This is a pretty accurate and sober portrayal of the state of things, and I mostly agree with it. But my unpopular opinion is that it wasn't always doomed to end this way. Past experiments failing does not prove the model is inherently flawed. Still, we do need to learn from those failures. So what went wrong? Governance tokens were sold as tokenized control over business machines: value accrual through buybacks from revenue, treasuries managed by tokenholders, etc. But the actual business logic was always elsewhere - inside Foundations, Labs, and affiliated entities. Part of that was forced by the Gensler-era regulatory environment. Part of it was imo a deliberate design choice: a way to cash twice on the same investment. Obviously this varies by project; details matter. In the beginning, this mostly worked because the token machine was supposed to be the main business line. Then reality kicked in: 1. the token machine was not as good a business as expected; 2. there was at least a credible path to a viable business elsewhere; 3. there was less regulatory need to keep the business at arm's length from the token. So the businesses pivoted away from the token machine, officially or unofficially. Some now say: "the token was never meant to give anyone a claim on the treasury" (ENS). Others still keep the promise formally while doing effectively the same thing (L2s). And while I've been critical of the ENS Labs pivot, I think it is at least honest-ish. The others still promise token value through token governance, while effectively going through the same process of winding governance down one way or another. The reality is that the fair value of many of these governance tokens is close to zero, even if the teams and projects behind them are solid. Tokenholder rights do not exist, and tokenholders have no negotiating power today to protect their interests. They failed to secure those rights in the past, and they never put in the work to build structures that could fight for those interests in the future. Takeaway? In the next wave, tokens need a much stronger tie to the businesses they helped fund - through smart contract tokenholder rights (like ragequit) where the business operates on-chain, and through actual legal agreements where it operates "on-legal."

ArbitrumDAO is having an election for the OAT Council, and I think it deserves more attention than it has received so far. So I want to share a few personal thoughts on the matter. A disclaimer: these are my personal views only. We have not yet discussed in the governance team how we will vote. Why is this election important? For two reasons. 1. this committee is, in practice, overseeing and driving not only OpCo, but also many cross-ecosystem initiatives, and 2. it is the last avenue in ArbitrumDAO where tokenholders, via delegates, can directly express their views on how they want the DAO to evolve. As a long-time ArbitrumDAO community member, I want to use this opportunity to share my own view. The tl;dr is that while I believe the overall direction is correct and promising, I am disappointed with the execution style and performance, and I am concerned about the state of the DAO today. At the same time, I am still hopeful. I believe the future can be bright, but some things need to change. First, I want to say that I have huge respect for last year’s committee members. I believe they are highly competent individuals, and I stand by our election votes from last year. But this year, I would not vote for the same people. Not because I don’t believe they are individually suited for the role. But last year proved, in my opinion, that collectively, the OAT did not work as (at least I) expected. Instead of becoming more than the sum of its individual parts, it became something like the safest common denominator. The result was that the OAT and the broader DAO significantly disappointed and underperformed. I will repeat, though, that I still believe in the overall vision formulated at the beginning of last year, when OpCo and the OAT were formed. I personally supported it, and I still believe it is the right path. But I also have to honestly admit that many of the risks and dangers raised by critics back then materialized, while many of the benefits and advantages I was looking for did not. One of the features of having an OAT is that when results are disappointing, there is someone to point to and a clear place to call for change. I’m not necessarily saying that the current developments are bad, although I do have concerns here and there. I am much more concerned about the things that are not happening, and about the pace of development. Anyone who reads the proposals and related forum commentary from last year will see that the DAO, OpCo, and the OAT are nowhere near where they were supposed to be. By my personal expectations, maybe 20% was delivered, and most opportunities were missed. Some things have not been delivered at all. Many pivots may have been justified, but they were never approved by, or even consulted with, the DAO. The DAO itself became stale and almost completely inactive, to some extent by design and on purpose. Not to mention that the token price is far from tokenholders’ expectations. The overall market can be used as an excuse, but I would say that it is just that: an excuse. I don’t see the DAO doing anything meaningful to counter that trend. On the contrary, I see an entity vs. tokenholder conflict, similar to what we have seen in Uniswap, Aave, and ENS, looming on the horizon. The OAT/AAE vision promised better governance. So far, it has delivered governance in a coma. ArbitrumDAO used to be known for a great community and a welcoming DeFi ecosystem. A place to experiment, push boundaries, and bend reality. ArbitrumDAO used to experiment with ways to support builders. ArbitrumDAO created an RWA investment program (STEP) which attracted major financial institutions and supports Arbitrum’s budget today. ArbitrumDAO created a real investment fund. ArbitrumDAO funded incentive programs that attracted 100+ DeFi projects. Last but not least, ArbitrumDAO created OpCo, the OAT, and the rest of the foundations for what we have today. Of course, not everything the DAO did in the past was great. The changes we introduced were introduced for a reason. But I feel the pendulum swung way too far in the other direction. I probably don’t have a complete enough overview, but my impression is that over the past year, ArbitrumDAO has not produced anything materially significant. There is barely any meaningful discussion happening either. And it’s not as if the current state of affairs is clearly better than what we had before. I like some of the new things, but I miss too many of the things that are now gone. Most importantly, we no longer have any real DAO oversight or control. There are no meaningful feedback loops, just back-scratching and institutional inertia. ArbitrumDAO used to be Pied Piper. Now it feels like Dunder Mifflin Paper Company, the one just before the merger with Sabre. So what would I like to change? Def not everything. The overall direction set by the previous OAT should be maintained, but executed better. I want to go back to the original spirit of governance advancement. Creating meaningful governance, not waiting for it to magically appear out of nowhere, and definitely not restraining it (inb4 later complain that governance is not working and should be removed). More communication, more openness to new ideas, less reliance on single vision-drivers. I want Arbitrum to strive to become a business greater than its creators, not the other way around. Working constructively with other entities, but as equals, not subordinates. But most importantly, I want DAO delegates to discuss this, state their views, and actively engage. Top delegates will choose the committee that will drive ArbitrumDAO’s future. I hope each of them does their research, formulates their expectations, and votes with confidence that they are choosing the people most aligned with those expectations. Not just going with the default to get it off their plate. I’m pretty sure Arbitrum will be okay no matter how the election settles, but DAO delegates should strive for it to be great, not just okay. Finally, I want to address the inevitable comments that I am criticizing and calling for change only because I have been sidelined and am not as actively involved as I used to be. These are fair arguments. And I won’t lie, I do miss, a bit, the times when I spent whole days on DAO-related calls. But I am genuinely fine doing what I am doing now. I have more ideas in my head than I will ever be able to tackle, and I am perfectly fine with others pushing the cart today. I just want the cart to go in the right direction. ArbitrumDAO’s fate is important for the future of DAOs, and Arbitrum’s fate is important for the future of crypto. I want both of those futures to be bright. P.S.: Of course, the fact that I'm writing this here on X instead of the forum is a statement in itself, IYKYK.