Author Topic: Should we kill the DACronym?  (Read 18855 times)

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Offline freebit

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Offline luckybit

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We have been using DA(CCCCC) for almost a year now and it has gained a wide acceptance, but despite this others have used DA Organization or simply Decentralized Application to describe the software.

Considering we cannot agree on what the C in DAC stands for and it is becoming quite clear to me that the "autonomous" part is a tad confusing considering the critical role that people and politics play in DPOS perhaps we would all be better off dropping the DAC term all together.   

BitShares is a global community using a decentralized application to produce the best money in the world.

I want to get rid of the use of "company" for the description of what BitShares *is* and instead rely on it only for the purposes of explaining the economic design for the purposes of aligning incentives.

These are just random thoughts off the top of my head.... what do you think?

Definitely don't kill the DAC. It's too important and it's a meme which is already popular even outside of the crypto communities.

Some call it distributed autonomous community, some call it decentralized autonomous corporation, but the idea of a DAC is basically what everyone is working toward even before they know what to call it. So I say stick with it but change company to community.

The DAC is what people are working toward. It does not mean we currently have to have it but it's a unifying idea and idealists need that.
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Offline fluxer555

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I love how the DAC term morphs based on context, and I love how many 'C' words there are that are relevant metaphors (or metamorphs, perhaps?).

I don't think we should kill the DACronym. It beautifully encapsulates the many-interpretation nature of blockchain technology.

It's also nicer to say than DA, DAPP, or DAO.
« Last Edit: November 10, 2014, 04:13:10 pm by fluxer555 »

Offline mint chocolate chip

I like the words partnership (a business or firm owned and run by two or more partners) or enterprise (a project or undertaking, typically one that is difficult or requires effort; a business or company)

blockchain partnership
blockchain enterprise

Offline davidpbrown

I've never liked "DAC", as it's too abstract - 'company' or 'tool' would be simpler. There is little point in noobs spending time trying to decypher what DAC means, when all that is trying to convey is the principal idea behind that instance of activity.

Perhaps there needs to be another word for the product that is each DAC instance. Perhaps each DAC could be talked of as a company in its own right? I was going to suggest "BitShares is a Decentralised Toolkit" but I'm less convinced now.. that would be easier for people to accept.. or you could opt for analogy that BitShares is the trunk and there are many branches of activity looking to provide different fruits.

Worth noting perhaps that BitShares [dev team and community] is different from a BitShare(s) [BTS]; so, perhaps do talk of BitShares dev team and community explicitly, rather than just BitShares; that will help instil confidence about the support BitShares community provides each 'DAC' and avoid confusion with the two meanings of BitShares.
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Offline werneo

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Lets face it, "DAC" with "C" standing for company is the best metaphor out there.  Taking the "company" out of the DAC is taking out the profit motive which turns the spaceship into a space-lounge.  It's the Millenium Falcon pretending to be an asteroid to avoid the detection of the imperial star destroyers.  And C3P0 can tell you the odds of successfully navigating an asteroid field are very low.

The question is, does calling Bishares a DAC (company) present such danger to itself that calling it something else is necessary?  I'm all for using a combination of alternative metaphors when giving a more detailed explanation, such as "community" or "platform" etc but the key description that makes the most sense to me and grabs the most attention is decentralized autonomous company.

Calling it a "platform" or "business platform" has advantages when attracting businesses to run as delegates.  Rather than talking about the toolkit as a platform, BTS itself is a platform and it's beneficial for BTS if entrepreneurs are aware that they could 'run their business' using BTS bitassets and fund it with BTS dilution if they can get elected as a delegate.

 +5%

I think DAC (like "blockchain") is a term that is entering the popular lexicon at this very moment. It is widely recognized that bytemaster coined the term. So, distancing bitshares from the term DAC is a bit self defeating, IMO.


Offline Rune

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I honestly think the best description of what bitshares "is", would be "blockchain". DAC works too, but from what i understand then DAC is synonymous with blockchain. There are plenty of established english words that work well as metaphors for describing and simplifying what bitshares is; company, community, cooperative etc. But all these words are just approximations, and I dont think we will ever be able to find an established word that properly defines bitshares, because nothing even remotely like bitshares existed before bitcoin.

So given that satoshi decided to name his invention "the blockchain", we might as well use that name too (if DAC causes confusion due to the company part)

Offline matt608

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Lets face it, "DAC" with "C" standing for company is the best metaphor out there.  Taking the "company" out of the DAC is taking out the profit motive which turns the spaceship into a space-lounge.  It's the Millenium Falcon pretending to be an asteroid to avoid the detection of the imperial star destroyers.  And C3P0 can tell you the odds of successfully navigating an asteroid field are very low.

The question is, does calling Bishares a DAC (company) present such danger to itself that calling it something else is necessary?  I'm all for using a combination of alternative metaphors when giving a more detailed explanation, such as "community" or "platform" etc but the key description that makes the most sense to me and grabs the most attention is decentralized autonomous company.

Calling it a "platform" or "business platform" has advantages when attracting businesses to run as delegates.  Rather than talking about the toolkit as a platform, BTS itself is a platform and it's beneficial for BTS if entrepreneurs are aware that they could 'run their business' using BTS bitassets and fund it with BTS dilution if they can get elected as a delegate.

Offline wuyanren

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Offline xeroc

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Something among the lines of Decentralized Platform?

Decentralized Developing Platform? Decentralized Improving Platform? Decentralized Platform for Applications? Decentralized Platform for Application Development? Or simply the above.. Decentralized Platform
Skynet Platform :)

How about:
- Decentralized Kernel
- Decentral Kernel
- Distributed Kernel

But I like "platform" too!

Offline Akado

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Something among the lines of Decentralized Platform?

Decentralized Developing Platform? Decentralized Improving Platform? Decentralized Platform for Applications? Decentralized Platform for Application Development? Or simply the above.. Decentralized Platform
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Offline Ben Mason

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Bitshares is anything you want it to be.....


Offline xeroc

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Isn't BitShares more like a decentralized operating system (core software or KERNEL) and things like bitAssets/VOTE/keyID .. are DApps ontop of it?

Offline santaclause102

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Bitshares is a life style  8)
C for Church?  :o
haha church is nice!

I thought of: Bitshares is a community based decentralized network providing accounting services (on a competitive level) and a platform for applications to make use of the "decentralized accounting".

I would always ad that it (among other things) behaves like a company, except that there are no legal obligations. Just because the company analogy helps a lot in understanding everything. But only if it does not have undesirable legal implications.
« Last Edit: November 10, 2014, 03:15:16 pm by delulo »

Offline Ben Mason

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A blockchain is better than a bank

Bitshares is a decentralized application enabling a global community to manage their blockchains