Joint vote on NCL and AlphaGrowth proposals
Joint vote on NCL and AlphaGrowth proposals
I am voting YES on two governance actions, one with hash a75645e0871f3dbb6207df867d9bd6a1a3a5befa40d68df6da651db4d6607fbf#0, and another with the hash 529dccaadaa000746c22f1682574cb3f436eeba4d19710b90791a54226dc96d7#0.
The metadata for my vote is located here, and this blog serves as a more human-readable form of that justification.
Justification
First, there is some unavoidable conflict of interest inherent in the AlphaGrowth proposal: every DeFi protocol (and IMO, the whole ecosystem) stands to benefit from more capital being deployed into DeFi on Cardano. That being said, the funds allocated in the proposal to an independent eligibility audit to avoid favoritism are, to me, sufficient protections against my own conflict of interest.
In response, I am voting yes on both the increased NCL, and the use of that increase in support of the AlphaGrowth proposal.
In orbital dynamics, there is a concept called delta-V. This represents the change in velocity available to you by your current fuel reserves. Spend a certain amount of fuel, change your velocity by a set amount, and this determines how you change the shape of your orbit.
If, however, you’re in a decaying orbit, this Delta-V becomes time sensitive. As the orbit decays from drag from the atmosphere, the Delta-V required to correct and sustain the orbit long term increases. Conserving fuel and expending it slowly over time to try to maintain your current orbit is a losing game, because you have finite resources. The longer you wait, the more your orbit decays, and the more Delta-V is required to repair your orbit at all, until you hit a point of no return and your crash to earth is inevitable.
I believe this is the position Cardano finds itself in. It has a fairly large reserve of ADA. Through unbelievable feats of human engineering it finds itself in a low, somewhat stable orbit. But it is decaying slowly over time.
In my view, conserving that budget to spend it judiciously over a long period of time while the value of that treasury shrinks is consigning Cardano to a painful crash into the Atlantic ocean. Perhaps conserving that treasury will delay that crash by a few years, or allow us some leniency to steer that crash into safer, gentler waters, but nonetheless, we will crash.
The solution, then, is to figure out how to stabilize the orbit. The Delta-V available in a stable orbit becomes a moot point. If we are stable, and self sustaining, we will have time to secure a resupply, and from that stable orbit our launch into the stars becomes far easier.
More concretely, the Cardano treasury will not replenish or grow its expenditures through transaction fees alone. It will grow it’s holdings by fostering billion dollar businesses that have no choice but to invest in the continued success of Cardano.
I believe the AlphaGrowth proposal is our best use of what fuel we have to change the trajectory of Cardano for the better. They have a proven track record, a concrete plan, and the right mindset to attract those businesses.
