At Pairwise, we’re always looking for ways to make decentralized governance more inclusive, flexible, and impactful. In Retro Funding 6 (RF6), we took a big step forward by introducing liquid democracy to the Optimism Collective. This was our first chance to see how liquid democracy could work in action, and the results were exciting. Building on the zk-powered pseudonymous voting tech we launched in RF4, RF6 gave the community a fresh, more dynamic way to participate.
With liquid democracy, votes are generally categorized and you can vote on every vote in every category or delegate to anyone that you trust to vote or delegate for you in each specific category. For example, imagine you're confident about environmental policy but less so about healthcare or economics. You could vote directly on environmental issues, delegate healthcare to your nurse friend Alex, and economics to someone like Juan Ramon Rallo, a Spanish economist. This way, your vote aligns with expertise and values, while you can reassign it at any time.
Liquid Democracy on Optimism
Pairwise launched another Optimism Collective experiment, offering the broader community an opportunity to engage in Retro Funding decision-making. During Retro Funding 6, Badgeholders, Delegates, Token Holders, and Guest Voters participated in the Pairwise experiment to promote projects, educate the community, and foster collaboration and network effects within the Superchain, while also testing liquid democracy to advance the voting process for Retro Public Goods Funding.
Through Pairwise, participants could vote on the categories where they felt confident and delegate the rest to trusted users on Farcaster. This flexibility ensured that expertise guided decision-making, whether participants were ranking projects themselves or passing their voting power to someone better suited for a specific topic.
The Results: What did the different community members say?
The RF6 results give us a perspective into the minds of Optimism’s different members. Let’s unpack the rankings from Badgeholders, Guest Voters, Delegates, and Token Holders to see where their priorities align—and diverge.
The chart above shows that all stakeholder groups prioritized Governance Infrastructure & Tooling, but their behavior varied in percentage allocation. Guests assigned the smallest percentage to infrastructure and the largest to analytics and leadership. Delegates and Holders had a similar structure, but Holders were more conservative with the budget, taking the difference from infrastructure and tooling compared to Delegates. Citizens allocated the highest overall budget. Holders and delegates, represent would prefer to spend less funds
Badgeholders: Infrastructure First
Badgeholders put Ethereum Attestation Service (EAS) at the top of their list, recognizing its critical role in governance infrastructure. Other highly-ranked projects, like RetroList and RetroPGF Hub, also focused on tools to strengthen the governance ecosystem.
Key Insight: Badgeholders seem to value projects that provide foundational infrastructure, ensuring the ecosystem has the tools it needs to grow.
Guest Voters: Leadership and Analytics
Guest voters had a slightly different focus, with leadership projects like numbaNERDs and GovNERDs earning top spots. These projects emphasize community-driven leadership and governance analytics, highlighting a strong preference for strategic guidance.
Key Insight: Guest voters may be more drawn to visionary projects that drive the governance conversation forward.
Delegates: A Balanced Approach
Delegates ranked EAS first, echoing Badgeholders’ infrastructure-first mindset. However, they also showed strong support for leadership initiatives like the Optimism Security Council and analytics projects like numbaNERDsin the top 5.
Key Insight: Delegates appear to value a mix of stability, leadership and analytics.
Token Holders: Infra and leadership at the top
Token Holders focused heavily on Governance Infrastructure & Tooling and Governance Leadership, with projects like EAS and RetroList ranking highest. Leadership initiatives, such as Optimism Security & Grants Council, also gained notable support, while analytics-focused projects like Superchain.Eco received comparatively less attention.
Key Insight: Token Holders prioritized stability and vision, emphasizing infrastructure and leadership over analytics.
What Does This All Mean?
Infrastructure Is King: Across most groups, governance infrastructure projects consistently came out on top. These tools are the backbone of a thriving ecosystem.
Leadership Matters: Token holders, Guest Voters and Delegates demonstrated a clear preference for leadership-driven initiatives, underscoring the importance of strategic governance.
Analytics Gain Traction: Analytics projects resonated strongly with Guest Voters, signaling a growing interest in data-driven decision-making.
Liquid Democracy Works: By allowing the broader community to engage at their comfort level, liquid democracy and Pairwise proved that decentralized governance can be both inclusive and effective.
For a deeper analysis of Pairwise allocations check https://www.pairwise.vote/rf6-results
Thanks for Joining Us!
Retro Funding Round 6 was an exciting step toward the DAO dream: communities truly having a say in the decisions that shape their world. Right now, many DAO governance models rely on a small handful of representatives.
Retro Funding Round 7 is coming soon, and we’re building on everything we’ve learned so far. The next experiment is just around the corner—and we’d love for you to be part of it.
