Mumble Session Highlights
I tried to post this a few hours ago but the forum was offline.
On 10/18/2014 bytemaster started this thread: https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php?topic=10148.msg132495#msg132495 (https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php?topic=10148.msg132495#msg132495) relating his initial proposal for a merger. Two days later Ander started this thread: https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php?topic=10214.msg133796#msg133796 (https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php?topic=10214.msg133796#msg133796) to summarize the merger discussion as of 10/22/2014.
At the end of the mumble session today I offered to document what I perceive is the majority consensus on some of the issues, but it is by no means a comprehensive summary of all of the points discussed in the session. Gamey always does an excellent job of that. My primary objective is to help document what appears to be points of consensus concerning the proposed merger. Upon reflection and a second listen of the entire session, I don't believe I have much of a consensus to document. Nevertheless, perhaps this post may help clarify some points for someone.
Translation of Existing Stakes Into BTS Shares
From what I have seen in the forums this week, the issues around what position each stakeholder of [AGS | BTSX | DNS | PTS | VOTE | MUSIC | etc.] will have in the new BTS ecosystem constitutes the majority of the contention and concern. No surprise there.
I was quite surprised however that no discussion of this took place in the mumble session. My personal take, given the large number of forum posts discussing this is:
- Either the majority of the community is satisfied and thus has reached a consensus
- None of those dissatisfied were present in the mumble session
- Those who were dissatisfied and present chose not to raise their concerns
As I think through the issues I read on the forum, I realize there are several aspects of the merger besides how a given stake will transform into BTS shares, such as how PTS will vest in BTS over time, will those vehicles continue to exist after the merger and how will they be represented on the exchanges, what market caps will be used to calculate investment values and issues about liquidity.
Since none of this was discussed at all in the mumble session, I tried to go back through the forum posts to come up with a concise position transformation formula, but I cannot, there is too many discussions and too many elements to factor in, at least for me.
Although much discussion was posted about the relative portions of AGS, BTSX, DNS & PTS etc to BTS It's not exactly clear to me when I see a statement like "7% AGS, 7% PTS, 3% VOTE, 3% DNS and 80% BTSX" what that even means. Percentage of what? If I have 1000 shares of PTS does that mean I get 70 shares of BTS? Is it a percentage of each funds market cap or of BTSX's market cap? It's very difficult to understand these discussions when so many elements are assumed or scattered on different threads.
Bytemaster was asked if DNS would be the same after the merger or if it would be a bitAsset. He said BTS would allow auctioning the domain names for bitUSD, but did not know the auction specifics.
Bytemaster also stated that PTS and AGS would not end but will continue on; they are not bought out or retired, contrary to his original proposal. Though PTS and AGS will continue to exist, he will no longer have any interest in them to divide his time and loyalties. But when asked if AGS would only be used for BTS "because they were bought out", he said yes. He also said that it's up to the shareholders of Music or Vote or other DAC team to decide whether to be a part of BTS or operate on their own separate blockchain, it wasn't his decision to make.
A summary of the current proposal should be stated for each of the entities in this ecosystem without ambiguity. Issues such as the vesting schedule and market cap should also be stated. But you'll have to wait for someone more capable than I at summarizing the forum discussions. When I asked Bytemaster when a more formal merger description would be forthcoming he tentatively said next week.
Chinese Community
There was considerable time given to address issues from the Chinese community, as well as discussion about marketing efforts to them. Concerns were raised that individual efforts from the Chinese community were not being recognized or compensated. Bytemaster said he trusts in Bo Chen but would like to see more transparency and disclosure of how the funds he has provided are being spent.
It was stated early on in the session that we should all be aware of the language barrier and difficulty the Chinese community has in participating in the session, and to make an effort to speak more slowly. There were several people present helping with the translation in real time.
Some questions were posed by the Chinese community about the metrics for evaluating performance. Bytemaster responded by discussing what Brian Page was working on and the difficult position he is in. He related how pleased he is about the new, unified BTS and how Brian had been asking for it for quite awhile now. He said Brian's pay and that of the entire marketing staff are dependent on market cap growth, as it doubles.
They would get 10 - 20 million BTS shares if they are able to bring BTS' market cap up to match bitcoin's.
Bytemaster was asked about the model of how new developers would be added. He responded by saying anyone wishing to become a BTS developer should demonstrate their value, how they will work with the team by fixing bugs or implementing new features. He feels it would be bad to hire someone with unproven skills.
The BTS Roadmap
After the merger a BTS marketing push slated for this December with a rebranded client, everything merged in with their vesting stake a working voting application or voting booth. IN early 2015 "KeyGraph" will be an important focus (aimed at vote validation / certification). After that the long term plan is to create a scripting app to compete with Etherium. The goal is to be able to create any other DACs without the need for continual hard forks. After that the focus will become specific appliations such as auctions and others TBA.
