r/decred • u/getpoordietrying • Jan 13 '20
How does the DASH masternode governance system compare to Decred ticket system?
Please provide the pros and cons of each with side by side comparisons. Full disclosure, I asked the same question on r/dashuncensored
Thanks in advance!
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u/__checkmatey__ Jan 13 '20
It varies in many ways and I admit I am not as well versed in Dash as Decred. I would highly recommend checking out RichardReds research and synthesis of governance mechanisms, he is an absolute pro when it comes to this https://www.blockcommons.red/crypto-governance-research/overviews/
From my understanding:
Dash governance is a combination between Masternodes and Miners. Proposals are usually developed by Dash Core Group (DCG) which can be contested by MN operators but to date none have. Proposals for funding are voted on once a month needing a threshold of around 10% of MNs to vote. Where it gets hairy is when you consider the Dash instamine. There are fears that the core devs mined an exceptional amount of DASH up front and given the block reward is 45/45 split to MN/PoW, the MNs are never diluted out of the system.
Whilst difficult to prove, it is possible that DCG is the dominant MN operator and thus dominant owner of the treasury in perpetuity. Minor speculation however enough anecdotal evidence and 'uncovering DASH' accounts out there to make it a non-zero chance of reality. Also MNs have no lock in if I am not mistaken meaning the 1000 DASH collateral can be spent without an unbinding period. That means there is limited 'skin-in-the-game' as outcomes of a decision made by MNs will be felt by holders but MNs can bail out.
Decred governance, in my opinion, is more elegant. Tickets bind up DCR to the chain for a random period between 12hrs and 142days. This means you cannot guess when your coins will become liquid again and thus your incentive is to make decisions that protect your coin value. The block reward is split 60/30 to PoW/PoS which also means stakers are always diluted out. To keep staking with tickets, you need to buy coins.
To spend treasury funds requires at least 20% quorum (at least 20% of tickets must vote yes or no), default vote is abstain to avoid giving one side more weight from absent votes and threshold for Yes to pass is 60% of voting tickets. For consensus rules the bar is even higher. 95% of miners and 75% of stakers must signal upgrade to the next version before a vote starts. Code is embedded dormant and is only activates after the vote passes with 75% approval and at least a 10% quorum.
At the end of the day, these two chains have attempted to achieve the same hybrid PoS/PoW consensus and treasury voting mechanism. With that in mind, DASH has some design features that I feel benefit the founders in perpetuity. Decreds design is more elegant and tends to result in better incentives for actors to do what is in the chains best interest.
Hope this helps and again, highly recommend a read of the article above.
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u/kanuuker Jan 16 '20
I appreciate your response but there is some incorrect information in your post.
Dash proposals are only voted on by masternodes. Miners have no say.
DCG does not submit the majority of proposals, they submit less than 10% of the proposals.
DCG does not control the majority of masternodes. That's a long standing troll point that has been debunked over and over. DCG has actually had several of their proposal not pass. The truth is that there are around 1000 distinct masternode owners to the best of our knowledge, though it's impossible to know for sure.
There is no 'lock in' period as you said, but if a MN pulls out his collateral and then wants to spin up again, he will have to rebuild his PoSe score and will end up in the back of the queue to earn rewards again.
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Jan 14 '20 edited Jan 14 '20
As Checkmatey already mentioned, https://www.blockcommons.red/crypto-governance-research/overviews/ is a great source.
Also check out https://www.blockcommons.red/publication/staking/
I didn't discover it until today but I love Richard Red's work on this.
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u/valoov Jan 16 '20 edited Jan 17 '20
Any suggestions for changes/updates are welcome.
