[DAO:70abbfa] Freeze All non-Platform Grant Spending

Governance
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100% of the people making games and content when asked “how many people are you gong to onboard” or “how many people did your last grant onboard” when being honest state that they are not responsible for onboarding users and that creating meaningful content isn’t going to onboard anyone.

Creating decent games in Decentraland is almost impossible given the current tech capablities and there is no valid reason to waste more money on attempting to do it until the new client is out and it’s capabilities are better understood.

Onboarding users is a marketing budget item, not a development one.

There are exponentially more games in Decentraland now then when most of us joined the platform in 2021/2022, and in the event that there is a sudden surge of users, they can play, on top of all the games like WonderMine that were here when we arrived they can play:

KoA
Vroomway
Exodus
ButterflyPrawn Farm
Meta Residence Tower

just to name a handful that come to top of mind, and I know i’m forgetting multiple other enjoyable game loops.

But there is very little room for innovation left in Decentraland as it currently exists, and shutting our eyes and pretending otherwise isn’t going to lead to a game with the ability to onboard the masses.

And to be clear, I don’t think the majority of existing users or Devs have the ability to take a grant and improve the platform, and I am 100% fine with not spending any of the grant money until the foundation does the heavy lifting.

But there have been plenty of very talented and capable people laid off from the foundation over the last year, so I’m sure there exists people who absolutely could take the DAO money and make meaningful contributions to the platform.

The reality is the people complaining just lack the ability to make those contributions and would rather waste the money making lack luster user experiences to pay their rent.

DCL DAO has funded at most 3 games that qualify as barely better then a 3D version of a 2006 facebook game, and anyone being honest with themselves would admit that even the best games the DAO has funded would require millions more in funding to make something truly amazing, and I don’t know if you’ve ever read the comments on a game grant, but it’s clear the community isn’t willing to dedicate the funds needed to make a truly great game.

So as much as I love the people actually building games here, the system is set up to waste the DAO moeny while making those creators look like idiots, because you simply can’t make a great game for $300k

And the largest possible size of a grant is $250k, so freezing spending and addressing the core issues preventing the DAO from funding worthwhile projects seems like a much better use of time and energy instead of fighting over crums to make what are at best demos so the creators can get a job at a company somewhere else.

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And, again, this Prop is currently failing, and unless @RobL or @esteban decide they want to force it through, it isn’t likely to pass. And given that both of them hate me, I really don’t think any of you have anything to worry about.

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You didn’t address what I wrote at all. I see no reason to pretend otherwise.

You don’t get to go “one question” and then waste my time answering it to then spout out something new.

That isn’t intellectually honest engagement.

And last time I spoke to tangpoko she had no intention of asking for another grant, and based on the GSS’s comments on Shelly’s last prop, it doesn’t seem like she’s following through.

And to be clear, the only person the TRU prop pays is Shelly.

Literally, all the performers there are only performing because they love DCL, so your argument is further invalid.

86

Prove this hypothesis.

The overwhelming majority of MANA is held by people who either founded the platform or have never stepped foot it in it.

You are just repeating the same flawed argument from your last comment. Again, the only person paid by TRUs grant is Shelly. Do you think MrSwe will stop performing at his new venue because Shelly is no longer getting paid?

The dao doesn’t exist to fund anyone’s failed business ventures.

This is an absurd argument that lacks integrity.

Some random alt account is hiding behind a fake name, making false arguments about how the community doesn’t care about being mocked because it believes in decentralization.

The majority of grant recipients could care less about decentralization. And nothing you wrote in that paragraph justifies the existence of grants funding bad projects.

The grant program should be frozen because everyone here seems to only be here to get paid by the grant program.

There are literally countless examples of games and communities that exist without people needing to be paid to be there and making content because they enjoy it. That is infact the best way to build a sustainable community.

Again, the prop is failing, so stop being dramatic.

I will refrain from replying to your next comment, which I suspect will just be a repetitive summary about how the babydolls and Shelly’s grant are what is keeping DCL alive.

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(post deleted by author)

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This grant freeze idea is a disaster. It is a celebration of the lack of common business sense that certain whales have because they are never inworld to play the game they’re invested in.

Shutting down all funding for games and events will cause DCL to lose daily active users.

Daily active users = price of MANA = value of the DAO treasury

The bear market for MANA that this proposal could create would cause a more significant loss of treasury value than spending funds that do not always provide ROI for the DAO. Business is all about risk, sometimes projects don’t work out and we lose our investment. 99% of all small businesses fail, we need to keep gambling on new grants to find the 1% that will bring MANA back to an all time high and give 100x returns on DAO investment.

There are more reasonable and less destructive alternatives to a grant freeze that would address the underlying concerns about corruption and misuse of DAO funding.

  1. Reduce budget for all categories by up to 30% depending on a community vote

  2. Increase the authority of the revocation committee to initiate community votes on whether a grant should be revoked or not. Now that Esteban is active in the DAO again, there should be no fear of any certain group being able to override the decentralized will of the community because we can trust him to have the best intentions of DCL in mind.

  3. Esteban could redistribute VP to align better with his vision of the future. If someone is abusing their VP in his opinion, then it would be a simple solution to redelegate that VP to community members he trusts. This would help him not waste time having to look through everyone’s proposal each week and have to potentially spend hours deciding who deserves a grant and who doesn’t. This is an understandable burden that I believe is influencing his support of this proposal.

  4. Make grants have to go through a 2 stage voting process similar to polls. This would allow a longer period of time for the merits of the new grant requests to be questioned and ultimately reduce corruption by exposing hidden flaws that can not be found during the relatively short 14 day process we currently have.

