I’m a huge fan of Neutron and a lot of the projects deployed on it, and I’m looking forward to this next stage of evolution for both Neutron and the Cosmos Hub. I think this will be a positive change for both.
As for the Cosmos Hub community pool’s NTRN being returned, I don’t feel that I’m qualified enough to have an opinion on whether this is fair, but I will say that if ATOM holders are against it, I think a great alternative could be to use Hydro to deploy it around the ecosystem (this could include both Neutron and other IBC-connected chains). This would allow ATOM holders to continue to govern it, but also put it to good use, improving NTRN’s liquidity across the Cosmos ecosystem and earning additional yield for ATOM holders. Neutron projects could still benefit from it this way too.
Hey Phil, appreciate your detailed thoughts. Let us analyze the problem and find the truth together.
1. Leaving ICS Replicated Security
Isn’t pursuing a fully sovereign economic model exactly what this proposal does?
2. Discussing Future Political Alignments
Please consider the following statements:
Neutron entered into an agreement with the Cosmos Hub specifically in the context of Replicated Security, as shown in Proposal #792
Failing to resume produce blocks for 12 hours or more after the correct instructions and patch has been distributed is a meaningful failure from a validator set.
The Cosmos Hub is making the sovereign decision to deprecate Replicated Security in favor of a different security offering called PSS.
The Cosmos Hub is making the sovereign decision to enable permissionless smart-contracts and build a local DeFi ecosystem on the Hub rather than on Neutron.
Are any of these statements false?
3. Transferring 40,567,950 NTRN from the Cosmos Hub to a Joint Committee
I believe the situations are different. Factually speaking, Neutron fully delivered on its commitments as part of Proposal 72. That being said I think it could make sense for the funds to be returned. The Foundation never sold the ATOM it received from Prop 72.
Respectfully, we’ve had a number of problems with Replicated Security, and this was the service that was paid for with the NTRN airdrop (in addition to a clearly stated expectation that Neutron would the smart contract layer in the Hub). While it might make sense to consider PSS, I don’t think it makes sense to lump that in at the current moment. Many of the issues that existed with PSS came from a lack of alignment between validators and stakers and Neutron (i.e., validators and stakers did not stake NTRN so they had a smaller financial interest). PSS in it’s current form doesn’t address this. Given the experience to this point, I think it’s optimal to go fully sovereign and revisit another security relationship at some point down the line after PSS has been proven out.
I don’t agree that Neutron is solely the party “choosing to dissolve the agreement”. The ICL has stated on numerous occasions their intention to launch permissionless CosmWasm on the Cosmos Hub as well as to deprecate Replicated Security.
Put yourself in our shoes. How does that level of uncertainty look to NTRN investors and users? I think it looks very poorly. Of course there is a role that Neutron is playing in the decision to go sovereign, but it wouldn’t be an accurate representation to say this decision is solely Neutron’s.
There is an outcome here which can be exciting to both Neutron and the Cosmos Hub. In my opinion, the only option that fulfills this is a termination of the existing security agreement and outstanding payments. A move that lets both Neutron and the Cosmos Hub move forward on their vision without the baggage of previously failed experiments.
With respect to the 50k ATOM, I agree and would personally support Neutron returning 50k ATOM back to the community pool (I think it makes sense to hold both ecosystems to the same standard). Can’t speak for @Spaydh here though.
Agree with this. I would support returning 50k ATOM back to the Cosmos Hub treasury. Would this change your outlook @Govmos ? This seems like a reasonable compromise to me.
(disclaimer : i’m speaking for my own opinions, not for anyone elses)
I think that’s fair. If it allowed both communities to move forward, I would support it.
For what it’s worth, the Neutron Foundation never sold a single ATOM.
My personal opinion is that they should be allowed to leave ICS / PSS / RSS and take their tokens with them (assuming the ATOM is returned to the Cosmos Hub as well).
My reasons:
The reputational cost of refusing to let a customer stop using our product here is much higher than any cost to the community treasury of returning NTRN. People already associate Cosmos with drama. We have a chance here to show the world that we can make big changes, kill failed experiments, and launch new products with the speed and focus of a startup. This is a big opportunity to change the narrative and kill drama.
The reality is the product failed Neutron. The team has spent hundreds of hours and lost weeks battling to get centralized exchange validators to upgrade. We’ve learned valuable lessons from their experiences and feedback that we’re going to incorporate going forward
The team is committed to continuing to work with the Hub (e.g. through using Eureka assets and other services from the Hub as they scale their ecosystem and we build out our product offering for app chains). This will drive value back to ATOM and create a win-win scenario out of what is currently a lose lose scenario
In the long term, the Cosmos Hub is going to become a massive aggregator and distribution platform for services and resources to app chains and protocols everywhere over IBC. Neutron has a chance to be a big customer for us in the future (it’s already one of the most mature IBC-connected ecosystems), so we should do right by them now so we can sell to them in the future. Plus, when other teams ask whether they should work with us or not, one of the first teams they will ask is Neutron because of our deeply coupled history. We want the answer to be unambiguously yes and we should do right by them here to make sure that’s the case.
