BitShares to become Decentralized Autonomous Community

[jae208]

 "Community is easier to market than company because not everyone cares about corporations but almost everyone wants to be a part of a community. I always saw Bitshares as a community not a company. "


Once again it is the part of our brain regulating emotion that pushes us to act. "Community" appeals to the emotional center of our brain. Appealing to people's emotions is very powerful. I always wondered why people believe in religious fairy tales when religious text are always full of such contradictory nonsense.  It is probably because religion and church appeals to our sense of community and belonging. People don't go to church to listen to the pastor or read a book that deep down they know doesn't make sense. Rather, they attend church for that sense of community. They attend so they can spend time with family and friends. They do so for social reasons.

The success of Bitshares might depend on how we appeal to people's emotions. How do we encourage and create a sense of community beyond what we currently have?

Marketing Bitshares as a business and focusing on the profit motive works as long as those attracted by such motives make money. They won't stick around to help Bitshares grow. They were simply motivated by personal gain. As that Ted video Bytemaster linked to on another thread points out, "They don't care what you do or how you do it, they care about WHY." The "what" and "how" appeal to our most recently evolved rational side, but for most of us it doesn't push us toward action.

What: Bitshares is like a company. How: Bitshares has "shareholders" "employees" and makes a profit.
Why: Bitshares seeks to bring freedom and justice for humanity through distributed software.

Honestly, I think that people really aren't rational and we aren't always seeking personal gain. Humans have too many biases to be rational and if we really were rational there would be no such thing as religious faith or non profit organizations.

I think that what we call capitalism isn't the only way to organize economic life and self interest isn't the only motivator either. Think of the people that contribute to the linux operative system. They aren't getting paid for their work. Some of them may, like those working for Canonical.(They are behind Ubuntu) Think about how Wikipedia is a collaborative encyclopedia housing all of human knowledge. By the way I donate to them on a yearly basis because I believe that we should all have access to human knowledge.

Given certain circumstances capitalism may be the best way to organize scarce resources. After extensive reading I think the collaborative commons will be the best way to organize ourselves going forward because we are moving away from a world of scarcity.


Many have heard or are aware of the Tragedy of the Commons.
However, not many have heard of the Comedy of the Commons. I highly recommend you read the original paper. 

http://digitalcommons.law.yale.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2827&context=fss_papers

Quick summarization of the differences between the Tragedy of the Commons and the Comedy of the Commons.

In the tragedy of the commons, each person tries to maximize their own benefit, and the end result is that everyone loses because of overutilization of limited resources. In the comedy of the commons, each person, while getting something for themselves, also (directly or indirectly) contributes back to the common good at the same time.

BitTorrent makes use of the comedy of the commons, since the more people who participate, the better the service gets.

[luckybit]

If you read my post, you'll see that I am holding BitAssets as well - actually to the tune of about 25% of my holdings. My reasoning for switching to Bitcoin is that I may invest elsewhere and diversify. I guess I was signalling that I'd like to see something that makes me want to put funds back here and avoid that need to diversify. Obviously from my post a lot of my concern surrounds the way the marketing is being handled. I just think that some here think that because they understand how it all works it automatically means that this project will ultiately be a asuccess. Most people won;t spend the time you've spent i here in order to become a true beleiver and that is why the marketing angle is so important in my view.

Getting prosecuted by regulators is not good marketing in the long term. Also if you call it a corporation then people less technically sophisticated might take it literally and sue Bitshares in court. Calling Bitshares a corporation is worse than to call it a country because countries have sovereignty while corporations don't. So why is it if we call Bitshares a Decentralized Autonomous Country people think it's science fiction but if we call it a Decentralized Autonomous Company people who aren't libertarians think it's science fiction or evil, yet if we call it a Decentralized Aunomous Community the only people who are confused by that are libertarians who were sold the old marketing.

Marketing has to be smart enough to adapt to different demographics. You own Bitshares already so you're already sold. The biggest market are the people who aren't crypto-anarchist, aren't libertarian, and who want a sense of community. Community is easier to market than company because not everyone cares about corporations but almost everyone wants to be a part of a community. I always saw Bitshares as a community not a company. Virtual companies might profit like companies do but they don't physically exist any more than a second life store is a company.

I'm not particularity confident in the long term price of Bitcoin, but I don't think holding some short term while I decide what to do with the funds is necessarily a bad idea.

The fact that I've only ever posted 23 times does not mean I am newcomer here, I've spent literally weeks reading things here on this forum over the last year.

