Uniswap Deployments Accountability Committee
This post follows the RFC and approved Temperature Check for the creation of an Accountability Committee for Deployments for Uniswap DAO.
The main changes from the previous proposal are:
- The committee’s Operating Policies and Conflict of Interest Policy are listed below.
- Cameron O’Donnell (Consensys) has stepped down from the committee, and Rafael Solari (Tally) has stepped up to replace him.
- The proposal overview is updated to account for the committee’s role following the expiry of the Business Source License.
Proposal Overview
We propose the creation of an Accountability Committee for Deployments tasked with overseeing the operational development of deployments of Uniswap V3 on other chains.
Licensure and deployments are the areas that have generated the most governance activity. The continued launch of new chains and platforms will require ongoing oversight and attention.
License Expiry & the Accountability Committee
With the expiry of Uniswap’s BSL on April 1, 2023, prospective deployers will no longer require license exemptions voted on by Uniswap Governance. Teams wishing to utilize parts of Uniswap V3 may deploy at their own will. However, in order to be considered a part of Uniswap ecosystem, some projects will seek to obtain the “official” blessing and management of Uniswap Governance.
The initial purview of the proposed Committee will be to liaise with projects seeking to deploy Uniswap; ensure deploying projects are correctly configured; and providing a recommendation to the community on whether to approve certain deployments.
Overview
Over the past year, several projects have requested Additional Use Grants to the Uniswap community and/or requested permission to deploy Uniswap protocol to alternative chains (including L2s and alternative L1s). Often such proposals offered financial incentives for Uniswap. However, the delivery of funds has been in some cases delayed or implemented according to mechanisms that weren’t part of the agreement terms.
In order to mitigate this issue and facilitate stronger accountability practices in Uniswap, we propose the formation of an Accountability Committee tasked with the following functions:
- Be responsible for the evaluation of proposals during the first two phases of the governance process (RFC and Temperature Check).
- Verify that proposals comply with the requirements of the Uniswap DAO Proposal Template.
- Implement and manage an on-chain commitment mechanism for Uniswap DAO.
- Require that deployment proposals offering financial incentives to Uniswap (including but not limited to grants for Uniswap community, liquidity mining, or metagovernance incentives) may not proceed forward to the last stage of the governance process without depositing a % of the promised funds into the commitment contract or other holding mechanisms.
- If the proposal does not follow the approval process, the committee will formally and publicly object to it.
- Provide last-mile QA and technical guidance for deployment configuration.
- Keeping track of commitments, disbursements, and project milestones.
- Report quarterly to Uniswap DAO on activities.
For each proposal that advances to the on-chain Governance Proposal phase, the Committee will engage in the following activities:
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Ensuring deployments are properly configured
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Liaising with the proposer team
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Facilitate delegate discussion around quality and credibility of the project
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Co-editing the final proposal with the proposer team
Committee Duration
The initial Committee will have 5 members and a duration of 6 months to allow committee members to begin developing practices and processes that may meaningfully carry forward into future iterations of the committee.
With the expiration of BSL on April 1, 2023, the Committee’s core focus will be correct configuration of deployment and providing recommendation to governance on deployments that may be managed by Uniswap Governance. At the end of the term the Committee will be subjected to review by the community to discuss areas of improvement and potential expansion of its scope to other kinds of partnerships beyond deployments.
We believe that there is plenty of scope for the committee to keep providing value to Uniswap community after the expiration of the BSL:
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Cross-chain governance will continue to be an issue after April 1 and the committee will be in a position to provide expert guidance and recommendations in the process, while gathering community feedback, guaranteeing compliance to the Cross-chain Assessment Bridge Process, and overseeing its implementation.
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Lastly, we believe future versions of Uniswap core protocol are likely to launch with a BSL.
Compensation
We propose that Committee members are compensated with a retainer of $3,500 per 6-month term and a fee of $6,500 for each evaluated project, paid at the end of each 6-month period. We propose a minimum of 2 committee members’ involvement in each agreement proposal.
We also propose an ad-hoc / discretionary budget of $1,000 per committee member to support any legal fees incurred by the team.
Assuming the Committee will review 2 proposals each term, the maximum estimated budget for the first iteration of the Accountability committee is $87,500 for the first 6 months, and $170,000 for a year.
Motivation
The need for an Accountability role in Uniswap DAO was crystalized in the first Uniswap Delegate Forum that Uniswap Foundation and Other Internet hosted in October 2022, following the publication of OI’s accountability report for Uniswap, which explored at length the legal, social and on-chain accountability mechanisms available to Uniswap. The Forum led to the creation of a dedicated Accountability Working Group to address Uniswap DAO’s accountability challenges.
As observed in the report, at present Uniswap’s strongest accountability measure in the context of licensing and partnership agreements is the Business Source License, which however has limited application toward enforcing the terms of an agreement and the delivery of promised funds after a proposal has been executed.
