Delegate Rewards

Ideas
1

Delegate (Keeper) Rewards – Discussion Summary

Hello everyone,

Here’s the summary of everything that was shared on the last thread around delegate rewards and measuring participation, from here I would like for us to pick up and continue sharing ideas so we can come up with a proposal that can be formally put up for vote.

As I have mentioned before we are looking at launching this set of rewards ideally alongside the Aragon UI but this require for all of us to rally around this topic as much as we can to have it ready be then.

Areas of Alignment

Keeper rewards should exist in some form. There is broad support for compensating delegates who contribute meaningfully to governance. The discussion is not about whether to reward, but how.

A minimum voting threshold is needed. Most contributors agree that delegates should meet a baseline level of voting participation (proposed at 80% of proposals) and provide published rationales to qualify for any compensation.

Quality matters more than quantity. There is shared concern that rewarding activity across channels (Discord, Forum, voting) without filtering for quality risks incentivizing noise, visibility, and rent-seeking behavior rather than meaningful governance contributions.

The V2 migration is a natural window. Since stakers will already be moving their assets and re-establishing delegations on the new Aragon-based platform, this transition offers a clean opportunity to introduce or pilot a Keeper rewards framework alongside the new staking system.

Key Points of Debate

1. How should compensation be weighted?

Two positions have emerged:

  • Participation-heavy model: 70% based on voting and rationales, 30% based on quality of contributions, with a bonus for proposals that get approved and implemented.

  • Quality-heavy model: 30% based on voting and rationales, 70% based on demonstrated quality (proposal drafts, validated objections, verified outcomes). The argument here is that this rewards proactive contribution over passive representation and better protects the protocol from rent-seeking.

2. How do we measure “quality” without introducing bias?

This is the most contested point. Concerns have been raised that subjective measures of quality could be influenced by personal positions, communication styles, or rhetoric. Contributions that are unconventional or unpolished might be undervalued even if they carry real insight.

Several ideas have been proposed to structure qualitative judgment and reduce subjectivity:

  • A reputation system where measurable criteria define what an “active” delegate looks like (voting participation, forum contributions, holding/staking CTX or Cryptex indices), with rewards gated or weighted by that status.

  • A social signaling mechanism where DAO members recognize meaningful contributions from peers, shifting incentives toward community-validated quality.

  • A facilitator role (inspired by consent-based decision-making) where a neutral, elected actor tests whether contributions like objections meet predefined criteria, making the assessment binary and testable rather than opinion-based.

  • Differentiating contribution types, such as: (a) drafting proposals that are approved and implemented, (b) raising reasoned objections that improve proposals, and (c) delivering verifiable key results tied to specific bounties or outcomes.

3. When should this be implemented?

Three options are on the table:

  • Implement now, alongside the V2 launch.

  • Defer until after major product milestones like Cryptex40.

  • Run a minimal, time-bounded experiment to observe real behaviors, test assumptions, and adjust before norms harden — with the understanding that waiting for perfect clarity in a complex system rarely works.

There is notable support for the experimental approach.

Open Questions

  1. What is the right weighting between participation and quality in the compensation model?

  2. Who evaluates quality, and through what process, to ensure fairness and minimize bias?

  3. Should rewards be capped per period (monthly or quarterly), and if so, at what level?

  4. How do we ensure the framework stays simple enough to implement while being rigorous enough to avoid gaming?

  5. Is the community ready to commit to a small-scale pilot during the V2 transition?

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2

Thanks for the summary, this is a solid foundation to build on. Wanted to share my thoughts on the open questions.

On the keeper reward framework

I agree with the broad direction here. Keepers who show up and contribute meaningfully should be compensated. The question is how to do it right.

1. Weighting: participation vs. quality

This is one of the key decisions we need to make as a community. Three positions have emerged so far:

  • 70% participation / 30% quality (@SEEDGov’s suggestion): Voting and rationales are onchain and objectively verifiable. You either voted or you didn’t. This weighting rewards the behavior that’s hardest to fake and reduces reliance on subjective quality assessment, which we don’t yet have a proven process for. The downside is it could reward passive “show up and vote” behavior without much incentive to go above and beyond.

  • 50/50 split: A balanced middle ground. Keepers earn half for being reliable participants and half for active contributions. The risk here is that we’re giving equal weight to the quality piece before we’ve figured out how to measure it properly.

