Cosmos Community Rejects ATOM 2.0 White Paper

The Cosmos community has voted against the latest ATOM 2.0 proposal, which aims to revamp the ecosystem’s native ATOM token. Alternatives dubbed Atom One and Atom Zero were rejected by much larger margins.

Voter turnout for the proposal reached 73.41%, a standard amount for the Cosmos ecosystem. 

Of the token holders who participated, 47.51% voted in favor of the proposal, with 37.39% voting no with veto and 13.27% choosing to abstain.

Voting no with veto in the Cosmos ecosystem indicates a stronger opposition to the proposal than a simple “no.” If a total of one third of voters (33%) veto a proposal, the proposal is rejected and deposits are burned.

The ATOM 2.0 white paper was first unveiled at Cosmoverse in late September. It was designed so that it could secure economic scaling and make ATOM a core collateral within the Cosmos ecosystem.

In the first version of the white paper, developers proposed a large mint of ATOM tokens for a treasury, followed by a drop in ATOM staking rewards. That would result in a reduction of the ATOM inflation rate over time, but the community was concerned with the front-loading of ATOM tokens in the first few months. 

The proposal was revised to include community suggestions, and voting went live on Oct. 31.

Community members cited a lack of clarity on proposed changes and the broad nature of the proposal as primary reasons for their no vote.

Cosmos community member Mark W. Dalton said in the discussion forum that the proposal “is too much like Government stuff-in good/bad in the same bill to sneak things through. We should hone each major piece.’

Despite the criticisms, a majority of members are still supportive of ATOM 2.0’s general vision. However, they’re interested in ironing out some of the details.

In comparison to the Atom One Constitution (Proposal 83), where only 3.89% voted in favor, those who voted against the 2.0 proposal expressed the general view that the proposal was a good starting point to design the next version of the Cosmos. 

Audit.One, a Cosmos Hub validator and contributing member of the cosmos ecosystem, said in the forum, “we do agree with some points and like some ideas in the paper, but we don’t agree with ‘ratifying the entire content of the paper’.”

Echoing Dalton’s sentiments, Audit.One said, “in our opinion this proposal needs to be split up in separate actionable proposals.”

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