Pillar Governance (Idea-2-Proposal) Process

🚀 Proposals
#1

Purpose

This document is a suggested process for developing Pillar Governance and advancing Pillar Improvement Proposals (PIPs). It is a living document intended to be owned, modified and enforced by the Pillar DAO.

Governance Venues

Several governance venues are available to the Pillar Governance community, each serving a dedicated purpose as described below:

  1. Governors’ House chat in Discord

Token permissioned chat in Pillar’s Discord server exclusive for PLR holders with at least 10k PLR and/or at least 100 LP tokens for providing liquidity to Uniswap or Sushiswap PLR-ETH pools. It is an agora where various ideas are formed and where early discussions on said ideas can take place.

  1. Governance Forum

A Discourse forum for governance-related discussion. Community members must register for an account before sharing or liking posts and voting in polls. This is where we take the initial ideas brought to the rest of the Governors so they can get properly analyzed and refined ahead of the soft vote taking place in the poll added to the discussion thread.

  1. Snapshot page

Snapshot is a simple voting interface that allows users to signal sentiment off-chain and ratify the vote on the PIP as soon as there’s a consensus on it (post soft vote). Votes on Snapshot are weighted by the number of PLR delegated to the address used to vote.

Governance Process

Below is a preliminary draft for the proposed two-stage Pillar governance process, detailing exactly where the above venues fit in.

:bangbang: These processes are subject to change according to feedback from the Pillar community. :bangbang:

Phase 1: Discord —> Discourse

The purpose is to determine if there is sufficient will to make changes to the status quo.

To create a Discourse thread:

  1. Ask a general, non-biased question to the community in the Governors’ House chat in Pillar’s Discord.

  2. Seeing the interest create a thread on gov.pillar.fi about a potential change (example: “Should Pillar add XYZ feature to the wallet?”). Forum posts should be labeled as follows: “IDEA - [Your Title Here]”. They should also have a poll attached to the first post of the thread to see how many Governors are for/against the proposal, so we can prioritize those around which consensus (visible majority) is forming.

  3. Reach out to the Governors’ House to build support for the proposal, let Pillar Governors add their arguments and counterarguments to analyze the matter further. Discuss the proposal and solicit Governors to vote on it. Be willing to respond to questions asked in the thread. Share your viewpoint, although try to remain as impartial as possible.

That’s it! You’ve just started the process of gaining support for a proposal.

Phase 2: Consensus on Discourse —> Snapshot

The purpose is to establish a formal discussion around a PIP and set it for the final vote.

To create a Pillar Improvement Proposal:

  1. Write the proposal on the Pillar’s Snapshot page. Proposals should be labeled as follows: “PIP #X - [Your question from the Forum thread] (example: PIP #1 - Should we contribute 50k PLR weekly for a Liquidity Mining Rewards program?”). Briefly describe what the PIP is for, summarize conclusions from the Forum discussion and add a link to it. Select two or multiple choices, set dates and publish a proposal on Snapshot.

  2. Ongoing discussion can take place in the gov.pillar.fi forum as well as the Governors’ House in Discord.

  3. If the proposal passes successfully via a SnapShot vote, it’s set for implementation. If it’s relevant for a given case, at that point DAO treasury wallet signers will begin to process the payment for a proposed initiative.

See the visual summary of the Pillar Gov Process. :point_down:
DAO process flowchart-04

Next Steps

The above is the currently proposed approach to a more robust Pillar Governance process, owned and managed by the DAO.

Now it’s up for comments and suggestions from Governors. Once agreed upon and approved, it will be revisited, evaluated and revised as required.

4 Likes
#4

I feel like I’ve actually thoroughly read this, great job. My comments are as follows:

  • Love the acronym pips (Pillar Implementation Proposals) and the description, living document.

  • Maybe we should make it clear under Governance Venues #2 the Governance Forum is a website vs #1 being in Discord? Maybe add the link?

  • Under Governance Venues #3 Snapshot page could you explain the last sentence a little more. “Votes no Snapshot are weighted by the number of PLR delegated to the address used to vote.” Are we using DAO PLR for the votes?

  • Under Phase 1: Discord – Discourse #3 you could add video link to a short tutorial on adding a poll. In #4 you refer to a Consensus Check thread, I’m not sure what that is.

  • Under Phase 2: Consensus on Discourse – Snapshot #1 what/where is the Pillar Snapshot page? Sorry if I missed that in the call. You might need a short example video link here too.

  • I’m a little confused at the end as to when the vote takes place. In #1 under Phase 2 are the dates you set establishing when the vote will take place?

#5

Thank you for the review and feedback, @vmelvin! :pray:

If you hover over those subtitles with Gov venues, they’re all hyperlinked, so access should be easy. That’s also where you’ll find the Pillar Snapshot page. :innocent:

We are voting with our wallets literally - one PLR is one vote and depending on how many of them you have in your wallet, that many votes are going for or against a given proposal. There’s no on-chain settlement, so tokens never leave your wallet and there’s no transaction fee for a casted vote.

