The system is not working if the 'okay' that comes from witnesses is based on fear... Of losing votes. I don't know for sure that's the case, but it might be.

It frustrates me that I want to vote for witnesses and take that quite seriously but now feel this huge need to organize a press conference where the witnesses can answer questions to the community :-) Because 'we the community' have to scrape our information from so many places and so many places are not even accessible to us... I mean, what discussions have been held behind the scenes? Who had what opinion? I recently got a message from a (smaller) witness why I had removed the witness vote - I told this witness I just was confused after some things that happened and was now basing my votes on what I could actually see and not on what I thought people were doing.

I knew this witness might be doing right but it just was not visible and I need more visibility.

But then again, I didn't remove all the votes of all the witnesses I had doubts about, because well, I'm just super unsure of so many things :-)

I feel the need for a more open witness platform with discussions like Politicians do when they are running for president or towards other elections. I know there are a few of these happening on but at times like these I need them every week until the big release is launched. Just a 'state your opinion on the following issue'... kind of format and each witness in the top xx states their opinion in 1 minute max or something.

Okay, this comment might get too big for the available Mana I have :P Joking. I have no finalized opinion, but just some random thoughts I wanted to share.