Manifesto Cardano Brasil

HUGE thank you to all of you for showing up and contributing to this Roundtable Talk on the Concentration of Voting Power. @JBriggsLondon, @NicolasC3rny, @Encrypt2, @phillip_pon, Nikhil Joshi, @JaromirTesar, @Lo_Ponch, @Cerkoryn, @yutazzz - genuinely appreciated the openness across the board. Not just in sharing perspectives on where Cardano governance stands today and the challenges you’re seeing, but also in putting forward actual, thoughtful ways to move things forward. That’s what matters. Special mention to @phillip_pon for calling out, in a very real way, the challenges that come with engaging publicly while still trying to stay constructive. That balance isn’t always easy, and it didn’t go unnoticed. Appreciate every single one of you for leaning into the discussion the way you did. The hope is that this doesn’t end here, but continues, because ultimately this is something we’ll only solve together, as an ecosystem. Also a big thank you to everyone who tuned in live and continues to engage in these public conversations. That ongoing dialogue is exactly what pushes things forward. Catch the recording below 👇

🚨Under Cardano’s 2025 annual treasury budget of 350M ADA, well under 1% has effectively reached grassroots & community-led initiatives. 👉That is the scale of the imbalance. If 1% or percentages feel abstract, remember The Lord of the Rings and the Battle of Helm’s Deep. ⚔️What does the Battle of Helm’s Deep in The Lord of the Rings have to do with #Cardano treasury and governance⁉️ I use this comparison to symbolize disparity and the tension between morale/volunteerism and structural reality/incentives. In a pivotal moment of the film, one that would define an entire era of Middle-earth (much like Voltaire in Cardano), Aragorn and Legolas debate. Aragorn looks at the defenders of Rohan and sees farmers, stable boys, men too old or too young to battle. Legolas states the odds of victory in disbelief: 300 men against 10,000 orc soldiers. Roughly 3%. His conclusion wasn’t despair. It was realism. The imbalance was structural. Aragorn rallies to fight anyway. That wasn’t denial. It was leadership. In that moment, morale was necessary. Without morale, the walls would fall faster. Both were right. Realism names the imbalance. Morale keeps people standing. But morale alone does not change arithmetic. However, Helm’s Deep fortress does not hold because hope increases. It holds because the equation changes. It was reinforcements that turned a last stand into a victory. The lesson isn’t about pessimism or blind optimism. It's about holding both truths at once: Realism to accept the imbalance and morale to endure it, while recognizing that morale has limits if the structure doesn't change. The Cardano community has morale. That morale often expresses itself as volunteerism, builders willing to contribute, open-source, mentor, and persist even without guarantees. ⚠️But volunteerism alone cannot sustain an ecosystem indefinitely. Volunteerism can hold the wall for a while. It cannot fund the ecosystem forever. Coordination, allocation safeguards, and structural support are the reinforcements. Without them, the base layer doesn’t collapse dramatically. It thins out. Legolas wasn’t wrong. Aragorn wasn’t wrong. But without reinforcements, Helm’s Deep would have been lost. Governance is no different: without reflection and more resilient design, centralization becomes a systemic risk. It narrows development dispersion, concentrates decision power, and gradually suffocates the community layer that keeps the ecosystem alive. 