I have also geeat hopes and expectations about the ambassador program.
They are 21 people, who are supposed to dedicate let’s say at least 80% of their time to Polkadot.
So i expect some to build bonds with Parity/W3F to discuss and tackle the main management issues in the ecosystem.
Decentralization is for sure not easy, finding a balance between some emboying Polkadot vision (or a small group of people) and full decentralization is for sure a hard path.
But i don’t believe that, in the current state of OpenGov, a full decentralized entity will succeed.
Many tools are lacking in OpenGov for a better and efficient OpenGov.
Yeah, i will try to focus on a dedicated document listing the possible improvemetns for Polkadot.
Some can be done by Pollassembly/Subsquare without any change of OpenGov code i think, it will require community’s approval.
Some others will require developments and code changes.
I hope to make such a document by end of Sept.
W3F and Parity both do limited BD when opertunities arise, primarily by offering technical assistance, but also governance assistance.
Again though, you cannot really market a blockchain because a blockcahin is middleware. It’s only applications that run on a blockchain can be marketed. W3F itself cannot do marketing either, because W3F like Parity makes Polakdot, and yout cannot really market middleware directly.
DF should become successful if people ship applicaitons & games for the DF organizations to market. If not, what can they market?
I would like to take a moment to share my perspective on this topic. For those who may not be familiar with my views, I encourage you to review my posts on X.
It is my belief that as long as decision-making remains concentrated in the hands of a select group (whales + DV), it will be challenging to alter the current negative trajectory.
If we truly value the project and the community, I would suggest that we engage in some introspection and prioritize collective interests over individual egos. It appears that we often allocate resources to various initiatives, while essential needs may not receive the attention they deserve.
Polkadot has the potential to function as a multinational corporation. Recognizing the significance of managing it with that mindset could serve as a pivotal moment for our progress.
Exactly! Polkadot should find its own niche, and it shouldn’t be DeFi! Substrate and private chains, that should be the niche, IMO. There are good projects like the Root network, for example, who are built on substrate but never associate themselves with Polkadot.
Otherwise, I think Polka’s curse is the lean towards dev. Its a normie’s nightmare. Average Joe couldn’t care less about JAM, async backing, elastic scaling. People want fun and entertaining experience, and do not want to feel dumb reading all these tech terms.
I’m sorry but i won’t continue to participate anymore in Polkadot OpenGov or how improving things for the eco.
I’m now called a fudder on socials for asking questions or pointing what has to be improved.
Some decide who can talk and who can’t in the name of the ecosystem.
You can close the discussion, it’s NOT well seen to discuss unfortunately.
I was really surprised by the amount of replies to my post, which means we are all concerned by the state of Polkadot and we want it better. So thx everyone, thx A LOT.
I didn’t participate in this discussion but I found you were doing great things.
When looking at the civilized discussion in the thread you started, it is clear you had the support of a lot of people, probably a lot keeping silent like I was. So I’m surprised of your reaction to, as much as I saw it from the linked tweet, one person calling you a fudder. Don’t let that bring you down!
Rather than focusing on an insignificant message on X, look at the positive reactions you had in this thread:
You clearly care.
I agree with you, my friend, on many things.
this post is very well written. Love each points.
Very good article, really good PLAN
Hats off to the Warriors.
We share many of the same views.
First of all thanks for the very good points.
etc
As soon as someone does something, it will be criticized by some. It can be as constructive as you want, some will still want to bring you down. Just don’t pay attention. In difficult times, I like to remember this quote :
It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself in a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.
Maybe it is an overreaction after a tiring day? I personally hope you’ll reconsider.
I found your input here useful, and it feels like you were genuinely trying to bring value. From the Twitter interaction linked, it seems you haven’t done anything in bad faith, so I’m a little confused with the interaction (while also having no idea what a ‘smol’ is). Was Jay referencing other times he’s seen you ‘FUD’ on Twitter, or was that the only occasion he took particular exception to?
I would encourage you not to let this push you away. There’s a difference between playing devil’s advocate in the pursuit of improvement and spreading FUD. The latter will happen regardless, but we certainly need the former in order to grow as a community.
