Agree with 10-60-30 split.
Will znode owners vote on funding proposals, as in other masternode networks? If so, giving unallocated funds back to them will disincentivize them to vote ‘yes’ on proposals. Therefore, I believe remaining funds should go to the devs or be burnt.
I agree with the 10-30-70 split.
Breaking down the 10% further, how about 8% for dev and 2% for community for the purpose of voting on things that could bring more awareness to Zcoin sort of similar to voting on marketing or charity project the way dash does.
You guys do great work and definitely want to make sure you’re all compensated for continuous work as the road map is ambitious. The dev fund also includes research right? If not then 5% dev 4% research for Lelantus and others with 1% community/emergency fund.
I am divided on this point. There is a founder reward. Some portion of that goes to the Team and bounty wallet. If there is going to be an allocation of any amount after the four years towards the Team and bounty, I would have to need more information.
I don’t know if the information is available but I would like to know how the funds are being used. I believe that this is the address of the team and bounty wallet that is being used to allocate the 3 XCZ per block a1HwTdCmQV3NspP2QqCGpehoFpi8NY4Zg3. Please correct me if I am wrong.
If the team has used all the funds that was allocated towards them, c’est ca. If the team however is running nodes, then I think the problem at hand could be viewed from a different angle.
Ideally I think that the team should have a certain amount of nodes that can generate a steady form of revenue. These funds can then be used to undertake challenges and projects.
After the halving, with an allocation of 10%, the team would take a setback from 3.0 XZC to 2.5 XZC. On the other hand that would still be 0.5 XZC higher than the previous 2.0 that was allocated towards the Team and bounty wallet.
Bear in mind that this is per block. That would mean that in the upcoming two years 250K+ XZC will be allocated towards the Team and bounty wallet. After the halving the team would get around 130K XZC per year for the then upcoming four years. Again please correct me if I am wrong.
In the case that it is an absolute must I think we should keep the 14% to generate a certain amount of Team and bounty nodes. After that the 14% could be divided amongst miners and nodes.
I also think there is no way to bypass that this would need to be organized centrally in the form of a foundation or something similar. I am no expert on this and I am eager to hear other people’s opinion on this.
Also how are the funds being managed right now? How many members of the current team would leave if there are no reward? How many team members are running nodes themselves and how much are they incentivized to work on the project?
I am personally not fond of the idea of developers having to run nodes. Node returns are also not as predictable as they depend on the number of nodes on the network. But the main thing is I don’t want to create a system where Zcoin infrastructure is dependent on the Zcoin team maintaining it and should be on our own personal capacity. Also incentives are not aligned as i detail further.
I don’t want to give exact breakdown of how the dev wallet is used for competitive reasons but let’s say if Zcoin is at 5 dollars we’ll be running roughly break even at about USD64,800 a month. With the recent boost we’re doing much more comfortable but still it’s lean.
Consider that we have significant amount of full time members (8 members) along with semi-full time (3 members).
6 operations/community support/marketing members (4 full time)
and cryptographic research, PR team, server infrastructure and tools, office space…I can say that we’re a super lean team. Many of us are taking cuts in our salaries too with the downturn because we really believe in the project. These team members will expect rises in the salary to reward their commitment if the price increases as they deserve.
Our research funding and other activities such as conference attendance/community building are coming from our reserves that we accumulated in better times. Note that during better times, exchange listings and many other services cost a lot!
Now consider that a silicon valley programmer costs about 250-500k USD a year this means that other projects might just higher 3-5 programmers for the same price 
If there is no reward, a big majority of our team will leave as the salary is their source of income. Znodes alone at current prices are not enough to sustain life and if they were enough, then there’s a huge centralization of ownership problem. Most are full time jobs and none of us are super rich and need to support our life and families.
A znode currently gets 90 dollars a month and after halving this will go down 45 USD provided that there are no new Znodes and price is the same.
Also it is unfair to have some people reaping benefits just by virtue of owning while others have to work hard for it. Expecting people to work seriously for free or rely on donations (such as Grin) or to boost their bag is a poor way to fund consistent development and opens us to outside influence. Even Bitcoin heavily relies on paid development by Blockstream which has questionable motives. I rather have a fund that funds development transparently but if we don’t do well or don’t deliver results, we can be replaced which keeps us honest.
Dev fund includes research yes!
The drawback I see to being too specific on the percentages is that it limits flexibility depending on market situations. For e.g. in tough times, we may need to scale down research and promotion to keep development running. In better times priorities will shift.
With a fund I think monthly reports on the allocation HAS to be delivered, like what percentage of the fund went where so that will have some degree of accountability. A third party ‘auditor’ can perhaps also certify this report.
This is still in discussion as to how the funds are voted in and is in this thread: https://forum.zcoin.io/t/zcoin-governance-and-development-past-4-years/26
My personal preference is :
10% Dev/Community Fund
45% Miners
45% Znodes
I opt for an equal remuneration between mining and masternodes.
Mining generates sales to pay mining expenses, putting selling pressure on prices and tending to lower ZCoin prices.
Conversely, each masternode blocks 1000 ZCoin in collateral. Not only you must buy these 1000 ZCoin, but in addition, they are no longer available for sale. The buying pressure increases and the selling pressure decreases : the trend is upward ad the price pump.
Nota : I mine ZCoin and I have masternode, both interest me.
Edit :
If, like I think, the price grows up with the 45%/45% reward for miners and masternodes, the part for development/community could even be reduced to 8 or 6%, and the rewards for miners and masternodes could be increased to 46%/46% or 47%/47%.
For the second question (“what happens if the funds are not fully allocated”), I think the funds should goes to masternodes.
My personal preference is :
10% Dev/Community Fund
45% Miners
45% Znodes
10% dev fund - It is a no-brainer!
Looks like most are ok with 10% (which will be less than currently) should we extend for one year and see how it goes or longer?
I think 10% is reasonable, especially with the idea that it can be changed in the future if/when hopefully prices increase. Is part of the 10% rewards also going to the bug/bounty system?
That really depends on if we have spare funds. If we do we would also directly fund stuff on zcs.zcoin.io as well.
10% Dev/Community Fund
45% Miners
45% Znodes
That looks ideal BUT, Zcoin is a PoW coin, miners have to get the majority of the reward.
46% Miners - 44% Znodes is better,
10% Dev/Community Fund
40% Znodes
50% Miners
That is the best balance.
Great suggestion guys, looks like we are trending towards a 10% dev reward.
And between a 30-45% znode reward
Znode is useless, failed idea, they don’t have any special role in securing the network.
I don’t like idea changing “road map”.
So I vote to stick to the road map i.e. for status quo: 70% Miners and
30% Znodes, and devs should set up fund for donations.
Once chainlocks implemented they do secure the chain against 51% attacks and instant transactions though.
Also just letting you know one of the reasons we setup the https://zcs.zcoin.io is to see if we can fund stuff via donations. If it works out, then there may not need to be a dev reward but at the rate it’s going (see how many people have weighed in their opinions), we will need to let go all our staff if it’s a donation model.
Ideally znodes should enable insta payments, by ensuring the transaction they sign.
Yup that will be done after deterministic masternodes is done.
Just a quick update on this.
So far, general community seems to be for the idea of:
10 Dev
60 Miners
30 Znodes
or
10 Dev
45 Miners
45 Znodes