For those missing context on past discussions of coin-weighted voting in Zcash, here are some pointers.
- The previous staked/straw pol told people to compromise their privacy in order to exercise their voting rights, (and nothing was fixed in the 2 years that passed). Others concurred.
- A substantial discussion of the privacy started, but at the moment when it got into meaningful technical suggestions and criticism of these, it suddenly stopped.
Beside these privacy/safety issues, there has been critique of coin-weighted voting even in principle, and aborted (as usual) attempts to design it rationally for Zcash.
- @vbuterin’s article On Collusion
- Why coin-weighted voting is actually pay-to-vote, with a surprisingly low cost of buying votes; see also Placeholder’s How Much Does A Crypto-Vote Cost
- Why it can’t be all of: coin-weighted, permissionless and whale-resistant
- Problems with how to define the holding period in coin-holding-time-weighted voting, none of which was resolved
(Sorry for so many self-quotings, these are just the posts it was easiest for my to locate by memory. Similar sentiments were expressed by many others, on this forum and elsewhere.)
In today’s post, ECC says says:
We believe the benefits outweigh potential risks, and one of the best ways to mitigate these risks is through this crawl, walk, run approach.
Very well, the baby step already happened in July 2019. And then again in August 2019, when the same baby was unofficially but prominently consulted by ECC on allocating a ~$100M Dev Fund.
As far as I can tell, nothing has changed, it’s the same “giving ZEC holders a voice” happy-talk as last time, dismissing the many ways in which it’s misleading and dangerous. So let’s be clear: this baby has been crawling for over 2 years, and appears to have a serious developmental disorder.
So with that in mind, it’s great that ECC’s post at last calls for:
more nuanced discussions based on user feedback and engagement
Perhaps it would be good to start by addressing the issues that have been on the table for the past couple of years, awaiting that nuanced discussion.
P.S. On a personal note, my frustration with ECC’s irresponsible conduct in the above polls, and their stonewalling of rational constructive discussion as evidenced above, is a big reason for why you see me less often on this forum these days. For the sake of avoiding redundant waste of everyone’s time, I don’t intend to engage in this discussion at depth yet agin, unless the already-elaborated issues start getting addressed in earnest.