I suspect you were particularly taken aback (and reacted as you did in this post) because the person criticising you holds quite a lot of weight in the ecosystem. That being said, I think it’s also important to note that IF more notable people are unduly pushing back to the point of keeping others quiet, then your contribution is probably all the more needed, as this is certainly not a precedent we should look to foster.
Although there have been valid points made in this forum post;
It’s been accompanied by many wrong, no evidence backed budget commentaries and mis-priced dollar amounts associated with different treasury spends posted publicly on X which has started multiple echoes of misinformation and doubt.
As the entire ‘Alt Market’ underperforms in a very usual and recurring theme of a classically known crypto cycle, these public over-reactions built on wrong information has started a negative loop of reverse marketing of Polkadot - effective only in tarnishing the brand.
With a very misleading clickbait title - ‘React or Die’ - the content found within the comments of this post - publicly calling out CEO’s of W3F / Parity and flip flopping between who is to blame when Polkadot itself is a fully open source, decentralized network with the ability for anyone to participate and add value, shows only a lack of maturity and experience in delivery or even desire of real, actionable change.
Almost all the issues posted could have all been handled in private and off public socials.
For every discrepancy - information and a contact was always just a DM away.
If an issue is found - there are ways to sort things out collectively.
A very unfortunate and avoidable amount of damage taking place at a very vulnerable time in the market overshadowing many of the positive developments taking place.
There may be points raised by OP for which mistakes were done, but I don’t think it’s a reason to reject it completely. There are some valuable points that are very much relevant, which need to be fixed by the community, for which a DM won’t do.
What concerns me particularly is that some projects having built on Polkadot are leaving, and no analysis of why seems to be done. Maybe they have good reasons independent of Polkadot, but on the other hand maybe they can suggest improvements to make Polkadot more attractive to future projects. I don’t think anybody asked.
Some see any critical voice as nefast to the project, as they prefer to live in their illusion that everything is fine and only minor issues exist and technology superiority will prevail. The technology is great, but I agree with OP that Polkadot is acting far below its potential due to other problems . For that to improve, there needs to be a critical debate taking place. But that is impossible if people voicing criticism are labeled as fudders, and if these people immediately quit after being labeled as fudder
When people ask me what I use blockchain for its basically getting better interest rates on savings. MakerDAO offers 8% on a stable coin (DAI) that has proven to be pretty reliable over a number of years. Any other DeFI stuff is too complex for the average user.
@burdges. Somewhat way off topic, but [assuming you have Bandersnatch/RingVRFs in mind] since you’re optimistic you have a killer blockchain application with an “open world collectable card game”, maybe could you write this up so we can turn it into a fun JAM “hello world” application. Please open “blockchain games” category and lead the way, thank you!
The “defi doesn’t count” conclusion is highly contentious, but Its very clear blockchain gaming does not have the enormous network effects to overcome problem that defi has. In contrast, Mythos/Mythical + blockchain gaming has a “product market fit” for Polkadot parachains very well, and we see robust usage in the data very clearly. Its been ambassadored by John Linden extremely well and I hope this can be 10xed in the coming year with ease.
In fact, a citizenship system and an on-chain credit mechanism tied to it could be introduced. This system would assign a credit score to each address (identity) based on their on-chain behavior, thereby providing incentives or penalties for their actions on the chain. Additionally, I previously suggested airdropping tokens to everyone who actively participates in DOT treasury governance. You can check the details here: Thoughts on Polkadot Treasury Governance 1: Integration and Reallocation | by Polkadot.ERI | Medium
It was next to impossible to get a meeting with the Head Ambassadors (been suggesting it since Decoded) and when I finally did, only 5 people attended since the others were busy with the other thing.
Here I tried to give a chance for the Head Ambassadors to take the lead:
Now it looks like it might, indeed, be better to get the council going again like @bkchr suggested. It doesn’t look like the Ambassador Program is going to be ready any time soon. When it’s finally in place, perhaps it’s best that they focus only on the community education and expansion to all corners of the world.
All this takes is 5+1 coordinators to bring in the initiatives that are already working on these things. They don’t necessarily have to be Ambassadors and, no, it’s not a top-down model. The coordinators have no decision making power. The whole point is to bring together the ecosystem players in these different areas and treat them as the members of each Fellowship.
Let’s build on what we already have and what works.
