The 2nd WAX OIG Election
Office of inspector generals (OIG) on WAX is a team of three individual candidates who’s job is to evaluate and rate the guilds. Guilds on WAX are responsible for running the infrastructure of the blockchain and are paid by inflation. To separate themselves from other teams they focus on different areas that provide value to the ecosystem, such as building products, community engagement, support, business development and much more.
The OIG’s job is very important, specially in the early iterations since this is when they outline the direction of the ecosystem moving forward. To a large extent they decide what is important for the Guilds, and vice-versa what isn’t.
It is very important to not allow the metric to become the goal.
The goal is and should always be to provide value for the ecosystem, period.
The Goodhearts law
All metrics of scientific evaluation are bound to be abused. Goodhart’s law […] states that when a feature of the economy is picked as an indicator of the economy, then it inexorably ceases to function as that indicator because people start to game it.
- Quote from Wikipedia
The Campbell’s law
“The more any quantitative social indicator is used for social decision-making, the more subject it will be to corruption pressures and the more apt it will be to distort and corrupt the social processes it is intended to monitor.”
- Quote from Wikipedia
McNamara fallacy
The first step is to measure whatever can be easily measured. This is OK as far as it goes. The second step is to disregard that which can’t be easily measured or to give it an arbitrary quantitative value. This is artificial and misleading. The third step is to presume that what can’t be measured easily really isn’t important. This is blindness. The fourth step is to say that what can’t be easily measured really doesn’t exist. This is suicide.
— Daniel Yankelovich, “Corporate Priorities: A continuing study of the new demands on business” (1972).
There are a lot of aspects in the Guild business that can not easily be measured, such as tech competence, nodeos skills, finding and solving errors, customer support, availability, thought process, community guidance, on boarding and much more. The current system do not fully reflect the value a team adds to the ecosystem, and some changes that are measured by a basic layer actually removes the edge that quality team provides. A lot of the positive aspects of a team is very hard to evaluate an specially to quantify with metrics. From our perspective it is important to keep working and finding ways to improve the ratings to reflect these aspects.
So, now lets evaluate all the candidates based on what they have communicated so far. Without digging to much into detail, I will also link to interviews with them all so you can evaluate the candidates yourself.
The current OIG system requires the candidates to manually evaluate products and contributions of the guilds, some of the current candidates have ideas to implement to improve in this process.
It is important that the evaluation done by the OIG encourages guilds to focus on their playing field rather than incentivize them to chase the same ball.
Evaluation
For any entity to properly evaluate the job the guilds do and what is required of them, that entity needs multiple skills. All of these skills are not required by all members of the OIG, as they can complement each other. But as a team it is needed to keep the entire system functioning. All candidates has ideas and see areas which can be improved, some of these ideas are however already implemented. One of the provided ideas is already in the OIG ratings guidelines which shows a lack of understanding the evaluation.
In the below ratings I have removed the aspects of their application that is already being worked on by the OIG, a guild or a third party. I.ex. some of the automation processes for infrastructure has been built by sentnl.io and Blacklusion. Kaefer got elected on and are working on implementing a better outlined criteria for evaluating projects so they can more easily evaluate themselves.
Aspects suggested by multiple candidates:
+ Automate the testings of the guilds infrastructure
+ Bring metrics on chain
These are already being worked on and tested.
Javier Mendonça — Top candidate — Interview
Android developer with a passion for blockchain based in Sweden. Has released an WAX android app to keep track of the NFT drops on atomichub.
Javier has been following the EOSIO development before EOS mainnet launched and has been a huge supporter for multiple projects since. He has kept up with WAX and WAX governance all along the way, which gives him a great insight into the development of the OIG ratings system. Prior to applying for this job he properly researched the entire OIG process as well as interviews current OIG Candidates to get a better understanding of the job.
