<blockquote>
<p>If we want decentralization, should we not focus supporting Single-stakepools with lower saturation?</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Decentralization is a loaded topic that goes way beyond <em>simply</em> delegating ADA to small pools.</p>
<p>A truly decentralized network must incentivize individual participants' behaviors in ways that promote its healthy functioning and long term viability. This is a highly recursive process, because in order to compensate for the inevitable evolution of world conditions, the very definitions of &quot;health&quot; and &quot;viability&quot; too must evolve over time. If the initial conditions are correct, and the first domino is knocked over just right, the result is self-stabilizing feedback loop, which is ultimately the goal.</p>
<p>All of this is to say that, it is unlikely that there can be one-size fits all solution for ranking a set of decentralized service providers (especially for core infrastructure providers like SPOs). These providers are in constant competition with each other, and may offer unique services/incentives that address a particular corner of the delegate market, but is irrelevant for the rest of the stakeholders. The recent <a href="https://www.sundaeswap.finance/posts/iso-update-3" rel="nofollow noreferrer">sundaeswap ISPO</a> applies to most stakeholders, but is still a good example - how do we rank the 30 participating pools in relation to each other? And harder still - how do we rank them in relation to other sets of pools offering different/additional services?</p>
<p>Even if Daedalus ranking was crowdsourced/decentralized (which it isn't), no ranking system can perfectly keep up with all the variables that may influence stakeholders' decisions. Such is the power and responsibility of decentralization - an entire community cannot rely on any one source of data interpretation. Daedalus ranking may be a start, but is far from holistic.</p>
<p>TLDR; spreading ADA across small pools helps to diversify L1 block production. Decentralization however is a meta-phenomenon that isn't represented by any one such metric. <strong>Decentralization is about doing what <em>you</em>, the individual participant, has reasoned to be best for the health and viability of the network.</strong></p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-01-19T15:01:06.707Z
2022-01-19T15:06:54.353Z
2022-01-19T15:06:54.353Z
zhekson
<p>This topic is years old.. Daedalus stakepool rankings are sorted in a fashion that do not benefit small pools. This concern has been brought up on numerous occassions on Cardano Forums yet nothing has changed. It's not a priority for CF because while the K variable may currently be set to 500, the network needs far fewer than that to be secure. This is why CF doesn't care that multi pools dominate. In addition to that there are currently over 3K pools which is way more than Cardano needs or wants - this is why there hasn't been (and probably won't be based on Charles' recent declaration that there is no planned change to K on the horizon) a change to the sorting mechanism.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-01-18T16:29:54.803Z
2022-01-18T16:29:54.803Z
Tygar Pool
<h2>Epoch 315 statistics based on Daedalus-ranking</h2>
<p>Epoch 315 numbers for the k500 pools in daedalus:</p>
<p>From the total 500 ranked pools, 340 are multipools, 160 are single stakepools.</p>
<p>In the first 10 ranked pools are 8 multipools.</p>
<p>In the first 100 ranked pools are 87 multipools.</p>
<p>If we want decentralization, should we not focus supporting <strong>Single</strong>-stakepools with lower saturation?</p>

<wallet><stake-pool><daedalus><staking><decentralization>
Are Single stakepools losing?
# Are Single stakepools losing?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2022-01-18)

## Epoch 315 statistics based on Daedalus-ranking

Epoch 315 numbers for the k500 pools in daedalus:

From the total 500 ranked pools, 340 are multipools, 160 are single stakepools.

In the first 10 ranked pools are 8 multipools.

In the first 100 ranked pools are 87 multipools.

If we want decentralization, should we not focus supporting **Single**-stakepools with lower saturation?

**Tags:** wallet, stake-pool, daedalus, staking, decentralization

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## 2 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2022-01-19. Score: 2

> If we want decentralization, should we not focus supporting Single-stakepools with lower saturation?

Decentralization is a loaded topic that goes way beyond *simply* delegating ADA to small pools.

A truly decentralized network must incentivize individual participants' behaviors in ways that promote its healthy functioning and long term viability. This is a highly recursive process, because in order to compensate for the inevitable evolution of world conditions, the very definitions of "health" and "viability" too must evolve over time. If the initial conditions are correct, and the first domino is knocked over just right, the result is self-stabilizing feedback loop, which is ultimately the goal.

All of this is to say that, it is unlikely that there can be one-size fits all solution for ranking a set of decentralized service providers (especially for core infrastructure providers like SPOs). These providers are in constant competition with each other, and may offer unique services/incentives that address a particular corner of the delegate market, but is irrelevant for the rest of the stakeholders. The recent [sundaeswap ISPO](https://www.sundaeswap.finance/posts/iso-update-3) applies to most stakeholders, but is still a good example - how do we rank the 30 participating pools in relation to each other? And harder still - how do we rank them in relation to other sets of pools offering different/additional services?

Even if Daedalus ranking was crowdsourced/decentralized (which it isn't), no ranking system can perfectly keep up with all the variables that may influence stakeholders' decisions. Such is the power and responsibility of decentralization - an entire community cannot rely on any one source of data interpretation. Daedalus ranking may be a start, but is far from holistic.

TLDR; spreading ADA across small pools helps to diversify L1 block production. Decentralization however is a meta-phenomenon that isn't represented by any one such metric. **Decentralization is about doing what *you*, the individual participant, has reasoned to be best for the health and viability of the network.**


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### Answer by username_2 on 2022-01-18. Score: 1

This topic is years old.. Daedalus stakepool rankings are sorted in a fashion that do not benefit small pools. This concern has been brought up on numerous occassions on Cardano Forums yet nothing has changed. It's not a priority for CF because while the K variable may currently be set to 500, the network needs far fewer than that to be secure. This is why CF doesn't care that multi pools dominate. In addition to that there are currently over 3K pools which is way more than Cardano needs or wants - this is why there hasn't been (and probably won't be based on Charles' recent declaration that there is no planned change to K on the horizon) a change to the sorting mechanism.


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