I’ve borrowed that name from somewhere, but essentially it’s a thread with a poll - advanced and refined idea that we’re checking the consensus around and that’s about to become a proposal if the said Consensus Check is successful (I’m thinking 3:1 or 4:1 and this kind of convincing majority).

Yes, that would be a voting period. It’s the question if we want to set it for all votes or decide on a case-by-case basis… Whatever brings us closer to getting more proposals going!

1 Like
#6

My first impression was without judging:
/ PIP → i suggest in addition Pillar “Improvement” Proposal
/ too much Information although it is understandable and well written. I have to read and scroll to understand. Don´t have time → i prefer flowcharts with little text.
/ For non “native” english speakers the word venues sounds really fancy → places or else ?
/ some comments: Discord Chat is “informal” and “undocumented” → the govenors forum is “formal” and “documented” → the snapshot is and “binding” and “dokumented”
/ some questions that are open to me: to which degree can a proposal in the gov.forum be changed because it is considering the comments of the govenors before being put up to the snapshot page. maybe the chanchge proposal has to point out clearly what has been changed ?
/ the snapshot page: some proposals are maybe good for govenors but are not good for the project itself or the other way around. Is there somehow maybe a “KILLSWITSCH” for each side ? like a Veto option, Godmode, overwrite everything ?
/ one deditcated person would be nice to have that actually proofreads every proposal to ensure it passes all the requirements successfully. This is also important since external audience should read the proposals too.
/ is there maybe an option to classify the degree of openness to some Proposals ?
/ what are the limits of a proposal ? financials, lex, etc.

2 Likes
#7

Nice proposal and good questions raised, my question would be… what about governors that have their tokens locked in LP positions,… is there a way to get their token count there?

1 Like
#8

With only 44 governors I think adding a restriction of 100lp tokens is going to only restrict the amount of users in the governors house… Is that really a good idea?

1 Like
#9

There’s also the option of holding 10,000 PLR in a wallet, preferably the pillar wallet :grin:

#10

Is it one or the other? Maybe I’m reading this wrong but doesn’t it say you would need both?

“Token permissioned chat in Pillar’s Discord server exclusive for PLR holders with at least 10k PLR and at least 100 LP tokens for providing liquidity to Uniswap or Sushiswap PLR-ETH pools. It is an agora where various ideas are formed and where early discussions on said ideas can take place.”

#11

I thought it was one or the other because I’m not a lp provider. Maybe we need clarification from @jackbass .

#12

If plr wants to become a community owned wallet and project i like the idea of making it mandatorry to provide liquidity and be a govenor AND lock your tokens into a smart contract to be able to receive rewards from fees ocuring inside the System. BUT since we still have no working tokenomics modell that favors tokenholders i will refuse to provide any liquidity to the project or lock anything and rather drop out as a govenor. No tokenomics no liquidity from me.

1 Like
#13

Great feedback and even better questions - thanks @eggman! :pray: All the linguistic suggestions are now amended.

Let’s finalize this process and once it’s done, we can def think of a diagram that will make things simpler.

IMO it can change pretty dramatically it’s based on the research, gathered data and more information analyzed. I’d hope that we won’t rush in taking proposals from Forum to Snapshot and we make sure there’s consensus on them before the Snapshot vote. That’s why it’s so important to promote Forum threads in the Governors’ House just so everyone has a way of providing feedback and adding input before the vote.

I don’t think that those options come hand in hand with the decentralized governance approach, to be honest… Team members are also Governors and vote with their tokens too, but as long as this proposed process is followed we should be able to identify such issues before the Snapshot vote and constructively discuss them before they’re becoming “official”.

I agree and would vote for such a role to be paid out of the DAO’s budget. :slight_smile:

Wouldn’t that be an initial posting in the Discord chat and getting other Governors to comment on it? Or a bit more elaborated Forum thread with a poll attached to it?

Everything about this process is painted with a pretty broad brush here and we tried to establish as few limitations as possible to kick things off. Are there any specific financial / legal / other rules you’d like to add?

There definitely is a way and making it available for LPs was part of the reason why we held Snapshot’s launch for a while. We’re going to launch without it now and as soon as the product team has some bandwidth they will be working on allowing the second token (LP one) in our Snapshot.

As @vmelvin said it is one or another. Happy to make this clearer in the original post if you think it’s confusing.

#14

Suggested change: “Token permissioned chat in Pillar’s Discord server exclusive for PLR holders with at least 10k PLR and/or at least 100 LP tokens for providing liquidity to Uniswap or Sushiswap PLR-ETH pools.”
Point 3 seems overcomplicated, seems like every Idea thread should have a Yes/No poll from the beginning

What’s the qualifier to move to Phase 2? A certain amount of Yes/No votes? 51% Yes?