  • 30% participation / 70% quality (@alexsotodigital ’s suggestion): This rewards proactive contribution and reduces rent-seeking risk. However, quality contributions (forum posts, proposal feedback, objections) are inherently more subjective and easier to game. Someone could post surface-level comments on every thread just to tick boxes. Without a robust evaluation system, this is the riskiest option.

My instinct is that for a v1 pilot, we should lean toward weighting participation more heavily (70/30) since it’s the metric that’s hardest to game. But I think this is worth discussing openly, and the right ratio may also depend on what tools we end up using to evaluate quality (more on that below). I’d love to hear where others land on this.

2. Who evaluates quality, and how?

This is the hardest part, and I share @DesertDwelr’s concern about subjective measures. I’ve looked at how other DAOs have tackled this:

  • Obol Collective (which @Curia mentioned they helped build) uses a Delegate Reputation Score (DRS) scored 0-100 across three dimensions: voting participation, rationale quality, and forum engagement. Delegates need a score of 65+ to qualify as “active” and earn compensation. Rewards are then distributed using a square root model based on delegated voting power, which prevents the largest delegates from capturing a disproportionate share. The scoring is calculated by @Curia and tracked onchain.

  • Arbitrum DAO runs a Delegate Incentive Program where the top 50 delegates with a participation score above 60% earn up to 5,000 ARB/month. They use Karma to automatically track delegate activity across platforms: voting, public rationales, forum engagement, and discussion contributions. The program ran as a 6-month experiment first before being extended.

  • Optimism also uses Karma for delegate tracking, with a tiered system where delegates are ranked based on activity scores, with different compensation levels per tier. They award bonus points for governance call attendance and notable ecosystem contributions.

For Cryptex, the onchain part is likely already covered. Aragon V2 natively tracks voting participation, delegation, and staking. Crisgarner also mentioned features like a voting multiplier and cooldown period, so the infrastructure is there.

The challenge is offchain tracking: forum contributions, proposal feedback, discussion quality. For that, we’d likely need an external tool. Two options stand out:

  • Karma: used by Arbitrum and Optimism, it automatically tracks delegate activity across governance forums, voting platforms, and other channels. It provides a delegate dashboard where activity scores are public and transparent.
  • Curia’s DRS system: already mentioned by @Curia in the previous thread, they built this for Obol and are working on a conceptual framework for Cryptex. It scores delegates on measurable criteria and tracks it onchain.

I’d suggest we explore both options and decide as a community which approach fits Cryptex best. Either way, having automated tracking rather than relying on manual or subjective evaluation would make the whole system more credible and harder to game.

3. Should rewards be capped, and at what level?

I think capping rewards per period is essential. It keeps the program predictable for the treasury and prevents any single keeper from extracting a disproportionate share. Whether that’s monthly or quarterly, I’d lean quarterly to match the pilot duration and reduce admin overhead.

As for the actual cap amount, I think that depends on the size of the keeper reward pool, which we still need to define (more on this below). Once we know how much CTX is allocated to keeper rewards and how many active keepers we expect to qualify, we can work backwards to set a meaningful but sustainable cap per keeper per quarter. Would love to hear others’ thoughts on what range feels right.

4. Keeping it simple enough to implement, rigorous enough to avoid gaming

This is where I think the v1 pilot approach really helps. If we try to build a perfect system from day one, we’ll either never ship it or overcomplicate it to the point where nobody understands the rules.

My suggestion: start with a small set of clear, hard-to-game criteria and iterate from there.

  • Hard criteria (binary, easy to verify): 80%+ voting participation, public rationale for each vote
  • Contribution criteria (verifiable actions): Drafted a proposal, posted substantive feedback on a proposal thread before voting, raised a reasoned objection that improved a proposal.
  • What we avoid in v1: Scoring based on Discord message count, number of forum posts, or anything that incentivizes volume over substance.

By keeping the criteria tight and measurable, we reduce the surface area for gaming. After the first quarter, we can review what worked, what got gamed, and adjust. This is similar to how Arbitrum started with a 6-month experiment and iterated into their DIP 2.0 based on what they observed.

5. Timing: are we ready for a pilot during V2?

With the Aragon staking system on track to launch by March 6th and the current staking contract extended until May 18th, the migration path for stakers is now clear. I agree with the consensus that this V2 transition window is the right moment to introduce keeper rewards. Running a minimal experiment alongside the Aragon launch makes more sense than deferring and letting expectations harden, as @alexsotodigital pointed out. That said, if keeper rewards need a few extra weeks after staking goes live to get right, that’s fine. Luis mentioned current governance work will count retroactively, so no one loses out.

