[DAO:225a93e] Can we improve the culture of communication in the DAO?

Governance
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by 0x63f587fc66d140368be6f808785937d63b8e6fc4 (CarlFravel)

The problem:
The discussion of items in the DAO often includes language that is disrespectful of individuals or prejudicial – name-calling, ad-hominem attacks, character assassination, distortion of wording, changing the wording of “yes, no, invalid” to biased alternative wording, etc.

This affects people visiting and considering getting involved in the community and the DAO, as they can be put off by this rancor and be reluctant to comment or vote for fear of being attacked.

It can even put off commercial prospects from using the platform for events or commercial enterprises, hence harming the economy and traffic of Decentraland.

In the Rules channel of the DAO Discord there is a link to the Decentraland DAO Code of Ethics.
Here is a direct link to it: Decentraland DAO - Code of Ethics.pdf - Google Drive

I think it isn’t being observed, in either the Discord server or especially in the comments on proposals.

I’m asking if we can find a path to a better communications culture in the DAO.

Applying the enforcement mechanisms in the Code of Ethics might be one approach, but what we really need is to develop a commitment to a strong culture of respectful and useful consultation about issues and proposals.

I am posting this poll to seek a sense of the community’s interest in bringing about this change, and to gather commentary on how we might go about achieving it.

Let’s say that a Yes vote indicates a desire and commitment to only communicating respectfully and about the topic under discussion.

I think that a No vote would indicate that the current state of communication culture is ok, not a problem.

But commentary here is much of what I’m seeking, thoughts about how we can make the DAO a happier environment in which to discuss ideas.

A closing thought: I believe that people have tried the experiment of using DAOs for governance because we are genuinely unhappy with other current forms of governance. But we are seeing in this experiment that DAOs don’t intrinsically guarantee good decision making or high quality consultation, any more than the legacy forms of governance do. I submit that the way to get there is cultural – a growing community commitment to a style of consultation that helps us understand the real pros and cons of issues and builds greater unity around decision-making.

  • Yes, let’s work on better communications
  • No, we’re ok as it is
  • Invalid question/options

Vote on this proposal on the Decentraland DAO

View this proposal on Snapshot

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Thanks @CarlFravel for epic intent to move DAO in more positive direction. Think having people offer counter solutions would help rather than people just saying “no” with no explanation. However more rules and regulations we have only seen leads to more abuse of power and censorship.

As said before I do not agree with cussing me out, talking down to me, and harassment of the payroll trolls (HP, PB, and Tobik) :money_with_wings: :troll: always do to me, as well as the negativity from the bucket crabs :crab: :bucket: do to each other here however will choose freedom of speech any day over asking for them and I both to be censored over a small groups subjective opinions on what the ones in power deem as “right.”

So maybe we can have a box where people can also fill in alternative solutions rather then just raw negative feedback? Hope it helps thanks.

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Thank you Aaron.
I too hope that we can achieve this mostly or even entirely by the community’s sense of what’s ok rising.

As for alternative solutions, since proposals now have to go through “poll” and “draft” stages, and the author can incorporate good suggestions, that probably can take care of it. If we don’t harangue people for making them.

Also, about being attacked or name-called personally, my experience says that the best thing to do is to largely ignore the negativity, stick to the topic, answer real questions, etc. Surely if we post negativity in response to negativity it just turns up the heat.

1 Like
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Talk about negativity then target people in the same sentence :joy::bucket::crab:

PB is still not getting paid by the DAO btw.

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I agree with that sentiment.

It would go a long way toward a better comms culture if, when someone attacks, or has attacked you, you wear teflon, let it go, don’t name names, and keep the conversation on the topic of the proposal.

That can be hard to do, because being attacked is certainly upsetting. I know. But i have never found that it makes things better, or helps with the topic at hand, to “fight back”.

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haha no, @HPrivakos A person that likes to troll while on pay roll is by definition, what it is, an on pay roll troll :money_with_wings::troll: it is not negative, just a fact. A lot easier then going through the history of your situation to the new people that don’t understand whats going on.

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Continuing to argue towards a person is what doesn’t work very well in building a better culture, rather it is what we’re struggling with healing.

Let’s see if we can focus the discussion on the topic of processes to improve our consultation, not on persons.

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Thanks @CarlFravel ! As long as it does not lead to more censorship and abuse of power, I am rooting for all results you seek on a more productive ecosystem! :saluting_face::heart:

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Hello Carl, your insights are appreciated, and it would be good to read your opinion more often in the future.

