Overall, Fire Eyes is in favour of empowering the ENS Foundation with a broader role within ENS. However our immediate concern is around the speed at which this proposal (and Brantly’s proposal) are trying to execute with. There is certainly strong alignment within the DAO that our coordination structures aren’t keeping up with the importance of ENS, however one line from the retro I think is important to reiterate here is “Data analysis from interviews shows that top grant recipients were the strongest opponents of retrospective accountability reviews”. This objective data shows how DAO stakeholders (Labs included) are inclined to push against accountability reviews and are instead skewed towards action that drives funding rather than investing time and resources into building a more accountable (and therefore sustainable) structure.
Our primary issue is moving forward without discussing or referencing key considerations from the retro research. Within the google drive and docs created so far by MetaGov.org there are a number of considerations and concerns that could be baked into any proposed solution. Taking the time to reference existing issues within the DAO and how a proposed path forward addresses these seems par for the course for any proposal. At minimum, we had hoped that our ENS into 2026 post would culminate in discussion around all of these potential ideas, rather than multiple stakeholders taking steps to action their own proposals without broader consensus. Despite the structural issues with how this (and other) proposals have been brought up, the empowerment of an ENS Foundation is something we generally support. However, the initial Foundation composition and structure as well as the complete removal of community facing ENS DAO structures are the biggest concerns from our perspective.
Foundation Composition and Structure
Given the existing composition of the Foundation directorship: Nick, Avsa and Validator plus the described next step of “I will work with the existing ENS Foundation Directors to lead a search process for the external seats”; our concern is that the Foundation becomes a Labs centric organisation. We have significant respect for the ENS Labs team, however empowering a Foundation to directly manage the financial accountability of ENS Labs and other service providers while a significant proportion of it’s directors are heavily intertwined with Labs only escalates accountability concerns highlighted in the Retro.
ENS’ Labs budget increased from $4.2m to $9.7m in November 2024. Since then (we would argue) we have not seen twice as much output or value from ENS Labs with registrations staying flat over this time period. This is not just a criticism of ENS Labs, all service providers should be examined with this level of scrutiny. What we’re highlighting is that after an immense increase in budget and flat registrations, placing accountability within a Labs-centric Foundation is unlikely to result in rigorous and impact-driven oversight of the ENS Labs budget.
This isn’t a reason not to progress the ENS Foundation expansion, but rather to start a discussion about the selection of directors and the accountability mechanisms that exist between the DAO, Service providers and the Foundation. Given that 3/3 Directors to date are heavily Labs aligned, our proposal would be that we either expand the total number of directors to ~7/9, or keep 5 but reduce the Labs crossover significantly (for instance, industry standard would be that Labs and Foundation have clear separation and certainly shouldn’t have the CEO of Labs as a Foundation Director).
There are many ways the DAO could structure the directorship of the ENS Foundation, however we would advocate for a directorship structure with broader representation of the DAO and community:
- One truly independent party with minimal political or financial connection to ENS, we’re imagining someone like a traditional management consultant or academic, who’s livelihood isn’t tied whatsoever to ENS’ success.
- One ENS-aligned independent party, someone from the Ethereum Foundation or similar, that understands ENS, it’s impact and wants ENS to succeed at an industry level.
- Two DAO-voted directors, where delegates are able to vote in directors they that they believe will have the DAOs best interests in mind.
- One ENS Labs team member to be the through line between Foundation and Labs.
Though this exact structure we don’t feel strongly about, the high level takeaway is that Labs should be meaningfully disconnected from the Foundation, especially given the Foundation will serve as the overseeing body for Labs’ spending.
The Importance Of Community Facing Initiatives
The proposal outlines removing all existing working groups. ENS working groups have historically been the first place a contributor or community interfaces with the DAO. Removing this front facing element entirely will almost certainly lead to a reduction in contributor accessibility. This isn’t an argument to keep all three working groups (or working group budgets) however having one (mega working group, community-facing working group, ecosystem working group, etc) is likely a solid middle ground for this next phase of ENS DAO and creates a balance between the different parties; The ENS Foundation, ENS Labs, ENS Service Providers and the public facing working group.
The thinking for why some type of public facing initiative is important, is the progress DAOs have made globally in creating space for new and diverse contributors that drive protocol growth and adoption. This has already been seen with multiple service providers, grant recipients and DAO community members initially being onboarded through a public working group.
This public facing working group amendment wouldn’t propose any major changes to the above ENS Foundation expansion other than carving out space for a public facing working group to engage with the ENS ecosystem, public goods, IRL events, etc. This single working group wouldn’t need to have the same kind of budget, output or composition as the existing working groups and instead is simply meant to be the most approachable organisation within the DAO.
Conclusion
Empowering and expanding the scope of the ENS Foundation is something Fire Eyes generally supports and we’re excited to see ongoing refinement of this proposal. Our hope is that the retro can continue, conclude and be referenced before any proposal is made to the DAO.