  5. Give the revocation committee, DAO committee, Governance Squad, and GSS an increased level of combined authority over the revocation process

  6. Allow grant requests to only be resubmitted 2 or 3 times per quarter

  7. Require all grant requests to have an initial 1 month trial to see if the project deserves the DAO’s risk of being funded for 2-6 months

  8. Reducing the overall budget of the DAO’s spending each quarter is the most reasonable alternative to a grant freeze. Without DAO funding there is no incentive for creators in DCL to create anything because of the opportunity costs of working for someone else. The effect of a grant freeze would be a loss of daily active users which would cause the treasury to lose value, the premise this proposal is based on is invalid as it will have the opposite of the intended effect of protecting the treasury.

We should reduce the budget for a limited amount of time to properly address the underlying problems in the current DAO structure.

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Voting No on this proposal. I completely understand and empathize with the concerns people raised, and it is commendable to bring attention to the fact that if we continue spending money at our current burn rate, we will deplete our funds. Change is necessary. However, I believe that completely halting the grants program would be a critical error.

Although, I think it would be great to continue leveraging the in-platform grant category for new games, tools, etc. Their benefits would be completely diminished if no one knew it existed (individuals outside of Decentraland).

In addition, Decentraland functions seamlessly with the aid of its squads and committees. I believe that freezing the grants program would have a direct impact on them. Furthermore, I firmly believe that having funds allocated to support marketing and content creation is crucial for the success of Decentraland.

Nifty Island for instance, has made a highly successful launch and many individuals continue to speak very highly on the platform. I anticipate though within the next year or two, additional competitors will also enter this domain. If we freeze grants now, I foresee a very dim future for Decentraland.

Again, I do think it was great to raise the flag, but we shouldn’t completely freeze it again. Possible alternatives we could implement a maximum cap (which was previously suggested) of no more then 80K and / or increase the value of VP for certain amounts. I believe that incorporating these standards would help enhance creativity in this domain without imposing any limitations. These guidelines can also be reviewed on a semi-annual or quarterly basis for their effectiveness.

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In philosophy, “有舍必有得” can be understood as a universal principle of balance in life, reflecting the inherent connection between action and consequence. This principle suggests that, typically, to gain some benefit or advantage, one must make corresponding sacrifices or relinquishments. It implies that in the pursuit of goals or ideals, individuals often need to make decisions involving trade-offs. Sacrificing certain things may entail short-term pain or loss, but in the long run, such sacrifices may lead to greater gains or achievements. Therefore, “有舍必有得” reflects a universal causal relationship in life, emphasizing the necessity for individuals to balance choices and sacrifices in decision-making.

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It does seem like grant recipients are using a lot of @esteban’s VP to vote against an idea he said he supported.

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Not to suggest all the people captured in this image are nefarious. Just an observation.

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I think having difference of opinions is healthy in this space- as long as we do it in the professional manner and have a compelling argument. Again, I do believe some changes are needed because it is quite alarming at this current burn rate. But to implement another freeze would be a grave error.

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Yea, burn rate is interesting. However, to improve anything, the vp system and the way grants get passed has to be fixed. If you don’t fix that, it won’t matter how much money is “saved” for the future of the DAO.

Pausing funding now for the future or spending it now will not change how grants get passed; so we would just be delaying the same “insanity” loop of passing less than stellar grants.

I’m very curious though for those who voted “yes” so far, what exactly would you be holding funds for in the future? Better content? Better gaming studios to come in and develop?

What would be different in the future if we just held funds without changing anything else?

1 Like
94

We would have a year to rework the grant system, while the platform is being improved.
Grants for other categories would still be possible, but through bid&tendering, which would hopefully improve competition and lower costs

2 Likes
95

I am for those types of changes; however, this proposal mentions none of that and that’s why this proposal needs to be rejected.

The Motivation and Conclusion sections mention no action plans to improve anything or anything remotely close to what you have stated.

96

We will have 10 months to plan that, if we could do it without pausing grants we would not need this proposal

1 Like
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That is not part of this proposal.

My whole point is that we don’t fully think things out before slapping a proposal together.

Let’s create an action plan to accompany the pause.

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Lets waste 10 months creating no content in DCL during a bull run?

How about we actually solve the underlying problems with misuse of DAO funding right now? Everyone wants to fix the system but no one has any suggestions, lets create a long list of possible solutions to address the concerns and start immediately reforming the grant request process. A grant freeze does not propose any solutions to the underlying problems, its just a delay to fix the problems later. How about we take real measures to fix the problems now?

I have already proposed 8 possible solutions so feel free to add to my list if you want to actually fix the system instead of just endlessly talk about it. Let’s start fixing the problems with fair reforms instead of procrastinating for 10 months.

How about for every grant request we have a new process: poll, trial, final request? 3 stages of voting would create significant transparency around voting and hold voters responsible. How about we lower the quarterly budget and save money that way? This grant freeze idea would reserve 50% of the budget, but I have already suggested a 30% reduction in a poll. You want to shut down all funding for games and events over 20%? How is a budget reduction not a more reasonable solution than this proposal?

Feel free to agree or disagree with any of my ideas. Lets start reforming the grant process now, 10 months is too long to wait because we are in a bull run and need to produce more content to get more daily active users.

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What an amazing bullrun we are in =)

1 Like
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Just to be clear, your position is “I will only support a proposal that already has fixes planned for everything? There is no possible way that if the prop that creates the time needed to address issues doesn’t call out a plan on how the proposer will personally fix all the issues, we should not take any action.” Or am I putting too many words into your mouth?

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Incorrect. Read the words that I type and nothing more.

102

If core unit grants are excluded now except Facilitation squad, who will work to apply this kind of changes? So, will the Facilitation squad instead of the Gov App squad apply this change to the Gov app?