Arbitrum DAO members propose $120 million recall in gaming fund for missing deadline

adminOctober 13, 2024

Governance DAO Proposal passed in June on the Ethereum Layer 2 network decision ARB

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The project, which was meant to “catalyze the growth of the gaming ecosystem” on the network, recently faced scrutiny due to an apparent lack of communication and missed deadlines on several occasions, leading one DAO member to suggest that the funds be withdrawn.

The Block previously reported that Arbitrum’s Game Catalyst Program (GCP) was passed in June of this year after being unveiled in March and aims to “immediately expand awareness and adoption of Arbitrum/Orbit/Stylus by builders and players in the gaming community.” We previously reported that this was our goal. The proposal allocated 225 million ARB tokens to the initiative over three years, which at the time had a total token value of $215 million, but due to ARB’s price decline its value has now fallen to approximately $122 million. .

The GCP proposal, which passed with 76% of the votes, sets out several goals for the first four months of the program, covering the period between June 10 and October 10, 2019, using passage of the proposal as a starting date. this year. Tasks assigned during this period include electing or confirming interim council members to permanent positions, issuing the first Request for Proposals (RFPs) for infrastructure development, initiating grant applications, and establishing communication channels.

However, as noted by Arbitrum DAO member and DeFi founder Joseph Schiarizzi, who goes by the handle @CupOJoseph, GCP appears to have missed several of the deadlines laid out in the original proposal. GCP does not appear to have created a website, issued an RFP or considered grants, and it is unclear whether any permanent council members have been elected. GCP has provided some updates via Arbitrum’s DAO forum thread, but the flow of publicly posted updates appears to be falling short of its proposal to require updates every two weeks.

With the deadline missed, Schiarizzi proposed withdrawing the majority of GCP’s funds – 220 million ARB tokens, worth about $118.6 million at current prices – from GCP’s multisig wallets to the Arbitrum DAO’s treasury. “It is unconscionable to continue to allow 3/5 multi-signatures to hold $120 million at ARB when they have failed to meet their agreed-upon oversight obligations,” Schiarizzi says in his proposal.

When reached for an interview, Schiarizzi said he didn’t expect his proposal to pass, but that it had already had the intended effect of raising awareness of the deadline GCP had missed. “The ideal solution is not even for us to recover all the funds. The ideal solution is for the DAO to ensure transparency and ensure that the obligations set at the start of GCP are met.”

In a response post to Goldfeder wrote of

Schiarizzi also noted that the quarterly transparency reports promised in GCP’s original proposal have not materialized, although the proposal does state that the first report could take four to six months after passage of the proposal.

“There are no transparency reports because the program is being set up. The foundation still holds all the funding for the DAO. Obviously, there are no data transparency reports on GCP performance. They are not done yet,” wrote AJ Warner. The Director of Partnerships and Strategy at Offchain Labs said in his response post to X:

Schiarizzi said that in his edit of the proposal, GCP committee members said that instead of counting the proposal’s passage as a start date, they would “…come to the DAO in the future to formalize the start date.” program.”

“I am looking forward to it and will not pursue (the proposed defunding) if we can get back to normal quickly and post these updates publicly. Without public updates posted in the update thread, there is no official source of information. I will continue to explain how close I am to achieving my four month goal.” Schiarizzi’s post continues:

Schiarizzi reiterated that despite his view of GCP’s failures so far, his intention is not to cancel the program, but to get it back on track.

“I didn’t originally write this post because I wanted GCP to fail or end. I wanted it to succeed,” Schiarizzi said. “When we started looking at updates, it was clear that we needed a moment of greater clarity and greater commitment to the original things everyone voted on.”

Offchain Labs, along with Goldfeder and Warner, could not immediately be reached for comment from The Block.

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adminOctober 13, 2024