Is Uniswap Governance a Shell? DAO Representative Accuses Uniswap of Unveiling Unichain Without Their Knowledge

Uniswap recently launched L2 Unichain, sparking community doubts about the effectiveness of DAO governance. Billy Gao, representing the Stanford Blockchain Association, posted a series of tweets on Twitter explaining the events and questioning what UNI holders can really govern.

Unichain brings 468 million in annual revenue to Uni, an article analyzing which individuals will benefit or be affected by the mechanism.

Unichain Lightning Listing, DAO Representatives Caught Off Guard

Billy Gao pointed out that many DAO representatives, including StanfordCrypto, were completely unaware before Unichain went live. After a week of discussion with the community, they decided to publicly disclose these concerns on 10/20, reflecting on the situation so far and their stance on the current issues.

The Uniswap Foundation only held a community meeting to discuss this issue a few days after Unichain was launched.

1/ @Uniswap’s sudden launch of @unichain has raised serious questions about DAO governance and caught many of us off guard.

Is this a bold leap forward for DeFi, or a worrying step back for decentralization? Here’s our breakdown of what unfolded, why it matters, and what’s next.

— Billy Gao (@__billygao) October 19, 2024

Community Discussion is the Core of DAO Governance

Billy Gao first acknowledged the efforts and innovation of the Uniswap team, believing that Unichain's product design is a significant step in the DeFi space, but there are concerns in the launch process.

As representatives of UNI token holders, they were not given any opportunity to voice their opinions throughout the process, feeling excluded from decision-making, whether through forums, private discussions, or any other means.

He emphasized:

While respecting the technical expertise of the Uniswap team, community discussion is essential to DAO governance. With many technical experts in the community, bypassing discussions should not be a reason for efficient decision-making.

Billy Gao cited the recent event of Uniswap's deployment on BNB Chain as an example, illustrating how effective community discussions can lead to positive developments in DAO governance, which gave rise to the successful operation of the cross-chain bridge evaluation committee.

He firmly believes that effective decision-making requires open discussions, especially between DAO representatives. DAO representatives bear the trust of token holders and should be given more rights to participate in decision-making.

Does Community Governance Have Protocol Control? Why Choose OP Stack?

Billy Gao further pointed out that while they appreciate the technical capabilities of the Uniswap team, choosing OP Stack must have its reasons, and the lack of transparent reasons is one of the reasons for the current concerns.

He mentioned that Arbitrum Orbit can be used out of the box, and it is the highest trading volume L2 solution. Choosing OP Stack seems to bring unnecessary technical debt to the team and raises questions about behind-the-scenes transactions and processes.

Arbitrum Orbit is preparing to launch, will it trigger the development of the L3 ecosystem?

We are concerned about the rights of token holders, especially in future decisions. Given past precedents, Uniswap can bypass DAO governance through technology, products, and back-end. Do token holders really have control? What we hope to see is an unaltered decision-making framework, such as the team being able to release discussion memos to truly understand the reasons, processes, and reasoning behind current decisions.

Billy Gao concluded by emphasizing that the StanfordCrypto will continue to actively serve as a major DAO governance representative, delighted to discuss governance-related issues and hopes that the crypto community will pay more attention to them to receive more governance-related updates.