Hi everyone, as the representative of one of the three remaining elected protocols I wanted to share my thoughts about how the last Season went for the Programme.
I think that the overall concept of the Protocol Delegation Program is one that is needed to ensure that a disconnect doesn’t build between the Token House and those who build in the Collective. Like @jackanorak already mentioned above, the program has assisted in providing more variety of viewpoints and participants, and I think that the option of letting protocols choose a delegate would just consolidate the current structures even more, which goes against the ideas of the Collective.
Now for the harsh part: Despite the idea of protocol delegation being a great one, I believe there were a few points that limited its potential:
- Lack of protocol-significant votes in the Token House: In this season, protocol delegates only had two votes, one for suspending a delegate and a ratification of the Bedrock upgrade. I already shared my thoughts about these in my delegate update thread, but basically both of these votes did not really need input from anyone representing a protocol. This isn’t because of this season being unusually quiet, but rather because of my next point:
- Delegation of funding decisions to the Grants Council and Citizen House: Full disclaimer, as an individual delegate I am in favour of both of these initiatives. However, the decision to take these votes away from the Token House has meant that the delegation of votes of this initiative has done very little in helping Protocols have their say in the vast majority of governance decisions happening this season. The only way to have any say would be to talk personally with the members of both groups, which is a very time intensive task which might not even have a considerable outcome and won’t help you hit 70% participation.
- No significant benefits for protocol delegates outside of idealistic ones: Finally, it’s also worth noting that unless you already care about Optimistic governance, there was very little incentive to devote time and manpower to assist with governance. Protocol delegates didn’t have a say on funding either upcoming projects or rewarding existing ones, and they are the only major delegating power to be excluded from retroactive delegation rewards. Considering the opportunity cost of participating in governance, many protocols might have preferred being disqualified over spedning precious opportunity cost volunteering.
If the Optimism Collective wishes to get Protocols more actively involved, I believe these three points have to be addressed in one way or another. I personally have a couple of ideas, but I would rather let other governance members take the initiative to decide what actions could be taken. However, I think that in its current state the Protocol Delegation Programme is not ready for Season 4, especially since the Foundation will be requesting a KYC from now on from all future members, which will discourage even more protocols from participating and also introduce an additional risk for those who are.