BTS DAC Structure
A number of questions related to the company structure and accountability to shareholders were raised, and bytemaster responded by saying the future direction would be to migrate developers into elected delegate positions and have their work rewarded by that model as opposed to being paid through I3. He emphasized that AGS funds would be invested into the growth of the BTS "superDAC" and it's staff.
When asked about revealing individual staff member pay bytemaster said they have avoided doing that to protect privacy, but salaries as a group will continue to be reported for I3. Bytemaster said that tying delegate pay to bitUSD would be very complicated.
Mumble Session Highlights
I tried to post this a few hours ago but the forum was offline.
On 10/18/2014 bytemaster started this thread: https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php?topic=10148.msg132495#msg132495 (https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php?topic=10148.msg132495#msg132495) relating his initial proposal for a merger. Two days later Ander started this thread: https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php?topic=10214.msg133796#msg133796 (https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php?topic=10214.msg133796#msg133796) to summarize the merger discussion as of 10/22/2014.
At the end of the mumble session today I offered to document what I perceive is the majority consensus on some of the issues, but it is by no means a comprehensive summary of all of the points discussed in the session. Gamey always does an excellent job of that. My primary objective is to help document what appears to be points of consensus concerning the proposed merger. Upon reflection and a second listen of the entire session, I don't believe I have much of a consensus to document. Nevertheless, perhaps this post may help clarify some points for someone.
Translation of Existing Stakes Into BTS Shares
From what I have seen in the forums this week, the issues around what position each stakeholder of [AGS | BTSX | DNS | PTS | VOTE | MUSIC | etc.] will have in the new BTS ecosystem constitutes the majority of the contention and concern. No surprise there.
I was quite surprised however that no discussion of this took place in the mumble session. My personal take, given the large number of forum posts discussing this is:
- Either the majority of the community is satisfied and thus has reached a consensus
- None of those dissatisfied were present in the mumble session
- Those who were dissatisfied and present chose not to raise their concerns
As I think through the issues I read on the forum, I realize there are several aspects of the merger besides how a given stake will transform into BTS shares, such as how PTS will vest in BTS over time, will those vehicles continue to exist after the merger and how will they be represented on the exchanges, what market caps will be used to calculate investment values and issues about liquidity.
Since none of this was discussed at all in the mumble session, I tried to go back through the forum posts to come up with a concise position transformation formula, but I cannot, there is too many discussions and too many elements to factor in, at least for me.
Although much discussion was posted about the relative portions of AGS, BTSX, DNS & PTS etc to BTS It's not exactly clear to me when I see a statement like "7% AGS, 7% PTS, 3% VOTE, 3% DNS and 80% BTSX" what that even means. Percentage of what? If I have 1000 shares of PTS does that mean I get 750 shares of BTS? Is it a percentage of each funds market cap or of BTSX's market cap? It's very difficult to understand these discussions when so many elements are assumed or scattered on different threads.
Bytemaster was asked if DNS would be the same after the merger or if it would be a bitAsset. He said BTS would allow auctioning the domain names for bitUSD, but did not know the auction specifics.
Bytemaster also stated that PTS and AGS would not end but will continue on; they are not bought out or retired, contrary to his original proposal. Though PTS and AGS will continue to exist, he will no longer have any interest in them to divide his time and loyalties. But when asked if AGS would only be used for BTS "because they were bought out", he said yes. He also said that it's up to the shareholders of Music or Vote or other DAC team to decide whether to be a part of BTS or operate on their own separate blockchain, it wasn't his decision to make.
A summary of the current proposal should be stated for each of the entities in this ecosystem without ambiguity. Issues such as the vesting schedule and market cap should also be stated. But you'll have to wait for someone more capable than I at summarizing the forum discussions. When I asked Bytemaster when a more formal merger description would be forthcoming he tentatively said next week.
Chinese Community
There was considerable time given to address issues from the Chinese community, as well as discussion about marketing efforts to them. Concerns were raised that individual efforts from the Chinese community were not being recognized or compensated. Bytemaster said he trusts in Bo Chen but would like to see more transparency and disclosure of how the funds he has provided are being spent.
It was stated early on in the session that we should all be aware of the language barrier and difficulty the Chinese community has in participating in the session, and to make an effort to speak more slowly. There were several people present helping with the translation in real time.
Some questions were posed by the Chinese community about the metrics for evaluating performance. Bytemaster responded by discussing what Brian Page was working on and the difficult position he is in. He related how pleased he is about the new, unified BTS and how Brian had been asking for it for quite awhile now. He said Brian's pay and that of the entire marketing staff are dependent on market cap growth, as it doubles.
They would get 10 - 20 million BTS shares if they are able to bring BTS' market cap up to match bitcoin's.
