Governance Meeting Notes Mega-Thread

Secret Governance
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I agree. Consensus was price of the moment you go to chain

1 Like
23

Will add it to the notes

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Abstract Additional Meeting (15/10)

  • The discretionary budget consists of community funds to be spent to further the committee and the community. It’s risky if you don’t immediately switch to USD for USD costs. These calls should be at the discretion of the proposer / lead, but should be explainable to the public and be transparent.
  • One hard to define issue is where does the committee stop? What is in-scope and what is out of scope? If we limit it to just what is in the proposal or charter it becomes too restrictive. Make the decisions in the moment that you feel are necessary but explain those expenses if asked for. It should be explainable to the public and be transparent.
  • People with different backgrounds might value contributions differently, but all contributions are valuable as long as they help the community. Putting this into guidelines for a ‘Secret Network Charter’ with suggested pay-rates is very hard, but we should get input form the entire community to take steps forward with this.

Full Notes:

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Abstract

  • A new infrastructure proposal (‘the Spartan proposal’) is on the forums to increase the number of nodes of the community API. This proposal is centered around physical hardware.
  • Ownership of public good hardware should be further discussed if it continues to increase in the future.
  • Consensus seems to have formed that all spend proposals should be based on USD values at the time of submission with a 20% increase for potential swings. If at the end of the vote the value of the received SCRT is 10% lower than the original ask (in USD), a second spend proposal would immediately be ‘approved’ for the difference.
  • Discretionary budgets spending / conversion to stable coins really depend on the specific proposal, for some spends it will be important to immediately convert to a stable coin, for others (paid in SCRT) it might not be necessary. In the end it is the responsibility of the proposer(s). Mismanagement should be taken into consideration for future proposals.

Action Points:

Full Notes:

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Abstract

  • Technical contributors that are already relayers for IBC have seen the discussion and it seems like they are going to take care of (most of) it.
  • People would support a bigger ask from Figment, to make sure our infrastructure is up to par.
  • The Spartan Proposal (#55) is a very close vote, make sure to cast your votes!
  • We should talk to each other, not at each other, and not use loaded language. There’s always going to be some infighting in decentralized systems, but we have to work with each other. We all agree that our goals are the same, namely what is best for the network.

Action Points

Full Notes:

2 Likes
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Abstract

  • IBC upgrade scheduled for November 10th, signalling proposal is currently on chain.
  • The Spartan Proposal (#55) was rejected by a very slim margin (no: 50.26%; yes: 49.51%). This was the closest vote in SCRT governance history, 82 million SCRT cast their votes either directly or indirectly, a 25% increase from the previous record.
  • It’s up to the individuals engaging in the toxic behaviour on Telegram to invoke the positive change we all want to see. One-sided ‘Infographics’ do not support constructive and respectful discussions.
  • Consensus seems to be that ‘receipts & payments’ requests should be limited to committee discretionary budgets. This could be included in the ‘Secret Network Charter’. Previous Awareness Committee proposals can act as examples.

Action Points

Full Notes

Notice

Next week’s meeting (2021/11/10) will likely be dropped due to the IBC upgrade. Due to DST ending, upcoming meetings will move to 16h00 UTC.

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Abstract

  • The proposal for initial incentives on SCRT pairs on Osmosis is currently live and should end tomorrow. The forum post on the SCRT forums is about external incentives. Once the initial proposal is passed, then we can put up a proposal for them matching the external incentives.
  • NGine, schultzie, and cryptocrew amongst others are going to run relayers. Priorities are osmosis, cosmos, sifchain, and terra. If you’re interested in running relayers, contact schultzie for an invite to the relayer telegram room.
  • Using a 10% volatility buffer would result in roughly 1 in 10 spend proposals that could go back to the chain (10% below original ask). Without a volatility buffer this would become roughly 1 in 4. Support for 10% seems strong, and will move to the forums for further feedback.