The most important thing to learn about how things work is that it's all about community. The altcoins which survive and thrive are the ones which develop a community. The altcoins which focus only on profit are pump and dumps.

A lot of people got into Bitshares thinking it would be the ultimate pump and dump. Language like how it is a corporation and other financial terms are great to attract speculators. Those speculators came into the community, they pumped, and then they dumped. Now that they see Bitshares actually has a serious vision, and that Bytemaster actually wants to lead a community rather than be a mere developer/CEO, they want out so they can focus on the quick buck because it's a lot more work to build a community than to build a profitable company.

Maybe I'm wrong about Rune's post. I think clear explanation as to why we need to change the language would help both us and the SEC understand how perhaps we do not fall within the bounds of something that would traditionally be seen as a hierarchical company with a centralised structure and CEO. This is not what we are about and that is why we have so far been called a 'Digital Autonomous Company' and not just a  'Company'. Surely the arguments to the SEC can still be made as to why we should not be treated in the same way without completely changing language and the direction of all marketing efforts away from the 'Company' metaphor. If I'm wrong here though and people really think it's worth steering clear of the 'Company' moniker then personally I prefer 'Digital Autonomous Cooperative.' It sounds more like something that actually produces something rather than something that just pushes an ideology.

The SEC has no business governing the Internet period. They only have an issue when you solicit for investors. This is why there should be no investors allowed in our community. We simply don't have any need for investors when we have sponsors who will freely give money when money is needed without any expectation of ROI. If the SEC wants to fine us all for giving gifts and donations then they can make a case of that. It's a lot more difficult of a case to make than if you put up a big sign which says; "Crowdfunding! Investors welcome!".

All the SEC would have to do is send one of it's informers to pretend to be an investor. Then their researchers can build many cases over time to take the whole community down through petty fines and court battles. It's just not worth it to have to risk that or put the community at risk just to use words they don't like or processes they don't want used.

http://cointelegraph.com/news/112826/how-to-protect-your-bitcoin-business-from-regulators

[ozvic]

The fact that I've only ever posted 23 times does not mean I am newcomer here, I've spent literally weeks reading things here on this forum over the last year.

 

Many of us avid readers and supporters don't feel the need to quote a wall of text to add a  whether it be to show true agreement or to get their post count up. Many may be like me, only speak out when they have something truly useful to say. Unfortunately for me that's not too often... so I'll leave it at that.

[pseudoscops]

This thread and the accusations fuzzy has leveled at Rune, i think, are jointly responsible for today's sell off.

Someone wants you to think so. But if a trader is playing with tens of millions of dollars, do you think he or she really gives a darn about some bickering between a few members on a user forum? They may not even read it. If they do, this kind of thing simply gives them cover for the perception that there is dumping or buying based on news. In reality, someone simply owned enough to engage in one last dump/pump before the distortion of the upcoming snapshot. And it was a good bet that there wouldn't be too much buying right now as folks cautiously await the next stage--great time to dump and buy it back cheap. I'll bet $20 million that whoever dumped today doesn't care what Rune or Fuzzy thinks and doesn't care what I think either! This is simply crypto-static for long term investors.

It is possible that you're right here. I may have all of this completely wrong and none of it matters. It is entirely possible that my more general concerns about a lack of understanding of how to manage PR and marketing are leading me to overblown the importance of individual posts. Perhaps I'm  projecting my larger concerns on to things that I shouldn't be. My Spidey senses indicate to me that I'm not, but maybe they are wrong.

Despite having six timed my original stake in crypto in the last year or so, I'm actually a pretty naive investor with little experience. Most of my gains have probably been due to dumb luck in fact. Perhaps I've been losing my cool a little, where others more experienced just ride it out. Please feel free to tune out if you think I'm just adding unhelpful noise here.

[luckybit]

...
I do realise that SEC concerns might have led to an itchy trigger finger on this announcement and that they ultimately might necessitate us having to re-imagine everything as a 'Digital Autonomous Community' or something similar rather than calling it a 'Digital Autonomous Company'. I really hope not, but maybe we do have to act here. If that is the case then the message from Dan needed to be more along the lines off 'Hey look guys we're gonna get screwed by the SEC if we don't rethink the language we use surrounding BitShares.
...

