Crypto's Biggest Challenge: Governance

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Cryptocurrency is a field of experimentation at this point. It is a wonderful world because all options are on the table. We see projects that do a lot of different things being tested out. It is like the Wild West of innovation.

Since all of this operates in the digital, we are operating in near limitless ways. Whatever we come up with can be tried. A lot of it will end up faltering, dying a slow and unspectacular death. There will be some, however, that do make major strides, creating changes in humanity that we desperately need.


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One area that is lagging is in the field of governance. Cryptocurrency is providing a vast ability to tokenize projects how we want. This includes in areas of governance. Unfortunately, we appear to be following the same ole tired models that we developed a number of years ago.

A project gets started and somehow distributes tokens. This is the framework from which the governance model is derived. Either those tokens are voted or are aligned with other tokens distributed, forming the governance model. Those who are holders of the tokens get to vote, mostly in a staked manner.

There is nothing wrong with this approach. However, it is already known. When it comes to furthering the impact upon society, we need to try different concepts.

Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs) hold great potential. They can revolutionize the business structures. This will not be the case if we still follow the same concepts surrounding governance. In fact, a case could be made that DAO development is hindered by the lack of progress on the governance end.

Ultimately, we find ourselves in the situation whereby we are thinking too conservatively. Experimentation is, by design, meant to explore to the farthest edges. Hence, it could prove beneficial if we expanded our view of what is possible.

Does this mean it all will work out? Of course not. Nevertheless, it is vital that we start the process in this realm. The advantage to the digital is that things can move very quickly. This is orders of magnitude faster than the physical world. The world is in dire need of new governance systems and modeling what is in the real world with a digital adaption isn't going to cut it.

As we embark into a deeper realm with regards to our digital and virtual lives, it is important to note that our existing governance institutions are going to have less of an impact. While that will be celebrated by many (if not all), it does create a serious void. The idea of a networked economy is enticing until we realize that we are still lacking sound governance models in which we can engage upon said networks.

We know what does not work. This is clear to us. Stated another way, we know what we do not want. However, what we want is not yet designed. Moving away from something is a decision, just not one that opts for something else. Without an alternative, we are operating in a vacuum.


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Cryptocurrency is rapidly bringing about abundance. The only problem with that is we are entering this realm while operating with governance models that are based upon scarcity. Until we start testing the limits of what is possible, we will still be following the same path.

This could also make us vulnerable in the same as many other entities. Decentralization is only as good as its weakest point. If a system can be overtaken at the governance level, then all else is immaterial. It is a situation that needs to be heavily looked at.

The existing system is doing all it can to try and adapt to what is taking place. Even though they are far behind, the fact that they are even in the conversation shows how little we did on this end of things. We had over a decade head start plus the advantage of being in the digital world. With that being the case, we should be light years ahead of what is out there now.

We are not.

Of course, that does not mean all is lost. We can quickly put ourselves into the express lane. There are a lot of bright minds involved in crypto. We have the potential to create governance systems that will be unrecognizable to the rest of the world. This should be our goal. If the masses can't identify it, then we are likely dealing with something completely new and radical.

And that is exactly what is called for.

DAOs have tremendous potential but it is hindered if we structure them like traditional companies with the exception being tokens instead of stock. In a situation like that, we will basically see the same thing.

Is there a better way? The answer is of course. We know there are always more innovative ways of doing things. And let us be honest, when it comes to updating, global governance systems are long overdue.

The answer is obviously not clear at this time. That is where experimentation, adaptation, and innovation all come into play. We might find a few concepts that work very well and a bunch that do not. What is important is to find what works. From there, we can expand upon things to a much greater degree.

This is how we start putting light years between what we are creating and the present system. The digital realm provides an open platform that is fast and flexible. We are not constrain by either the Newtonian laws of physics nor a legacy system. Instead, we are free to go in whatever direction we seek.

It is time we start to apply the creativity and innovation to governance models. The world is sorely in need of an update.


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Automating governance: putting our ideals in charge instead of people, will be the greatest challenge and achievement of all time.

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It will be quite difficult to achieve a governance system that is perfect or almost perfect to what we imagine and need. There are many people working on different governance systems and let's say this is a trial and error experiment. It's like Edison when he created the light bulb and it took him 10,000 tries to finally get it right. When we find a viable governance system, we will probably enter a new era of peace and sustainable economy.

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(Edited)

There is nothing wrong with this approach. However, it is already known. When it comes to furthering the impact upon society, we need to try different concepts.

Nothing new under the sun, especially in this area.


This will not be the case if we still follow the same concepts surrounding governance. In fact, a case could be made that DAO development is hindered by the lack of progress on the governance end.

When I came to Hive a few months ago and began studying the DHF and how it is governed, my initial reaction was, "This is pure centralized decision-making wrapped in a 'decentralized' nightgown." From my perspective, it has few if any of the benefits of centralization and, similarly, almost none of the benefits of decentralization (especially none of the local knowledge benefits).

I will be posting a 'reform package', hopefully within the next few weeks, detailing my vision of a truly decentralized DHF.


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Well put mate, I think a big aspect is that people often blame governments for their problems but fail to acknowledge that they don't engage in governments. Many don't even vote, even when it comes to governance voting in the Cryptocurrancy world people don't engage.

Furthermore the American model of democracy and finance has been implemented and sad to say, it's not working. Biggest numbers wins and the way to get biggest numbers is through money. Crypto is a bottom up approach.

It is pretty much a copy paste of traditional American finance. Probably set up that way to compete with the American dollar.

But as it advances globally it is causing issues.

Voting weight is disproportionate to what's actually trying to be achieved. With the current model there will never be effective or adequate governance.

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Governance is hard to figure out and I don't know what will happen. Depending on the community, one type of governance will work on one but not on another. Of course we should give people who have more tokens more power but there has to be some type of balance. I think the governance systems of various different tokens and cryptos will be a nice case study as things proceed.

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I know a lot of people bag on him, but I kind of feel like Dan Larimer is doing a lot of this. If you look at it through the lens you pain here, many of his past projects like Bitshares, Steem, and EOS could be seen as experiments in governance. It didn't work out quite the way he wanted. Many people accuse him of abandoning projects, but again if you look at it through this lens, he is just trying again until he gets it right. It sounds like EdenOS is going to be his next attempt. Time will tell how that turns out...

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It is certainly easier to create a project 'X' in the world of cryptos with almost no development', take advantage of the popularity of some famous personage to post a few good lines on Twitter and hope that their fans will make that project a kind of cult place. Unfortunately most people join the crypto world thinking more like a herd following a leader than as part of a movement where their conscious participation has an impact on a leading role in the community.

On the other hand, governance will leave the utopian plane when people assume cryptocurrencies as something more than a simple means to increase personal income.


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we could also try to make governance more fun and engaging, both in the physical world and on hive, people are not big into voting and stuff

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Cryptocurrency is rapidly bringing about abundance. The only problem with that is we are entering this realm while operating with governance models that are based upon scarcity.

I don't know the answer yet, but I really think that you nailed the right question to ask, how to design a governance model based on abundance?

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This post is conducted in really nice way that made me force to think about governance.Usually people blame government but all the time government didn't wrong. Some time individuals don't cast the vote as well as did not follow the rules created by government. This is the greatest challenge of the time. Developing governance system is difficult instead of imagine.still I don't know the right answer but I must say you raised the most valuable point.

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