Perspective on the EOS Alliance

This article represents my own opinions and experience of the first EOS Alliance board meeting. This is not an official Alliance announcement.

EOS is a very interesting experiment in governance, distributed authority, and consensus. All Blockchain projects have some sort of governance, and many also have distributed authority. In Bitcoin, choices on the direction of the software is made by mostly by mining coalitions — called pools — and Ethereum is led by Vitalik Buterin of the Ethereum Foundation.

In EOS, the authority is distributed to the token holders vote to elect Block Producers (and eventually on referenda to make governance decisions). Block Producers choose how to run the Eos software and therefore they choose the development path. There is a constitution on EOS which lays out rules for the ecosystem. There is also an arbitration forum (ECAF) designed to resolve disputes occurring between any parties using EOS to conduct business. Finally, there is the company Block.One that built the EOS.IO software.

What’s missing here is that there is no voice of the decentralized community — until now…. Now we have the EOS Alliance. The Alliance is an organization that by design has no authority and also has a main purpose of not accumulating any power itself. Staying as neutral as possible gives it the ability to facilitate conversations and provide a focal point for discussions about EOS.

I had the honor of attending the September 14–15 kickoff meeting for the EOS Alliance board as a member of the steering committee. It was held at a 509- year-old farmhouse in the mountains of Ibiza off of the coast of Spain. The island itself is believed to be a vortex of enlightened energy. It is also rumored to have once been a vacation spot for Ancient Egyptians and the island where Odysseus spent 10 years during the Odyssey.

Thomas Cox, formerly of Block.One is serving as the interim executive director and facilitator of the Alliance. His mission is to save the world from “bad bosses” and teach good leadership to organizations. Thomas facilitated the 2 days of the Alliance meeting where we could meet and discuss our visions for our lives as well as for EOS, and then that informed goals for the Board and for the organization.

Attendees included initial board members Brock Pierce, Galia Benartzi, Nix Nolledo, and Peter Li — and initial EOS Alliance staff Thomas Cox, Myra Wang, and Kevin Wilcox. The steering committee members present were Ian Grigg, Dan Levine, and myself, Ben Sigman.

We each given the opportunity to share with the group, with priority given to the board itself. I was amazed to see how much the vision differed from person to person — especially with the 4/7 initial Board members in attendance. The initial board members were recruited by Brock and they are all scheduled to be replaced through staggered elections over the next 11 months.

We started day 1 by gathering at a large wooden table in the yard of the farmhouse in the morning. Thomas Cox had chosen “The Carver Model” as the Alliance’s internal governance approach. It calls for, among other things, defining the organization’s purpose. He wrote with colored chalk on the outside side of the house: What were the goals of the Alliance and who would it serve?

Galia Benartzi, who left the US a few years ago to live in Israel — a land that both divides and unites the major religions of the world — spoke about the importance of inclusion. She spoke about the potential of blockchain to “create a more fair world. Distribution of access to what the world has to offer. More fair progress towards a more beautiful world. A fair space for access gifts — individual gifts and the gifts of the planet — as well as a place for collaboration and creation.”

Nix Nolledo, an entrepreneur from the Philippines — where 90% of the population doesn’t have daily internet access — spoke about his vision of making “EOS the platform that enables digital global inclusion — distributing more evenly the success and rewards of technology.”

Peter Li — a very intelligent and practical man from China — spoke about the need to think about the future as well as to be respectful and to honor and support Block.One, the organization that built the EOS software.

Brock Pierce spoke about the importance of being servant leaders and stewards for the greater community of EOS — token holders, developers, Block Producers, and the world…

At the end of the first day, a small group of us that included Galia, Nix, Ian, and Dan gathered to put pen to paper and define the goals of the EOS Alliance. After 2 hours, we came up with a few sentences:

“The EOS Alliance (EA) envisions an inclusive world with fair and safe access to the gifts of humanity for all of society. We are champions of an open and welcoming, informed community, supporting the adoption of EOS globally across cultural, linguistic, and economic boundaries and giving a voice to those currently disenfranchised or lacking access to modern infrastructure.

We believe that EOS can withstand resistance from the status quo and provide a self governing, alternative legal infrastructure for effectively balancing varying interests, small businesses, entrepreneurs and educational institutions through clear and open dialog.”

On the next morning, we opted for a more tribal meeting place to stay out of the rain — we huddled together in a large tent. Sitting there on pillows and air mattresses, we shared fruit and coffee during the loudest thunderstorm I have ever heard. We joked that while standard board meetings happen in a hotel conference room with little pens and pads and blue napkins and white tablecloths. It was clear that this board wants to be anything other than standard.

We got right to work — Thomas did an excellent job of moving the agenda forward. Decisions were made on many fronts. Galia was brilliant in her contributions, Brock was quick to motion for decisions and consensus was reached. Before lunch, we had accomplished more than we did the entire first day.

After lunch, the board agreed to make its first public declaration — it would not seek any funds from the controversial WPS system of EOS Funding for at least 18 months. At that time, the elected board could choose to do what they wanted.

An hour after lunch at the closing of the meeting, tasks were delegated and schedules made. For the Alliance to be truly useful to the community, it needed to be organized and it needed to prove itself through action. We took a few minutes for each participant to speak about their takeaways.

Brock shared that his experience of EOS is different from other Blockchain projects he has been involved in. “Something that is different about EOS compared to other projects is that most of the people in the community are here because of what this symbol stands for…” says Brock. “The chestahedron represents the earth, the heart. When you take the ‘H’ from the end of ‘Earth’ and move it to the front of the word you get ‘heart’… Who else can tell the most important piece of this story other than EOS?”

“The alliance has a unique space to move into to tell part of this story.” Said Galia in agreement.

Nix summer it up by saying “this is not a typical farm.” Although there were vegetables being grown, 2 baby pigs, some chickens, and a few Basque artists who lived there in exchange for taking care of the land… for these days, it served as a meeting place for laying the foundations for the EOS Alliance and — any of Brock’s events — there is an open door to join and participate if you know how to get there.

Several special guests joined the meeting throughout the two days, including Stephen Morris, Serry Osmena, David Denberg, Alex Lightman, and Timothy Lewis. The additional members presented a great opportunity to ground ourselves in the intention of the organization — to form allies and be inclusive to people who are directly involved with EOS as well as anyone who could be tangentially affected by it. My personal takeaway was that, while destinations and goals are important, life is about the journey and the people with who we are on that journey.

All in all, the EOS Alliance (nee Foundation) has a lot of challenges ahead to prove itself and its usefulness to the EOS community and the world. The next few months will be critical. I was impressed by the diversity of the board board leadership — geographically and ideologically. These were all very successful entrepreneurs who all had powerful visions for their individual legacies. Their intentions in leading the Alliance seemed to be clear and selfless, which is good because they will need the community to trust them and support them. The ultimate question is whether or not Block.One will choose to publicly support the organization in its mission.

Personally, I hope that Block.One considers getting involved and working with the community through the Alliance. The next 12 months are important for EOS as it matures and being able to have open conversations with the organization that gave birth to the EOS.IO software would be very good for EOS.

If you are interested in getting involved, there are active working groups formed for Constitution, WPS, and other topics. You can join the Alliance Open Discussion here to learn more . https://t.me/eos_alliance