PB accountability

Recently there has been a spate of staff investigations into banks related to PB. While the initial intentions may have been pure, these surprise audits took many by surprise and eventually proved deeply unpopular among the endgame community. The ToS was changed soon after to add a new rule so the act of "refusing to distribute drops and/or profits properly and adequately" now falls under the mass griefing clause. The meaning of "properly and adequately" can only be guessed.

PB banks exist primarily as a logistical tool to handle money as it is too cumbersome for a host to individually pay every runner. For the last 2.5 years, PB banks have broadly behaved with good intent but due to a lack of regulation, each bank has its own patchwork of accounting metrics. A bank is built on trust and often maintained at expense of the hosts's time and only in very serious and rare situations were there audits as it causes significant reputational damage. That trust is now at risk because of bank run plotting by some members of staff prior to mass audits. On the horizon, there are new runs hosted by staff members (staff-hosts) who are likely also their self-appointed regulators. Staff-hosts can be considered safer because they have insider knowledge of the path of future regulation, enabling for more resilient runs. By being able to self regulate, staff-hosts can act with absolute certainty rather than resorting to the art of guessing, and freedom from public audits, amounting to significant, unearned advantages over current hosts. A real world example of this problem is Boeing/FAA.

In the past, I have been burned by someone with such contradictory incentives. The month prior to prestigious coin implementation, I found there was an individual relentlessly undercutting me selling cs every time I owled. I had 80 cs at 250m each and they ended at 225m the day before patch, a 10% loss for the month alone. Prices fell precipitously the days after and I knew at least someone on the server was made whole. I wish there is some oversight and transparency with these new developments and hope to compete on a level playing field going forward.

Spoiler: correction

correction: my numbers above were based on ws, based on owlrepo the scroll price dropped from 230m to 201m in the time. Notice the jump in volume

Spoiler: correction 2

legitimacy of CS transactions were clarified privately