Foundation FAQ (Core Dev Perspective)

Foundation Elections
#70

I am very aware that I have been absent for the last six months due to health issues. Hopefully, some recognise me from old / the beginning.

Reading @Jaguar0625 initial post and the follow-ups from @BloodyRookie and @gimre fills me with sadness. These three talented individuals have done more for NEM than anyone else, they have committed significant energy to creating what NEM is today. They have poured hours and hours of their time into coding what NEM v1.0 is and what NEM v2.0 (Catapult) has the potential to become. Without the three of them NEM is vapourware.

UtopianFuture led us from the beginning with a vision, regardless of his faults (of which their were many) he gave us two things. A very talented bunch of core DEVs and a level of integrity in that when he was found out he left to save NEM. Lon and Jeff took the helm and lead us through some dark times and made NEM one of the most successful coins of 2017. But who remains, working day in and day out? The core DEVs.

The purpose of the Foundation and therefore the President and each Council member “…is to be the trustee of and make decisions for the public chain and spread its adoption…” They must help, advise and support the Devs and from reading @Jaguar0625 this is not happening. We, the community, voted for this originally and set aside significant funding. We, the community, must ensure the Foundation honour the charter, support and advise the Devs

Old Cole

15 Likes
#71

Someone who has technical leadership experience or product leadership experience?

Nelson has acted mostly as blockchain community support alongside his role as regional head, not the same thing, and my understanding is because there was never quorum agreement with the other foundation members to get anything done.

I think there needs to be clarification on what the council members can actually do and what budgets they can assign and recruit under, otherwise this entire thing is DOA

1 Like
#72

@Jaguar0625 - Directly from Stephen Chia:

Allow me to explain…

One year after NEM Foundation was formed, in 2017 (even before I got on board) the founding President Lon and his council agreed to create a Centre of Excellence (CoE) in Europe. The idea was that CoE EU would have most of the R&D, toolsets and tech development, including Catapult. That responsibility was given to CoE, which was then headed by Albert from Spain and under the custody of European region. With the exception of Lon, Jeff, Kristof, Albert, Takao (of TB) and Clayton (he left Council in end 2017) who are more technically inclined, the rest of the Council roles were to grow the NEM eco system in all the regions.

But in 2018, Albert left the CoE and EU team, and subsequently Kristof (also being the EU Regional Head) took over the task of leading and guiding the CoE. It was assumed then (and still now) that the task of the NEM tech development and roadmap remains in the custody of CoE. In May 2018, Lon and Jeff stepped down, and Kristof was appointed by them to be interim President, overseeing the entire Foundation council. Perhaps the questions raised on roadmap development should be asked to the right parties.

You have to realise that not all Foundation Council are tech savvy, and I do not profess to be. Even my knowledge of NEM tech is average, and still learning everyday. I, along with other NEMbers found out about the release of Catapult private chain on May 2018 during Consensus NewYork.

Just has with any other organisations, there are specific responsibilities within Council, just as you would not expect the marketing or the HR/communications person to do the job of the CTO or vice versa.

Whether you vote or me as President or not, that is entirely your decision.

So basically it sounds like the reins were left in the hands of Kristof & the CoE - who with other responsibilities hasn’t kept up with this aspect of the work? @Xpedite any input as to what the hold ups are? If it was your remit to be handling this aspect then as interim president (apart from the obvious time constraints) what has held up pushing the development forward?

#73

The thing with programming and technical work (I have done a very little of each), is those who make the deals and do all the public liaisons often think of it as some sort of “magic”, hence a programmer or technician is often caught between reality and the lofty ideals of those who have nil understanding of the real world limitations and hurdles of the tech and ultimately eventually fall short on accommodating whats needed to continue with momentum and cost efficiency.
I am not directing this to anyone in Nem, it’s just a fact I have came across many times.

In my honest opinion I thought Nem would have been investing in the Devs and the tech in this slow 2018 market and as I have been reading here it seems they have not been doing this.
However there does appear to be a lot of success with partnerships, listings on exchanges and so on.
Truth is there has to be some petrol in the tank to go the distance and if your idea/product/vision is pretty much run on tech and programming (as opposed to a farmer that grows crops or a clothes maker that makes fashion), may I suggest that tech and programming holds quite a lot of load when it comes to crypto currency.

Then on the other hand we do not want a glut of programmers that become lackadaisical because there are too many on the same job or they have been thrown into the space without any real thought of how they will work together, there must be a well thought out balance.

