Who are the validators?
Who are the validators?
TL;DR
The universe of Proof of Stake and validating is growing by the block. The 15th of September 2022 saw ETH complete its merge and move to POS. This adds the largest crypto ecosystem to the total market cap of POS, which according to staking rewards was already at > 10% of the total MC prior to the merge itself. That's over 6 million users (stakers) before the merge and a lot more now. That's over 250 known providers (operators) before the merge and a lot more today. In fact, this is difficult to measure, but we are certain that the Cosmos ecosystem, alone, contains more than 250 providers.
The point and the mission
We view blockchains as cities. We have been talking about this for years. Finally, it seems that the narrative is catching up. If one was to take the statement that blockchains are developing cities as an assumption, then an obvious question is - where does that place the validators (those who run nodes as a service and / or as a business)?
At Citizen Cosmos we strongly believe that node runners, along with the infrastructure and the services they provide, can be seen as business startups are to a city. If the blockchain space is a universe of cities and each wallet is a citizen, then this easily makes the validators business owners. Where each business is competing for customers and for attention from the city in various ways. One builds more infra, another provides media services, another opens a bank, etc.
The irony comes when you think VC for a moment. In this case the VC becomes the delegators! Decentralzaioton and on-chain governance are with us for a while now. Those cities are user-manged. We delegate to the business we think will benefit our city the most. And just like a VC, we expect a return from the share of the business. In fact, in this case, we get a return of the business straight away. Every block. If we don't like the business or not happy with what they do, we redelagete. Sure - VC, isn't the perfect word. The point is the metaphor, and we think that it fits perfectly.
But still. What is the point?
Great question anon. The point is that if all those operators are the businesses. The delegators (or the citizens) are the VCs, and it is up to us to develop the city (finally... a world where we can really decide where the money goes to), then we believe it is important to understand who the business owner is and what they are planning to do with that money.
Today, there are several ways to try and understand this. There are various metrics and dashboards. There are foundations (founding fathers city council) that each have their own valuation criteria, various public Excel spreadsheets, etc... But does it truly help to build for decentralization and for a bright future?
We believe that the only way to truly recognize what a business owner wants, is to ask them. Yep, as simple as that. This is why the Citizen Cosmos podcast and now the streams have been, and will be dedicated to getting down to the bottom of this question.
Our mission is to pick validator minds to understand their motivation, their mission, and their purpose. Not just their role in the building of the city, but of the whole universe. We want to know who we delegate our money to, and what those companies spend their money on. Are they motivated by greed? By success? By philosophy? Or maybe they are lunatics building a nuclear bomb in a shelter with the money they earn from delegations. Anything is possible.
The cherry
Currently, we judge to possess the biggest source of such info. We have 1-1 and team interviews, that go down to the bottom of these questions with a lot of the top validators and node operators from across the Cosmos and POS ecosystems. And we are on a mission to expand that catalogue further.
Who are you then?
Another great question. We are ecosystem developers. We believe in decentralization maximalism, but we hate chain maximalism. We believe that nothing should be banned, yet we hate censorship. We have been in crypto (almost) since its inception, however we are just starting out. We are a small team of enthusiasts, that believe in education, code, and lack of blackbox opinions. Most of all, we believe in freedom.
If you would like to support our mission in creating educational content and aligning the goals of different communities, please stake with us here)
Join our community, to build a future where communication is decentralized. May the code be with you!