Contribution to the OIG:
+ Want’s to make the rating process more transparent
+ Want’s to streamline communication
Attributes:
+ Did a lot of research prior to applying
+ Understands technology
+ Experienced in Blockchain
+ Launched a product on WAX
+ Active in the community
+ Long term WAX supporter
+ Understands EOSIO
+ Android developer
Ben Petersen & Ellie Cheng — Runner up candidate — Interview
Ben is a developer and data analyst and the creator of waxplorer.com, Ellie Cheng is a front end developer, they are both based in Germany.
From a discussion with Ben, if elected he will take the lead and Ellie will be supporting him. This is great since it will allow them to have discussions while evaluating teams before presenting it to the other candidates. This team has properly considered the requirements of running as a candidate and deem they have the time, resources and capabilities to do a proper job based on interviewing one of the OIG Candidates and discussing internally.
Contribution to the OIG:
+ Want’s to evaluate guilds services by talking customers
+ Involve the community voices in the OIG process
Attributes:
+ Built one of the WAX NFT staple products
+ Experience from using services from current Guilds
+ Understands technology
+ Big community presence
+ Long term WAX supporter
+ Mainstream user experience perspective
+ Ben is not afraid of raising his concerns
+ Front end and back end skills
Big Mike — Interview
Community member that is part of nifty wizards, Crypto twerps and operates blokshop.io and is based in Canda.
Mike is active and passionate about many aspects of the WAX ecosystem which gives him a vast understanding in the community. That he contributes to multiple projects shows that he is here to add value.
Contribution to the OIG:
+ Higher priority to the community aspects
+ Open up the guidelines further to encourage thinking outside of the box
+ Adding a bigger user perspective to the guilds contributions
Attributes:
+ Working with products on WAX
+ Big community presence
+ Mike is not afraid of raising his concerns
Brandon Lovejoy — Interview
Communication professional from the US. With a background in multiple blockchain projects and currently working as a writer of cryptocurrency related articles.
His experience in previous Dpos projects give him a good perspective in problems that can easily occur with such a governance system.
Contribution to the OIG:
+ Community Centered perspective
+ Better communication to guilds and community
Attributes:
+ Experience in blockchain governance
+ Communication skills
+ Detailed application
Sukesh Tedla — Interview
CEO of Greeneos, guild and block producer on EOSIO blockchains and is Based in Sweden.
Sukesh currently operates a guild in the WAX ecosystem and their guild related work will cease to exist if he get elected to prevent biased outcomes.
Sukesh has one of the most outlined applications which I think can be looked at for future applications for the Office of Inspector Generals.
Contribution to the OIG:
+ Building a TLR rating system for products
+ Plan to reach token holders
Attributes:
+ Experience with the OIG system
+ Experience with guild operations
+ Sukesh is not afraid of raising his concerns
+ Detailed application
Summary
Based on above, our top candidates are Javier, Ben & Ellie. Based on the information provided by the candidates in their application as well as interviews, and the current state of OIG. There are still a lot of OIG tools that need to be developed where they can add value outside of strictly rating the guilds. This has pushed these applicants to the top.
Javiers preparation prior to applying for the OIG is what pushed him to the top. It shows that he takes this position serious and intends to put in the required work.
Rating is as follows:
- Javier
- Ben & Ellie
— — — — —
- Javier will be a great addition to the current elected Inspector Generals, Josep and Kaefer.
- Javier’s experience, interest and knowledge on the technical aspects of blockchain technology as well as governance is a key feature.
- Javier expressed specifics on what can be applied to improve current ratings and I believe he has the ability to implement them.
- Being an android developer he adds to the current toolset within the office.
— — — — —
I hope that the other candidates applies for next election and continue to work on their applications. That Javier and Ben is rated at top does not reflect the work of the other candidates. That we place Javier on top was a difficult decision. Multiple of the applicants would be beneficial to the guild rating system. And if one of the others end up on top, I believe they will do a great job.
Based on this process I hope to see next election process being longer, and require the applicants to write a more detailed blog post about their contribution to the Office of Inspector Generals.