TLDR: There is a bright future ahead of the Cosmos Hub. Let’s close this chapter and move on to that future with Neutron as a customer of the next generation of our products instead of leaving them with a bitter taste.
I would love for a merger to be considered as an option on the table. I know this is quite complex and challenging, but i could see how this could be a winning force rather than two cosmwasm ecosystems competing.
I know collaborating is part of the proposal, but i still imagine some level of fracturing. Maybe there are different visions at play, but i think united with deep resources could be a much better way to go.
Thanks to the Neutron team for all the work that went into being a consumer chain and one of the first to adopt it. I know it was not always the smoothest experience, and the Hub learned a lot about what worked and didn’t work from their experience of being the pioneers in adopting ICS.
Personally, I can understand returning NTRN to Neutron and ATOM to the Cosmos Hub makes for a clean divorce. However, I feel cross-holding the tokens is what makes the protocols aligned much more closely than the ICS provider-consumer relationship ever did. The Neutron tokens in the community pool are obviously a very large amount that vastly exceeds the ATOM received by Neutron from the Cosmos Hub, but I would still like to see alignment between the Cosmos Hub and Neutron by each holding the others tokens - that said, I think it’s cleanest to end the existing relationship, and let a new relationship emerge. The Hub should invest in its future relationships by being kind and a good partner to work with, and that should in this case be by respecting Neutrons wishes.
I hope that Neutron will still find value in acquiring and holding ATOM, and similarly for the Hub holding Neutron tokens, given that the relationship is so close, and to grow the pie together still. One example I think could be particularly exciting would be liquidity deals between the Cosmos Hub and Neutron - with the Cosmos Hub already deploying ATOM in the ecosystem through Hydro, adding NTRN to the mix could allow deploying paired ATOM<>NTRN liquidity and keep the projects cooperatively aligned, especially if there is still a desire for both parties to hold the others tokens, too. I don’t think the Cosmos Hub should force this decision on Neutron, and if that’s a route to go, it should be with the buy-in from both parties.
I share many of the concerns voiced by community members here but I’m leaning towards a Yes as long as the ATOM are returned to the Hub.
The optics of holding the $NTRN tokens hostage would be terrible and would kill any hope of PSS finding pmf in the future.
The strategic thing to do imo, despite the financial downside for the Hub’s CP, is to return the tokens, make sure the upgrade is smooth and leverage this situation to learn from our mistakes and show that the Hub is a reliable partner to have.
I would, however, recommend that the Neutron team reconsider the budget allocated to fund migration:
The amount should be split equally amongst eligible validators and not pro-rata based on VP. This aligns with the Validator Incentivization distribution model proposed in #867.
The budget allocated could be improved ( a vesting schedule could be introduced with the revised budget).
It’s putting the armored door of Tendermint on a cardboard box.
We shouldn’t be promoting its use (I understand some are stuck w it for now)—especially when you account for naive validator behavior assumptions and critical issues like:
The validators chosen to validate the chain are validators from the cosmos hub, once again PSS is a sovereign security model, you choose your validators with PSS in the same way that neutron chose its validators for its sovereign chain, the only difference is that you will slash Atom and therefore reputation on the validators set of the Hub instead of slashing illiquid and centralized tokens. PSS is a way to obtain sovereignty, having a token that you use as a slashing collateral does not mean being more sovereign. We really need to redefine this notion of sovereignty because it is too often used for vampiric purposes.
Additionally PSS can also be seen as a technology to scale the hub, I would not be surprised if the current ICL strategy is to fill the hub blocks using EVM contracts and that later, because the cosmos hub blocks are filled PSS is used again to scale with specialized EVM, SVM and of course cosmwasm chains.
But I completely agree that letting them go is the best thing to do , while still letting them get their NTRNs back. Neutron has always been sovereign and that’s why he should be able to leave today. (It is important to mention that with the PSS opt-in model, Neutron would not even have needed to ask the governance to leave, further demonstrating the sovereign nature of these chains.)
I hear you, but characterizing PSS as a sovereignty preserving option (bc you choose the subset) is overstating the case, especially given the economic and validator dependencies it introduces.
I think it’s more of an interdependence model that trades execution autonomy for shared economic security, and that tradeoff deserves a more sober, risk-aware conversation.
Neutron is a ghost chain and replicated security for it certainly was an overkill that cost Cosmos Hub validators a lot of money. Failed experiment, time to move on.
Good luck Neutron with the radical change. I missed the interesting discussion, I know there is nothing we can do about the proposal right now but it would still be appreciated if you can answer a few questions
What characteristics do these validators have that others missed?
Were there any applications?
Is there any transparency report for the process?
those are internal, closer to the team validators =)
you have vals, NOT on this list providing tools, infra and media for neutron in much larger amounts than half the list above, but no one cares. Let alone geographical and DC centralization