Bytemaster was asked about the model of how new developers would be added. He responded by saying anyone wishing to become a BTS developer should demonstrate their value, how they will work with the team by fixing bugs or implementing new features. He feels it would be bad to hire someone with unproven skills.
The BTS Roadmap
After the merger a BTS marketing push slated for this December with a rebranded client, everything merged in with their vesting stake a working voting application or voting booth. IN early 2015 "KeyGraph" will be an important focus (aimed at vote validation / certification). After that the long term plan is to create a scripting app to compete with Etherium. The goal is to be able to create any other DACs without the need for continual hard forks. After that the focus will become specific appliations such as auctions and others TBA.
BTS DAC Structure
A number of questions related to the company structure and accountability to shareholders were raised, and bytemaster responded by saying the future direction would be to migrate developers into elected delegate positions and have their work rewarded by that model as opposed to being paid through I3. He emphasized that AGS funds would be invested into the growth of the BTS "superDAC" and it's staff.
When asked about revealing individual staff member pay bytemaster said they have avoided doing that to protect privacy, but salaries as a group will continue to be reported for I3. Bytemaster said that tying delegate pay to bitUSD would be very complicated.
Another point he made was that he was calling this a "share drop" not a "merger", My understanding of this was that, although "merger" was a usefully descriptive word used early in the discussions, he no longer feels that is the best description of what has evolved from this week's discussions. He now thinks "share drop" is a better description. Names matter because they set expectations and assessments of whether one has acted "fair and honorably".
He has stated that he is trying to carve out a sustainable role for himself where he can honor all his commitments without a conflict of interests. He is also clearly trying to set the industry free by decentralizing its leadership. He will continue to lead and compete, but as one of many. In particular, as he has been saying from the beginning: He is recommending how developers should honor the social consensus but it is completely up to each developer to craft his or her own specific instantiation of the Social Consensus given that she must compete under the Ten Natural Laws of the Crypto Universe. To succeed in capturing community support a developer should present how they intend to honor the social consensus and see if the community considers that a reasonable and acceptable offer to obtain their support.
As the number of interest subgroups grows with different snapshots and different DAC constituency groups, there may be many reasonable variations that can and should be honored. We have long advocated that PTS and AGS can be honored through honoring DACs that have previously met this obligation. So the mix can get a bit complex.
In the end we must remember that all of this was about incentivizing developers to honor this community while doing what is in the developer's own interest. It is in the developers own interest to honor AGS, PTS and their offspring without feeling obligated to do so for any reason other than their own interest in attracting demographics favorable to their enterprise.
For regulatory reasons it is very important to keep in mind that this is structured as a gifting economy. Supporters freely give to develop the ecosystem and developers freely give to thank them and seek their support.
These are all idealistic ways of thinking that we have been promoting for the past year. The concepts have continuously evolved but the ideals remain the same. Concepts will continue to evolve. We are all learning.
So, IMHO, we should try to view every developer's attempt to deal honorably with the community in the right spirit. Someone is attempting to give us a gift. Hopefully we all can receive it graciously.
Here's how I view what Bytemaster has proposed. (This is another patented analogy, metaphor, pedagogical example, lens of perspective, whatever, that I am using to enable me to receive graciously the gift of his time he is trying to make to all of us.) This is only an example, not a change in his current proposal.
Suppose BM, in his new role of single DAC developer, wanted to honor the existing community with a new revolutionary DAC concept, BTS. Using the previously established consensus he decides to honor the existing community this way:
10% AGS
10% PTS
80% BTSX
He picks his target supply to be 2.5B BTS. Sounds like he's right on track. By doing this, the single DAC he is focusing on will still be honoring his commitment to give 20% of his future innovations to PTS/AGS supporters. As he continues to work on BTS, they will get the promised fruits of his future work. Meanwhile, independent third parties continue to honor PTS/AGS because they still represent the same demographic they always have.
The problem is that he wants to incorporate two DACs that are still in-utero, partially born, without aborting them. In some sense, they are still in the future too, lumped into the category of his not yet fully realized future innovations. So he decides to do his 20% share drop gift to AGS/PTS using a weighted mix of several snapshots. Why not? Its become standard practice for developers to select their own mix and snapshot timings. What's inherently wrong with selecting a mix of mixes based on a mix of snapshots? Complicated, but perhaps necessary to accomplish all his launch objectives. Nothing says a developer must be completely evenhanded to all demographics. He must do what is practically feasible and what satisfies the Ten Natural Laws the best for his DAC. This is not a dishonorable outcome, just a complicated one tailored for a complicated situation.
We now have a situation where other developers can honor AGS and PTS while Bytemaster will have met his commitments once and for all with his signature SuperDAC.
Semper Fi