tl;dr
Starting today, any Votecaster user can delegate their voting power to another user within Votecaster communities using Liquid Delegation.
Introduction
At Votecaster, we've successfully addressed one of the major challenges of Web3 governance: lack of participation.
By integrating governance directly into users' timelines, enabling direct voting through an end-to-end verifiable voting frame, and creating tools for community leaders (e.g., to send reminders), we've significantly boosted turnout for DAO governance.
Our approach has allowed us to exceed the average turnout rates in the Web3 governance market, where on-chain voting typically sees less than 10% participation and off-chain voting sees less than 20%. DAOs using Votecaster achieve an average participation rate of 53%.
Despite these encouraging numbers, our aim is to further boost participation, making DAOs stronger, more agile, functional, and ensuring their outcomes are more legitimate. To achieve this, we are introducing Votecaster Liquid Delegation.
We believe liquid delegation is an effective system to improve Web3 governance, enabling users to delegate their voting power to trusted members of the community. This system allows users to delegate their voting power to a trusted person or entity, who can then further delegate that power to another trusted party, creating chains of trust, known as Metadelegation.
Votecaster Liquid Delegation enables voting power to be dynamically reallocated through a network of trusted delegates. This ensures decisions are made by those who are best informed or most trusted within the community.
The concept of liquid democracy is not new and has been theorized and experimented with by organizations like the Pirate Party. It has its pros and cons. One clear downside is the potential accumulation of power by those who are more charismatic or have higher visibility. Another is extended peer pressure, and yet another is prolonged disengagement; if delegation becomes the norm, users might further disconnect from the governance process.
However, we think it's a great idea to experiment with liquid democracy alongside the Farcaster Protocol, specially with small communities (like DAOs) where discussions can happen easily.
How does it work?
To delegate their vote, a user should visit the page of a Votecaster community they're a member of and select another user to whom they want to delegate their voting power. It's important to note that this user may have their voting power delegated to someone else too.
On the same form, users can revoke a delegation. Alternatively, they can visit their profile page on Votecaster to view and manage all active delegations.
Notify your members
Do you want to reach out to all the members of your DAO to ask them to delegate their vote? If you're a community admin, just go to your community page, and from there click on "Notify members". They will receive it in their Warpcast direct messages.
Start today!
Start today by creating your own Votecaster community here, and begin enjoying a unique and integrated DAO experience on Farcaster.
Votecaster liquid delegation specifications:
Delegations are only possible for votes that occur within Votecaster Communities.
A Farcaster user can freely delegate their voting power to another Farcaster user.
A Farcaster user delegates their voting power within a specific community. They can decide to delegate their voting power in some communities they belong to, while voting directly in others.
A Farcaster user can revoke their delegation at any time.
If a vote has already started, any delegation or revocation will only become effective when a new vote begins.
A user who has delegated their voting power to someone else cannot receive delegations from others, to prevent potential loops.
A user who receives a delegation can’t refuse it. Only the user who delegated their vote can revoke it.
