[EP15][Social] Dissolve Community Working Group

DAO-Wide Archived Proposals
1

[EP15] [Social] Dissolve Community Working Group

Status Active
Discussion Thread Discuss
Vote Snapshot - Passed, Onchain - Active
Authors alisha.eth

Description

This was previously numbered EP14, but was renumbered due to a numbering collision.

This is a proposal to dissolve the Community Working Group at the conclusion of the First Term of 2022 in accordance with rule 3.1 of the working group rules passed under EP 4.

If this proposal is passed, the Community Working Group will be dissolved at the conclusion of the First Term of 2022, leaving three remaining working groups within the ENS DAO:

  1. Meta-Governance Working Group;
  2. ENS Ecosystem Working Group; and
  3. Public Goods Working Group.

On the basis that new working groups cannot be formed within the DAO unless it can shown that “… the work cannot be undertaken within an existing working group” (rule 2.2), the same standard should apply for the dissolution of working groups.

After consulting with Stewards and Community Working Group participants, regarding their work and experiences during the First Term of 2022, it is clear that:

  1. Each subgroup within the Community Working Group could comfortably fall within the Ecosystem Working Group; and
  2. The DAO does not have enough active participants to justify having “community” as a standalone working group.

Therefore, using the same standard set out in rule 2.2, we should dissolve the Community Working Group and migrate all existing subgroups from that working group to the Ecosystem Working Group or another working group as appropriate.

By dissolving the Community Working Group, the remaining working groups will have distinct mandates that provide clarity for contributors, without overlap. This will allow stewards to more efficiently facilitate work within the remaining working groups.

Please note: there is currently an election taking place on Snapshot to elect Community Working Group Stewards for the Second Term.

This proposal, to dissolve the Community Working Group, has been moved to a vote at this time at the request of current Meta-Governance Working Group Stewards to minimize disruption and ensure that results are available soon after steward elections conclude.

If this vote passes, incoming Community Working Group Stewards will not be required to serve as Stewards of the Community Working Group in the Second Term, which starts on July 1, 2022. If the vote does not pass, incoming community stewards will take up their positions within the Community Working Group on July 1, 2022.

Specification

This is a proposal to:

  1. Dissolve the Community Working Group;
  2. Return any unspent funds remaining in the Community Working Group multi-sig, at end of the First Term of 2022, to the ENS DAO treasury; and
  3. Migrate all existing subgroups within the Community Working Group to other working groups within the ENS DAO before the end of the First Term of 2022.

The ENS DAO will have three working groups for the Second Term of 2022 and all Terms thereafter. These working groups will be:

  • Meta-Governance Working Group: provides governance oversight and support of the management and operation of the ENS DAO;
  • ENS Ecosystem Working Group: continues development and improvement of the ENS protocol and ecosystem; and
  • Public Goods Working Group: funds public goods within web3 in accordance with the ENS DAO constitution.
5 Likes
3

Ecosystem: 11 Pods, 3 Stewards
Meta-Gov: 5 Pods, 3 Stewards
Public Goods: 2 Pods, 3 Stewards

Ecosystem stewards about to have their hands full while PG/Meta-Gov stewards make picnic? Please consider appropriately increasing or decreasing number of Stewards in each new WG.

4

Larger number of pods presumably means more resources, not just more responsibility.

1 Like
5

Clearly not the case here. Ask the stewards. Ecosystem and Community are massive and easily require more manpower. Plus, manpower is the resource I believe.

I am concerned with how fast these proposals are coming through. Until two weeks ago, DAO couldn’t pay someone to work. Now, we are overhauling systems at the speed of light less than a week before elections. Until two weeks ago, DAO was too young to make changes. Now the DAO is a playground for instinctive decisions. The fact that two separate proposals have come in the past few days completely restructuring the DAO shows how ill-thought this whole thing is. There is a whole section in the upcoming DAO survey with feedback on WG structure; would have been useful to see those results. But you do you I guess, boss. Just my 1.5 cents.

