[Temp Check] ENS Code of Conduct

🌱 ENS Ecosystem Community
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Hey all! Thank you for your feedback on the previous Code of Conduct thread. I’m making this new thread to reflect updates to the Code of Conduct, and introducing a soft yes/no poll to gauge the temperature on if we’re ready for this to go to an official social proposal.

Again, huge shout out to @estmcmxci for doing a majority of the footwork here and @Coltron.eth for playing a large role as well.

Note: If/when passed, this and all related documentation is intended to live directly within the ENS Governance Documents.

Is this Code of Conduct ready to be sent to a social proposal?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters

ENS Code of Conduct

Scope

The ENS DAO code of conduct applies at all times within our community spaces or when an individual is officially representing the ENS DAO.

Community spaces may include the governance forum, Discord, and any other virtual or physical space that is de-facto understood to be a gathering place for the ENS DAO.

Representation of the ENS DAO includes, but is not limited to, using an official ENS e-mail address, posting on an official ENS social media account, or acting as an appointed representative at an online or offline event.

Community leaders have the right and responsibility to remove, edit, or reject comments, commits, code, wiki edits, issues, and other contributions that are not aligned to this Code of Conduct and will communicate reasons for moderation decisions when appropriate.

Our Pledge of Conduct

As members, contributors, and leaders in the ENS DAO, we pledge to maintain a safe space that encourages high standards for inclusivity and representation.

Participation in our community will be welcoming to people from all walks of life, no matter their orientation, race, creed, status, age, culture, religion, philosophy, ideology, gender, etc.

Accessibility and transparency are core to our ethos. When practical, all exchanges on our platform will be documented and stored in a public space to allow all members the opportunity to take an active role.

The ENS DAO will accommodate both the needs of neurotypical and neurodiverse community members, understanding that each community member’s voice is impactful and essential to the development of our ecosystem.

We will act in good faith. Interactions among the ENS DAO, or on behalf of ENS DAO, should assume that all parties are acting in good faith.

Our Social Values

The ENS DAO operates from a prosocial, human-centered perspective:

  • Prosocial: We value things that first create and support public goods. Profit is not bad in and of itself, but providing services to support the ENS community is more important. Indeed, profit is critical for our goal of creating a regenerative economy that supports the token engineering community.
  • Human-centered: We encourage initiatives focused on ethically using token engineering and strive to only create a positive impact.
  • Acknowledgement & Recognition: As best we can, we praise members’ contribution to the Commons and incentivize participation of existing and ongoing initiatives throughout the ENS DAO.

We hold ourselves to high standards of safety, resilience, and integrity:

  • Safety: We create an environment where everyone should feel safe to be themselves, interact with others, and express their opinions and contributions free from any negative reaction.
  • Resilience: We ask members of this community to communicate openly and make an effort to maintain alignment with the ENS Mission, Vision, and Values. If conflicts arise, we expect members to act peacefully towards a resolution and the restoration of harmony and efficiency.
  • Integrity: Honesty and consistency lead to trust, a core value of healthy communities. Our approach is to trust first, but any apparent instances of scamming, deceit, spamming, or fraudulent activity will be treated as a violation of this code of conduct

We encourage our members to be radically open-source, non-hierarchical, creative and transparent in their intentions, and accountable for their actions:

  • Open-source: Ideas are meant to be shared. We default to using MIT and Creative Commons with attribution licensing on our work, but we accept all open source licenses.
  • Non-hierarchical: Everyone is encouraged to exercise their autonomy, creativity, and full agency when acting in the Commons. Every individual is wise in their manner, and the diversity of perspectives enriches our Commons.
  • Transparent: We value individuals’ efforts to act transparently and proactively identify their incentives, especially if there are conflicts of interest, especially when it comes to proposing, funding, work progress, and other essential activities involving the ENS Commons.
  • Accountable: Community members are expected to be accountable for all their actions and commitments. Accountability brings trust, and trusting each other is critical for our success.

“We welcome new community members to review the ENS DAO’s Value Board, which explicitly states our values promote a healthy ENS DAO and ENS Community.” - Marcus Martínez, Community WG LC.