🔎Back to Reality: A Cardano Ecosystem Funding Diagnosis under the lens of grassroots initiatives Now back to the numbers. In 2025, under a 350M ADA treasury ceiling, less than 1% has effectively flowed to community-led initiatives, almost all of these funds via Catalyst. That gap isn’t symbolic. It’s structural. The official Catalyst website projectcatalyst.io shows Fund 14 with 18,591,246 ADA in total to be allocated to funded projects, but only 3,254,948 ADA were distributed as of Feb/2026. Even taking the full distributed figure, that represents roughly 0.93% of a 350M-scale ceiling. Cardano needs forward momentum. But “just a higher NCL = growth” does not align with what 2025 execution shows in practice. Catalyst is the primary practical funding lane for community-sized initiatives. Execution speed and composition therefore matter. Fund 14’s category budgets included: 🔸 Open Developers: 3M 🔸 Open Ecosystem: 3M 🔸 Use Cases Concepts: 4M 🔸 Use Cases: Partners & Products: 8.5M The “Partners & Products” track is explicitly framed around enterprise collaborations and large-scale applications — not small independent teams. Numerically, roughly 45% of Fund 14’s available budget is structurally oriented toward enterprise-scale work (8.5M out of 18.59M). The community-facing side of the fund is therefore closer to ~10M ADA in budget capacity — not the full headline. Execution is the second constraint. Overall distribution stands at roughly 17.5% so far (3.254M out of 18.591M). Without a clear public dashboard breaking down distribution by category, the exact flow to grassroots initiatives cannot be stated precisely. But even under proportional assumptions, the effective flow into community-oriented tracks remains in the low single-digit millions — preserving the “well under 1% of treasury-scale capacity” reality. Zooming out: the 2025 NCL was set at 350M ADA (Epoch 532–604). In 2026, with ADA weaker and many budgets quoted in USD, a similar nominal ceiling buys less real capacity while incentives tilt further toward concentration into a few large mandates. The structural outcome is predictable: 👉 The base community layer gets squeezed. 👉 Open-source maintainers lose runway. 👉 Small teams pivot or exit. If growth is the goal, discussing only the ceiling is not sufficient. 🔹Minimum safeguards must be explicit: 🔹Transparent category-level distribution reporting 🔹 Execution gates and stop-conditions for large mandates 🔹 Coordination rules across funded work 🔹 Denomination discipline for USD-based budgets 🔹 A protected community floor with guaranteed cadence Otherwise, 2026 repeats 2025. I expanded on several of these budget and NCL considerations in my recent Governance Action vote thread. Link below for context.👇 🔗xitter.cf/AgoraCardano/status/20… #Cardano #dRep #blockchain

We would like to share an update regarding Project Catalyst. Following our joint review, @IOGroup, which operates Catalyst today, and the @Cardano_CF have agreed to work expediently towards the Cardano Foundation assuming stewardship of Project Catalyst. This transition is now underway and members of our Catalyst team will join the Cardano Foundation to ensure funding continuity for all existing grantees. The programme continues to administer funding to more than 500 active projects, with over 2200 projects funded to date. As part of this process, in consultation with the Cardano Foundation we have also agreed that running Fund15 and Fund16 in their proposed form is not feasible at this time of transition. The near-term focus will be on maintaining continuity for all grantees through Fund14, ensuring that funds continue to be administered in line with agreed milestones. Meanwhile, the Catalyst team, the Cardano Foundation and @IntersectMBO will continue to work together to develop a clear path forward for the future of community funding. At the heart of these plans is our community whose input will be invaluable to this process. Work also continues steadily towards other funding opportunities and maximising synergies for the @Cardano ecosystem. We would like to thank all those projects that submitted their applications for funding to Fund15 and deeply regret that we cannot see these projects through at this time. While we recalibrate, we believe it is appropriate that all ada previously earmarked for grant funding in Fund15 and Fund16 be returned to the treasury in alignment with Intersect. We’d like to thank the community for their patience while we finalize the process. Further updates on the status of this and future rounds will be shared once the transition is complete.