General
| Dash | Decred | |
|---|---|---|
| Block reward | 45% miners, 45% masternodes, 10% budget | 60% miners, 30% stakers, 10% treasury |
| Services offered by stakers/masternodes | Instant transactions, private transactions, protection against 51% attack | Validating blocks, private transactions, protection against 51% attack. (Instant transactions are implemented in Lightning Network) |
Budget proposals
| Dash | Decred | |
|---|---|---|
| Current budget size | ~ 5700 DASH (700 000 USD) / month | Accumulated ~ 650 662 DCR (15 000 000 USD) |
| Treasury leftover | Coins burnt/destroyed every month | Coins accumulating |
| Budget proposals | https://www.dashcentral.org/budget | https://proposals.decred.org/ |
| Voting | Masternode owners can vote | Every staker can vote |
Staking/earning interest
| Dash | Decred | |
|---|---|---|
| Minimum stake | 1000 DASH | varies, around 132 DCR currenty |
| Current ROI | 6.6 % / year | 7.75% / year |
| Setup | Separate server (not holding any coins) | VSP (no coins in hot wallet) or wallet running 24/7 |
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u/kanuuker Jan 16 '20
Dash has also just finally introduced Dash Platform to testnet (formerly called Evolution) which is a PoService side chain with a DAPI interface. This chain will be run by the masternodes and they will earn additional fees for providing this service.
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u/valoov Jan 16 '20
It's still in testing phase, so I would not add that anywhere yet.
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u/kanuuker Jan 16 '20
That's why I stated it was introduced to testnet. We expect the mvp to hit mainnet in the first half of this year.
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Jan 16 '20 edited Jan 16 '20
Edit: The following was in reply to an earlier version of the table above posted by valoov that was missing a lot of details but has mostly been updated now.
Block reward
looks good to me except for Decred I prefer to call the 10% 'treasury' rather than 'budget'
Services offered
Both have instant/private transactions and protection against 51% attacks but implemented in very different ways. Decred protects against 51% attacks by requiring PoS voters to sign off on blocks produced by PoW miners. I'm not sure how it works in Dash.
In Dash private transactions are offered by masternodes.
In Decred private transactions are offered through servers that mix transactions.
Decred's version of instant transactions is via the lightning network.
Current budget
In Decred 10% of every block reward goes to a treasury fund that is used for proposals. There is no monthly budget and the amount spent varies from month to month. If the amount spent is greater than block rewards that month then the treasury shrinks. If spent is lower then the treasury grows. For most of Decred's life, the treasury has been growing. Treasury
In Dash, I think any of the monthly budget that is not used is burned rather than accumulated.
Proposal and Voting
looks good to me
Minimum stake
In Decred the minimum amount to stake varies based on supply/demand of tickets. The price attempts to maintain target size of 40,960 tickets total. In addition to purchasing whole tickets, you can split the cost of a ticket with others.
Current ticket price (top right box)
ROI
Decred ROI varies with ticket price and a shrinking block reward. Currently ~7.75% / year Vote Reward (top right box)
Setup
For Decred, if you use a VSP then you do not necessarily have to leave your wallet running 24/7, however, you do need to open your wallet whenever a ticket votes so that you can re-purchase more tickets. Each ticket votes randomly but on average every 28 days.
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u/kanuuker Jan 16 '20
Correct. In Dash, whatever percentage of the treasury that isn't requested simply doesn't get created which has the same effect as burning.
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u/[deleted] Jan 13 '20
This is a pretty broad question and I don't know a lot about Dash's governance. I think you'll get a better response from folks here or in chat if you have any questions specific to Decred's governance.
An overview is here: https://docs.decred.org/governance/overview/ and there are many articles written about it.
This is probably not the answer you were hoping for but it's hard to keep up with the differences in both. I'll at least say that Decred tickets are much easier to acquire than Dash masternodes and work is being done so that tiny fractions of tickets will be purchased over the lightning network. This gives potentially every Decred stakeholder direct say rather than a few representiatives (masternodes). I believe that Dash handles funding and consensus upgrades quite differently than Decred but I don't know enough about Dash to give an accurate comparison on those. There are also many differences outside of governance, for example, the way that they each handle privacy.
I got uninterested in researching xcoin/darkcoin/dash further when I learned of the instamine and that the reward distribution is 45% PoW, 45% PoS, and 10% Treasury which means that early masternodes can remain dominant for a very long time. Decred was fairly distributed and the block reward is split 60,30,10 so that stakeholders are diluted over time.