I totally agree with the idea of using rolling snapshots and average them out throughout the season instead of a one time snapshot.
With blockchain tools, we may also be able to recreate the average voting balance of the delegates for the past season too If I am not wrong…hope that is adopted
Seems really unfortunate, but I don’t think Optimism Gov should retroactively change the recipients of the Retro Rewards when the list already has been published. That would create a really bad precedent.
However I do think it would be worth to consider whether a rolling snapshot might make more sense moving forward.
Even better, in my opinion, however would be to reconsider the criteria altogether. I don’t think it makes sense that we reward the Top100 Delegates, but then half of them are inactive & thus ineligible, which means that at the end, we end up with only 50 Delegates actually being rewarded.
I propose to change the eligibility criteria to encompass the Top100 active Delegates. This is also something which I think can be retroactively implemented without it harming anyone as it only expands the number of eligible delegates and doesn’t remove delegates (as would happen when one were to retroactively change the snapshot date).
Maybe this change would also mean that @mastermojo would be eligible after all? (I don’t know if he just dropped down to rank #101 at the snapshot date, or if he had no tokens delegated to his address at all)
EDIT: I just checked the data, and it does appear that if we were to change the criteria to include the Top100 active delegates,@mastermojo would be eligible. I think this would be a healthy change overall, because unfortunately the majority (!) of the delegates in the Top100 are inactive. This also makes it a lot more challenging for new delegates to get even within reach of being eligible for rewards, and maybe is one of the major reasons for the lack of new delegates here in the Optimism Collective.
I’m sorry to hear that happened to you. I experienced something similar during Season 5. Despite being an active top 100 delegate for 99% of the season, I moved some funds towards the end, which unfortunately coincided with the snapshot timing. I chose not to raise a complaint, knowing it would likely be futile, but it’s clear to many of us that these incentive structures are flawed and susceptible to manipulation, as highlighted by @Jrocki’s example.
I’ve shared some recommendations in other threads on how these issues could be addressed, and I hope the feedback is considered to improve the incentives system for the next season.
May I suggest adding more information relating to the claims process in the original post?
With new participants via the guest voter stream (myself included), this season’s eligibility list is presumably full of people who will be claiming rewards for the first time. My concern is that a lack of clarity surrounding how or when to claim rewards serves to increase the community’s vulnerability to phishing attempts.
After reading the original post and filling out the linked deform (entitled Season 6 Retro Rewards Claim), I was under the impression that a claim and KYC process would be presented. This was not the case, (unless I missed something?), and reading the replies on season 5’s post led me to the impression that I could likely expect an email sometime in the future.
An addendum added to the original post that provides some idea of what to expect might be in the best interests of participants- and with that, information on how to verify the integrity of any communications.
Apologies if my lack of clarity is a symptom of having missed something. It does happen!
Hi All! Julian from the Foundation here.
I wanted to provide an update on our reward distribution system.
We’re collaborating with @v3naru_Curia to analyze the potential implementation of time-weighted rewards for participants who maintain top 100 positions throughout the Season. This is a change the foundation is considering for only Season 6 and beyond, as rewards have yet to be delivered.
While we’re still evaluating the data to make an informed decision, I’ll ensure to keep everyone updated on our final approach through this channel.
On a related note, I’m pleased to announce that the first distribution of Season 6 Retro Governance Participation Rewards is scheduled to begin as early as next week.
Thank you for your continued engagement and feedback.
Hi @swartz
We have provided additional information on the original post based on your feedback.
Thanks!
Perfect- thanks and very much appreciated!
Would this reward be some kind of ‚bonus’ in addition to the existing rewards?
If not, I’m a bit concerned about changing rules after publishing an eligible participant list. While the current system is not perfect, this has to be changed moving forward, and not retroactively. I don’t think it makes a difference whether rewards have already been distributed, or only the list has been announced.
In any case, this expands the Overton window of acceptable changes in governance, which seems troubling.
It’s not that this isn’t a good change. In fact, I believe it would make a lot of sense to have rolling snapshots, but that has to be implemented carefully.
Three potential solutions:
Implement time-weighted rewards/rolling snapshots retroactively for Season 6 (and beyond), but grandfather in all currently eligible delegates. Already eligible delegates (as published on Google Sheets) remain eligible for Season 6 Retro Rewards, regardless of rolling snapshot results. This should affect at most 5-10 delegates.
Implement rolling snapshots starting next Season.
Modify criteria from top 100 delegates to top 100 active delegates, which could be be done in addition to implementing rolling snapshots. It can also be retroactively implemented (but doesn’t have to be) because it doesn’t harm anyone, but only expands the number of eligible delegates.
This is fair pushback. But let’s not forget that this is retroactive funding. It’s not a salary.
Building on the previous comment, the rules weren’t known to participants. And are also at the discretion of the Foundation for measurement.
As long as no one goes from getting rewards to being excluded from rewards, we support the Foundation’s willingness to investigate what it would look like to use a season-wide measurement window for eligibility, rather than relying upon a single snapshot at the end.
They were known to participants in so far as that this has been the way it has been historically handled in all previous Seasons, and there has been no communication indicating that this would change.
But we can ignore this point, and we still have an eligibility list that has been published and changing the eligibility now, which would likely see some delegates not getting any rewards, or less, seems not fair.
I think you agree with my suggestion on a - if it needs to be - retroactive implementation of a season-wide rolling snapshot, but also honoring the already published eligibility list? For this Season only, one could for fairness reasons just add all delegates to the eligibility list that would qualify under the season-wide rolling snapshot (which would include @mastermojo), and also have everyone who would now get rewards receive them even if the new eligibility measurement would remove them.
