Ranking 50 Top EOS Block Producers on Governance Best Practices & Value-Add
Also Introducing Mereo.io, a Comprehensive EOS Block Producer Ratings Platform
TL;DR
Presented in this article are the updated scores for 50 of the most well-known EOS Block Producers (BPs) based on a governance and value-add scoring system that I developed. The majority of these 50 BPs currently make up the Top 50 BPs by number of votes, although some rotation has occurred. The top 10 highest scoring BPs per my methodology are:
1. eosdacserver (237 points)
2. eoscanadacom (234 points)
3. eosnewyorkio (223 points)
4. eosnationftw (220 points)
5. eosauthority (219 points)
6. eosriobrazil (213 points)
7. eosswedenorg (200 points)
8. cypherglasss (200 points)
9. eosasia11111 (197 points)
10. teamgreymass (188 points)
This scoring system will forever be a “work in progress” as I continually update it to ensure accuracy, relevance and depth. At present, I believe this is one of the most comprehensive governance and value-add scoring systems available to the EOS community to allow tokenholders to make more informed voting decisions.
I have recently launched Mereo.io, a website which will provide ongoing reporting of BPs’ performance against this governance and value-add benchmark. The site is still under development, although I expect to have it fully operational with all the latest BP scoring data within the next week to 10 days. If you’d like to stay up to date with my research and analysis, please consider subscribing on site.
Verb (Latin): mereō (present infinitive merēre)
1. Earn, deserve, merit, obtain
Introduction
This post is a follow-up to an article I wrote about two weeks ago which you can read here. If you don’t have time to read it, I’ll provide you with a quick summary:
Using a scoring methodology that I developed, I re-ranked the Top 21 BPs based on governance best practices and community value-add. I assessed each Top 21 BP across four key pillars which I defined as “Voter Concentration,” “Disclosure & Accessibility,” “Structure & Leadership,” and “Value-Add Offerings.”
The vast majority of feedback on the article was very positive. However, as noted in the original post, there were limitations to the study which a few readers rightly pointed out. It was not intended to be the finished article, so to speak, but rather an introduction to a potential process for encouraging greater scrutiny of BPs and the adoption of simple best practices so that BPs can better serve the EOS community.
Since publishing the initial article, I have spent considerable time refining and improving the methodology and scoring process, and also expanding the Block Producer universe to cover 50 BPs in total. I consider these updates necessary for creating a much more detailed, accurate and consistent process for measuring BPs across each category.
Updated Results for 50 Top Block Producers
Summary Methodology
In the days and weeks ahead, I will be developing a more comprehensive methodology document which will describe in more detail how I evaluate BPs across each of the four pillars. Once it’s ready, I will post it to the website, Mereo.io. In the meantime, however, here is an updated summary of the key scoring components which make up each pillar.
Voter Diversity
What was once called “Voter Concentration” is now more accurately described as “Voter Diversity.” The guiding principle behind this pillar is that BPs with a more diverse voter base are less likely to be coerced by large voters (i.e., “whales”) into making network decisions if they are not overly reliant of the votes of a few accounts for their long-term success. In addition, while a reasonable argument can be made for the 1 EOS = 1 Vote concept, the concentration of EOS tokens among relatively few accounts means that the interests of an overwhelming majority of tokenholders are not fairly represented.
To evaluate Voter Diversity, the number of votes across each BP’s five largest voters was summed and calculated as a percentage of their total votes. The lower this percentage, the higher the score.
Furthermore, to help create a fairer representation of tokenholder interests, each BP was scored based on the number of discrete accounts that voted for that BP. This moves us slightly away from 1 EOS = 1 Vote and a little closer to 1 Account = 1 Vote. The higher the number of discrete accounts voting for each BP, the higher the score.
Overall performance under this pillar is determined by summing two scoring components
Disclosure & Accessibility
To effectively serve the community, I believe Block Producers must meet certain minimum disclosure and accessibility thresholds. Prior to the EOS mainnet launch, EOSGO encouraged (but not required) BPs to provide minimum disclosure around eight key criteria they identified, including a public presence (i.e., a website), company location, an employee list, type of servers to be used, a scaling plan, and technical specifications, among other things.
In addition, as required by the EOS Constitution, compliant BPs must run and sign the regproducer command when registering as a Block Producer to demonstrate their commitment to the regproducer agreement. Fortunately, certain pieces of this agreement can be validated technologically, such as the website URL, Code of Conduct and Ownership Disclosure. As a result, almost all BPs opted to do this by embedding a bp.json file at the root of their domain (thanks to Ben Sigman at sheos21sheos for his work which explains these issues in more detail here and here).
During my research, the level of disclosure across the 50 BPs was wide-ranging, to say the least. In some cases, it was excellent as easy to find. In others it was available but needed to be tracked down by trawling through pages of Steemit or Medium posts. In a few cases, it didn’t appear to exist at all.
To evaluate Disclosure & Accessibility, I conducted a review of each BP’s json file to assess its completeness, and whether it had been recorded on-chain. In addition, I assessed the website to ensure proper onsite disclosure (or a clear link to the disclosure) of four key compliance items: the Code of Conduct, Ownership Disclosure, the bp.json file and the regproducer agreement (simply posting the Code of Conduct and Ownership Disclosure on Steemit without referencing it onsite is not sufficient in my view). I also reviewed the availability, accessibility and thoroughness of disclosures related to technical specifications, scaling roadmaps, and security. Finally, the availability and functionality of key points of contact (i.e., email and social media links) was considered and scored.
Overall performance under this pillar is determined by summing 18 scoring components.
