We can get the ball rolling.
- What is the timeline to stake the remainder of the ETH?
While we are not ecstatic about Foundation unilaterally choosing where to do so, it has got to be better than leaving it idle. While we were critical of the decision-making process to the first tranche was staked, leaving ~18,000 idle ETH is worse than just letting the Foundation choose a provider (or put it all with the existing provider).
- What is the timeline for governance to control its own ETH?
Leaving aside our support for quickly staking, it seems clear this not a task the Foundation is particularly suited for, eager to do, or both, just judging from it being June 2025 and only 2k ETH having been staked for yield ever.
Given the continued deteriorations in OP price, it would be very helpful to have another currency (ETH) to make grants or payments with. Even better would be a stable-asset reserve, like the ~$40m Arbitrum has built, but that requires even more empowerment of governance.
- Given recent communications signaling a shift towards minimizing governance control over the protocol and Superchain, what is the envisioned role for the OP token? Will it be given financial rights to offset that curtailment?
We are several years into this project, and governance does not control upgrades, does not control accrued revenue, does not control its own governance fund, does not control the governance contract, does not have a way to independently make proposals, and does not control even the OP token contract.
- Can we pause governance experiments?
This is referring to things like futarchy, all of the retro funding rounds, the recent attempt to institute sortition. Generally, these have all been either a waste of OP tokens or simply not impactful. The recent rejection of sortition - despite there being no organized campaign against it - demonstrates that tolerance for quirky, funky, governance experiments is at a low.
Given that the product and business plan of Optimism are in need of upgrading, instituting a detox period on political science and game theory experiments can only help everyone focus on technical and business development goals.
- (Our most important question, so if time is limited, only ask this one) We see that TVL is down (in both USD and ETH terms), sequencer revenue is down, token price is down. Everything is down. Interoperability has been only a few months away since at least the tail end of 2023. What is the plan?
Sequencer revenue (NB: June is still in progress)
OP and Base are steadily losing assets; Bera’s outflows as heavy incentives become less effective also relevant for various smaller Superchain members
Token price history
The Superchain as a product is predicated on interoperability being delivered, being safe, and being a value add to end users. That should be the focus of Labs, and to the extent governance can assist, we should. However, governance is probably well-positioned to assist with business development.
The Grants Council has tried to fill this role, but has consistently, across seasons, been hamstrung by jackrabbit pivots in goals, confusion about what the Superchain even is and who its members are, poor communication sharing between Foundation and governance (although this one improved steadily under Ryan in the last Season), and listening to signals from Foundation that we should actively support and prioritize interop when interop was not close enough to drive the bus in grants policy.
Crucially, governance is consistently denied the tools, freedom, and funding it needs to be a meaningful partner in the growth of the Superchain. A farmer that leaves half his field fallow cannot expect a full harvest.
Tasks that governance should be empowered to pursue, rather than blocked:
- Building a stable-asset reserve (GFX Labs has a lot of relevant experience)
- Payments in currencies other than OP, like ETH or stables
- Deciding whether to continue retro funding or repurpose the funds
- Payment for services that is not OP locked for 12 months
- Flexibility in financial allocations, such as:
- offering interest-free/low-interest loans
- grants that vest governance with future equity or token rights from the grantee
- offering guarantees that secure loans from other financing sources
- Forgivable grants (grantee repays if revenue materializes, forgiven otherwise)
- Matching grants (grantee has a milestone tied to other fundraising)
These are simply top-of-mind suggestions, some of which have been floated before in various channels. They are offered as evidence that “What is the plan?” comes from a place of many members of governance having a wealth of suggestions on how to improve the financial and strategic position of Optimism, as well as the capacity to execute on those suggestions with minimal burden on the Foundation or Labs.
Outside of where governance can assist, how are chains like Base and World going to be firmly tied to the Superchain and Optimism? We see that many of the chains with DeFi TVL have still not committed fully to joining the eventual interoperability set.
It would be a terrible rebuke of the Superchain thesis to see the strongest or fastest growing members ultimately choose to remain independent, or even start their own competing superchain ecosystem. Presumably there is a plan to firmly tie these chains to Optimism irrevocably?
Finally, we would be remiss if we didn’t emphasize that “What is the plan?” includes not just product adoption but businsss plan. We know we have disagreed in the past over whether sequencer revenue share alone was viable longterm viable strategy, and feel that time has only strengthened our view. It would be wonderful to know as part of this answer, whether sequencer revenue is still the primary business case to stabilize the finances of Optimism.
