Hi, I am a smart contract engineer for Vesta and think it would be good to give my opinion about Mikey and Atum. I consider myself pretty impartial to the situation as I do not have a personal grudge or favourite amongst Mikey and Atum/Midnight. I also do not have a huge stake in the current situation financially as I have earned less than a tenth of the tokens that founders own.
First, I don’t think any party is completely “wrong”. I respect both Mikey and Atum (don’t know much about midnight) in that when working with both of them seemed hard working, and wanted Vesta to succeed and be good at what you do respectively. I don’t know exactly what caused this departure but here are my observations of some things about Mikey and Atum to help shed light on the situation.
For Mikey, I think how he handled the staking module with constant changes back and forth was a real roadblock to us shipping on time. This was very frustrating and I think this could be alleviated if Mikey were a little more decisive. Perhaps Mikey was spread a bit thin and didn’t have as much time to dedicate to it, but he probably should have delegated it and trusted me to make a final decision on it. Whatever the reason is I think that was not handled very well.
Recently Mikey has hired a few researchers to collaborate with him in West Coast which I am very positive about. We have had some hires in the past for this but they have not been very good. I think this is a good step forward in trying to build new products since Vesta has not found a product market fit aside from a small amount of power users.
For Atum, most of our communication has been asynchronous for two reasons. I live in Australia so there is not much overlap in our time zones with North America and Atum prefers most communication to be asynchronous. Although I liked that at first(who doesn’t like fewer meetings) over time I started to feel like a lack of regular standup(we only had once a week) was a bit detrimental to how in sync we are about certain things and how much I can learn from him. I think Atum’s way of working is really good if we have a regular pipeline of work that is well-defined. But since we work at a startup requirements and product changes frequently so I think a more regular communication style Mikey proposed is necessary, especially for the early stages of product development.
There would also be times when I talk to Atum and Mikey separately and it would see they are not in sync in that I would hear different things from either of them. That was when I first suspected there might be a lack of communication between them which seems more detrimental since they are cofounders.
That being said I think everyone has flaws and shortcomings, I myself have a lot that I want to change personally. Despite their shortcomings, I think those two are very good at what they do and it’s a shame to see this conflict happen.
Atum is one of the best developers and software architects I’ve worked with. My overall impression is that he is an excellent individual contributor but he doesn’t seem to not enjoy being a manager. I think more frequent communication is pretty key for faster iteration of early-stage design in new products I can see why Mikey would think he is not a good culture fit for a startup like Vesta.
I think Mikey is a good leader who has identified problems with Vesta’s product and team and is proactive at fixing them. I firmly believe he has good intentions with his decision to continue building and wants Vesta to succeed. I think his objecting to the dissolution which I think profits him quite a bit says something. He and the new researchers have been working hard on a new product tangential to Vesta’s main protocol. However, since Vesta has only made incremental improvements to its protocol since inception and has not reached a large market product fit I can see why Atum and Midnight no longer believe in Mikey’s vision for Vesta.
Ideologically I don’t think either Mikey’s or Atum’s proposals are unreasonable asks.
When it does get unreasonable is more in the details. With the ragequit or dissolve I think it is considered unfair to a lot of investors (angels and public) to see a founder who failed at a startup getting paid 650k from the treasury funded by them. Yes, founders put in their time and effort building and should be compensated. But (I’m assuming) they have been paid a salary/wage for their time and probably should get some back for their equity in the business but being able to profit that amount while investors are underwater by a lot is a bit unfair. I think a more reasonable way to dissolve is something like what this person wrote in VSP-3 proposal. I think a fixed amount should be allocated to the founders + team. And then the rest should be given to public token holders. Founders and team’s tokens should be burnt and the portion they sold should be accounted for in their compensation.
Mikey’s proposal of continuing without Atum and Midnight could also be unreasonable. If I was an investor and I knew two cofounders and exiting I should probably have a say on whether we want to continue or not. The investor invested in the cofounders as well as the project/product. I think if the whole community and investors reach a large consensus that they want to dissolve, it is a bit unreasonable to say fuck you I have the power I will continue bleeding the treasury for my pet project(it is now a pet project if no one other than you and maybe a few teammates want to do it while investors deem it unimportant/unprofitable).
Personally, I am okay with either outcome with a slight preference for continuing building for at least a little longer to see Mikey’s work with the researchers come to fruition. I have already booked a flight to West Coast in the next two weeks(before knowing about this conflict) for two reasons. I think being in the same timezone as Atum will alleviate some communication issues with him. I can also work with Mikey in person since more frequent communication is better for early-stage product iteration. We have also begun hiring as Mikey has instructed me to help with the process in case of a situation where Atum and Midnight leave.
However, I would prefer a dissolve over working on Vesta if we don’t get somewhat off a fresh start. If we are working on a new product and constantly interrupted by baggage from either old cofounders, investors or problems with the majority of the community then I think it’s better to dissolve. Because at that point no one is getting what they want. Investors don’t like it they want whatever is left of their money back, The team don’t like it if you can’t work on a new product/project properly.
In the event of a 50/50ish divide on dissolve or continue, I’m not sure what to do. I don’t see myself as an authority, so I will just give my perspective and allow others to decide.
