This is the kind of math that honestly goes over my head, but I’d asked previously about how self dealing would be handled in the gatewayverse, since any gateway which is also a noderunner could theoretically route to their own nodes. This is one of the reasons that Shannon is so critical.
Thanks for the insight, Joe.
Remember when we used to have protocol developers who understood math and cryptography? That was cool lol.
ETA: the current protocol team is very talented in their respective domains, but it’s hard to deny that we’ve lost some critical adversarial thinkers in the last couple of years.
Governance of PNF
I can understand the nervousness of some of the community about giving any 1 Individual complete control over decision making, in my experience on boards, especially with startups, the board decisions are lead by the CEO/Founder and it’s is only an illusion of control in these situation, where an investor might have 1 board seat and easily out voted buy the Founding team.
Reserved Matters
What I believe could be more pragmatic approach could be outline the key areas, as ‘reserved matters’, these decisions would require a PIP, PUP or PEP in exactly the same way that it is required now, and have a ‘high water mark’ for what they are and also what they are not
As an example, what would NOT be a reserved matter
As an example, what would COULD be a reserved matter
Advisory Board(s)
I would set up several, voluntary advisory boards with the purpose of helping guide the @o_rourke / Director(s) of PNF with key members of Gateways, PNF and the Community and Key Opinion Leaders (KOL’s.)
If PNF was to adopt the policies and or ideas of the Advisory communities, there could be a retrospective remuneration process, as there has been for recent development updates from multiple parties.
Note: I would have a Non-exec chair (non voting capacity)/company secretary that would; arrange all board/advisory meetings, take minutes, circulate all information priory to each meeting, provide agendas and guide the meeting (while not participating), allowing all contributors to fully focus on the meeting at hand and not burdening them with additional work
Summary
I believe this would give @o_rourke/Director(s) of PNF control over all day to day decisions, allowing Grove, PNF and the protocol to ‘rock-and-roll’ and allow the community and more to add real value to the Key Reserved Matters
I have an amendment recommendation:
Objective:
Key Components:
The goal of this council is not to dictate spending, it is purely to provide transparency by a 3rd party
Accountability Mechanism:
Suggested Lead:
Foundation commitment:
This amendment aims to ensure that all fund allocations are transparent and justified, fostering trust within the community while holding foundation leaders accountable.
If this strategy and liquid staking do not clash with Mike’s proposal, and there are no downsides, is there any reason not to proceed with these now, under Shane’s oversight as temporary director? If these catapult the POKT token price, pre-Shannon, to $1, the PIP-38 monetary milestones could be revised accordingly.
I am back, it seems Michael has verified my claims for which I was banned - unfortunately I am still perma banned from the telegram but as this is being fast-tracked to a vote very soon (just as I said about $GROVE and the fork plans maybe trust me on this one this time) I think its best I share my thoughts. Anyone who knows me knows how much I loved POKT - key word there LOVED. Past tense. Whatever this is now is not the Pocket I fell in love with, it’s not the Pocket that had tremendous amounts of promise. It is not, if Mike has his way, the:
Censorship Resistance Decentralised RPC Base Layer
That we as a community aligned around - PNF did not formulate
its own vision and road map
Rather we - the DAO, the community, the people building on top of this once promising protocol, we aligned on these ideals together. I have the utmost respect for the work that @b3n, @Dermot, @JackALaing did for this protocol and I was thoroughly ashamed to see them booted out of their positions because Michael wants power again.
In this post I aim to give my insights where possible and try to prove without a doubt not only is this a terrible idea, not only the end of the protocol, but with a few correct moves - something Michael clearly doesn’t understand how to do or those around him either unfortunately. I believe we can take the reigns back and push this protocol back on the right direction. I will call for some drastic changes, I may not say the things you want to hear but they are in fact the things you need to hear, we all need to hear these truths and really deep them. This is either the start or the end of Pocket and we need to make sure we make the correct calls - as a community, not a dictatorship lead by a proven incompetent leader.
Lets start with the very first point:
What drew me to start protocol development - no to crypto in general was Pocket so when I say this I saw it with true sadness in my heart. Shipping Shannon has never been a priority for Grove - not at all. They may have said all the right things, put up a front as if it were but hear me out now. I now work for Polymer Labs a mature codebase - they also started by building out a native L1, then pivoted to a rollup using a customised OPStack “Hack” utilising both Cosmos-SDK, OPStack, DA Layers - I hope by now this is starting to sound familiar to anyone who has kept up with the Shannon Development journey. Its exactly what we did - what I was a part of. When I joined the protocol team initially as an outsider working under PNF then slowly transitioned over to Grove (still paid half by PNF) until finally being hired fully by Grove I knew nothing. I had just taught myself to code, sure I picked it up fast and found it easy which helped but I didn’t know what a codebase 2 years under development ought to look like. Having now seen a codebase that has been under development for the same amount of time, is in its 2nd or 3rd testnet and mainnet soon approaching - that ALSO followed the same pivot journey that we did I know now what company focused on shipping a protocol’s codebase SHOULD look like that far in. I don’t even know how long Shannon/V1 was in development for before I got involved - but I know it wasn’t a short amount of time.
