume that Im not the target audience anyway:( I wouldnt waste my, nor your, time here if that was the case...

Oh cool! Being both an EOS holder and eosDAC holder (in my mind) puts you light years ahead of "limited crypto knowledge" compared to others I chat with often. I have a lot of people that follow my blog that really know next to nothing about blockchains and don't own cryptocurrency, but want to learn. I just wanted to clarify this isn't the best video for those people (though http://understandingblockchainfreedom.com/ might be).

Sorry if my comment was taken as a knock against you. That wasn't my intention. I did say "if" because I didn't know. Thanks for clarifying, and I look forward to the discussion!

Gotcha. Yea well even though I study Blockchain basically fulltime for one year already I’m nowhere close to being confident enough to say that I "understand" this whole new ecosystem, therefore I stated that I have limited knowledge (but I understand how that means very different things to different people). No worries I don’t take things personally. I was just confused since it seemed like you encourage us to have a dialog with you and then you were like "meh are you really the target audience?":D Ill share my reply here when its ready:)

I'm looking forward to it!

Informative

You think it's a good time to invest on EOS ?

Tonight, I had an interesting meeting with one of the founders of a blockchain based company here in Nashville, I have been thinking that if you have the time, we could have a conference call with them and see where you can help. They are involved in trying to lift up people from developing nations out of poverty, especially the people from the great lakes of Africa. I wait to hear from you.

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EOS is a great alternatif too

Thanks for share your complemant

Hi Luke, good considerations and it's great that you are seeking an open discussion. I wouldnt see the airdrop as vote buying since their is no direct relation between individual voting and payouts, like you and a few others have pointed out already.
But what in my view could be an issue, is that eosdac will likely need to provide monetary rewards to the core team as well as all the - i say- non-operating token holders, and this could turn into overall higher payouts needed for eosdac than with a privately owned bp and thus being potentially less efficient than other bps and only stay on top because a majority of holders benefit and continue to vote you in despite the weaker efficiency (think that's about what @ashe-oro and you discussed earlier). What eosdac would need to demonstrate is that this is not the case. just as i stumbled over @eos-socal transparency Dashboard (which i think is great, not affiliated with them):
https://busy.org/@eos-socal/introducing-the-block-producer-transparency-and-accountability-dashboard-eos-socal
For example taking their expense class pie chart, eosdac could show, how e.g the tech and administrative expenses are not lower than of other bp, but lower campaigning and community projects make up for payouts. this way you could increase transparency and demonstrate how you use rewards differently but not necessarily less efficiently or maybe better.

Everything we do will be completely transparent. Just paying more for servers doesn't guarantee a BP is more qualified than others. In some cases, it could demonstrate the opposite if they are wasting money on the wrong thing at the wrong time.

I look forward to figuring out exactly where everything shakes out as far as the BP rewards, the "real-world" server costs, the future price of EOS, and our costs as a team. From there, we'll see what eosDAC means to people. It's going to be a fun ride.

Well, it could be though we're not so sure about that yet. Right now, I just think EOS is quite good so far so to be safe, it's better to have it.

I alwys see your post and follow you.resteemit done dear

Great way to get people to vote for the project.. Airdrop tokens to everyone... I would be interested in knowing who would not vote for you seeing that you have already given the community something. Interesting.

Can I have bit of your genius brain Luke bro? 😁✊️

Hahah. Only what I continually work to give away with my content. :)

Besides, pieces of brain get messy. No one wants that. Heheh.

Also, don't ask me to paint anything. My 7 year-old can draw circles around me.

I've been tossed about concerning this. Sincerely wish I could find someone would explain the airdrop to me.

Sorry, Luke, It is perceived as vote buying by many block producers and others I spoke with. It is considered an inventive to vote for eosDAC in many forums by token holders. Legally I understand that it is not vote buying. But the problem can be changed very easy. To be very clear to the community announce that you will not pay dividends, only burn the tokens. I believe your intent is be good, the reality is different. The airdropped tokens are viewed as vote buying by a to big percentage. You can be an example DAC without it. Rhett, EOS Amsterdam