Bigfoot Governance

Bigfoot needs both a maintained protocol and a process for selecting people to perform certain network roles. These involve different responsibilities: protocol stewardship determines the protocol's direction and rules, while network governance administers appointments under those rules.

Soliton Group LLC maintains and develops the Bigfoot protocol and official software and is responsible for protocol policy.

Soliton Group LLC also currently serves as the governance steward, a network role with specific authority over governance membership and continuity. The same organization currently holds both responsibilities, but they are distinct roles.

Governance members are volunteers. They contribute to the running of the protocol by sponsoring candidates and participating in decisions to approve or decline appointments of validators, footnote reviewers and other governance members, following the rules for each role.

Governance membership is a network role. It does not confer authority to set protocol policy or a position on the governing board of the organization that maintains the protocol. Appointment methods and approval requirements are defined by the network’s current rules.

Validators participate in agreeing on and recording network transactions under the protocol's rules. When they record an authorized appointment, they carry out the decision made through the appointment process.

Footnote reviewers assess submissions through Bigfoot's footnote review process.

These roles are separate from governance membership. Holding one role does not automatically confer another.

Certain completed network actions include an additional 0.5% protocol support fee. Soliton Group LLC receives the entire fee for its work maintaining and developing the protocol and official software.

Governance members receive no share of the protocol support fee.

The current fee and recipient are disclosed on this page. Changes to either are published with their effective date. Official software presents the exact charge before a participant authorizes an action.

This page records the current public governance arrangement and protocol support fee. Material changes are published here with an updated revision and effective date.