Structure & Leadership
As discussed in my previous post, proper structure and effective team leadership among BPs is critical. Not only is it important to have a capable group of technicians with relevant experience, it’s also important to ensure the team is large enough to provide the necessary “bench strength” in the event that team leaders are unavailable for some period of time (e.g., due to travel, illness or other unforeseen emergency).
Ideally, I believe that team members should also be dedicated to the EOS project with limited or no involvement in outside projects or dApps which could be a distraction from their duties as a BP. To the extent possible, it is also my view that BP team members should be free from conflicts of interest that could arise if they are affiliated with a cryptocurrency exchange, have significant mining operations outside of EOS, or serve on the leadership teams of other dApps, projects and businesses.
To evaluate Structure & Leadership, I assessed the onsite disclosure of BP team members and the thoroughness of their onsite bios, including the existence of links to external experience sources (i.e., LinkedIn). The proper onsite disclosure of these items resulted in the maximum number of points being awarded. Partial credit was awarded for BPs with team bios that existed but were not properly linked or disclosed onsite. Negative credit was assigned for BPs which did not appear to disclose their team or team bios anywhere that was easily accessible. To evaluate bench strength, the number of listed team members was considered and scored. However, given the “looseness” of what constitutes a team member and what doesn’t, this piece was not factored heavily in the calculations. Finally, negative credit was also applied to any BP where it appeared the potential for a conflict of interest might exist, in my opinion.
Overall performance under this pillar is determined by summing five scoring components.
Value-Add Tools
Updated from “Value-Add Offerings” to “Value-Add Tools,” performance under this pillar is arguably the most important of all. However, given the subjective nature of “value,” it’s also the hardest to measure and measure consistently. For example, publishing EOS educational content and hosting EOS meetups is undoubtedly valuable. But how can we score this? What makes one article or video better than the other? What makes one meetup better than the other? The quality of the speaker or the number of attendees? Maybe. But then you might disadvantage BPs that are not located in major cities with less ability to attract “big name” speakers and large crowds. The frequency of articles/events is also not a good barometer because then you get into the issue of what is better: one excellent article/meetup, or five average articles/meetups? You get the point.
In light of the above, I decided to strictly evaluate the issuance of value-add tools or products when scoring BPs under this component for the time being. I do have an idea of how to measure things like educational content, but that will require more work. At the moment, education is considered in the scoring process, but only to the extent that it has been packaged into a discrete product offering that tokenholders can access (e.g., EOSdocs.io developed by eosnewyorkio and eosnationftw).
Other key value-add tools that were considered and scored under this pillar include, but are not limited to: wallets, key and account management services, voting tools, wallet and BP alarms, voting and blockchain analytics, BP/network monitors, block explorers, testnets, games, snapshot tools, and other major value generating initiatives (e.g., cypherglasss’ hardware wallet bounty or eosdacserver’s establishment as a DAC). Each value-add tool was scored similarly, but not the same. Tools which are most common, and therefore provide less incremental value (such as a wallet), received a slightly lower score than those which were less common and had the ability to set one BP apart from another.
Great. What’s Next?
As mentioned previously, I have recently launched Mereo.io which will provide ongoing reporting of BPs’ performance against this governance and value-add benchmark. I expect to have the website finalized with all the latest BP scoring data within the next week to 10 days. The site will also contain additional details around BP performance and the scoring methodology. Please subscribe on the site if you would like to stay up to date with the latest ratings and developments.
In the meantime, I encourage questions, comments and feedback from EOS tokenholders and Block Producers to help make this system even stronger. There is always room for improvement. Also, if there are any BPs which are not on the list that you would like to be included, please let me know and I will try to add them.
Some Information About Me
I co-own and operate a compensation and corporate governance consulting firm on the West Coast of the United States. I regularly consult with both private and publicly-traded companies on items such as executive pay and incentives, compensation risk, shareholder rights and board structure, and help them ensure compliance with (or an understanding of) disclosure and governance best practices enforced (or encouraged) by the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC), Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) and Glass Lewis. Today, ISS and Glass Lewis are the two largest and most prominent proxy advisory services in the world.
Over the last 18 months, blockchain and cryptoassets have become keen interests of mine. I discovered EOS in June 2017 and have been a strong believer in its technology and future potential ever since. Since I don’t have a technical background, I’m hoping to use my skills in finance and corporate governance to add value to the EOS Community.
I am not affiliated with or being compensated by any Block Producer, nor do I consciously hold any bias when conducting my analysis. I have no dog in this fight, other than to see EOS be as successful as it can be.
If you are interested in what I am trying to do, please follow me here on Medium, on Twitter and on Reddit, or message me on Telegram @theblockchainkid.
And Finally…
There’s an old adage in the crypto-world to “do your own research.” While the Mereo.io scoring system is intended to help tokenholders make more informed voting decisions, some scoring components inevitably come down to my judgment or interpretation, which may differ from yours.
I have defined my Code of Conduct as follows:
“To the best of my ability, I will offer a fair representation of the facts and circumstances of each BP as I see them, and to score each BP as accurately and as consistently as possible within the context of the Mereo.io scoring methodology.”
Please note that, in some situations, my analysis could include unintended errors or miscalculations which could significantly affect a BP’s score. For this reason, it is always important to also conduct your own independent analysis outside of what is presented here or what is presented on Mereo.io now and in the future.
A special thanks to Jonny and Jesse for their technical guidance, and to Brian for his edits and peer review.
Detailed Results
Voter Diversity
Disclosure & Accessibility
Structure & Leadership
Value-Add Tools
