There is uproar in the IOTA community over official plans to increase total token holdings by 65 percent. Meanwhile, IOTA Foundation CEO Dominik Schiener refuses to answer substantive questions.
IOTA plans to bring in the Stardust upgrade on Sept. 29, which will also “reprint” 1.8 billion IOTA. Foundation head Dominik Schiener is therefore under criticism: because the increase of the total stock of all IOTA by 65 percent will represent an “inflation hammer” in the coming years and trigger considerable price pressure. If you watch the current video Q&A session with Schiener, you will get the feeling that he is withholding information and categorically refuses to give the community a say in such far-reaching decisions. Some examples:
– Schiener is asked why there has been no referendum to increase IOTA’s total stock and none is planned. “We believe that those who work on IOTA every day are also the ones who can make the best possible decisions for IOTA,” Schiener replies. Not only IOTA co-founder David Sønstebø sees this completely differently, who feels ignored by Schiener in an exemplary manner and receives a lot of support from the community for his demand for a referendum.
– Schiener is supposed to provide information on who the so-called “contributors” are and have selected, who are to receive millions of US dollars in IOTA as part of Upgrade Stardust. Here, too, Schiener is stonewalling and cannot even bring himself to exclude personal enrichment as a “contributor”. So 5 percent of the future total stock of all IOTA will be distributed to “Contributors” for free and it remains a secret who will profit from it?
– The IOTA Foundation’s finances have always been a sensitive issue, and empty coffers have apparently prompted the foundation under chief Schiener to avert bankruptcy by reprinting tokens. But even here, Schiener does not want to be transparent, which is actually self-evident, and state how many IOTA the foundation currently still owns.
– Sønstebø and others have expressed in recent days to have lost their trust in the IOTA Foundation under Dominik Schiener. But Schiener smiles over such criticism and says that the committee of validators coming with Stardust will make the network decentralized and thus trustworthy. In terms of content, this is simply nonsense, because the ten members of the committee are appointed by Schiener and the foundation and are not legitimized by a democratic election. In addition, Schiener has not yet revealed who is actually to sit on the committee alongside the foundation.
– The decision to unceremoniously shut down the IOTA Side Project Assembly (ASMB) also created a lot of buzz. Schiener is now being asked what will happen to the approximately 18 million US dollars in venture capital that has already flowed to Assembly and has apparently been used up elsewhere in the foundation. Schiener answers that these capital providers would be reimbursed with a portion of the new IOTA. In plain language, a wave of IOTA sales is brewing here as well.
Conclusion: IOTA appears to be severely battered – Schiener undeterred
Just over a month ago, Schiener had admitted mistakes in the information policy and promised more transparency and opportunities to have a say. The result is pretty much the opposite – and the price curve of IOTA is tumbling downwards. Pushing through such a plan of miraculous token multiplication at IOTA, as Schiener is currently doing, has nothing to do with principles of cryptocurrencies like decentralization, self-governance and capped maximum amount (Bitcoin: 21 million tokens). Those who are involved in the drama as IOTA investors should ask themselves self-critically whether earlier warning signals – as regularly published here with us – should not have been taken more seriously.
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