Action Points

Full Notes

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Abstract

  • The Secret Foundation Q3 Transparency Report will be presented December 8th during the governance call at 16h00 UTC on Discord. They will try to get the report out before the meeting, but no guarantees can be made.
  • Now that IBC is live we returned to the topic of gas fees, gas usage has improved with the update but our fees are still higher than other Tendermint chains. Data will be accumulated during the next week to determine what the costs of running relayers are. Systematic solutions won’t be available in the next couple of months so reducing gas fees could mitigate this. If we decrease gas fees we should probably decrease it in steps and not reduce by x20 in one go. An additional aspect is allowing other ibc tokens to pay for gas fees, currently every validator can decide for themselves but perhaps this should be a chain parameter? This is a very delicate subject as it directly impacts tokenomics. It is possible to make the fees in other tokens more expensive than the scrt fees.

Action Points

Full Notes

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Abstract

  • Next week (Dec 8th, 16h00 UTC) the Secret Foundation Q3 Transparency Report will be presented during the weekly Governance call.
  • Large decrease in relayer fees. Partially due to the gas amount reduction, but also due to gas fees. There are a couple more external relayers, should stabilize us more over the next couple of days.
  • The education committee will go to the chain next week, this time also focussing a little more on the process behind dev educational material. Creation of learning paths for potential new secret network developers, making routes (front / back end / NFTs / other contracts) to guide them in their interests.

Action Points

Full Notes

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Abstract

  • The Secret Foundation Q3 Transparency Report was presented by Tor, SF strives to send out the TR 6 to 8 weeks after the end of quarter. This time it was delayed a bit due to events and projects for which they apologize.
  • Fiat (USD) expenses are now also included in the TR. All spends will be higher in Q4 and in Q1 2022 they will be higher again, SF is trying to grow operations as the chain grows, both for the full-time team as well as contractors.
  • SF is looking to expand in-person events in major cities with large blockchain communities across the world, similar to the Secret Beers Chicago event. Anyone in the secret agent program that has proven they have alignment and knowledge of the network will be qualified to lead up one of these local meetings.
  • Probably before the end of year the SF and SCRT Labs roadmaps will reveal the strategic vision for 2022, with its own really cool branding.

Action Points

Full Notes

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Abstract

  • The SF 2021 Q3 TR is now available: Secret Foundation Q3 Transparency Report
  • Signalling proposal 67 aims to reduce fees ~20x. This is a non-binding proposal and the ‘high’ fee would probably need to remain at its current amount to allow validators that don’t change to continue proposing blocks.
  • As a result of spend proposals changing from SCRT to USD as base denomination, a drop of more than 10% in value of their ask (excluding volatility buffer) at the end of voting was suggested to be allowed back on-chain for a small proposal to make up the difference. In case of committees and other time-based proposals an alternative solution could be to reduce the funding period by that percentage. In case of the education committee this would most likely result in the next proposal going on-chain 7 to 10 days earlier. If you have strong feelings either way, please leave your feedback on the forums (Education Committee Funding Proposal (Dec 21 - Feb 22)).
  • Increasing decentralization is a continued point of attention, the Shade snapshots had a noticeable positive effect. As Secret Network grows decentralization will most likely also improve. Staking derivatives, different rankings, and a new system for team delegations could all help improve decentralization.

Action Points

Full Notes

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Abstract

  • Reaching quorum was more difficult for the last couple of proposals, but it does not seem like a recurring problem at this time. Voting turnout seems reasonably stable for similar proposals.
  • The first ‘major’ (naming t.b.d.) monthly SCRT Governance meeting will likely be arranged at the end of January 2022 to increase the reach and attract attendees that usually can’t make the weekly meetings.

Action Points

Full Notes

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Abstract

  • BizDev aims to create separate proposals for certain aspects of BizDev. Thereby give the chain options regarding the topic it would like to see action on, instead of an all-encompassing basket.
  • The upcoming Awareness proposal aims to trial a new agent platform thereby streamlining the backend and giving additional options to the secret agent programme.

