State of the Swarm - Born out of the distributed governance whitepaper and Decentralized Autonomous Society

crypto_coiner · February 26, 2015, 7:51am

Link: https://medium.com/@Swarm/state-of-the-swarm-7835b413f3d4

Swarm was born out of the distributed governance whitepaper and Decentralized Autonomous Society with a vision to empower collaboration through decentralized technology.

See the physical meetup: http://www.meetup.com/Decentralized-Autonomous-Society-Meetup-Palo-Alto

This is very interesting:

Our detailed legal work performed in conjunction with Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet and Society, Coin Center, and some top legal firms in January 2015 indicates that many of the current models for crowdsales may have problems. We have established a new complete model Distributed Collaborative Organizations (DCOs), which you can read more about here.

About three months ago the CEO of Techstars, the world’s largest accelerator network, said “Swarm’s innovative fundraising model has the possibility of completely transforming the venture capital industry.” We are happy to announce that as a result of this deal Techstars is now acquiring Swarm coins on the public market. We expect that will be the case with all future Swarm partners.

We should think about getting the boost of VCs - is there any reason why we should not?

crypto_coiner · February 26, 2015, 8:55am

The white paper and optimal model from the founder, Joel Dietz

github.com

fractastical/distributed-governance/blob/master/whitepaper.md

New whitepaper in progress: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ramz8scma26mk4y/Network_State_Whitepaper%20%200.2.5.pdf?dl=0

One very cool thing about the evolving distributed autonomous organization (DAC/DAO) layer on top of cryptocurrencies is that it increasingly allows programmable governance.

This paper includes my best thoughts on an optimal approach. It is partially an attempt to resolve the tension that for most projects there is an early need for centralization (i.e. classic startup) vs. the legitimate desire to have more voices heard as things evolve. Many projects also need funding in order to get started and need to accomodate investor interests. 

Here are some existing models:

 * Current corporate model is investors decide via board seat allocation. You only have an opening once you hit IPO, but there are severe barriers to IPO which seem to be increasing. 

 * Cooperative model and non-profits I perceive as extremely inefficient in the early stages. Among other things they need a board, have high initial costs, and don't scale internationally.

 * Some cryptocurrencies have a "founder lock" on fund received via multi-sig, which is cool but doesn't exactly address the issue of evolved control over time and generally assumes static decision makers. Actual decision making is a bit vague at this point and not captured in the protocol layer. 

My optimal model is something like: 

     *  All major "board level" decisions captured in blockchain format. 
     * "Board level" decisions decide allocation of funds, which then go into pools
     *  Pools of funds allocated to individuals/projects can each have one or many decision makers. Once allocated pools have complete autonomy. 
     *  "Boards" have the following decision-makers, "founders," "investors," "users."

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Here are some existing models:Current corporate model is investors decide via board seat allocation. You only have an opening once you hit IPO, but there are severe barriers to IPO which seem to be increasing.Cooperative model and non-profits I perceive as extremely inefficient in the early stages. Among other things they need a board, have high initial costs, and don’t scale internationally.Some cryptocurrencies have a “founder lock” on fund received via multi-sig, which is cool but doesn’t exactly address the issue of evolved control over time and generally assumes static decision makers. Actual decision making is a bit vague at this point and not captured in the protocol layer.

My optimal model is something like: * All major “board level” decisions captured in blockchain format.

“Board level” decisions decide allocation of funds, which then go into pools

Pools of funds allocated to individuals/projects can each have one or many decision makers. Once allocated pools have complete autonomy.

“Boards” have the following decision-makers, “founders,” “investors,” “users.”

Voting is handled by a two-tiered process in which each group allowed one or more proxies. Those proxies become a board. This board then makes relevant decisions.

How does Nu compare?

thExit · April 28, 2015, 10:59am

There are more guidelines coming from the Swarm about distributed governance, with an intent to educate the broad community about the benefits of blockchain-powered collaboration.