🚨#ProjectCatalyst Fund 15 voting will start SOON! 🔥My proposals to foster critical thinking, decentralization & accountability for better decision-making If you’d like to know more, keep reading 👇 🧠 Proof of work / credibility This work builds on years of hands-on participation in Project Catalyst since Fund 2, including roles that directly touch decision quality and accountability (proposer work, veteran community reviewing, moderation, milestone review processes, and mentorship). Governance-related work has also been produced and shared publicly in structured formats. 🗳️ My Proposals in Fund 15 1⃣ Agora Research Bureau – Voltaire 🔗catalystexplorer.com/en/prop… 📌Deep dive reviews of Governance Actions & off-chain voting, this Bureau delivers structured, public & bilingual (PT/EN) reports. By standardizing how governance is analyzed and communicated, it raises transparency, strengthens accountability, and helps Cardano governance grow on solid foundations. 📊 Community Reviewers Score – 4.0/5.0 2⃣ Project Catalyst dRep Analysis Framework 🔗catalystexplorer.com/en/prop… 📌A practical framework for dReps to filter, analyze & share rationales with clarity and consistency. It systematizes pilot lessons, decentralizes influence away from whales, and reduces voter fatigue. Empowering delegators and dReps alike with transparent, replicable, and accessible methodology. 📊 Community Reviewers Score – 4.1/5.0 ⭐ My proposals were endorsed by Nicolas Cerny, Governance Lead at the Cardano Foundation, under his “Governance Lens” review in Fund 14 — and they remain essentially the same in scope. More details below 👇 🔗 forum.cardano.org/t/fund-14-… That endorsement was part of the Catalyst Representatives Pilot Program initiated by Cardano Foundation / Cardano. Within the same initiative, I also curated and endorsed 22 Fund 14 proposals on Distributed Decision Making — a pro bono proof-of-concept aligned with the Project Catalyst dRep Analysis Framework proposal scope. 📌 Full list & methodology: 🔗 forum.cardano.org/t/distribu… Both proposals were designed to address critical gaps in the Cardano ecosystem that remain underexplored and unresolved, such as: 🔴Tackle the scarcity of structured review frameworks by publishing clear, reproducible methodologies for Governance Actions and Catalyst proposals. 🔴 Mitigate hype-driven voting asymmetry by surfacing high-quality proposals that lack reach, using merit-based curation and standardized comparisons. 🔴 Mitigate language-access barriers by publishing consistent multilingual governance content that enables broader participation beyond English-speaking circles. Together, these initiatives strengthen transparency, accountability, decentralization, and education, ensuring that Cardano’s governance grows on a stronger, more inclusive foundation. Which proposal resonates with you the most? 💬 Your FEEDBACK & VOTE matters. Let’s build stronger governance together! Drop your thoughts below 👇

Grassroots projects are quietly dying under outdated #ProjectCatalyst rules that no longer fit innovation & independent builders who keep #Cardano alive Decision-making in Catalyst remains top-down, community has ideas, but no voice in the final call 🧩Let’s talk about why👇 Over my five years in Project Catalyst, I’ve seen too many talented contributors walk away, not because they lacked good ideas or a strong track record of contributions to the ecosystem, but because they felt unheard. Rules meant to promote fairness ended up discouraging those building from the ground up. We’re losing passionate builders who spend countless volunteer hours shaping proposals, joining Town Halls, reviewing, and voting — yet the system punishes them with rules that no longer make sense. Charles Hoskinson once emphasized that Cardano should avoid becoming a “cult of personalities,” ensuring governance remains decentralized and community-driven. Yet Catalyst’s current structure unintentionally rewards visibility over merit and diversity. Successful funded proposers absolutely deserve their recognition — but when marketing and outreach become the primary drivers of funding success, talented grassroots teams without massive outreach, wide networks and whales support are left behind. Fund14 made this painfully clear: dozens of ecosystem proposals with strong engagement were rejected because of one outdated threshold. Project Catalyst has been promoted for years — both officially and informally — as the world’s largest decentralized innovation fund. Yet that claim rings hollow when its core rules and parameters continue to be decided in a centralized manner. That’s not decentralization — that’s how innovation quietly dies in plain sight.💥 ✋🏻Now bear with me — I’ll break down the data behind this. The insights I found explain why these rules no longer fit Catalyst’s current scale, and why you should care if we want an ecosystem that stays open, fair, and alive for independent builders. 