Our Responsibilities

All members of the ENS DAO must:

  • Have compassion for our shared humanity.
  • Promote diversity and inclusivity.
  • Respect individuality.
  • Prevent alienation or marginalization of any individual or group.
  • Hold each other accountable.
  • When in doubt, follow the “Golden Rule.”
  • Be kind and give praise when due.

As members of a diverse community, we respect that the values and beliefs of others may not align with our own. Disagreements are a natural occurrence in open organizations, but will not be conducted at the peril of our values.

Conduct for Disagreements:

  • Will be conducted in alignment with our values and responsibilities.
  • Will be constructive.
  • Will always remain civil:
    • Free of name-calling.
    • Free of ad-hominem attacks.
    • Free from condescending language or tone.
    • Free from knee-jerk reactions.
  • Will be conducted with the best interest of the protocol and community in mind.
  • Apologize when necessary.

Severe conduct violations

Severe conduct will not be tolerated and requires expedited moderator intervention or community escalation:

  • Use of sexualized language or imagery and sexual attention or advances of any kind.
  • Trolling, insulting or derogatory comments, and personal or political attacks.
  • Public or private harassment.
  • Doxxing other user’s information without consent.

Escalation procedures can be found in our conflict resolution guidelines.

Community Empowerment

The ENS DAO is operated as a collective, community effort. If you have any questions, suggestions or feedback, open a new topic in the forum and discuss.

Moderators and stewards try to maintain open DMs. For critical or urgent issues that a new topic or flag can’t handle, please reach out directly.

Related Topics

Conflict Resolution

The ENS DAO recommends resolving all disputes at the lowest level possible.

Governance Documentation / Terms of Service

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For anyone catching up, this draft has already been discussed here.

Thanks for posting this @spencecoin and @estmcmxci for doing the majority of the drafting.

The main difference between this [Temp Check] and the previously discussed version is the separation of our values from the enforcement of those values.

While we may take more time decided how to enforce the values, we can still communicate them without consolidating these (what I think) should be separate discussions.

Note: There is a link to conflict resolution guidelines that will be developed by the Community Working Group. The link is included for formatting consistency and will be working when the document goes live.

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I think “orientation” (I assume “sexual orientation”?) and “status” (“marital status”, “citizenship status”?) need qualifiers. “Etc” of course has no definition. And what happens if someone thinks that aspect of a person in one of these categories is disrespecting of themselves in a different category? (E.g What if someone’s ideology is disrespecting of another person’s philosophy.)

Does this include Twitter? I bring it up because Twitter is a place where people discuss ENS as well as many other topics (politics, social issues, their personal life, etc).

The last part - “express their opinions and contributions free from any negative reaction” - is absurd. Safety from physical harm is of course a requirement, but “safety” from “any negative reaction” would make all discussion and work impossible. In fact, the ENS DAO should specifically foster an environment where people feel “safe” to contradict, disagree, and reject ideas and proposals they disagree with. Having your ideas rejected or dismissed doesn’t feel nice but that’s a part of work. The key thing is basic rules of civility, not a lack of “negative reaction”.

As is, I would definitely vote “No” on this proposal.

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I agree that “negative reaction” is too broad. Maybe “free from any personal attacks or uncivil behavior”?

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They should take a chill pill, look in the mirror and read better books.

Work for ENS should not overlap with personal opinions. Get separate twitter accounts perhaps?

This probably needs rewording. I agree with @serenae’s suggestion of ‘uncivil behaviour’. It resonates.

Side note: Is your contribution to ENS limited through Twitter? Does your contribution to ENS remain limited to proposals that somehow relate to your personal ideologies? Just that we haven’t heard from you in a while on a number of other things that need attention

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I laud the objective of this proposal, but as written I would probably vote no for two reasons, one specific and one general.

