Name: Blockchain at Berkeley

Address or ENS: CalBlockchain.eth

Twitter: @CalBlockchain (verification will be posted here)

We have read and understood the Delegate Commitment Process: Yes

We understand that becoming a delegate is a significant commitment: Yes

our reasons for wanting to be a delegate: We are active delegates for Uniswap, Compound, AAVE, Tribe, and DYDX - we believe we have the infrastructure and experience to contribute to Optimism governance. We see Optimism governance as a bold step for the L2 space, governance structures, and Ethereum as a whole - we hope to contribute greatly to the conversation.

Our view on the Optimistic Vision: Blockchain at Berkeley, as a non-profit, student organization focused on onboarding individuals into the crypto space through a technical-first value driven approach, supports the Optimistic Vision. We see the failure of our market to reward individuals based on collective impact, which we want to steer the Web3 community away from. Furthermore, we see the need for the Web3 space to scale in terms of values. The crypto space emerged due to philosophical ideals of anonymity and decentralization, and has grown to value composability, forming communities, and defining ownership. We want to see these values strengthened throughout the space, and the Optimistic Vision aligns with this by supporting public good projects that reward impact.

Our view on the first three articles of the Working Constitution:

1. We are confident in the OP collective’s ability and determination to define itself. We are committed to pushing the boundaries and being experimental with OP governance for the goal of developing a well informed permanent constitution when the collective is mature. We see the need for a more rigid structure overtime - but hope to contribute greatly to the collective’s experimental years of self-determination.
2. We believe OP’s bi-cameral system will be the force that ensures positive impact is profitable. Simple fungible token governance can create unhealthy dynamics - decisions made based on token price, consolidation of voting power, buying votes for selfish reasons, etc. Onboarding citizens who care about the success of the protocol - and not attaching a price tag to their vote - will help defend against these trends we have seen play out in other protocols. The dynamic between $OP holders and OP Citizens will create a system of checks and balances that we believe will be equilibrium of digital governance.
3. We view progressive decentralization as a necessity in our space - and we are grateful the Optimism Foundation will oversee stewardship of the Collective in its youth. We trust as the Collective matures and decentralizes its voting power, control over Optimism will be handed over. We hope to help aid in maturing governance.

Our skills and areas of expertise: Smart contract development, full-stack development, DeFi, teaching and creating educational content, external/community generating!

Our Web3 interests: DAOs, DeFi, Infrastructure, Social impact

Our favorite Web3 projects: Gnosis Safe, Tribe DAO, Compound

Languages we speak and/or write: English, Mandarin, Turkish, Telugu, Punjabi, Hindi, French, Spanish, Farsi, Armenian, Odia, Japanese, Russian, Portuguese, Gujarati, German

If you have any questions before delegating to us - feel free to contact our organization on twitter @CalBlockchain or me personally @DevenMat