3 Likes
6

Both the Ecosystem and Community WG stewards have agreed to this change, so clearly they’re fine with it.

The number of stewards needn’t reflect the amount of work a WG has to do; stewards can and should delegate.

Please let’s not get into inertia-for-inertia’s sake. If you have a reason you think this change is a bad idea, state it here.

2 Likes
7

My concern here is that the DAO is quickly shifting toward centralisation in an attempt to fill the cracks. It is a well-known fact that centralised organisations perform much more efficiently as long as they have a well-defined vision and a dedicated team. Funnelling the decision-making is definitely the more efficient path to take for the DAO but it comes with the risk of abandoning the DAO ethos. If one really wants to go this way, then for instance, TNL could hire 10-20 active contributors from among the DAO members, take over the ENS management by a vote (I’ll vote ‘yes’ if I didn’t mind centralisation) and easily outperform the DAO. This will be the easy option. Harder option is to stick to the DAO ethos and take up the difficult task of maximising coordination such that the DAO can compete with a centralised structure. I guess I am trying to suggest sticking to that path.

2 Likes
8

The number of pods is not a useful proxy for work that needs to be done by a steward. If anything pods show the work that is NOT being done by stewards. Since the lead of that pod is doing the heavy lifting.

A clear example is community server sub group. Outside of voicing my support that group has required almost no work from the stewards. The identity server is one of the most impactful things that got started in the first term of the DAO.

What we need is more contributors who are accomplishing things, instead of commenting on how work should be done.

I favor the dissolution of Community WG because it simplifies the work for stewards and thus improves efficiency.

We are here to shepherd folks through DAO processes, provide perspective when asked, and ensure that the budget is spent wisely. We are not here to work in the DAO. We can work on projects if we want, but as contributors.

For example, when a steward such as @AvsA creates a map of all ENS contracts he is working in his capacity as a contributor not a steward.

6 Likes
9

Centralisation is not measured by how many different people are trying to do the same thing. It’s measured by who has the power to effect change, and this doesn’t change that; voters are still in charge of electing stewards.

100% this.

7 Likes
10

Some excellent points nicely put here @slobo

1 Like
11

I’ve been out of pocket this evening with the American holiday, but as a Community Steward I fully support this draft proposal.

Reducing the number of stewards should focus the burden of responsibility on fewer stewards, which will result in increased accountability – something desired during the last term.

One thing to note with this pod structure is that, ideally, funding will cascade from the working group multi-sig and into subgroup multi-sigs. This structure will give subgroups greater autonomy by allowing them to oversee their funds. If executed correctly, this will reduce the need for a higher number of stewards.

The podarchy visualization may look intimidating, but this proposal only specifies a dissolution of the Community Working Group and a transfer of funds back to the DAO treasury. I am confident the future stewards will take on a number of subgroups that is not burdensome.

5 Likes
13

I changed my mind shortly after writing. That’s what happens when you write before the first coffee:-)

3 Likes
14

Agree with: that this seems, for organizational matter, more effective.

Disagree with:

  • On the other hand, I feel 3-4 months of roughly work for each of this WGs is not enough time to know what work and what didn’t. One clear outcome of this term is our poor coordination, and I think this proposal is trying to tackle this. But I am afraid, this comes out to soon: we haven’t have enough time to learn from our previous practices and try to adjust the current model, and this feels more like an aesthetic change rather than an improvement based on previous results.

  • My hesitancy comes, if, from January, another proposition for organisation comes, and then we will have to change again.

  • As someone said before, there isn’t enough people for so many pods. It’s not about having enough stewards, is about awareness of the time bandwidth that will be required to support this. One Lead for Ecosystem seems too short.

My apologies if this comes out strong, I deeply value the effort that are placed on this proposal, but I feel like this isn’t the DAO who is proposing this, or the delegates based on the community sense making (the time between temp check and this was short, posted during the weekend, so it feels rushed).

