RPIP-4: Community Resolutions and Voting

Abstract

The Rocket Pool community at large agrees to use Snapshot voting for governance proposals via the snapshot.org platform. Snapshot votes which pass mean their proposals are immediately adopted and the RP DAO will endeavor to enact them as soon as reasonably possible. This proposal is not related to the protocol DAO (pDAO), which refers to a planned on-chain protocol governance mechanism.

The Snapshot voting mechanism uses staked and weighted RPL token voting.

Motivation

Governance in Rocket Pool is currently ad hoc, and there is no way for the community to adopt proposals. We must adopt a governance mechanism, even if imperfect, before any governance actions can be taken legitimately, such as spending pDAO funds.

Implementation

Poll Procedure

All Rocket Pool governance proposals MUST have an associated post on the governance forums at dao.rocketpool.net. Promising community sentiment and a corresponding RPIP document (successfully past the Review stage) are REQUIRED for snapshot voting to be scheduled.

Topics SHOULD approximate community sentiment by including a poll with the following format which MUST be live for at least 7 days:

[poll type=regular results=always chartType=bar]
* Support
* Oppose
* Third option
* etc
[/poll]

Once the requirements have been met, either 1) Darren Langley AKA langers (General Manager - Rocket Pool Pty Ltd) or 2) a party he entrusts with this ability MUST create a snapshot vote and publicize it as soon as reasonably possible unless exercizing their veto power (see Vetoing below).

The snapshot vote SHALL run for at least 7 days -- with 14 days being RECOMMENDED -- and SHALL REQUIRE a minimum 15% voting power quorum to be successful. Proposals MAY specify a higher quorum. In the case where no quorum has been met for three of the last four polls, the needed minimum quorum SHALL be reduced by 25% permanently unless governance action dictates otherwise.

Snapshot Vote Strategy

Eligibility, delegation state, and vote power are all determined based on a snapshot when a vote is created.

The value of RPL used will be the price according to the protocol; at this time, that is embodied in RocketNetworkPrices.getRPLPrice().

Eligibility

All nodes are eligible to receive vote power. For nodes eligible to receive vote power, RPL staked on a node contributes to vote power up to 150% of the value of the node's bonded ETH.

Delegation

Eligible RPL voting power MAY instead be delegated to another wallet. All delegated RPL voting power is added to the total voting power of the voting wallet according to the formula below.

RPL Voting

All RPL votes are recorded into a results map which requires a Rocket Pool node address as the index (address). The results map's values SHALL include:

• an integer vote which indicates the chosen vote option
  • Generally, the following mapping SHOULD be used: 1 corresponds to "For", 2 corresponds to "Against", and 3 corresponds to "Abstain"
  • An alternative mapping MAY be used, with the only limit being the maximum integer value, but using this option MUST be specified by an RPIP.
• an integer power which contains the ultimate voting power of that node

results.power is determined in accordance with the following equation for voting:

results.power = √rpl, where rpl is the amount of RPL staked in that node, with the result truncated into an integer for simplicity.

Any delegated vote results.power is summed with the voter's own results.power to achieve the final vote power for a single voter. Addresses which delegate their vote power are not included in the results map, but if an address that delegates its power instead votes directly, the address' results.power is no longer contributed towards the delegated address' power and is instead counted for the original address only.

Total vote power for each of the poll choices indicated in each results.vote entry is summed into an rplTotalPower array containing the total sum of power for each of the poll choices, with the index of each entry mapping to the integer corresponding to the vote choice. This is used to compute the outcome as described below.

Outcome

The rplTotalPower array is searched for the maximum value. The index of this maximum value corresponds to the vote outcome. If the winning choice corresponds to "Abstain", however, then the index of the second highest value is the vote outcome instead.

A different vote outcome calculation MAY be used, e.g. ranked or single choice votes among multiple options, but this MUST be specified via an adopted RPIP.

Vetoing

Given that the snapshot voting system is not comfortably secure (see Security Considerations below), there are two safeguard vetoes in place.

The first veto consists of those with the power to bring forward a vote (see Implementation above) refusing to bring such a vote forward for consideration. Although potential changes can be technically implemented by the implementer (oDAO or pDAO guardian depending on the proposal) regardless of vote, the implementer MUST NOT do so and any such action is considered illegitimate.

A second, more absolute veto consists of the implementer refusing to implement a passed proposal.

Veto powers SHALL NOT be used lightly and SHALL be reserved for cases of vote manipulation, malicious action, or proposals that would result in clear damage to the Rocket Pool project.

When a veto power is excercised, the entity excercising a veto SHALL publish a Veto Explanation Document that describes why this step was taken. If possible, the report SHOULD also suggest potential similar-but-non-damaging votes that could be considered.

Rationale

Snapshot.org

Snapshot.org is a web3-native platform for token voting and provides several pre-strategies for accomplishing this, such as 1-to-1 voting and quadratic voting. This platform also provides the capability to create custom voting strategies, which is necessary for Rocket Pool to include staked RPL, for example. The Snapshot.org platform is widely used and does not require fees.

RPL Stake and Weight

The RPL eligibility requirements help prevent vote-buying by participants unaffiliated with the protocol’s operations.

The algorithm used for calculating power uses a square root for flattening the power contributed by any single node. This helps prevent large node operators from obtaining dominance over the voting process.

RPL vs rETH Voting

RPL is used in isolation -- not in conjunction with rETH -- because vote-buying is guarded against via staking and node creation is more sybil-resistant. While sybil-resistance is not guaranteed with this RPL-only method, it was chosen as the best compromise among the various options.

Security Considerations

As with any token-based voting mechanism, even voting with a power-flattening algorithm such as the one used here allows large actors to influence the outcome of votes. Although this risk is significantly lower with this strategy vs 1-to-1 token votes, it is possible that a large actor may create a proposal which harms the security of the protocol and force it to be adopted via this mechanism.

As of 08-13-2022, the full quorum is computed at 4000 vote power. To singlehandedly pass a governance proposal, an individual or collective would need to amass at least 50.1% of total voting power. Assuming the full quorum of roughly 4,000 voting power participation opposes them and all other votes abstain, a single actor would need to stake just 640,000 RPL across 10 nodes to reach this threshold. This is well within reach of known protocol participants today as well as many outside actors. Therefore, this system should be considered insecure and attackable. The Rocket Pool community, especially those who can bring a vote forward, must remain diligent in both their analysis of and participation in proposal votes to prevent governance attacks.

Copyright

Copyright and related rights waived via CC0.

Citation

Please cite this document as:

Mike Leach, "RPIP-4: Community Resolutions and Voting," Rocket Pool Improvement Proposals, no. 4, March 2022. [Online serial]. Available: https://rpips.rocketpool.net/RPIPs/rpip-4.