My suggested framework for a v1 pilot (summary):

  • Eligibility: Vote on 80%+ of proposals AND post public rationale for each vote.
  • Compensation split: Participation vs. quality weighting to be decided by the community (see discussion above).
  • Bonus: Keepers whose proposals get approved and implemented earn a bonus on top of the cap.
  • Quality evaluation: Onchain activity tracked natively via Aragon. Offchain contributions tracked via Karma or Curia’s DRS, community to decide which tool fits best.
  • Cap: Quarterly cap per keeper, amount to be determined based on the total keeper reward pool.
  • Duration: One quarter as a pilot, then review and adjust.
  • Skin in the game: Keepers should ideally be staking CTX or holding Cryptex indices themselves, aligning with Curia’s suggestion.

On keeper rewards funding

One thing I’d like us to clarify: now that the staking allocation and extension are sorted, will keeper compensation be funded from a separate, additional budget with its own proposal and vote?

Luis mentioned on Discord that ideally the keeper rewards allocation would have nothing to do with the staking allocation, which I think is the right approach.

If keeper rewards are indeed a separate pool, we should start discussing the size of that pool and where it comes from so we can design the framework with realistic numbers in mind.

Looking forward to hearing everyone’s thoughts.

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@dnkta.eth thanks for the super clear and well-structured breakdown, really appreciate you pulling in examples from Arbitrum, Optimism, Obol, etc.

A couple of quick points from our side:

1. Minimum CTX Threshold
We should add one more question to the list: What is the minimum CTX that must be delegated to a keeper to be eligible for rewards? This feels like the cleanest “skin-in-the-game” filter and pairs perfectly with the on-chain data we’ll already have from Aragon.

Two sensible options we could take:

  1. a fixed token floor (easy to implement and understand), or
  2. a percentage-based floor (scales with supply).

Our recommendation: pick a simple fixed min CTX for the v1 pilot. This keeps onboarding friction low and leaves % models for later refinement.

2. 70/30 Split
We suggest we work with a 70% participation and 30% quality split.

On tooling, while tools like Karma are excellent for tracking quantitative metrics (voting attendance), they often struggle to measure the nuance of “quality” automatically. Also, not sure Karma can fully automate meaningful quality scoring yet (@SEEDGov could help confirm this as they used this tool well in Arbitrum), so a light human layer here feels safer than pure automation that could be gamed.

We propose that the 30% quality portion be determined by the Head of Governance (or a similar role) to ensure we aren’t just rewarding farming behavior, but actual value-add contributions.

3. Reward Cap
Completely agree — the per-keeper cap should be sized based on the total keeper reward pool we allocate. That keeps everything predictable and prevents any single keeper from draining the bucket.

4. Simple but Rigorous Framework
We propose: 70/30 split (with dnkta’s suggestion here) + minimum CTX delegated combination.

This is simple to track, hard to game, and still rewards real contribution.

5. Timing
Also fully aligned with dnkta here — perfect window to run the v1 pilot alongside the V2 migration / Aragon staking launch. Let’s use the momentum.

1 Like
[RFC] Cryptex Keepers Rewards (CKR)
4

Thank you for the clear summary, this helps move the discussion forward in a very structured way.

  1. How should compensation be weighted?

I believe a 70/30 split (participation / quality) is the most practical option, especially for a first iteration.

Having 70% based on voting participation and published rationales keeps the framework objective and easy to verify onchain, while also avoiding early disagreements around who evaluates contribution quality.

  1. How do we measure “quality” without introducing bias?

I’m less convinced by a reputation-based system at this stage. We currently have several new delegates joining governance, and tying quality evaluation to reputation too early could unintentionally disadvantage newer participants whose insights may still be valuable.

A facilitator role feels like a better starting point. A neutral actor with governance context could evaluate whether contributions meet predefined criteria (for example: meaningful proposal feedback, reasoned objections, or constructive improvements), making evaluation more structured and less dependent on popularity or visibility.

  1. When should this be implemented?

I support running a minimal, time-bounded experiment alongside the V2 transition. Governance systems are difficult to perfect in theory, so testing a simple framework first and iterating based on real behavior seems like the best path forward.

Open Questions

What is the right weighting between participation and quality?

70/30 participation model.