This thread and the accusations fuzzy has leveled at Rune, i think, are jointly responsible for today's sell off. By the way I'm not saying that fuzzy is wrong, but Rune seems genuine to me when I ask my gut what it thinks. I get the impression he's young, very intelligent, very excitable and perhaps a little naive in thinking that one day BitShares will take over the world. I think he's is probably going to turn out to be a huge asset to this community in the long run. I hope I'm proved right.

Hmm.. isn't that as good as broadcasting to the SEC that Dan is changing the 'language' of Bitshares on purpose and with a clear intention to avoid the SEC?  This does not sound like a good idea to me.

What fuzzy said about Rune has an impact on btsx price?  Common.. you are stretching it.

Even if the SEC would arrest Dan BTS would survive because of the change of language. Let's face facts, there can be no investors if the SEC says there can't. There can be no crowd funding if the SEC says there can't. This is no different from Bitcoin being "banned in China" and it should be explained to the Chinese via translation that changes are necessary to save the community from regulatory persecution as it is something people in the Chinese community can relate to.

If there are no investors then there can be no corporation if the SEC says no. It also means there can be no mergers because that would trigger the FTC. There an be no legal contracts of any kind in our community.

No matter what happens to Bytemaster the SEC and other government agencies have power over the language and you cannot use their language. If you don't like the language we use then take it up with US regulatory agencies who say that in order to use securities you must ask permission and that unlicensed securities are illegal. The SEC might not be sophisticated enough to care that these are not securities and are just software. If you go out of your way to try to convince them it is a security you'll justify them treating it like a security.

[pseudoscops]

You've posted a total of 23 times, and you've taken your money out of BTS to put it into Bitcoin so that you can lose money as the Bitcoin price goes down?

For some reason I don't believe you. Why didn't you just buy BitUSD like I did?

If you read my post, you'll see that I am holding BitAssets as well - actually to the tune of about 25% of my holdings. My reasoning for switching to Bitcoin is that I may invest elsewhere and diversify. I guess I was signalling that I'd like to see something that makes me want to put funds back here and avoid that need to diversify. Obviously from my post a lot of my concern surrounds the way the marketing is being handled. I just think that some here think that because they understand how it all works it automatically means that this project will ultiately be a asuccess. Most people won;t spend the time you've spent i here in order to become a true beleiver and that is why the marketing angle is so important in my view.

I'm not particularity confident in the long term price of Bitcoin, but I don't think holding some short term while I decide what to do with the funds is necessarily a bad idea.

The fact that I've only ever posted 23 times does not mean I am newcomer here, I've spent literally weeks reading things here on this forum over the last year.

Hmm.. isn't that as good as broadcasting to the SEC that Dan is changing the 'language' of Bitshares on purpose and with a clear intention to avoid the SEC?  This does not sound like a good idea to me.

What fuzzy said about Rune has an impact on btsx price?  Common.. you are stretching it.

Maybe I'm wrong about Rune's post. I think clear explanation as to why we need to change the language would help both us and the SEC understand how perhaps we do not fall within the bounds of something that would traditionally be seen as a hierarchical company with a centralised structure and CEO. This is not what we are about and that is why we have so far been called a 'Digital Autonomous Company' and not just a  'Company'. Surely the arguments to the SEC can still be made as to why we should not be treated in the same way without completely changing language and the direction of all marketing efforts away from the 'Company' metaphor. If I'm wrong here though and people really think it's worth steering clear of the 'Company' moniker then personally I prefer 'Digital Autonomous Cooperative.' It sounds more like something that actually produces something rather than something that just pushes an ideology.

[cube]

...
I do realise that SEC concerns might have led to an itchy trigger finger on this announcement and that they ultimately might necessitate us having to re-imagine everything as a 'Digital Autonomous Community' or something similar rather than calling it a 'Digital Autonomous Company'. I really hope not, but maybe we do have to act here. If that is the case then the message from Dan needed to be more along the lines off 'Hey look guys we're gonna get screwed by the SEC if we don't rethink the language we use surrounding BitShares.
...

This thread and the accusations fuzzy has leveled at Rune, i think, are jointly responsible for today's sell off. By the way I'm not saying that fuzzy is wrong, but Rune seems genuine to me when I ask my gut what it thinks. I get the impression he's young, very intelligent, very excitable and perhaps a little naive in thinking that one day BitShares will take over the world. I think he's is probably going to turn out to be a huge asset to this community in the long run. I hope I'm proved right.

Hmm.. isn't that as good as broadcasting to the SEC that Dan is changing the 'language' of Bitshares on purpose and with a clear intention to avoid the SEC?  This does not sound like a good idea to me.