Point 1 in Phase 2: PIP could be a summary, but creating a PIP should be explained in detail (what information should be included) or PIPs could be hard to read.

:+1:

Snapshot Votes are the PLR held in the wallet used to sign the address

:+1:

If you vote “yes” to a proposal or an idea you completely agree, anything else is a “no” and you should author a new proposal based on new ideas and feedback

imo no limits but the team’s opinion in a proposal would be important, and as governors the majority of us want the project to be successful…

Agree the way it’s written it sounds like you must have both

@eggman :+1: Let’s finalize this with more detail and then we can make a summary flowchart (“Step 1: Start a discussion in Discord about your idea - read this for more detail”…)

This sounds like an idea for a proposal in order to change the requirements for being a governor. However to be fair this would need to be a long vote, some people might want to become governors before changes could happen.

1 Like
#15

Love the feedback and your suggestions, massive thanks @_dj! :pray:

Good call. I’ve merged points 3 and 4 into one, check if it’s better now.

I framed it as “visible majority” and by that I mean 3:1 or 4:1 - this kind of convincing majority. To be honest I’d try to avoid voting on 50/50 cases, but rather spend more time on bringing the sides together on such occasions. Snapshot to me is a place to set in stone things we previously aligned on through the Forum discussion. As @eggman put it nicely, to make it binding and documented.

Happy to discuss other options as well!

I’ve tried to add more info, let me know how you like it now.

1 Like
#16

It’s better, thanks. That info should help with writing good proposal labels and descriptions.

1 Like
#17

Thanks for the input everyone! As we don’t get more questions and suggestions on this, I’d like the proposed flow to become our default Idea-2-Proposal process.

Obviously, the thread remains here and we’re able to discuss it anytime someone has a better idea. As stated, it’s a living document and an open process, so feel free to propose alternative directions and improvements as we go further.

Now, @eggman and @_dj - do you guys want to help with a summary flowchart? :sunglasses: As soon as we have a draft ready I’ll give it to our graphic designers so it looks nice!

#18

Sure…

I may not complete a flowchart graphic if it’s better done by the Pillar team but I can summarize this to prepare:

  1. Post your idea in Discord and build publicity on other platforms
  2. Discuss the idea in the Pillar Governors’ discord
  3. Create a thread on the Pillar Governance forum (Title: IDEA - your_title_here) with a Yes/No poll for community response

If the majority (~75%) of people like your idea and you have integrated community ideas into your proposal, continue on. If not, edit your idea or propose a new one based on response.

  1. Create a Snapshot voting proposal ( Title: PIP #proposal_number_goes_here - Your_idea_from_forum_thread ) and provide a brief description of the PIP, a brief summary of conclusions of forum discussion, and a link to the forum thread.
  2. Discuss and raise awareness for the proposal to get a good number of votes.
  3. If the proposal passes, continue by implementation and getting the DAO wallet signers to process the payment, if necessary.
1 Like
#19

That helps a lot, thanks @_dj! :pray:

Let me work with our graphic designer on this and drop the flowchart here whenever it’s ready.

1 Like
#20

Got this for now, but I feel like it’s too text-heavy and we need something easier to follow… If you have some ideas on how to trim it a bit, I’d appreciate some help with this!

DAO process flowchart-01
DAO process flowchart-011768Ă—2514 467 KB

2 Likes
#21

Great job Jack. Here’s some feedback.

For me the top numbers 1 and 2 say sort of the same thing. Maybe one could be “Post your idea in Governors’ discord, build support, answer questions.” Number 2 could be “If supported by discord chat create a thread in the Governors’ forum (title: IDEA – your_title_here) with a Yes/No poll for community vote.”

Then the part in the middle could be #3. “If the majority (~75%) of votes support your idea and you have integrated community suggestions the idea moves to a Snapshot vote.”

I’m not sure you need the last sentence in the middle. “If not, edit your idea or propose a new one based on response.” I think that is implied or you could just say “refer to step 1”.

Then the middle could mention that the team actually creates the Snapshot vote; and, the bottom could just be two blocks. Discuss and raise awareness for the vote; and, if the proposal passes, ……

I would probably leave off the Discord logo, it makes me think I need to go there to do that part (hahaha).

1 Like
#22

210612_Sketch_Flowchart_Idea-Thread-Proposal
210612_Sketch_Flowchart_Idea-Thread-Proposal5150Ă—2214 946 KB
For my flowchart i used a more visual approach. Over time the process goes from left to right, Over hierarchies/Levels the process goes from bottom to top. I like the image of a greek temple too where at the outdoor/bottom level we have an open/emotional discussion, on the indoor/middle level we have a closed/educated discussion and on the top level we have a consensus in form of a stable triangle, saying this, maybe we add a temple, people, governors and something else into that image ? What do you think ?

2 Likes