It really pains me to say this as I consider @Olshansky a good friend, but friendships aside for now lets get down to the difficult conversation. The time pre-h5law (AKA The Dark Ages) → V1 (pre-pivot/native L1/building cool shit) → Pivot #1 (Rollup w/ Rollkit on Celestia) → Pivot #2 (Cosmos-SDK L1 w/ RollChains integration for Celestia DA added security); in my eyes this journey demonstrates a clear lack of understanding of shipping a product - it even gives incompetence vibes. So much wasted time, wasted research cycles, wasted hires and fires. If Grove really wanted to ship Shannon I can see a few key points where things SHOULD have been done differently.
In crypto its not about who you are but what you can deliver
Simple as that if you cannot deliver you are worthless, nuff said. Its a shame, Its peoples livelyhoods you may say. If they wanted to sit around and not deliver, maybe read a cool paper and do some research go into academia, join a bigtech company. Crypto is different, maybe its why my generation (doxxing myself rn but I’m wait for it Gen Z) love it. Crypto should be free from the bureaucracy and bullshit you find everywhere else, instead it should focus on what started this entire industry - an anon fighting for ideals in a world that lacked them (big up Satoshiiii).
Again it pains me to say this, it really does because I love the guy personally - even his knee high socks he’s so nice and caring - but Olshansky, if under management that cared about delivering the product would’ve been either:
I can’t stress how much I love this guy, I genuinely am having difficulty writing this but numerous times Olshansky himself would ask me “Who do you feel like you work for?”, each and every single time I would reply “I work for the protocol, not Grove, I want what is best for Pocket Network” I was very often the one to challenge the team in their decisions - I was seen as the “voice of the community on the protocol team” and I was proud of that. I wish I could have done more to avoid the mess we are in now. I was against the pivot, I was against Olshansky’s push towards the OPStack (thank fuck we avoided that mess), I enjoy shutting people down I can’t lie it was fun to point out why all the ideas were dumb - I said lets either keep with V1 or use Cosmos-SDK for IBC. We settled on Rollkit because it was shiny - but it wasn’t ready for us so good thing we kept the backup plan of just using Cosmos right? Or is this something the Lead Developer, Staff Engineer, Super Senior He Could Date Your Dying Grandma Engineer, Lord of the Protocol Team, Chief Naming Officer (don’t get me started on our tiffs calling it Poktroll - especially now that its not even a rollup 
) Big Man Oldshansky SHOULD HAVE THOUGHT ABOUT JUST A LITTLE. The idea was to pivot and ship ASAP, good intentions - yet another poor execution. It wasn’t ready for us, it set us back. If this was the only misstep it is absolutely forgivable without question. But if you look back through the timeline how many years, where Grove supposedly focused on protocol development, were wasted due to poor decisions, poor execution and just plain ignorance on how to ship a protocol.
The reason this statement doesn’t sound correct is because in reality Grove never was focussed on shipping the protocol, maybe they would have hired more than 5 people to work on it. Maybe they would’ve used the DAO rebate to fund it - not just one of the following:
Its not nice to say but let’s be real, when you’re startup becomes so uptight that being blunt, slightly dismissive of others, or fucking straight up rude and mean to others is more important than shipping your forever SOON™️ protocol release things have gone terribly wrong. Just to be clear here I was the blunt, dismissive, rude and mean one. I admit it but I am of the opinion that if you are becoming corporate before you’ve launched your fucking product thats a sign of bad leadership at all levels. So lets dive into that, leadership.
o_rourke wants to take control of Pocket, he failed miserably before, thankfully PNF picked up his mess and carried us somewhere respectable - a long way to go but god damn those guys did amazing work through bear and bull they shined. Big ups b3n, Dermot, JackALaing and Adrienne on god these guys did a lot if you cannot see that you are delusional.