What fuzzy said about Rune has an impact on btsx price?  Common.. you are stretching it.

[luckybit]

This thread has been very enlightening and points out how different messages reach different audiences.

I never intended this thread to completely change everything...

BTS will be marketed according to how the marketers feel it will be best and I am deferring to their judgement.

Good discussion everyone.

Reading the above it kinda sounds like the answer to my questions about the marketing teams involvement in the Community message, see below, should have been 'no not so much really'.

I have to ask - was this run through Brian and the marketing team before being announced? What is Brian's view on this if so? I think it's really important for the community to know that it was at least discussed with him first?

Its probably actually coming from Marketing, (and/or Legal).

I think BM has learned by now not to just randomly post his thoughts on the forum, after what happened last time.

This overall goal was discussed with the team and Adam from Follow My Vote and we are coordinating with Brian to revamp the marketing for the BitShares launch.    Adam is really a huge asset and is helping us a lot.

Either that or BM did discuss it at length with the team and is now graciously trying to take the fall for what everyone on the team now realises was perhaps too radical of a message for the market to take. Honestly I like the vision but this ideology/community focused marketing that's taken up so much airspace recently is not going to work well for us IMHO - it really needs to take a back seat if it somehow can. I'm not sure you can sell the DAC this way. The ecosystem, the technological USPs, focused products/apps built on the SuperDac and most importantly the utility need to be in the spotlight. I'm all for a list of one word tenets, as originally suggested by Kisa, that embody the things that BitShares stands for. One of those words could and should be Community:

e.g. Freedom, Privacy, Fairness, Creativity, Meritocracy, Security, Community

But no more than this. I do realise that SEC concerns might have led to an itchy trigger finger on this announcement and that they ultimately might necessitate us having to re-imagine everything as a 'Digital Autonomous Community' or something similar rather than calling it a 'Digital Autonomous Company'. I really hope not, but maybe we do have to act here. If that is the case then the message from Dan needed to be more along the lines off 'Hey look guys we're gonna get screwed by the SEC if we don't rethink the language we use surrounding BitShares. Here are some of the things that I've been thinking over, what about about if we used a Community metaphor etc etc etc  - now please lets us all discuss this.' Maybe there are other legal issues at play here that I don't understand that make that difficult to do.

Instead the way it was announced by Dan and the way it came across seemed to demonstrate a fundamental lack of understanding of how one should approach this sort of delicate matter. It sounded like a dictat and I think it spooked a lot of people today.  Dan you are so talented in so many other ways and have led this thing so far, I'd hate to think that your apparent total lack of good PR and marketing instinct could lead to you torpedoing all the hard work from you and everyone else. Please seek more advice on how to approach these kind of things before you post them, even if there are legal issues afoot.

You mentioned you didn't think that this thread had much to do with today's drop in share price. I believe that you believed this when you wrote it, but I knew you were wrong when I read it.

Guess I was right to feel bad about this post, another 20% drop today.

Congrats on killing Bitshares.

Who will be left in the "community" when bitshares is below 1 cent?

I doubt this post was the cause of the 20% drop...

This thread and the accusations fuzzy has leveled at Rune, i think, are jointly responsible for today's sell off. By the way I'm not saying that fuzzy is wrong, but Rune seems genuine to me when I ask my gut what it thinks. I get the impression he's young, very intelligent, very excitable and perhaps a little naive in thinking that one day BitShares will take over the world. I think he's is probably going to turn out to be a huge asset to this community in the long run. I hope I'm proved right.

But back to these posts and more importantly how they've affected my actions today. My actions on an individual level are not that important and probably did little to shift the share price, but they are perhaps an important bell weather as to how others might have felt and acted today. I put more weight on this thread being responsible for the larger portion of the share price drop today. I actually shifted about 25% of my holdings back in to Bitcoin as a result of BMs OP in this thread and as a result of the mixed and muddled marketing I've been witnessing here lately. I might shift at least part of this into the Music DAC from Bitcoin. I was all in before today either in BitUSD or BTSX. I hope things don't go even more pear shaped, I don't think they will in the long run. But I wanted to mention how I acted today so that people can understand how someone passionate about this project, I've been following and investing for almost a year, has reacted as a result of what I think is carelessness handling of information presented here on the forums. I don't feel like I've been a weak hand, I've just lost a tiny little bit of faith in the direction of things lately and I've had to act in order to reflect that in my holdings.