Establishing and formalizing an accountability role within Uniswap, with a clear mandate and responsibilities, will greatly improve accountability toward the DAO, avoid repeating past episodes of missing or delayed funds, and overall facilitate the operational autonomy of the DAO going forward. We also plan to leverage work on the cross-chain bridge assessment group and liaise with them in security assessments.
Selection Process
We initially proposed 5 committee members that were participants in the accountability working group that Other Internet ran at the beginning of the year. Following the feedback from the community, we supported Uniswap DAO contributors and delegates nominating themselves for a position on the committee. The committee size is capped at 5 members, at least for the duration of the trial period. The goal of the cap is to keep the costs in check, scale manageable, and committee members accountable.
Desired criteria for committee membership include:
- Context on the history of accountability challenges faced by Uniswap and DAOs in general.
- Demonstrated commitment and active participation in Uniswap governance decisions.
- Understanding and context on prior Uniswap deployment processes.
- Experience managing and negotiating partnerships and agreements.
- Clear understanding of technical architecture of Uniswap v3 and governance.
Selected Members
The committee was ratified by the Uniswap community in the Temperature Check phase of this proposal using Approval Voting. One of the selected delegates had to step down and has been replaced by Raf Solari. Uniswap’s first Accountability Committee is composed by the following delegates:
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Doo Wan Nam (COO at StableLab) @Doo_Stablelab
Experience: Professional delegate at StableNode across major DeFi protocols, including MakerDAO, Optimism, Aave, 1inch, Balancer, Element, InstaDapp, Hop. Previously spent 3.5 years at the Maker Foundation.
Past Uniswap Activity: Participation in an Accountability Working Group that shipped Proposal Template 2.0 - Upgrade for Deployments & Agreements
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Jun Sun (Governance lead at Pennblockchain/FranklinDAO) @pennblockchain
Experience: Governance Lead at Penn Blockchain, Uniswap delegate for 2 years, Delegate at Compound, Aave, MakerDAO, etc.
Relevant Uniswap Experience: Helped draft, steward, and submit cross-chain deployment proposals on Boba, zkSync, and Kava chains. Co-authored a research paper Deep Diving into Uniswap's Governance with recommendations on reinvigorating governance activity. Active participation in cross-chain governance forum discussions and proposals.
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Kendra Leong (Governance at she256) @kendraleong
Experience: Professional delegate at Uniswap, Compound, ENS, Hop, and Optimism for crypto nonprofit She256. Prior experience as General Counsel. Familiarity with enterprise risk management structures and creating accountability within transactional proposal processes. Previously Legal Cybersecurity Liaison to the White House.
Relevant Uniswap Experience: Participation in Uniswap votes on behalf of She256 since 2021.
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Raf Solari (Co-Founder & CTO at Tally) @rafaelsolari
Experience: Senior technical architect and cross-chain governance expert, CTO at Tally. High degree of understanding of different governance processes and accountability procedures across DAOs.
Relevant Uniswap Experience: External technical advisor on UGM bridge evaluation process.
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Kydo (Lead at Stanford Blockchain Club) @kydo
Experience: Vice President of Stanford Blockchain Club, programming committee member for Stanford DAO Workshop, co-organizer for CEE246A class at Stanford on crypto entrepreneurship. Previously Kydo contributed to Llama, Gitcoin, and FWB.
Relevant Uniswap Experience: Participation in an Accountability Working Group that shipped Proposal Template 2.0 - Upgrade for Deployments & Agreements. Leading MMA design for cross-chain messaging.
For more details on the selection and voting process, see the Temperature Check here.
Committee Operating Policies
We ask that delegates and community members participating in this vote and the activities of the committee abide by the following points emerged in the previous discussion, that form the normative touchstones of this first iteration of the committee, and may be ratified as part of the bylaws of the committee by future governance decisions.
- The committee has elected to approve Doo Wan Nam and Kendra Leong as co-chairs of the committee for the first 6 months. The Chairs will coordinate meetings, governance, and assign members to proposal review.
- Retainer compensation is paid at the beginning of the 6 month period, and evaluated project fees at the end of a 6 month term.
- Committee members should be elected every 6 months and cannot serve for more than 2 consecutive rounds.
- Delegates may nominate themselves or others.
- Retiring committee members are responsible for nominating and educating their successors.
Conflict of Interest Policy
https://docs.google.com/document/d/13CBE5KZSG9c09Y2M1cp4v_ejemLAcouaLxRKPbD_h5s/edit
Proposer details
This proposal is put forward by Uniswap Agreements & Accountability working group — an initiative stewarded by Other Internet with the participation of Uniswap Delegates and Uniswap Foundation.
Points of Contact
Laura Lotti, laura@otherinter.net
Kendra Leong, kendra@she256.org
Doo Wan Nam, doo@stablenode.xyz
Jun Sun, junsun1@wharton.upenn.edu