Action Points

Full Notes

35

Abstract

  • The Validator Survey Report is released on the forums. The CCBL signaling proposal will most likely hit the forums this week with the Secret Network Charter and Code of Conduct following a week later.
  • The first ‘major’ governance meeting is provisionally set for the last meeting of January (26th of January) at the normal timeslot (16h00 - 17h00 UTC). The aim is to get as many parties as possible into this meeting that are involved in SCRT Governance, a lot of them do not have the time available to join weekly meetings. A monthly meeting could keep them up to speed and involved in governance.
  • There are a few committee lead openings in the upcoming weeks / months, specifically education and international growth. Reach out to Jordan or Patrick at SF if you are interested in stepping up and contributing.
  • How does the community feel about long-term funding for projects through the Community Pool? This topic was brought up again in relation to the Community API long-term sustainability, please add your thoughts to the forum thread.

Action Points

Full Notes

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Abstract

  • SCRT Labs has recently released their Delegation Strategy for 2022, all validators should carefully read the blogpost.
  • Due to the increase in staked coins percentage (currently ~55%) the apr has gone down slightly. Rough estimations suggest the effective apr might lower to ~21% in the next weeks if we approach a staked coins percentage of ~63%. Ideally we keep effective apr above 20%, this seems to be the case for the foreseeable future so immediate action is not required.
  • A discussion regarding a minimum validator commission percentage has surfaced again, initial discussions suggest that there are at least some supporters and that it would be fairly easy to implement. However, further discussions are required and will occur amongst others in governance calls.

Action Points

Full Notes

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Abstract

  • Next week will be our first ‘major’ Monthly Governance Meeting on Wednesday January 26th from 16h00 - 17h00 UTC. All parties involved or interested in SCRT Governance are invited and encouraged to join!
  • The best moment to consider increasing the MaxValidator parameter would probably be after the next hardfork.Depending on performance improvements, 100 might be in the cards. For now 70 seems good.
  • The idea of a minimum validator commision was raised again by one of the validators in the 2021-Q4 Validator Survey. One of the main advantages seems to be that it would shift competition on the basis of higher returns to competition on the basis of added value. One of the main disadvantages would be that new validators have less ways to set themselves apart. A new discussion thread has been created on the forums and welcome everyone’s thoughts and discussions.

Action Points

Full Notes

38

Abstract

  • 110 community members, amongst whom at least 15 validators, attended the first monthly Governance call on Discord. Going forward, every last Wednesday of the month will see the Monthly Governance call at 16h00 UTC, in addition to the weekly governance calls.
  • An increase in short surveys sent to the validators seems more popular than increased use of signaling proposals.
  • Preliminary dates for the Secret Foundation Transparency Report are Feb. 9th or 16th.

Action Points

Full Notes

39

Abstract

  • Developers have freedom to give their own twist to an approved CCBL project in their proposal, as long as it is in the spirit of the approved project. Each proposal is judged on its own merits, and proposals can of course also be made outside of the CCBL.
  • Feedback from the community is wanted in setting the inclusion parameters for validators on the staking whitelist of the Shade liquid staking product. By selecting the right rules, hopefully good behavior can be stimulated.

Action Points

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Abstract

  • The Education Committee and Support Team proposals are both being discussed on the forums. Edu has Ertemann and SeanPop as new leads and the Support team is expanded with Ertemann and Waffle to improve coverage. Education will now include a subcommittee ‘agents of the round table’ in their discretionary budget. IGC will go to the forums next week.
  • The individual addresses that voted on proposal #72 more than tripled from the previous record to 4690, including 40 validators! Great to see such a massive increase in governance participation. For the Secret Agents, participation in on-chain governance is covered by mission V-12 - Support Democracy.

Action Points

Full Notes

1 Like
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Abstract

  • The first proposal resulting from an approved CCBL idea has been placed on the forums. This proposal aims to create a reference implementation for fractionalized secret NFTs.
  • A Developer Committee charter and proposal has been posted on the forums by Gino. He has several plans to attract more developers to the ecosystem.
  • The community and developers would like to improve communication between SCRT Labs and the community. Ideally by means of regular (monthly or quarterly) updates by SCRT Labs where they answer community questions, for example related to upcoming upgrades.
  • The Secret Foundation Transparency Report is delayed a little because something came up, more information will be provided with the release of the TR. That may be the 23rd of February, but no guarantees can be given at this moment.

Action Points

Full Notes