Thanks for your answers, Sophia. I appreciate your insight.
This doesn’t comport with the rest of your post where you continue to imply collusion between TF and the tzBTC consortium, which would be unethical on the part of Arthur and TF.
I think that asking for transparency and implying collusion are separate concerns, which is why I went out of my way to explicitly state that and offer a public apology if my words were not clear in previous posts.
I’m advocating that we, as a community, should hold ourselves to a high standard in this regard, not advocating that I think there’s some form of collusion. Even if there was collusion, I am not naive enough to think that we’re going to somehow expose / investigate / litigate that in a community driven, public, internet forum.
Ozcam’s razor applies here: Perhaps I’m simply trying to make it easy for the Tezos Foundation to set a high standard of disclosures by asking easy questions to answer, and thereby removing the conflicts of interest angle from this debate.
With all that said, I do think it is the community’s right to ask/expect reasonable disclosures of conflicts of interest (and it’s also the Tezos Foundation’s right to not engage should they think that’s the best path for them). I personally don’t understand why there’s so much pushback on what seems to be a non-controversial request.
I have seen both public and private discussions where others are repeating this request for transparency, and I’m glad the community is pushing on it.
I’ll respond to a few of your points below (quoted for brevity):
I do not financially benefit from any of their investments other than through my continued employment at an organization they fund. Suffice to say, it is extremely far fetched to imagine I colluded with the tzBTC consortium.
Thanks for stating that! This represents a simple, complete and useful statement that expresses transparency.
I appreciate you taking the time to say this, and for the avoidance of doubt, I certainly don’t think you are colluding with anyone.
I will also note that there’s one group I’m fairly certain does not care about this elevated prestige: anyone associated with tzBTC. As Arthur already explained, the institutions behind it are large enough the minting fees mean nothing to them. And the contract was developed quite some time ago as a contract job by a consultancy who does not stand to financially or reputationally benefit from it at this point. Finally, tzBTC already has elevated prestige compared to other assets from its significant first-mover advantage.
Thanks for stating this as well. I think that’s a great explanation of the state of the world and provides some more details to the folks reading this that perhaps were not wildly known.
I don’t believe you think Arthur did either, which is why it’s disappointing you continue to concern troll about it and claim you’re innocently arguing for transparency. Of course, I can’t argue against TF releasing this information because it would appear as if there’s something to hide. But you have no evidence that any relationship between TF and the tzBTC consortium is relevant to the choice of tzBTC for liquidity baking.
My point is that summarizing the relationship between these entities as a “price of two beer” relationship isn’t a complete picture.
A series A investment typically comes with a price tag higher than a few beers. It’s also been stated in another thread on Agora that Bitcoin Suisse is the custodian for the Foundation:
(Source)
Presumably the cost of custodying 600M of Bitcoin [2] is also higher that two beers.
I do think these facts are relevant to the discussion about giving an asset elevated prestige and I think it’s in everyone’s benefit to disclose them openly.
I wish we would be totally transparent that these are / are not the only relationships between these entities.
Lastly, I’ll state again that conflicts of interest can be okay if they’re disclosed properly. It’s okay for entities or people to make money. Everyone has a rent/mortgage to pay, or needs a way to feed themselves dinner this evening.
If the Tezos Devs write a great protocol, it is absolutely fair that they get paid for doing so. If the Tezos Foundation makes a great investment and it appreciates in value that’s okay too.But we should be explicit about these relationships when picking a “winning” asset and advocating for it [3].
In conclusion, I’m advocating for transparency and responsible disclosure. I do perceive the transparency and pushback that this request has received is hurting public perception of this proposal. I’m also pushing us to do this proactively and better in future protocol proposals, since I don’t think a 300+ post Agora thread is serving anyone at this point.
[1] I realize that Corey (to the best of my knowledge) works at Tezos Commons, but I assume he wouldn’t make a purposefully misleading statement.
[2] Tezos Foundation Annual Report, pg 44.
[3] Regardless of if that asset was chosen because it was the best option, only option, chosen by a coin flip or otherwise, and regardless of if the asset already has prestige