Much more consideration needs to be taken before posting such radical changes to messaging. Perhaps we need some sort of official press release channel, maybe then everything suggested on the forum can immediately be assumed to be up for discussion and not set in stone until it appears as an official press release from the marketing team separately from the forum. Somewhere on the main website is the obvious place. I do believe in BitShares and I'm hoping to become a 100% believer again. I also hope circumstance will allow me to contribute something more practical to the ecosystem. As well as having some marketing skills I can code too, mainly Rails, front end web and some hybrid mobile stuff. Get your marketing and PR act together guys. If you don't you are going to keep hemorrhaging share price. Where is Brian in all this, I'm not sure I've even seen a post from Adam yet. Sorry about the wall of text, but I just had to get all this off my chest.

Dan, hope there's no hard feeling here. It's not personal I think 99% of everything else you do is great!

You've posted a total of 23 times, and you've taken your money out of BTS to put it into Bitcoin so that you can lose money as the Bitcoin price goes down?

For some reason I don't believe you. Why didn't you just buy BitUSD like I did?

[donkeypong]

This thread and the accusations fuzzy has leveled at Rune, i think, are jointly responsible for today's sell off.

...donkeypong...

You found the quote of the day donkeypong, and made my day! 

Though I will say, this thread did not help much, to the cause of the other direction.

Can we call you Tony2k now?

[zerosum]

This thread and the accusations fuzzy has leveled at Rune, i think, are jointly responsible for today's sell off.

...donkeypong...

You found the quote of the day donkeypong, and made my day! 

Though I will say, this thread did not help much, to the cause of the other direction.

[Riverhead]

Maybe Peter Lynch is dumping

Sent from my SM-G900T using Tapatalk

[donkeypong]

This thread and the accusations fuzzy has leveled at Rune, i think, are jointly responsible for today's sell off.

Someone wants you to think so. But if a trader is playing with tens of millions of dollars, do you think he or she really gives a darn about some bickering between a few members on a user forum? They may not even read it. If they do, this kind of thing simply gives them cover for the perception that there is dumping or buying based on news. In reality, someone simply owned enough to engage in one last dump/pump before the distortion of the upcoming snapshot. And it was a good bet that there wouldn't be too much buying right now as folks cautiously await the next stage--great time to dump and buy it back cheap. I'll bet $20 million that whoever dumped today doesn't care what Rune or Fuzzy thinks and doesn't care what I think either! This is simply crypto-static for long term investors.

[pseudoscops]

This thread has been very enlightening and points out how different messages reach different audiences.

I never intended this thread to completely change everything...

BTS will be marketed according to how the marketers feel it will be best and I am deferring to their judgement.

Good discussion everyone.

Reading the above it kinda sounds like the answer to my questions about the marketing teams involvement in the Community message, see below, should have been 'no not so much really'.

I have to ask - was this run through Brian and the marketing team before being announced? What is Brian's view on this if so? I think it's really important for the community to know that it was at least discussed with him first?

Its probably actually coming from Marketing, (and/or Legal).

I think BM has learned by now not to just randomly post his thoughts on the forum, after what happened last time.

This overall goal was discussed with the team and Adam from Follow My Vote and we are coordinating with Brian to revamp the marketing for the BitShares launch.    Adam is really a huge asset and is helping us a lot.

Either that or BM did discuss it at length with the team and is now graciously trying to take the fall for what everyone on the team now realises was perhaps too radical of a message for the market to take. Honestly I like the vision but this ideology/community focused marketing that's taken up so much airspace recently is not going to work well for us IMHO - it really needs to take a back seat if it somehow can. I'm not sure you can sell the DAC this way. The ecosystem, the technological USPs, focused products/apps built on the SuperDac and most importantly the utility need to be in the spotlight. I'm all for a list of one word tenets, as originally suggested by Kisa, that embody the things that BitShares stands for. One of those words could and should be Community:

e.g. Freedom, Privacy, Fairness, Creativity, Meritocracy, Security, Community

But no more than this. I do realise that SEC concerns might have led to an itchy trigger finger on this announcement and that they ultimately might necessitate us having to re-imagine everything as a 'Digital Autonomous Community' or something similar rather than calling it a 'Digital Autonomous Company'. I really hope not, but maybe we do have to act here. If that is the case then the message from Dan needed to be more along the lines off 'Hey look guys we're gonna get screwed by the SEC if we don't rethink the language we use surrounding BitShares. Here are some of the things that I've been thinking over, what about about if we used a Community metaphor etc etc etc  - now please lets us all discuss this.' Maybe there are other legal issues at play here that I don't understand that make that difficult to do.

