[Idea] MGRC Q&A Live Streams

Governance
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FINAL UPDATE

Please refer to MGRC Candidate Q&A Live Streams - Dates and Information for the dates/times of the sessions. This thread will no longer be updated.

UPDATE

Officially calling on @MGRC-Candidates to participate.

The following candidates have agreed to participate.

  • Souptacular
  • mistfpga
  • dontpanicburns
  • cburniske
  • LizBoomLiz
  • Vish
  • ml_sudo
  • alchemydc
  • Shawn
  • lawzec
  • decentralistdan
  • holmesworcester

I am a candidate who is running for a MGRC position. We are now 1 month away from the vote that decides which 5 candidates will be on the Major Grants Committee. I am concerned that those voting for this important position do not have the resources they need to get to know the candidates.

Iā€™d like to organize a series of live streams where sub-sets of candidates come on a video-conference call and take questions from the community. It would be helpful for those voting to get to know the candidates a little bit better in a venue other than the open community video call on Sept. 4th hosted by the Foundation (which will inevitably be crowded if most candidates attend).

Here is my initial vision, subject to changes based on responses in this thread.

  • Calls will last 1 hour long and contain no more than 5 candidates (ideally 3-4).
  • The content of the calls will focus on community provided questions that I will solicit in this forum and other places where the Zcash community hangs out.
  • A moderator will have a list of compiled questions and ask each candidate their answer. There can be rebuttals at the moderatorā€™s discretion.
  • Answers will be time-boxed.
  • Questions will be the same across calls, even if that cuts the time of the calls down significantly.

If we go forward with these sessions, I will start a new thread to announce the dates/times of the calls and elicit questions.

If you a candidate who is interested in participating please respond in this forum post and private message me contact details (Twitter DM, Telegram username, or Signal number). I will likely only collect names for 7 days to ensure we have time to schedule and run the calls before the Sept. 4th Foundation call.

A last missing piece for this is who the moderator should be. Iā€™d love to get someone who has familiarity running panels for conferences or moderating Q&A sessions/debates. If you have a nomination (or want to nominate yourself) do so in the comments. I will be providing the video conference hosting (likely Zoom) and the live stream capabilities (YouTube), unless the Zcash Foundation has a YouTube channel they would allow me to live stream to.

Iā€™d love to hear feedback on this idea.

Thanks all!

[Twitter post: https://twitter.com/hudsonjameson/status/1291503460672770050?s=20]

16 Likes
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We could use the upcoming Zeal call 8/24 for this! We can even organize a few additional calls to accommodate different time zones.

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That would be cool to use an already established time people know about. However, Iā€™m concerned that the Zeal call wouldnā€™t be long enough to accommodate all candidates answering multiple questions + having ECC host a call could be seen as a COI to some people. I wouldnā€™t personally consider it a COI, but I know others would and am thinking about it from an optics/legitimacy perspective.

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This is a really good idea, and I appreciate your effort here!

Iā€™ll ask around for moderator volunteers.

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fair enough. :slight_smile:

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Although the spirit behind the Zeal calls is to be a community space (not an explicitly ECC space, thatā€™s what we have quarterly livestreams for). I would love Zeal calls to become a place where any Zcash group (such as the MGRC) could propose an agenda and run the meeting. For example, I could see a future where the ZF, ECC, MGRC and individual community members propose agendas/ topics for upcoming months.

That is why I would advocate Zeal calls for this type of MGRC discussion (and I would love if someone else moderated). There could be multiple calls the week of 8/17 and 8/24.

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Think Zeal Call should always have an MGRC slot, even if its default setting is a summary of recent events. Theyā€™ll be controlling maybe hundreds of millions of dollars, so yeah, important.

Optics? Easily solved, the slot must always be led by an MGRC rep - doesnā€™t matter which one & Iā€™m sure they can sort that out (playing nicely together is part of their job description!)

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I think this is a very good idea. I for one have little idea whats going on with the MGRC candidates. I know some of them, but its a huge mess.

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Great idea.

Is there any chance you can have one live stream based off BST/UTC please? I found the dev fund streams pretty difficult to be ā€œon the ballā€ in because it was so late my time.

Oh I dont have a webcam, is that an issue?

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I think this is a great idea, although I donā€™t think that livestreaming video interview responses to questions is the best format for everyone. Even if we end up agreeing on the questions to ask through this process, I think it would be good if the candidates are offered the choice to respond by written answer instead (like forum post replies, as many candidates have been doing so far), basically to avoid building up an expectation that the livestreams are mandatory.

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I think this is an effecient use of everyones time and questions. Sign me up!

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Thank you for organising this! This would be super helpful, as I need to read up on a number of candidate threads still. (Itā€™ll be like watching the movie based on a book for English class. :stuck_out_tongue:)

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Iā€™m happy to participate in this, though also agree with @amiller that it should be kept opt-in with people able to choose another preferred medium to respond to community questions.

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I agree! Letā€™s make written answers a second option (or an option you can do in addition to the video call).

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Iā€™d be down for that. Maybe we can group up candidates in similar time zones.

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nice one. Thanks again for doing this.

It might be worth tagging .dropped tag.

I am pretty flexible with dates. I have a preferred timezone (bst/utc or thereaboutsā€¦). but that is about it. I will work around others requirements, if that helps you organise this. It can be a bit like herding cats.

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Ty good idea!

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Could we maybe get CAP members? or is that too much of a long shot?

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Thanks @Souptacular, happy to participate.

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I am happy to participate in whatever format folks find useful.

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