Decrediton Proposal Voting

Staking your DCR and earning a reward is just one part of Decred’s proof of stake mechanism. As said previously, Decred has a limited supply of tickets (approx 41,000) these function as a layer of security and coin holder governance.

Because of its hybrid consensus mechanism, Decred is hyper secure. The majority of this security comes from the proof of stake ticket system. Firstly, a ticket is used to validate a block and the work completed by the proof of work miners.

As an added feature, tickets, can be used to vote on three different governance functions. Community proposals, consensus upgrades and treasury spending. In this video, we’ll look at proposal voting.

Although, proposals can’t currently be created directly in Decrediton. Decrediton does have all the available features for participating in voting.

Open Decrediton and after purchasing your tickets, head over to the governance tab. The top area shows the balance from the Decred treasury, 845,471 DCR (approximately $14 million). The tabbed section below this shows the three different voting mechanisms – proposals, consensus changes and treasury spending.

Click on the proposals tab. Under this, we have another tabbed bar that includes – “in discussion”, “voting”, “finished voting” and “abandoned” proposals. There is also a “create a proposal” button that sends the user to the proposals.decred.org site, also knows as Politeia.

At this time, there are five proposals up for voting.  Click on the voting tab to see the full list. In this area, we get a brief overview of the details including – title; author; how long it’s been active; how many edits its had; the hash; when the vote will end and the vote status bar.

In order for a proposal to be considered valid it needs to reach a 20% quorum, which is 8178 votes. If the quorum is reached, at least 60% of these votes must be “yes” for it to be successful.

To get a detailed view of the proposal and to vote, click on the arrow to the right of the banner. For this proposal, we have a voting power of 1 ticket. Before submitting your vote, it’s wise to read the details carefully. Also, whilst the proposal was in the discussion phase, you should ask any questions you are unsure about. Once you’ve done your due diligence, cast your vote. In this instance, I’ll click “Yes” and then press the “cast vote” button. Then enter my passphrase, and it’s done, within a few seconds, your vote will be added to the status.

To show this process again, let’s vote on another proposal. Click on the back arrow, which will bring us back to the voting page. Then click on the next proposal using the arrow on the right of the banner. And follow the same steps as before.

As you can see, Decred’s proposal voting system is a breath of fresh air compared to other consensus upgrades, spending mechanisms and political systems. When it comes to getting a true and accurate understanding of the direction the coin holding community wants to take the project, there is no better way. In Decred, it’s the coin holder that makes the final decisions, not a Twitter pole or a miner preference flag. The people who have the most to lose have the biggest say.