If you cannot vote for the party of your choice without consequences from people who govern you, then you're already in the thick of it. What happens if you have to become the CCP to avoid becoming the CCP?
Witnesses on the new blockchain showed discrimination towards 300 people on HIVE that voted for "unapproved witnesses" on Steem, this was done by excluding them from the airdrop. What guarantees do I have that I won't be dealt with similarly based on who I vote for as a witness on HIVE?
Steem users tried to create a social contract with STINC regarding how the ninja mine would get used. Are witnesses on the new blockchain and token prepared to offer any guarantees that protect both the sanctity of an individual's vote as well as their stake?
It was one thing to exclude the blatant sockpuppets and STINC related accounts with ninja mined tokens. However, it was another thing entirely to exclude HIVEians that were not voting with ninja mined stake. To distill this even further, should HIVEians be entitled to equal distribution of their stake on the new chain just like everyone else, or should they get penalized based on how they voted on another blockchain?
If we penalize these folks by not including them equally in the distribution based on their stake in the old chain, what does that tell us about the sanctity of individual HIVEian votes in the new chain? Now that the ninja mine is effectively neutralized (probably should have gotten nulled instead,) are any witnesses willing to publish a pledge on the blockchain that they won't run code that discriminates against legitimate stakeholders?
We learned that a lot of things can happen, which ought not to happen, because of the whole Ned/Justin saga. Four of the main ones that stand out in my mind are ninja mining, asset freezing via soft-forks, exchange colluding, and excluding regular stakeholders from the airdrop. It seems to me that all these shady things that can happen on a blockchain paves the way to an uncertain future.
As far as I can tell, @dhimmel's (DO NOTHING) solution could have worked if Justin had hijacked the chain. Had the community proceed to take this path, it would have negated the need to freeze stakeholder assets. The fork to HIVE would have been protective instead of hostile, and there would be no need to exclude 300 HIVEian's from the airdrop. Additionally, the ninja mine could have been nulled. That's minus 3 of the 4 mistakes right there, leaving the one remaining mistake, and that's in Justin's column.
Perhaps if his stake were not frozen; he may not have colluded with exchanges at all. That would bring it down to zero mistakes until he tried to break decentralization. Then we would have had a legitimate reason to fork and exclude both STINC and their socks by choosing decentralization over dPoS, but I think we still need to leave legitimate dPoS dissent in there or else the entire act of voting looks like a sham.
The community can still rectify the mistake of excluding 300 HIVEians from the airdrop. By doing so, it would prove that people have the right to vote for whomever they choose without fear that the top witnesses will take hostile actions against their accounts in the future. I think this would go a long way towards starting off on the right foot.
The onus is on the witnesses to fix the trust that was broken here. Until this problem is fixed, I won't be voting for any witnesses with my measly stake. If you've made it this far and agree with me, then perhaps you will join me in this effortless yet meaningful endeavor.