One more thing is that I am just starting to realize an aspect of “open source” that I doubt too many have considered. “Open source” means it is open to use and for people to contribute to, it also means there is no official support so pretty much the “open source” community have to be motivated enough or inspired enough to form groups and forums that operate as a supportive knowledge base, programmers coming onto this forum asking specific tech questions and getting no response is probably not good enough.
We have some amazing tech support people here on the forum yet are some asking too much for them to keep the boat afloat at such a high workload?

Sorry I should have put this post in “Nem ventures next steps” an admin can move it if they see fit.

Dan

#74

Not a great response from Stephen. Sounds like sloppy shoulders and finger pointing rather then taking any sort of lead, getting involved and getting the job done. It also underlines one of @Jaguar0625 points in that the council members "…should have good enough knowledge of the underlying tech so that it can consult other organizations or people who are building or considering building projects on NEM…"

Fundamentally the Core Devs and Foundation Council can’t be at odds with one another. Neither group is large and in theory they should have been working together for nearly two years. What is the purpose of the blockchain centres, do these not align with the CoE? We don’t need diverging strategies, we need unity and collaboration

2 Likes
#76

It was pointed out multiple times but maybe only on Telegram: They have to adhere to the bylaws currently in place and those do not allow that kind of vote.

#77

Directly from Stephen Chia

I very much question the commitment of someone who wants to run for president but can’t be bothered to sign up for this forum and respond to criticism directly.

Centre of Excellence (CoE) in Europe

The CoE is a global enterprise. Only the EU region has contributed to staffing it. I have directly asked you (Stephen) to recruit for it in SEA months ago, yet I am unaware of any candidates from SEA.

not all Foundation Council are tech savvy

Council members should have a basic understanding of the functionality of both the NEM and Catapult chains as well as an understanding of customer scenarios and use cases. Going around making material misstatements about the capabilities of both chains makes NEM look bad.

12 Likes
#78

Looks like the Core devs are lost without external support. What do you suggest instead a fundation?

#79

The Core Devs are definitely not lost, in fact they are the most stable thing about NEM. They have been together prior to the launch of genesis.

In any development cycle it is not the job of the development team to define requirements and scope. They may have their own ideas but it is absolutely the right thing to do to look externally. The Devs don’t go out and meet the customers of NEM v1.0 all the announcements of projects on NEM should have identified gaps or wishes that people would like to see in the next release. So far, it would seem, the requirements have been driven by Mijin moving to a public solution needs input from the Foundation, that is one of its primary functions

9 Likes
#80

The Devs are not lost. They need more developers to join them to help with public release. The core devs are not focused on public release. What should happen is more devs should be welcomed, not shunned away. The Foundation had a great developer, and his team (Albert), but he left after frustrations with the foundation…

NEM has a LOT of funds available, and it needs some kind of governing body like the foundation to manage these funds, and hire developers from these funds.
Perhaps hiring devs should be a job for some entity outside of the foundation to manage, time will tell.

9 Likes
#81

I am in a similar boat. As the Vietnam Head, I have close to Zero visibility on activities globally or regionally. I am often finding myself surprised that certain things have passed without my participation or input, but I had taken it for granted leadership was “busy” and I soldiered on as best we could in Vietnam.

My comment on the conferences, there are value to this. But without a good leadership these opportunities are sorely wasted over and over…

6 Likes
#82

There’s some good insight in Kristoff’s latest post.

1 Like
#83

Seems like the consensus is that NF members lack technical understanding, even at the top levels. I think @Xpedite has explained this quite well. Shouldn’t there be an onboarding process for NF members so they’re up to scratch technically? They may not be all tech savvy but at least having uniform talking points and a common understanding.

3 Likes
#84

But who could create this onboarding process?
If one of the Presidency candidates, be sure to know that NEM has 60 tps, and will have even 4000 on catapult version. And of course we have 1600 nodes all around the world.

#85

The mandate for Basic & Indepth understanding should come from leadership, and the development of that knowledge base and training should come from leadership.

I will admit, everything I have learned is self-studied as there is no formal curriculum or education even for Head of Countries such as myself. My knowledge comes from the forums and the fortunate guidance of Mentors who are technically savvy to help me understand.

If we select the right leadership, and hope that I can help lead that, we need to create appropriate training programs in both Technical, Leadership, and Business acumen to ensure NEM success.

And of course, with an appropriate Organization structure we can ensure a grounded base but strong leadership in fields that the leadership team is strong in.

I hope everyone reviews the candidates with an impartial and objective eye. Look at the 3Cs of Credibility.

  1. Their Character
  2. Their Capabilities
  3. Their Consistency in performance / outcome

Best of luck to all!

#86

Roadmap?
Was this available to the community, to Foundation members, to the Council or even more restricted?