Governance FAQ

Frequently Asked Questions

What is ɄDT?

ɄDT (Unlock Discount Token) is the native governance token of the Unlock Protocol DAO. It is an ERC20 deployed on the Ethereum main net, but also available on side chains and selected layer 2.

What is ɄDT used for?

ɄDT can be delegated to vote on proposals that govern the Unlock Protocol DAO.

How do I get ɄDT?

You can earn UDT today by using the protocol, or through grants from the Unlock Treasury.

What are the tokenomics of ɄDT?

When Unlock Inc. created the UDT tokens, a total of 1,000,000 tokens were premined. These tokens are kept in Unlock's multisig wallet and our goal is to use 800,000 them to foster adoption of the protocol (the company will keep at least 200,000).

As of November 1st 2021, the company has distributed about 120,000 tokens. By May 1st 2022, we want to have distributed another 200,000 tokens, totaling at least 300,000 tokens.

For this, we are considering 3 mechanisms: grants, bounties, and matchings.

Additionally, the protocol itself distributes new tokens using a logarithmic curve, based on the usage of the protocol.

What is Unlock Inc.?

Unlock Inc. is the company that wrote the first versions of the Unlock Protocol, with the intention of progressively decentralizing to give control of the protocol to the Unlock community.

Who is on the Unlock Inc. team?

Unlock Inc. is founded by CEO Julien Genestoux and includes Austin Robey (Head of Growth), Clément Renaud (Senior Software Engineer), Amber Case (Strategist), Crystal Street (Community Manager), and a few more contractors! We're always hiring, so get in touch if you want to join us!

What is the Unlock DAO?

The Unlock DAO is the decentralized organization of ɄDT token holders that govern and control the Unlock Protocol. Unlock Inc. is one of the stakeholders on the DAO, and we expect other organizations to emerge and eventually lead some efforts independenly of Unlock Inc.

Governance happens through proposals.

What is a proposal?

A proposal is a blockchain-executable transaction: it is code. This means that proposals can only trigger "on-chain" actions. For example, a proposal could be "The DAO pays X tokens to address.eth", or "Change parameter P of smart contract to be K", but it cannot be "The Unlock Inc. team needs to travel to conference Y", or "John Doe needs to purchase UDT tokens on the Coinbase exchange".

What is the lifecycle of a proposal

Proposals start as discussions and conversations. We suggest using Discourse but they can happen anywhere as long as they are visible by all token holders. These conversations can be initiated by any community member. In the begining, proposals are discussed between community members with the intention of making voting easier and straightforward by increasing awareness.

Once a relative consensus has been reached in the community, a community member will submit the proposal for votes, in the form of executable code.

At that stage, every delegate can vote in favor or against the proposal for 8 days.

If the proposal gets approved by a majority and if a quorum of at least 15,000 votes has been reached, then the proposal will get executed after a time lock of 3 hours.

Where do governance discussions take place?

Governance discussions can take place on our Discourse in the “Governance” section. Any community member can discuss the protocol and governance anywhere they want but we suggest having these discussions in the open to gather feedback and buy in.

How do I vote on governance proposals?

Voting for the Unlock DAO happens "on chain" thru the governor contract. To send their transactions, delegates can use any front-end application that supports the OpenZeppelin Governor contracts, like Tally. Voting on a proposal is only available to delegates with the balance of tokens they had at the time of the proposals' submission.

How can I help the Unlock DAO?

As a community member, I can help grow the adoption of the protocol, either by deploying a membership contract (a lock) and selling memberships or by purchasing other creators' memberships (keys). I can also reach out to my favorite creators and community and suggest that they use the protocol.

If I am a developer I can write code and plugins for platforms and applications to integrate Unlock... etc.

As a token holder, I can either delegate my votes to another member of the community or make sure I vote on proposals myself.

How do I delegate my tokens?

The easiest way is to go to the Unlock governance page on Tally and connect your wallet and then you will be able to delegate your vote.

Is it possible to become a delegate and not currently hold any UDT

No, delegation is the act of assiging the votes from address weighted by the number of tokens that this address owns. If you don't UDT, the weight would be 0 :)

Is there any minimum UDT holding threshold for delegate consideration

No, even owning 0.000001 UDT is enough to delegate.

What can the DAO ask Unlock Inc. to do?

Nothing :) Because Unlock Inc does not "exist" on-chain. Similarly, Unlock Inc. cannot ask other members of the community to do "things" through the DAO.

Why is Unlock Inc. not doing marketing for the token?

Unlock Inc. is not legally allowed to promote the token. Additionally, since this is a governance token, we do not recommend advertising it as an investment device.

Does the Unlock team promote its governance token?

No, the Unlock Inc. team is not allowed to promote its governance token or discuss its price.

What is the path towards decentralization?

As the usage and community of Unlock Protocol grow, UDT holders will gradually control more of the network. Eventually, they will fully govern the protocol and its treasury.

How does Unlock Inc. make money?

As part of our roadmap, we plan on allowing users who do not know of cryptocurrencies or have a crypto wallet to pay us (Unlock Inc) with their credit card in order to perform the transaction on chain for them. In that context we will charge a convenience fee on top of the (crypto) price of the keys. This convenience fee will cover the gas price, the credit card transaction and a small margin for us.