Who evaluates quality, and how do we minimize bias?

A facilitator role applying clear, predefined contribution criteria rather than a reputation-based system.

Is the community ready for a pilot during V2?

Yes. The V2 migration creates a natural reset point where delegation behavior is already being re-established, making it an ideal moment to test a Keeper rewards framework.

5

Hello,

Apologies for the late response. I’ve been chewing on this all week.

To be honest, I’m not sure I understand what problem we’re looking to solve with keeper rewards. I’m going off the assumption that the goal is to increase baseline keeper participation.

I’m a proponent of the KISS strategy: Keep it simple, stupid

Broadly assessing the quality of contributions in an unbiased, fair, and repeatable manner is an extremely complex challenge, and frankly a distraction from the primary focus of the core team.

My vote is to defer this discussion.

That said, there appears to be a desire to launch a program alongside the Aragorn launch, or at least a pilot program soon. If that’s the case, I’d advocate for a 100% participation program to avoid the quality challenge.

I’d set a baseline reward for all keepers who meet a minimum onchain participation rate. For example: the DAO sets aside 1,000 CTX per quarter for Keeper rewards which are evenly distributed amongst all active keepers (e.g. votes on chain for at least 80% of all proposals).

Optionally, the DAO can set aside an extra amount of funds and grant the Core team the power to provide a quarterly bonuses to keepers based on their opinion of the quality of the contributions from the program as a whole.

For example: the DAO grants an additional 4,000 CTX to be used annually for incentives. In Q2, the core team believes contributions were especially valuable, and grants a 50% bonus (150% total) - all active keepers would evenly split the base 1,000 CTX and the 500 CTX bonus. The remaining 3,500 CTX could be rewarded in future quarters with any unused funds being returned to the treasury at the end of the year.

In summary, I advocate for tabling this discussion to focus on the C40 launch. If we decide to proceed with the program, I’d keep it simple with a baseline reward for participation than can be increased through bonuses at the core team’s discretion based on the program’s output quality.

6

Lots of great discussion here. Thanks @dnkta.eth for the writeup and to all who have contributed in the discussion so far. My thoughts on each section in the proposal:

  1. Weighting: I had been leaning toward 70/30 participation/quality, but I have to admit I’ve been swayed by @Mkatx5 suggestion to simply start with 100 participation along with V2 transition. And we can look towards a shift to 70/30 (or whatever percentage the majority supports) in a future cycle (for example when the staking reward cycle renews in May). This would allow time to align on definition of quality and how to administer.
  2. Quality: At first read, I like the sound of what Obol does. I fear introducing too many tiers/ranks/etc. may tend to overcomplicate and could create a situation where it turns into a competition to outdo each other (or worse yet “outlength” each other because more is better, right? :wink: ) instead of just being about genuine participation. I like the idea of a simple threshold – this would ensure engagement with proposals and not JUST showing up to vote. I also like the fact that they at least partially factor in delegated voting power. I certainly don’t want to discourage entry of new delegates, but if we believe that the community pays attention and delegates their voting power to those they see actively participating, then using that measure is also a good indicator of sustained governance quality.
  3. Caps: I agree that the total keeper reward pool per period will be the more important number. Seems like the only time a keeper max would matter is if we have very low participation and a very small number of keepers end up being eligible for rewards. If we have the kind of participation we expect then I feel like the rewards will get distributed such that a per keeper limit is unlikely to even be hit. Not opposed to establishing one if there’s fear of low participation, but simply not expecting this to be a problem. Maybe something very simple like no keeper shall be rewarded more than 1/5 (or 1/8?) of the overall keeper reward pool for the period.
  4. Simplicity: 100% in agreement that we do our best to keep this simple and hard to game, and especially agree with avoiding incentivizing volume over substance. Prefer to pilot with a 100% participation (voting with rationale), but could also get behind a simple 70/30 (including some binary consideration of “sufficient” forum participation) to start.
  5. Timing: yes, supportive of piloting during V2. Though I do agree that staking rewards and keeper rewards are 2 different things and should be allocated separately, I think it may be good to align the periods so that we can consider extension of both on the same frequency. So if we start this pilot along with v2, I would suggest we run it until May 18th. And then on the timeframe we consider extension/adjustment of staking rewards we also consider extension/adjustment of keeper rewards.

Thanks all for the great discussion on this topic!!

1 Like
[RFC] Cryptex Keepers Rewards (CKR)