Statement by BP.Fish regarding the Allegations of Vote Buying and Collusion between Chinese Block Producers BP.Fish Follow Oct 5, 2018 · 3 min read

On the 26th of September Chinese source, EOSONE , released a file documenting the alleged collusion, mutual voting, and pay-offs occurring within the Chinese EOS Block Producer community. The two main allegations highlighted in the article are that of Chinese Block Producers mutually voting for each other to cement their positions as block producers, and that a particular Block Producer openly voted for BP candidates in exchange for EOS returns. We acknowledge that these are serious allegations, and should not be taken lightly. However, there’s a lot to unpack here, and things are not as straightforward as they seem.

Mutual voting and vote buying are frowned upon within the EOS community. With that said, this comes down to governance issues, something which EOS is experiencing so early on, by design, rather than four years down the line like Bitcoin. Unlike Bitcoin, we are tackling these issues head on, as they arise, ensuring that we have the upper hand at all times. We choose to look at this situation as an opportunity to foster growth, rather than as something inherently negative.

We at BP.Fish are aware that these allegations involve our company, and we’d like to clarify a couple of things: Firstly, we did not vote for Huobi. We acknowledge that we feature in the file. However, there are some inaccuracies in the document and the fact that we voted for Huobi is one of them. Secondly, there are disparities in how BPs function in the West versus how they function in the East. This is down to cultural differences and, while it’s something that needs to be acknowledged, we know that this entire situation could be ironed out through education and community building.

Marshall Long is the co-founder of TheLink.one, an organization dedicated to bridging gaps within the crypto and blockchain communities. Their goal is to transcend cultural biases, bringing the Eastern and Western communities together through a series of educational events, designed to bring back the human element to blockchain and peer-to-peer ecosystems. Part of the reason he founded TheLink.one was to overcome cultural boundaries that could lead to more situations like this, and to build a close-knit EOS community.

“The place this community is in, is very indicative of Bitcoin circa 2014–2015,” said Long. “The entire reason I’m involved in EOS is because these things are front-loaded by design. Once we scale up, it’s generally too late to change the governance model, and overall it bodes well that this stuff is happening year 1 of going live.”

BP.Fish does not condone the alleged actions of these Block Producers. However, we also have to acknowledge that we don’t have the full story yet. We ask that the EOS community recognize that much of this could be down to a misunderstanding on a socio-cultural level, as well as natural growing pains that occur within in a platform as young as EOS.

Original Research piece by EOSONE can be found here.