GFX Labs Delegate Communication Thread

Governance
43

1 Poll Closing April 20, 2024

Request for Continuation of the Arbitrum DDA Program
Summary: This poll asks if ARB holders wish to allocate another $4,000,000 in ARB to the Dedicated Domain Allocation grants program.

Recommendation: Vote Yes. This program provides a quick path for smaller grants (15k ARB and below). Quickly deploying experiment-sized grants is important in a grants program portfolio, but we would like to see a comprehensive follow up on how all grants to date have performed in meeting their internal goals.

3 Polls Closing April 25, 2024

Delegate to Voter Enfranchisement Pool — Event Horizon
Summary: This poll asks if ARB holders support delegating 7,000,000 ARB and a 50,000 ARB administrative budget for Event Horizon, which allows users with a soul-bound NFT to influence how this 7m ARB would vote.

Recommendation: Vote No. This is an idea that has been tried in various ways in other ecosystems. In general, the results tend to be lackluster, and don’t get at the core problem of small voters not having an incentive to devote time and effort into voting decisions. There is also the paradox of whether these voters have no delegation because they simply can’t get visibility or because they are not attractive for ARB holders to delegate to. To the extent delegation to those who fail to secure their own delegations would be desirable, we would prefer it be for individuals who have an established track record of participation and thoughtfulness.

Subsidy Fund for Security Services
Summary: This poll asks if ARB holders support providing subsidies on audit services for projects selected by the Procurement Committee.

Options are:
$0
$2.5m in funding
$5m in funding
$10m in funding

NB: This is a weighted vote poll.

Recommendation: Vote 100% for “1 Cohort of 8 weeks ($2.5m funding)”. This budget provides plenty of funding for audits, particularly if participants are asked to cost share a portion of the auditor fees. If this proves to be insufficient, more can be allocated in future rounds.

Safeguarding Software Developers’ Rights & the Right to Privacy
Summary: This poll asks if ARB holders support donating to Coin Center and DeFi Education Fund to provide legal and political advocacy in the US.

Options are:

Fund with 500,000ARB each;
Fund with 750,000ARB each;
Fund with 1,000,000ARB each;
Fund with 1,250,000ARB each;
Fund with 1,500,000ARB each;
Don’t Fund.

NB: This is a weighted vote poll.

Recommendation: Vote 100% for “1,500,000 ARB each”. Both of these organizations have consistently provided meaningful support on crucial areas of US litigation and public policy. We have personally witnessed their efforts forestalling poorly written legislation and in defending DAOs in court.

Disclosure: GFX Labs authored an earlier proposal that was then included in this one.

44

1 Security Council Election Closing May 2, 2024

Security Council Election
Summary: This poll asks ARB holders which candidates should serve in the next term as Security Council multisig signers. There are six seats to fill.

Recommendation: Vote bartek.eth, Raf Solari, OpenZeppelin, Ryon Nixon, fred, yoav.eth. Most of these names are familiar and so need little explanation individually. As a slate, we feel these selections would provide a Security Council with an ideal mix of technical, security, and legal understanding, and seasoned members while also beginning to cultivate new members. There is also a representative from Offchain Labs.

1 Poll Closing May 3, 2024

STIP-Bridge
Summary: This poll asks if ARB holders support partial renewal of STIP grants, typically up to 50% of the initial request or 500k ARB, whichever is higher.

Recommendation: Vote Yes. We have mixed feelings about this proposal. On the one hand, it continues to lock in incumbents. The commitment for Open Block Labs to provide summaries of the efficacy of previous grants, however, gets us to a Yes. The goal is always to spend grants money intelligently, and that remains the primary goal. If a grant to an incumbent grows Arbitrum, then that is acceptable, even if we would prefer a more open, standardized process like renewing LTIP, which would be available to all applicants.

Assorted LTIPP Revision Polls

Summary: These polls were put up by applicants that were not recommended for a grant under the LTIP Pilot.

Recommendation: Vote Abstain on all. We feel this represents a breakdown in the process. The LTIP Pilot did not allow for reviewers to provide feedback and then have applicants adjust, as their applications were frozen once submitted. This invariably did lead to some applicants not getting grants that likely would have had they been allowed to make revisions.

That being said, applicants should have been offered a new cycle of grants to apply to. In other grants programs, it is absolutely normal for grants to be rejected the first time and then subsequently approved after being strengthened based on feedback.

What we have here, however is the worst of all worlds. Applicants were rejected, given feedback, and understandably want to try again after responding to that feedback. Unfortunately, governance has chosen to revert back to direct appeals to delegates. We don’t think this is fair anyone.

  1. This process gate keeps new applicants, who are not allowed to apply in this manner.
  2. This process deprives existing applicants from a rigorous, thoughtful feedback process like they received in LTIP Pilot to maximize the strength and efficacy of their grant plans.
  3. This process deprives governance from an organized work flow that minimizes waste and maximizes return on grants spending in the form of new users, new developers, and demand for block space.
  4. This process encumbers delegates who must now go through each application carefully, which is the very task they sought to escape by establishing LTIP.

Governance would be best served by simply tabling all of these applications and immediately renewing LTIP to allow for subsequent grants cycles to minimize delegate work load, maximize return on grants, maximize opportunities for grant applicants, and minimize governance spend once the best opportunities have been exhausted.

Edit: We voted No on GovHack at ETH Brussels. This is an inexplicably big budget and should be half this amount or less.

CC: @karel @Sinkas @coinflip @olimpio @wintermutegovernance @gauntlet @griff @dk3 @blockworksresearch

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