Disclaimer: Before being labeled as echo-chamber or groupthinker, because I dare to disagree, I'm not pro/contra any coin/share and I'm probably one of the persons with the least amount of stake in bitshares compared to other projects, including some of the direct competing ones.
While I am all for competition, the fact that you are advertising your own competing products does not make your comment sound very objective even if you say you are doing so per invitation.
The very first DAC to come out will do exactly what Adam B Levine is apparently trying to create a competitor for and it's called bitsharesME and it will be released before DPoS-pts and way before bitsharesX(T).
Adam did you also provide a number of trustworthy contacts that would have been able to do what you blame Daniel Larimer for not doing? Seeing your concerns, have you tried applying for that position in the Invictus-team yourself? Talk is cheap especially if you are not doing any of the technical work yourself. Imo, you are making light of how difficult it is to find trustworthy people in this scene and I really, really hope it is only because of you being naive. Especially considering how many people are actively trying to scam the Invictus/bitshares-team already and one even successfully making off with their brand and website, which seems to be one of the driving factors of needing to rebrand into bitshares.
I've seen quite a few scammers target your platform(s) or you personally in order to catch a larger amount of people in their plans. For someone who has helped give scammers a voice in the past, you don't come across as being particularly concerned about it, nor does it seem to have made you any more humble or reserved in your statements. I've had people come up to me and boast about how they were able to mislead the stupid masses, proudly explaining in detail a number of successful strategies they pulled of in the past, and I see your platform and you personally as prime targets for people like that. So when you talk about spending funds as lightly as you are doing, that does not particularly inspire a whole lot of confidence.