@Cryptocorn correct me if I am wrong but wasn’t it under o_rourke’s initial tokenomics that the protocol was able to be bleed dry by mercenaries. The 1000% or whatever inflation Pocket came out the gate swinging with does not give me any hope that this guy knows a think about tokenomics - in fact it proves he knows not a thing. Read a book or something, read the forums, get active in the community and you (o_rourke) might realise this community IS INCREDIBLY KNOWLEDGABLE ABOUT TOKENOMIC AND ECONOMIC THEORY IN GENERAL. We have big brains like Cryptocorn and @RawthiL and others I am sure I’m omitting. We DO NOT NEED SOMEONE WHO NEEDED TO SELL HIS OWN HOUSE TO SECURE FUNDING FOR GROVE IN CHARGE OF THE TOKENOMICS OF THIS PROTOCOL. That is literally the dumbest thing we could do. Lets dive into that:
o_rourke I once thought you seemed calm but more and more you seem in way over your head. I would never trust you with any authority or leadership in this ecosystem, if anyone does they are blind as to the mess we are in. YOU ACTIVELY SPOKE WITH INVESTORS ABOUT FORKING POCKET WHY, WHY, WHY SHOULD ANYONE TRUST YOU?
Lets chat on this: Instead of paying Grove who has failed miserably to ship Shannon - but like every other company got lost in the AI sauce, was misguided time and time again and displayed a complete lack of competence. Maybe heres a crazy thought - lets further decentralise the protocol. Fire the entire protocol team, anyone who wishes to stay now must work for PNF - the beef between Olshansky and others at Grove with @poktblade needs to be squashed because I think he should be on the protocol team ffs its silly how you don’t like the guy on god.
Im deadly serious reinstate all of PNF immediately, transfer control of the protocol team to them - if that means smaller wages so be it. I can find talented devs to come on. People who care about the protocol are more likely to work for a little less - who knows if we chuck in forcing you to resign we might see a price boom as investors see us cutting dead weight o_rourke would you even consider that? I mean if you truly care about Pocket you must be able to see your influence on the protocol has been a net-negative undoubtedly, irrefutably.
I will stop here for now and continue later. But I’ll end for now on this - I love this fucking protocol, I was devastated to leave working on it. But holy fuck what a mess you have made big boy, now its time for the adults to come and clean it up - sorry if I hurt anyones feelings in this post (I am not) I am expecting another ban from @Jinx for once again speaking the truth (fr tho unban me Michael admitted to all I said you’re being childish). I hope I can convince some people to see the light and take the steps we should’ve taken years ago. Had this been, dare I say it, Web2 Michael would’ve been replaced the dev team cycled through for people that can ship a product and we would all be enjoying Shannon not just starting to discover the mess o_rourke has made in his diaper. If even a single person tries to say this is strawmanning grow up - read the text and you will see I have simply spoken the unadulterated truth, my way.
Look out for part 2
I’m totally back for this.
I’ve been telling you all time and time again that things were not right here. And as simple as it may seem, really thing about this, like seriously - if someone can’t even implement a proper logout flow and/or can’t fix it in a day or two, what makes you think they can build a whole protocol?
Sometimes it really is just that simple.
Problem is no one wants to work to grow $POKT because Grove owns too much of it. Why would anyone want to grow Groves bags.
Most of the good people here have moved on, and it was the teenagers that left first. LMAOOO
Its because young blood hasn’t got time for the older’s outdated mindset. Move fast (don’t break shit build shit) this aint 2000 anymore big man do things properly and do them right - first time preferably @o_rourke its just a little sad asking for a what is it now 5th chance/bailout/takeover however you want to phrase it. If you were my age you would’ve learned this lesson from fucking Pockémon of all places. If you love something let it go - let it grow and find its own path. Sometimes stepping away from something is the best thing you can do for it.
There were smart young guys in pokt, @addison @pierre dipped for greener pastures when they weren’t taken seriously anymore (AFAIK). Time for a new generation - don’t make us be the ones to do a CTO and fork the protocol from you. If we dropped the AI play and left that for the future when it might (if it ever will) be used Shannon would be going through serious testnets. The more I think about it the more I think its a good idea. Just as you forced out PNF we should force out Grove - tbf I’ve only ever heard complaints about Portal from people who’ve used it, myself included ahah ironic a little.
Maybe I’ll come back fork it call it something decent and get back to work on the things I built in the first place lol - SMT is my baby I built what you’re trying to pattent with the ProveClosest method maybe I should just beat you to market and we can see who does it better. The company struggling to raise or the dude doing it in his spare time for free ahahah - IK one of those two will ship a better protocol to be built ontop of with stronger tokenomics and the other will continue to lie, deceive and do all they can to have some power. You decide… Who’s who?
I’m going to remind everyone that in the forums we expect everyone to stay on topic and discuss the proposals.
No personal attacks.
If anyone wants to go insult people, go to 4Chan.
If members have a point of view and want to discuss the topic, you’re welcome to be as negative and dissenting as you want, but be respectful.
I don’t get paid to Mod, I’m doing it as a volunteer and while we are all frustrated, let’s not take it out on others in the community please.
Could you please tell me the difference between censoring a post containing valid points and a personal attack? @Cryptocorn I feel like I am being personally attacked by the Pocket Community firstly for calling out the truth of Michaels intentions which he lied about - turned out I was true about that.