Improvements should always be made in culture understanding and beneficial communication standards, both personally and within the community. However, I believe the focus should not be on sporadic individual arguments but rather on enhancing platform improvements aimed at growth while also resisting the endorsement of inadequate grants, like those for “advertising.”
If you don’t mind, why did you vote YES on this:
Advertising Platform (decentraland.org)
and then didn’t comment or vote a month later on this:
Resubmission: Advertising Platform (decentraland.org)
I appreciate your time and reply,
Jenn

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Hi, @Harlow / @Jenn / @DedHeadJ

I will try to answer your questions.

I apologize in advance to anyone who isn’t interested in the story around the MetaAds proposals in particular. I’m going to try to exemplify here how to discuss ideas with which some people may disagree, without attacking anyone.

The reasons I voted yes on the initial submission are explained in detail in my comments there.
But to summarize - landowners need ways to monetize their land, to earn income from it, as the primary foundation of a DCL economy. Few events can sustain admission charges. Gambling works, but not all landowners can legally use that method or would choose to. Selling things from the land, like NFT artwork or wearables, is a little successful. But most visitors expect the experience to be free. Given the experience with Web2, advertising could be an important source of income. However, it requires a broad platform like the one that Google Ads has built, so that advertisers will have broad coverage and traffic. MetaAds is working to build out such a platform, and for it to generate good revenue for land owners, it needs to be widely adopted, not just in DCL but across other virtual worlds, too. They are building relationships with both platforms (DCL, etc.) but also with advertising sources “DSPs” like Google Ads. Also, I beta tested their ad tech last year, and it has great features for both landowners and advertisers.
The proposal was, in exchange for some funding from the DAO, to open source the client and document its use, to guarantee access to the backend service forever to the community (or to open source the backend if they ever discontinued it), to offer a share of the future revenue stream to the DAO, as well as an unusually generous share of revenue to the landowners.

In the commentary on that first proposal, someone said I was a member of the MetaAds team, which is incorrect. I have given Yaroslav free advice, both about the platform and about the wording of the proposal. But I am not a member of MetaAds - neither an investor nor an employee, and would not have received any portion of the grant funds.

I was also accused of always voting for “money grabs”.
I have voted for about 60 proposals, and my voting has been 83% aligned with the community.
30 of those were grant proposals, and of those 25 were aligned with the community, again 83%.

Unfortunately once someone says something like that a vote is self-voting on a grant, or corrupt, or only voting for “money grabs”, those things sort of “stick” – people may perceive such things as facts. This is part of the harm of personal attacks in the commentary. It distorts reality.

So because of those things said in the first vote, I decided to stand back on the resubmission, to not vote or comment, and let it proceed on its own merits. It passed the 2nd time.

However, I learned from Yaroslav yesterday that the grant support squad declined the proposal, stating that it would need to be an Accelerator proposal rather than a Platform proposal (note that there are no Accelerator grants for at least the rest of 2024). They said that it was to fund a company and not fully open sourced. I’ve looked at the grant request form for Platform grants, and I don’t see those conditions stated. If that is policy, it should be clear in the submission process, rather than after a vote and then decline it, I’d think. Also, not sure why funding cannot go to a company or team. Does that mean that all platform grants much be just a single individual? I think that this policy needs some real clarification and for any such policy to be stated clearly in the submission process wording.

One thing I regret is that one of my pieces of advice to Yaroslav was to state that the MetaAds strategy wasn’t solely dependent on this grant (because they are pursuing other grants and investments) and that this proposal was to create a special relationship with Decentraland community and the DAO. That came across in the wording as “we don’t need the money”, which people took to mean that there was no reason to fund it from the DAO. Unfortunate.

I think MetaAds has as good of shot as any virtual world advertising platform, and I think they will still make a generous offer to Decentraland land owners, but the DAO has opted out of the possible revenue stream.

Jenn, I hope this clarifies things well for you, but feel free to ask other questions.
And I hope my approach to sharing my thoughts on this can serve as an example of putting forth one’s views without attacking others or trying to distort what happened.

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Can we improve the culture of communication in the DAO?

This proposal is now in status: FINISHED.

Voting Results:

  • Yes, let’s work on better communications 98% 5,934,745 VP (54 votes)
  • No, we’re ok as it is 0% 0 VP (0 votes)
  • Invalid question/options 2% 141,409 VP (4 votes)
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Can we improve the culture of communication in the DAO?

This proposal has been PASSED by a DAO Committee Member (0xbef99f5f55cf7cdb3a70998c57061b7e1386a9b0)