Or, alternatively, as I proposed we could also expand the eligibility from the top 100 delegates overall to the top 100 active delegates, which would not only have Mastermojo be eligible, but also a lot of other positive externalities. This could also be done in addition to the season wide eligibility measurement.
Mastermojo, by the way, is currently ranked #102, which would see him in the upcoming Season 7 not getting any rewards. The only sustainable way here to have him and many other active delegates be rewarded with a high degree of certainty, would be to finally move towards having the top 100 active delegates be eligible, and not have the ~60 inactive delegates in the top 100 block others from becoming eligible for rewards. This seems like a huge mistake.
This is my personal opinion and does not represent the Govnerds, the Grants Council, or any other group I participate in.
Someone with a proven (onchain) track record of being a top 100 delegate and participating in the votes during the entire season should be eligible. Honoring the eligibility list as it stands prioritizes exclusion over rewarding a delegate’s genuine governance participation, which contradicts the purpose of retroactive rewards.
There is no evidence of “a lot of other positive externalities” resulting from the current approach. This appears to be an isolated issue caused by a single snapshot on a single delegate, which could have been avoided with a more equitable system like rolling or per-vote snapshots.
The claim that “this has been the way it has been historically handled” is incorrect. Snapshots have historically been taken on each cycle, as stated in voting cycle roundups at the beginning of the voting round. The announcement for this round explicitly mentions a snapshot “as of November 20th,” which is a variation from the stated rules. It’s inaccurate to say participants “knew the rules” when the rules were not consistent with prior practice.
Rewarding meaningful participation requires systems that reflect actual engagement.
I agree with that. But with the caveat that we should honor the eligibility list only insofar as we should not have any delegates be worse off than before. This commitment can be kept while, yes, we should add new delegates (like Mastermojo) to the eligibility list through a new season-wide rolling snapshot/or similar.
Adding new delegates is fine, even if it retroactively changes the rules, since there is no victim. But no to removing delegates that would be ineligible for rewards if one were to change the criteria, because they for example had just been ranked at #105 throughout the Season, and then at end of the Season did get into the Top 100 and thus became eligible.
In the next Season Retro Rewards one would only have the rolling snapshot criteria, and this is a one-off special occasion to not have to remove delegates unfairly from the eligibility list that was already announced.
I apologize if I chose my words badly, as I never wanted to be misunderstood as someone not wanting to reward Mastermojo and others for their obviously great work.
I think this is a misunderstanding? I referred here to positive externalities in changing the entire eligibility criteria from the Top 100 delegates (which actually is only 40 delegate, because the remainder is inactive) to the Top 100 active delegates (where one would go as far down in the list of delegates until one had found 100 active delegates with >75% voting participation).
This also seems to be a misunderstanding? The Retro Rewards in Season 4 and 5 both were given out to delegates via taking one snapshot at the end of the Season. But again, I do want to have Mastermojo be eligible and preferably by not having any delegates suddenly receive nothing even though they possibly had read the Google Sheets and filled out the Form already, only to then have their rewards removed.
Hate to be that guy, but the exact same thing happened to me last season, and no exceptions were made for me. Changing the rules now would come across as unfair and suggest favoritism toward certain delegates. It could also open Pandora’s box by setting a controversial precedent. As I mentioned earlier, the incentive criteria definitely needs to change, but it should happen next season—or, if changes are made now, they must be applied fairly across the board.
Is this from a DM? Not finding it under Curia or your own profile when searching comments in May.
We would support correcting this consistently.
This isn’t changing rules. It’s improving the measurement. We don’t think most people had thought about this or were aware it was an issue. Particularly after it already came up in your case, this feels like it was an oversight.
Now that people are aware, this seems like a very solvable problem. We have snapshots at several points in Season 6: July 18, August 7, August 28, September 1, September 18, October 9, October 30. And then whenever the final snapshot used for this rewards list. That’s eight different data points to build a time-weighted average from.
So let’s wait and see what happens after the Foundation takes a look:
It’s in the season 5 thread:
This is great news! Much appreciated Julian 
It wasn’t a DM; the post and reply were made in the Season 5: Retro Governance Participation Rewards thread.
Thank you! It appears to be unlisted on the forum. Presumably to avoid confusion when the Season 6 thread was published.
FYI to @lavande and @Maxwell that this makes the comments unsearchable.
We should think about a way to keep the old threads searchable, since the forum is an important historic record. Maybe threads could just automatically lock after 90 days of inactivity? I think you can set different limits by category, too, so not all posts get auto-locked. That way the posts are preserved in public, but if someone got confused about which Season the announcement was from, they’d get a hint to doublecheck the date and title of the post.
Open to other suggestions, but that seems like the least work on forum admins.
Hi All!
Thank you for the thoughtful comments and discussion around this.
We had curia run the numbers of how rewards would change if we did a weighted average over the course of the Season. The aggregate impact was 7500 OP and therefore we don’t think it’s appropriate to change the methodology for Season 6. However, we will change the methodology, implementing a weighted average for Season 7 and beyond.
In terms of providing rewards for the top 100 “active” delegates, delegation is a free and competitive market and this issue should be addressed via initiatives to make the top 100 more reflective of deserving delegates rather than extending the qualification criteria beyond this set.
Ultimately, participation rewards is something the Foundation would like to transition to the community in the near future and these are important questions the community will be responsible for navigating when this transition occurs.
I believe this is a reasonable and fair suggestion.