👇🏻 🧮 When Parameters Become Politics: The 1% Threshold Paradox in Project Catalyst ⚙️ 1️⃣ Why Parameters Matter in Blockchain Governance In blockchain systems, parameters aren’t just numbers — they’re politics written in code. Every rule, from block size to staking limits, defines how power flows. In Catalyst, one such rule — the 1% approval threshold — has silently decided which ideas live or die since Fund 6, without revision. ⚖️ 2️⃣ The Fixed Threshold Paradox The 1% threshold was introduced in Fund 6 by IOG Research and the Catalyst team, alongside a new voting and rewards model. It made sense at the time — a safeguard against proposals passing with too few votes. But as Catalyst scaled, that same rule became a bottleneck, mathematically misaligned with the system’s growth. Despite extensive review of Catalyst and IOG research outputs, no public documentation explains why 1% was chosen or how it was calibrated. A parameter that defines funding outcomes should have a transparent, traceable rationale — one open to community review. 🧭 3️⃣ A Rule That Made Sense — Until It Didn’t In Fund 6, Catalyst had - 🔹 650 proposals 🔹 22K wallets 🔹 ₳3.58B stake 🔹 292K votes cast. By Fund 14: 🔹 1,280 proposals 🔹 56K wallets 🔹 ₳4.45B stake 🔹 But only 174K votes cast. 🔹Wallets grew +155% & registered voting stake +25% ❗️Yet votes cast fell 40% Catalyst kept a static rule in a dynamic system — the 1% threshold — and it stopped scaling with reality. What began as legitimacy became exclusion. 📉 4️⃣ Statistical Evidence of Voter Fatigue Correlation analysis between proposal volume and approval rate across Funds 6–13 shows a strong negative trend: more proposals → fewer approvals. As categories grew, voter attention and approvals collapsed. What once filtered for merit now filters for visibility. ⚠️ 5️⃣ How the Fixed Threshold Warps Governance The 1% rule, once a quality filter, now distorts outcomes: Legitimate proposals fail despite engagement. Teams feel demotivated; results seem arbitrary. Participation declines as voters feel their impact fading. The shift to Quadratic Voting (QV) deepened the problem: voting power was compressed, yet the same threshold applied. A system demanding more precision from fewer signals. Fairness eroded, not improved. 🏛️ 6️⃣ Parameters and Centralized Adjustments Over time, Catalyst parameters have been altered internally — allocations, rewards, milestones, categories — often without community deliberation. Even the most decentralized innovation fund in the world can behave like a centralized system when parameter governance isn’t open. 🧮 7️⃣ The IOG–Photrek Alternative Voting Research Between 2024–2025, IOG Research and Photrek explored Quadratic and γ-Power Voting. They proved mathematically that f(x)=x^γ (0<γ<1) redistributes influence from large to small holders, built privacy-preserving protocols, and simulated fairer outcomes. But gaps remained — no identity layer, no modeling of fatigue, and unclear communication that left the community confused about which method would be used in Fund 14. 🧩 8️⃣ Why Fund 14 Failed When Catalyst delayed Fund 14 results mentioning “an outcome that just doesn’t make any sense for Cardano ecosystem” data already explained why. Low engagement, too many proposals, static threshold, and no identity layer — the perfect storm. The cubic formula compressed power, the threshold demanded absolutes — the two canceled each other out. A dynamic formula stacked on a static rule. 🧠 9️⃣ The Deeper Structural Issue Quadratic systems without identity are Sybil-prone. Meanwhile, the threshold from Fund 6 remained unchanged, ignoring the huge increase in proposals and stagnant engagement over the last Funds. 🧭 1️⃣0️⃣ A Potential Fix 🔹 Dynamic thresholds Let approval scale with system activity: Threshold = f(proposals, voters, votes cast) 🔹 Decentralized identity “One human, one voter” — using privacy-preserving DIDs to ensure fairness. 🔹 Delegated (dRep) voting Delegation amplifies participation without centralization, restoring density and fairness. 💡 1️⃣1️⃣ Lessons from the Failure Fund 14’s issue wasn’t a bug — it was parameter misalignment. A new voting curve was applied to an old social structure. Adaptive thresholds, identity, and transparent parameter governance should be the next steps. 🌐 1️⃣2️⃣ Toward Voltaire: Parameters as Public Policy Now in the Voltaire era, Catalyst parameters are public policy instruments, not technical constants. Changes to voting models, rewards, or thresholds must come with open documentation, discussion, and ideally, community ratification — on-chain or off-chain. 🙏 Acknowledgments & Author’s Note This analysis was made by @Agora_Cardano, using publicly available data, performed voluntarily and independently to foster discussion — not blame. The goal is fairness, transparency, and decentralization that scales with community growth. Catalyst, IOG Research, and the teams behind new voting models deserve recognition for pioneering this governance experiment. 🧭 Full version with data, methods & sources: 🔗 github.com/Agora-Cardano/ago…