Thanks, @possum ! I’ve left some comments. 
1 Like
Thank you ser.
Also, I wanted to add: I hope that we use this charter as guide and not follow it blindly as a bible. We can plan and draw charts, but everything constantly changes, and we need to be ready to adapt. 
2 Likes
IMPORTANT: Charter v5 is up for review until EOD today ET. The biggest change: a formal Core Contributor Program now exists, and Core Contributors — not the Council — elect Council members and ratify charter amendments. The Council can’t pick its own successors anymore. Also sets the stipend baseline (100k XTM/month, $4k USD cap using a forward-reference rate), defines Council service as an active working role, and adds appeal paths for removals and rejected nominees. Full diff and rationale in the PR: https://github.com/tari-project/rfcs/pull/168
2 Likes
I really hate to be that guy but capping the stipend at $48k/yr right out of the gate is a mistake. Don’t we want people working on Tari full time eventually? That’s less than half what a Junior Developer makes in the US, and it doesn’t come with any benefits.
Setting the $10k/mo upper limit that Fox suggested was much more reasonable if we want to attract any sort of talent. This would necessitate a ~12500% price increase at 100k XTM/mo. People will take a small earnings cut to work on an open-source project like Tari, but $48k and no health insurance is a poverty wage in the US.
This is something that could be used to bring in new contributors right now. The promise that if they contribute enough, there is actually potential for a decent living one day doing something they love full-time. We shouldn’t rule out that possibility before things even get started.
1 Like
The stipend isn’t meant to be a salary. Council service is a part-time governance role, not a full-time job. The people doing full-time work on Tari would be funded contributors under Article III, where the Council directs what gets funded and built. What can’t be funded by tokens can be backstopped by enterprises (as Tari Labs is continuing to do but not limited to it). The Council only has control of the Community tranche of the premine (currently around 700M tokens). That’s a separate compensation structure the Council will establish once it’s seated.
$4k/month for a part-time board-level governance role is in line with comparable protocols (Arbitrum $5k, ENS $5-8k). If the token appreciates and 100k XTM exceeds the cap, the cap prevents it from becoming disproportionate.
Full-time contributor compensation is a Council operational decision.
Does that address the concern, or do you think the cap needs revisiting?
@possum Agreed on the council being a part time position. I’d actually be a bit worried if the council, especially when the project grows, got to a point where it couldn’t be part time. Mostly because it would indicate that we haven’t decentralized/delegated enough.
If it’s always intended to be a part time position then that’s one thing.
If the project grows enough I don’t see how it stays part time without becoming a bottleneck when the council is responsible for the bounty program and essentially everything that gets funded and built. It just seems like we’re placing a (relatively low?) upper limit on Tari’s potential.
Delegating also takes time. If they’re voting on TIPs - those can be pretty technical. We want the council to be informed on the proposals they’re casting votes for. Getting up to speed takes time.
Great work on the charter @possum - it will be a work in progress document for sure. The first council will work under a forward-looking valuation, that alignment is the foundation
Tari Community Charter V1.0 Ratified at Commit 512371c
If it turns out to be enough of an issue later on, the charter does have provisions for modification, and at that point, the need should be obvious, and the will shall be there. I could be entirely wrong about it staying part time-- but if I am, the tools are there (and the will will certainly be there) to remedy the situation.
I understand the charter allows for amendments. Good luck getting 2/3 majority in a crypto project to vote to pay other contributors more, though. This is not my first rodeo. People were initially upset that council members would get paid $80/mo and some even wanted a 12mo vesting schedule (for $1000!?!?).
The bigger problem now is it seems we’ve just decided this is going to be a part time commitment, forever, before things get going. Like I said, we’re placing a relatively low upper limit on Tari’s potential. And completely needlessly too. It’s concerning that others here seemingly don’t believe Tari will ever be as successful as other L1 protocols we’re competing with.
If we treat it like a hobby project, that’s all it’s ever going to be.
1 Like
The voting populace in this case would be core contributors, who work closely with the council and would be aware of what constraints they were under. The council would be appealing to said CCs for their vote. Right now it’s a lot of abstract hand-waving since nothing has happened yet.
I don’t think that’s what’s happening here. However, I will concede that the limitation is arbitrary, and while I think a well-run council will avoid making council work in particular full time, I don’t think that I can say that with so much confidence I think it should be forbidden.
@possum Would you be open to increasing the cap to something that would permit full time work should it be needed? Or are we now in the firm camp of ‘this should be a topic for the council to talk about once they’re in session’?
1 Like
I think it’s good for the first council session to have a little housecleaning to do.
1 Like
@possum @kinkajou (And others viewing)
The council has been appointed today and given agreements to sign as part of onboarding. These agreements included higher numbers intended to increase the sense of investment by council members.
To make this public (and allow for comment in case adjustment is needed) I’ve created this PR, which contains the adjusted numbers as signed.
This is a bit out of order for how I would have liked this to have happened (it doesn’t seem in spirit to me of how we were expecting such changes to be made), but I didn’t want to hold up signing and getting the council running further, and I certainly don’t mind being paid more, so I figure the next best option was to immediately make the information public so the community can voice their thoughts and council members can see if any further adjustments should be made, or if everyone’s OK with this change.
@Fox Great to hear the council has been selected. Do you have any idea when the full cohort will be announced?
I’m disappointed with how the compensation change was handled…While I’m supportive of increasing incentives if it helps attract and retain strong council members, the process seems at odds with how the council’s dayto day operations and governance were communicated to the community.
Discussing or debating a change after the agreements have already been signed is largely counterproductive, since there’s little practical opportunity to influence the outcome at that point. Hopefully this is an exception rather than something that becomes a recurring pattern.
1 Like
Congratulations @Fox , I am pleased you have been selected for the Council.
Thank you for this transparency. The Council selection process and its timeline were not as originally presented. The undisclosed compensation change casts another shadow over what many had hoped would be a new dawn for Tari.
I echo @Okz 's support of adequate compensation to incentivize quality participation as well as his disappointment with how governance has been handled at its inception.
1 Like
That’s a nice first block. That is some poetry! Cheers to positivity and good decisions!
1 Like
Having newly elected council and the first discussion is being of “how much council is being paid”. Stippend amount can and should be decided last, it’s a low priority IMO.
Council should be paid adequately yes.
How can we evaluate council moneteraly if there is no evidence of it’s efficiency?
1 Like