Instead the way it was announced by Dan and the way it came across seemed to demonstrate a fundamental lack of understanding of how one should approach this sort of delicate matter. It sounded like a dictat and I think it spooked a lot of people today.  Dan you are so talented in so many other ways and have led this thing so far, I'd hate to think that your apparent total lack of good PR and marketing instinct could lead to you torpedoing all the hard work from you and everyone else. Please seek more advice on how to approach these kind of things before you post them, even if there are legal issues afoot.

You mentioned you didn't think that this thread had much to do with today's drop in share price. I believe that you believed this when you wrote it, but I knew you were wrong when I read it.

Guess I was right to feel bad about this post, another 20% drop today.

Congrats on killing Bitshares.

Who will be left in the "community" when bitshares is below 1 cent?

I doubt this post was the cause of the 20% drop...

This thread and the accusations fuzzy has leveled at Rune, i think, are jointly responsible for today's sell off. By the way I'm not saying that fuzzy is wrong, but Rune seems genuine to me when I ask my gut what it thinks. I get the impression he's young, very intelligent, very excitable and perhaps a little naive in thinking that one day BitShares will take over the world. I think he's is probably going to turn out to be a huge asset to this community in the long run. I hope I'm proved right.

But back to these posts and more importantly how they've affected my actions today. My actions on an individual level are not that important and probably did little to shift the share price, but they are perhaps an important bell weather as to how others might have felt and acted today. I put more weight on this thread being responsible for the larger portion of the share price drop today. I actually shifted about 25% of my holdings back in to Bitcoin as a result of BMs OP in this thread and as a result of the mixed and muddled marketing I've been witnessing here lately. I might shift at least part of this into the Music DAC from Bitcoin. I was all in before today either in BitUSD or BTSX. I hope things don't go even more pear shaped, I don't think they will in the long run. But I wanted to mention how I acted today so that people can understand how someone passionate about this project, I've been following and investing for almost a year, has reacted as a result of what I think is carelessness handling of information presented here on the forums. I don't feel like I've been a weak hand, I've just lost a tiny little bit of faith in the direction of things lately and I've had to act in order to reflect that in my holdings.

Much more consideration needs to be taken before posting such radical changes to messaging. Perhaps we need some sort of official press release channel, maybe then everything suggested on the forum can immediately be assumed to be up for discussion and not set in stone until it appears as an official press release from the marketing team separately from the forum. Somewhere on the main website is the obvious place. I do believe in BitShares and I'm hoping to become a 100% believer again. I also hope circumstance will allow me to contribute something more practical to the ecosystem. As well as having some marketing skills I can code too, mainly Rails, front end web and some hybrid mobile stuff. Get your marketing and PR act together guys. If you don't you are going to keep hemorrhaging share price. Where is Brian in all this, I'm not sure I've even seen a post from Adam yet. Sorry about the wall of text, but I just had to get all this off my chest.

Dan, hope there's no hard feeling here. It's not personal I think 99% of everything else you do is great!

[Troglodactyl]

BM,
With all this merger (which I support) we are in a confusion period now. Adding new areas of change serves no good.
If you are proposing this "company to community" change just for the sake of cleaning up the bitshares concept - this is really bad timing. And also this is not a very motivating change from the marketing perspective: being part of a company is more inspiring than belonging to a community.

Unless you have legal reasons to do so - then this change makes much more sense as the last thing we want you to have are legal problems. But then this should be clearly stated as we (the stake holders) should know it.

It seems pretty clear to me that this "change" isn't significantly changing how anything actually works.  Unofficially, everything can still be explained in whichever way best fits the target audience, but officially, there's very little left for officials to potentially target.  Technically, both descriptions are accurate, because while the system can achieve the goals of a company, it does so without the need for actual enforced contracts, or regulated methods.

We are a leaf on the wind...

[jakub]

BM,
With all this merger (which I support) we are in a confusion period now. Adding new areas of change serves no good.
If you are proposing this "company to community" change just for the sake of cleaning up the bitshares concept - this is really bad timing. And also this is not a very motivating change from the marketing perspective: being part of a company is more inspiring than belonging to a community.

Unless you have legal reasons to do so - then this change makes much more sense as the last thing we want you to have are legal problems. But then this should be clearly stated as we (the stake holders) should know it.