Now I speak my mind in a supposedly open forum raising genuine points and critiques of a failed CEO and the crippled protocol team. Maybe I said it a bit crass but is that grounds to stop people from being able to read my comments and come to their own conclusion? I mean we allow all sorts of people I personally wouldn’t be caught dead associating with in this community but suddenly you can’t take valid criticism (that actually praised you IIRC) from someone who like most people here have been burnt my Michael’s literal defrauding of the entire community with his lies.
Yet for some reason his incessant lies, hostile take overs and outrageous ineptitude (not personal insults these are backed by his track record) do not class as grounds to do any of the following:
I’d rather not rewrite my post so if you can I kindly ask you return it to where it belongs and allow people to make informed decisions, we are all grown ups here. Treat people like children and no wonder they get fooled like them. Treat them like adults and they suddenly stop tolerating bullshit from serial frauds and wholly inept individuals.
Anyone can come to the forums and criticize proposals all day long.
We prefer to keep things pleasant in the forums and discuss actual details, proposals, and find answers. Raging is for the Telegram and blind rage is for 4chan.
You have valid criticisms to share and the community would be better off if you can share them in a calm, respectful manner so that they can be intelligently debated.
I personally have no beef with you and would prefer that to continue.
And on a side note- I appreciate your kind words for me.
Let’s keep the adult discussions in the forum and shoot from the hip somewhere else.
I’m just going to point out the elephant in the room: Illusory Autonomy
The protocol has always been centralized under PNI’s full influence and control. There has never been a time that PNI could not make a change and enforce it fairly quickly. This is evident in the current scene.
Grove: “we’re going to push through a proposal whether you like it or not”
PNF Directors: “we believe you” - resigns in mass
Valid to you. Valid doesn’t mean truth. I would think miss information or unverified information would justify censorship
I have restored @h5law’s comment: PIP-38: Re-electing Michael O'Rourke to the Foundation - #49 by h5law
I have also made changes to the forum’s Moderation Policy.
The truth never dies
You are tight, but I disagree that the cherry picker was offering any solace in the self-dealing issue. The CP data was withheld during the hyperinflation times, so we don’t know what happened then. When it was released to the public, I took the time to model it and see it it matched reality. It sorta looked like it was being implemented (but not a 100% tho), and that did not prevented many free relays to just evaporate when transitioning from Grove to Nodies.
In this sense, Mike proposal does not change anything.
This is also a problem of the current network, there is no approval path for new chains. God knows the motives behind new listings. What you describe can happen today, it will only be get worse with Michael x10 for new chains, but nothing more. That’s why I asked for “extra care” with this.
I doubt that any change will occur to app stakes, but only Grove has giga stakes, all new gateways are receiving apps with 10K POKT stake and are outside the control of PNF. make 20M relays per session (check here a random app).
This is impossible to know, unless the gateways does some obvious stuff like using the same domain for their gateway and nodes.
Same thing that happens today.
I’m a little lost with what you exactly mean here. Your reasoning seems sound (also the fact that we don’t support latex in the forum is a clear example of the level of discussions that are normally held… I was even accused of purposely confound people just for using it ).
What I can say is that there is no mechanism in Morse that can save us from fake traffic. Trust is the only barrier (trust and PNF legal contracts of course).
Why you say? because unless we set mint=burn there is always a mechanism. Even upping the relay cost make no sense (the 0.85 USD/millon relays ) because we need it to go lik x100 which makes no sense, or lower mint in a simmilar way, which also makes no sense. We are stuck in this matter.
The only way to prevent this is to make the recover of the attack too slow, as proposed by @shane for Shannon. In the meantime it is impossible, as I simulated here an attacker can very eassely recover the cost of staking an app only having a few nodes and waiting a few days.
So, we will still be in the same problem with Michael or PNF, we will have to trust gateways.
Just in case someone says “then remove the burn!” no, this is not the same, we need to prevent “flash attacks”, that’s why we need to set some friction.
Not trying to pile on too much… but what is.
Are you trying to get paid or not?
This is awesome work!!
Re the 48m POKT for shipping Shannon, the proposal should identify the recipients and, roughly, their respective allocations, that is, “everyone else who has participated up until now.”
To repeat, Mike says: “I don’t intend to take any for myself in this distribution. The same goes for the price-based milestones.”
Is Mike saying he does not intend to share in the other milestone payments? Or is he saying that he’ll share these payments with all responsible for achieving these milestones.
The proposal needs to make all of the above clear.
Based on feedback from the community I have added a a 2/3 multisig, voted by the DAO for transfers over $100k once we hit the $0.50 milestone.
Good call out @zaatar - I do intend do distribute myself POKT for the price based milestones specifically. Not the Shannon milestone.