Hive Governance: Accountability is Needed!
I've been thinking about the best way to govern Hive for a sustainable future, and the key word I will exemplify further is ACCOUNTABILITY because it's imperative to success. Having a system of accountability requires measurement, because how could you hold something accountable if you can't measure it? The answer is you cannot, and material weaknesses exist on Hive when things cannot be measured in an easy way, since it then can't be held accountable.
Accountability is the key ingredient to sustaining success. Human nature suggests that we are all greedy, no matter what good intentions we believe may apply, as Hive grows, so does the risk of it being copied and replaced. Without a good governing system to hold development of Hive accountable, it means the future of Hive will be 100% in the hands of a few. A few people we don't really know, we can't review their CVs, we don't see their Linkedin profile, and it's a team you or I can't apply to be on very easily. In my humble opinion; every Hive stakeholder, including the witnesses, should want accountability and should be asking for a system of checks and balances.
While exploring these ideas, I didn't think of them in silo, rather, I discussed them with some people who I thought were key Hive stakeholders. Because I didn't want to be off base, but I did find one common theme, and everyone expects someone else to think of the best solution for Hive. Is that someone else the blocktrades management team?
Do you really think you know what the driving force behind Hive actually is? If not, then you are speculating, so you could easily put Hive in the same risk category as dCity. Don't get me wrong, I don't mean to offend dCity in any way, but I believe we all expect more from Hive. However at this point, Hive doesn't have a sustainable value model due to it having material weaknesses in it's audit system and valuation for proposals, because it doesn't exist and the DHF is the only fund for Hive development to progress.
We have the first step simply because we have the DHF, but our current proposal system seems easy to abuse. It's more of a popularity contest since witnesses and popular accounts win proposals. The ones awarded show no standard way in which it is valued nor has there been any documented consensus around valuation. I'd argue that some proposals seem more like on-going job functions as well.
Hive Proposals
Hive proposals need a system of checks and balances plain and simple. This can be accomplished with a rotating team of elected officials, I'll call from here forward "Hive Auditors". This is an internal audit team that ensures there is nothing going on in Hive but the value looking to be created and enhanced from the proposals that are being requested.
Currently, no Hive proposal offers any voter a clear and standard way to assess value. The proposals didn't go through any sort of bidding process to establish the best market price. But, the general voter shouldn't be expected too, because I wouldn't even know how to assess them myself.
How much does it cost to build a blacklist API? I have no idea, I'm not a developer but I can assume I can elect a group of people smarter than me, with no interest to assess and review all proposal values. I also know of easy processes like reverse auctions to understand market pricing if you're not an expert in that particular market.
Source: hive.blog/proposals
Hive Jobs with Elections
I believe some of the proposals we see on hive could be easily converted into a job with results we can easily benchmark.
- Blacklist Manager
- Hive Help Desk
- Hive Witness
- Hive Auditors
Blacklist Manager
This job currently pays 20 HBD per day to Marky Mark. I have no idea what this job should pay, but we would do a reverse auction having qualified bidders who can perform the job function bid for the job. The top 5 or so lowest price jobs would be in the election post the bidding period. Then, the Hive Audit team would do periodic reviews to ensure the manager is performing the required functions.
Hive Help Desk Managers
There could be several roles for this based on different time-zones. E.g. someone is on live stream from 8am-5pm eastern time and available to help any Hive user with anything related to hive, including new user on-boarding.
Hive Witnesses
These are already running like jobs, except one big change needs to happen. We must implement term limits on witnesses. This will force rotation in a healthy way. Hive Witnesses votes should be reset after 4 years. Most of their votes are probably stale and their witness status should be reassessed. I think the max limit a Hive witness should be able to serve is 8 years. Let's make it easy, not recreate a wheel and treat a hive witness like a US congressman or senate.
Hive Auditors
I think a Hive Audit team can be open for debate, but the idea is this is the body of people that would put value in Hive proposals. There would be certain requirements for Hive auditors such that there is no conflict of interest; e.g. they can't have any active proposals or ties to any groups. This could even be a company we propose and elect year over year and award a "contract" if you will.
Another idea here would be to have a hybrid audit team that consists of one group being all top 10 ranking community leaders.
The Election Process
To elaborate further Hive Jobs would be governed through election processes that would include all votes to be reset every year on an agreed date.
This is so old votes don't become stale and the most active Hive members are constantly holding the positions more accountable with the help of a forced election.
Bidding for Jobs with Reverse Auctions
Elections would be prefaced with a period whereby all people seeking positions would do a reverse auction bid during a short time-frame to identify the best price point for the open jobs. Only qualified individuals would participate and this doesn't necessarily mean lowest price wins. Rather, it just lets you see your competition and at the end of the bidding period your price would be set firm. Your price would be for everyone to then vote on.
As it stands, I don't see much of a chance for a new witness to ever get to the top 5, and I believe a bidding process would be better for paying witnesses fairly. I'm not sure if aggroed is trying to get one of the top seats, but if he can't get it then it suggests we need a change from the current system.
Not Trying to Make Enemies
Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against our current witnesses, but as a stakeholder of Hive I have interest in the success of the platform. My concern is that Hive is beginning to concentrate it's power by keeping the same witnesses governing all advancements of Hive development.
This is likely the reason why the witnesses often win proposals. Proposals that can easily be condensed into a job system so that we can go through a process to ensure we're getting the right market value awarded to each job.
So Who Am I?
When I introduced these ideas to other active members of Hive in discord it often leads to them asking about my background. Here is a little bit about me in my introduction post, that includes my experience.
I work for a 5 billion dollar company and lead it's strategy as the category manager. In short, I manage 500 million dollars and ensure my company gets the best prices for it's services, or you could say "jobs" that I award contracts on behalf of my company.
I have designed systems and business processes to manage things similar to what I'm outlining here and I am only hoping to add value with some of these ideas.
Sources
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