Launch of Uniswap Agora & Delegate Race

[honn24x]

Hi all, Honn from the Uniswap Foundation here.

TL;DR

• Today we are announcing the launch of Uniswap Agora, which we are celebrating with Uniswap’s first ever Delegate Race!
• Uniswap Agora is a unified delegate and delegation portal built to improve the Uniswap governance experience.
• The goal of the Delegate Race is to set aside a specific time period during the year where new and existing delegates can focus on bootstraping delegation, and token holders focus on reviewing and re-allocating their delegation. The Delegate Race will occur over the next 4 weeks.
• The Delegate Race includes 2 phases:

1. Delegate Setup: New and existing delegates make delegate profiles on Uniswap Agora by Friday, May 12th. Profiles will describe your goals and values for the Uniswap ecosystem.
2. Delegation: UNI token holders review and allocate to delegates starting on Saturday, May 13th, and ending on Friday, June 2nd. This delegation is anchored by a UNI allocation graciously allocated by some large UNI token holders.

Introduction

One of the Uniswap Foundation’s goals is to build an active and values-aligned set of delegates governing the Uniswap Protocol. In moving towards this goal, we are excited to update the community with 2 announcements:

1. Uniswap Agora is now live at vote.uniswapfoundation.org! Uniswap Agora is a unified and dedicated delegate portal to improve the Uniswap governance experience. Through this new platform, delegates can craft a tailored profile highlighting their platforms, the issues they care most about, and the stakeholders they represent. Community members will be able to easily identify delegates based on these criteria, can re-delegate, follow proposals, and more.The Uniswap Foundation had the privilege of funding this tool through the UF Grants Program, and we are very excited to share it with the rest of the community.

2. To celebrate the launch of Agora, the Uniswap Foundation will be organizing its first ever Uniswap Delegate Race. During the Delegate Race, we set aside time for new and existing delegates to create their platform page on Agora, and for delegators to refresh their delegation. We have worked with UNI token holders to anchor the re-delegation campaign with up to 8M UNI to be delegated to participating delegates over the next month. Read more below.

Uniswap Delegate Race

A major friction for Uniswap delegates, particularly newer delegates, has been bootstrapping their initial delegation from UNI holders. The Delegate Race, alongside the launch of Agora, seeks to mitigate this issue by setting aside a time during the course of the year when we as a community expect delegators to refresh their delegation.

Over the course of the next 4 weeks (detailed timeline below), both new and existing delegates are expected to build out their Agora profiles, and delegators will evaluate delegate profiles created on Agora.

Delegate Profile Requirements

All those who wish to participate in the race and have an opportunity to receive re-delegation from our partners will have to do the following:

1. Fill out an official delegate statement on Agora with your answers to the following questions in the format below:

• Platform TL;DR (1 sentence):
• What do you want to see happen in Uniswap governance over the next year?
• Reasons for wanting to be a delegate:
• Skills and areas of expertise:
• Past contributions to Uniswap ecosystem and/or demonstrated protocol knowledge (if applicable):
• What are your views on 3 past Uniswap governance proposals?
• Disclosure of Conflicts of Interest:
  
  

2. If you’d like to include more information about your platform, feel free to include it in the delegate statement.
3. Select up to 3 Uniswap governance issues you care most about, then write about how you view that issue.

4. Select which stakeholder group you best represent in your votes. This is most likely to align with the kind of stakeholder you are. If it doesn’t, you might explain more about your approach to voting in your Platform.

5. NOTE: If you would like to be eligible for the up to 8M UNI set aside by UNI token holders for this campaign, please include your Twitter handle. Our anchor delegators may reach out to you directly via Twitter DMs to ask questions prior to delegating, so please ensure that your DM settings allow for this.

Timeline

Profile Creation Period

Monday, Monday May 1 — Friday, May 12th

• Those wishing to participate in the delegate race will have until Friday, May 12th to create their profile in line with the requirements above.

Delegation Period

Saturday, May 13th — Friday, June 2nd

• We expect delegators to review and refresh their delegation during this period, anchored by up to 8M UNI which has been set aside by large UNI token holders.

Conclusion

We hope that Uniswap Agora and the Delegate Race will make it easier for new and existing delegates to bootstrap their participation in Uniswap governance, and for delegators to ensure that their UNI is best representing their interests.

Based on community need and feedback, we may repeat the Delegate Race in the future. So please feel free to provide your feedback and thoughts on future iterations below!

[MattOnChain]

This is awesome!! I am beyond excited to see Agora’s positive impact on voter apathy and hopefully get some dormant UNI active again.

While we are still in the process of making it official, you can expect to see Blockworks Research’s participation and support in this campaign. We have been looking to contribute to UNI governance for a while now and this feels like the perfect opportunity to move forward. Keep an eye out!

[devinwalsh]

Love to hear that!! Would love to see Blockworks Research as a delegate