3 Likes
15

In the WG Rules amendment proposal active in parallel on Snapshot, despite multiple people commenting on the need of ‘accountability’, or at least a mention of it in the draft, nothing of that nature has been included in the draft. I can only put this down to lack of time and proper discourse because the only other option is that @alisha.eth unilaterally decided that she didn’t want to include it (which I firmly believe is not the case). In general, structural changes should at least be sampled from sufficient feedback (for instance the DAO-wide survey which A&R subgroup is working on for precisely this reason) and not subjective thoughts of two stewards. I am urging you to think this through one more time and allow for sufficient time for discussion, which is not now when everyone is super busy readying the DAO for elections.

16

At first it sounds like ecosystem would have too many things under its wing, but…

I believe the main role of the first term of the working groups was to figure out how working groups work ad don’t. So if both of these working groups though it would be better served if they merged, then I will support their decision.

1 Like
17

I agree with your sentiment. More can be done about discussing changes in existing organizational structure between Lead Contributors such as yourself and the Stewards before drafting a proposal. I believe that proposals like this should be co-written, so that it accurately reflects the interests of all those who participated in DAO activities and demonstrated high level contribution.

Perhaps this conversation is that very opportunity to co-write the proposal. I myself have no objection to the change, but if you have any amendment you’d like to make @vegayp I strongly encourage you to propose it now.

Continuing the discussion from Dissolve the Community working group:

Perhaps I am being a bit pedantic, but I believe that it would have been wise to retitle this proposal so that it reflects the essence of what is actually happening. According to this proposal, the Community Working Group is not being dissolved. It is being rolled under the Ecosystem Working Group; and so a better title might have been “Reducing The Number of Total Stewards from 20 to 12” (or something like that) since the reduction of Stewards is the force function of this proposal.

Edit: I understand that the purpose of EP12 is to repeal EP4 and replace the Working Group Rules mentioned therein. However, there is no mention of what Working Groups will exist in EP12. Perhaps consider to consolidate this Draft Proposal into EP12 for clarity’s sake, although now it may be too late.

@Coltron.eth understands that the focus of this proposal is to increase accountability. We shouldn’t be too hard on ourselves about the level of accountability of this term’s Stewards (or lack thereof). The efficiency and productivity of this DAO will improve with each iteration thanks to our high level contribution and outstanding work culture.

All in all, I am in favor of this proposal and hope to see it go to a vote.

3 Likes
18

Thank you immensely for this.

1 Like
19

My views have since changed and I’m focusing on productivity instead of spending time arguing over wording or details. The changes introduced here will likely prevent the issue of inactive stewards reoccuring by having fewer stewards and fewer workgroups.

That’s good enough for me.

5 Likes
20

I think this makes sense to do, especially if both current working groups are in agreement. If it becomes the case that separate stewards are needed for Community in the future, we can always spin it up again. I think focusing down is generally a good idea right now, and Ecosystem sounds like a good home for the activities Community is engaged in.

I don’t disagree with the worries about sufficient centralization, but since resources are still ultimately under the DAO’s control, I think short term concern is mitigated. Long term, it would be great if all these pods were formed/dissolved more organically, but I think that will require more involved re-structuring down the line after gaining more experience and learnings on how best to accomplish that.

Right now, let’s just do what needs to be done to get this DAO moving! :rocket:

1 Like
21

While two stewards may be in agreement, active contributors within those WGs are not, yet. WGs are more than just their stewards.

22

As an active contributor in the Community WG, I have no problem with this proposal. Really we’re just consolidating stewardship, but the actual subgroups will continue to function as before. The lead contributors on subgroups will remain the same as well I assume. There just might be a different set of stewards to reach out to for help if needed, but that was going to happen anyway with the upcoming elections.

It also reduces confusion I think. Often times I’m not sure whether an issue should be brought up to the stewards of Community or Ecosystem or both.

4 Likes