  • Specific: I also think “free from any negative reaction” is way too broad and basically prevents disagreement of any kind, which is bound to happen
  • General: The code of conduct is so broad and non-specific, I have a hard time imagining any concrete instance where it would add value in a dispute. In the most recent incident, I’m sure everyone involved would have claimed the CoC vindicated them. Can anyone given an example of a case that is realistic— not one with a cartoonish villain whom we’d all agree is bad without the CoC— where this CoC would add some kind of value?
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Disputes are solved through Articles, not CoC. CoC are guidelines. They are interpreted on case to case basis as they apply. They are meant to be broad. Can you suggest me any dispute where these CoC will not apply?

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What is the objective of the CoC?

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You tell me. I am listening

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Well, this is a bizarre thing to ask me, since I’m not the one proposing it or arguing in its favor.

But I would think that a Code of Conduct would lay out clear…codes of conduct, i.e. objective boundaries around behaviors that are/aren’t acceptable. My critique is that, by being so broad, this CoC fails to do this.

Edits: grammar

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I think the CoC does what you describe. Perhaps we are just interpreting it differently

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Well then I’d again put forward this inquiry:

Can anyone given an example of a case that is realistic— not one with a cartoonish villain whom we’d all agree is bad without the CoC— where this CoC would add some kind of value?

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I’ll think of a non-cartoonish one and get back to you :wink:

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Agreed that, “etc.” should be removed from the list, and there could be clarity on the “status.”

It’s unnecessary to draft an exhaustive list of classes. With corrections, the intentions can clearly convey that everyone should feel welcome.

I’d say that you are free to hold an ideology that is in conflict with another person’s philosophy.

The caveat is that if your ideology requires you to disregard the inclusive social guidelines that we are attempting to establish here, you should evaluate whether or not you are willing to put aside your ideologies to continue your voluntary participation in this community.

E.g. Hate speech shouldn’t be tolerated. Even if hate speech is an ideology, it can not co-exist with the intended community values.

I’d argue yes. If you’re in a position, such as director or steward, which is a position of community trust that can be granted or revoked by the ENS DAO, absolutely. Especially if you chose to speak on behalf of the organization on your personal account whereas your tweets are indistinguishable from organizational or private opinion.

There is precedence for this in government roles in the United States, and I’m sure globally too.

Agreed. That section could be revised. See this statement that was included in the original post:

“Disagreements are a natural occurrence in open organizations, but will not be conducted at the peril of our values.”

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The Code of Conduct is meant to outline community values and conduct that adheres to those values.

We can make it more specific under the Our Responsibilities Section. This a group effort, so I’d love to hear constructive feedback or specific suggestions on langauge.

For clarification, by design this CoC does not online punitive measures.

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I don’t think a case is necessary. We can’t assume every scenario possible, but what we can do is to build trust by creating frameworks like CoC. Disputes doesn’t get solve through a CoC, but they can be prevented, and they are necessary as we are a broad community with different mindsets but under an umbrella of a public good. We need to know what is the initial range of that umbrella, and what it covers.

I vote yes, even if it’s not perfect, amends should be incorporated.

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It’s hard for me to accept that something is necessary when we can’t even put forth a single example of how it will be useful. I’m not against codes of conduct, but I think they should be specific. If we’re not willing to be specific about which behaviors are/aren’t off limits, then I’m not sure I see the value.

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Take it as a chance. This CoC should be a live document up for updates and changes as the community evolves. The DAO structure isn’t old, even if the community has being here for a while, that doesn’t imply they are organized under a DAO figure therefore this cultural tools (like the CoC) will be something that evolves with the organization, so the cases will come with time, it just natural.

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Do you want an example demonstrating the benefits of rules that state, “members of our community must not, alienate or marginalize other people?”

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I’m going to choose not to interpret this as a bad faith implication that I’m in favor of alienating or marginalizing people.

My point is simple. Rules should be as clear and objective as possible. If you create a rule that says “don’t do bad things,” but don’t define what constitutes a “bad thing,” then the rule is at best useless and at worst a possible point of future contention in and of itself.

Can you give a concrete example of “alienating or marginalizing” behavior? In the incident that inspired the drafting of this CoC, which party/parties would have been in violation of it?

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