Great questions! I’ll speak just to the questions about the Frequency side and I’ve asked @wes to add notes from the DSNP side.
How are the interests of those owning and controlling the underlying infrastructure aligned or not with the interest of the DSNP users over time?
The interests of any blockchain (not just Frequency) is about being used and providing value. Frequency has a structure that builds collaboration between those transacting on it. The post about Frequency Economics and Capacity goes into a bit more detail on that.
As a general system, the alignment of the decentralized system of Frequency is that of those using it. While nothing of course can guarantee that an upgradable decentralized system is completely immune from drifting and changing (in fact that it is flexible to meet new challenges is important), the decentralization and disinterest (as a system) is key to maintaining that alignment. Should the uses of Frequency (such as DSNP) find it a poor choice in the future, that is a failure of the system to maintain value and utility and the individuals making up the decentrialized control should react by finding new alignment.
(A side note, if you don’t already know about it, you might find this interesting: Gödel's Loophole - Wikipedia which goes into the issue with any system that is completely “upgradable”)
Who will own and control the Frequency blockchain? What is the concentration of this ownership and how might the interests of the owners diverge from that of the users over time?
The goal is that it will be “fully decentralized.” There is a lot of question about what that means as it means different things to different people. My individual version of it is that no one person has a controlling interest. Currently the chain is controlled using a form of Polkadot Governance v1: Governance V1 · Polkadot Wiki That is just a starting point and I’m very curious to hear your or others thoughts on how to generally extend blockchain governance systems beyond merely tokens and systems such as this. (Soulbound tokens are an example, but still can only capture the interest of those directly participating. The delegation system that DSNP and Frequency use mean “coinless” users also exist and should be a part of the general decentralization and direction of the system).
What is the ownership and control structure of the underlying Polkadot chain, and how could the interest of the Polkadot owners diverge from those of Frequency and users of applications built on top of the DSNP protocol?
Polkadot uses a newer version of governance called OpenGov. You can learn more about it here: Polkadot OpenGov | The Pinnacle of Blockchain Governance | Polkadot
More generally, I would say Polkadot has two interest groups. Token Holders and Parachains. Again the utility of the Polkadot Relay chain is foremost.
This however is a (relatively) easy link to break. It takes a few modifications, but Frequency could run on its own without losing old data. It would of course lose the shared security that comes from the Relay chain model of Polkadot, but it is possible should it be needed.
Is there a chance for censorship or exploitation at the underlying chain level even if DSNP is perfectly designed?
The short answer is that it is difficult. It is theoretically possible (true in any system), but the best safeguard is to grow the decentralization. Already Frequency has outside Collators (the nodes that form the blocks), so to censor transactions is already difficult. It will only grow more difficult and expensive over time.
The possibility of a state level actor seeking to merely destroy with “unlimited” funds and bandwidth is always possible. The internet in general is only barely resilient to such attacks and that is as decentralized as the networks built on it can be.
Is there a chance for cultural divergence of the owners from some categories of future users (e.g. developed world owners vs developing world users) that would likely lead to ignorance or neglect of these future users needs and desires, and therefore produce design choices that do not ensure liberty for them?
I think this is mostly covered above, but it is always a problem in self-upgrading systems. There are interesting ideas in political theory about how best to represent the future and not just the present.
Will it be possible for users to fork the underlying blockchain if they deem it necessary, without undermining the DSNP applications running on top (e.g. without fragmenting the user base or social graph)?
Yes… but. Yes, that it is 100% possible. For development, we regularly spin up new versions of the network and “forks” of the network and data are also possible. The but is that unless everyone switched it would cause fragmentation. Splits in networks are hard to pull off. So while possible, I don’t want to be naive in the time, effort, and cost it would have to be successful. Ethereum vs Ethereum Classic is the best example of a successful fork in a blockchain as both continue to exist and the “fork” is actually the one that most think of as “original” (Ethereum is the fork that the majority followed)
Is it possibly necessary for the blockchain to be cooperatively owned and controlled by the users themselves in order to properly and permanently align the interests of the owners with the users?
I would say this is a part of full decentralization. At that point the distinction between “owner” and “user” breaks down and there is none.
The Frequency Capacity system is also setup such that the applications can receive Capacity from anyone. So it would be possible to have an application that receives its ability to transact with Capacity completely from its users.
That was a lot, and I’m sure @wes will have more. @bmiller59 curious for your thoughts? Anything I said resonate with you or I’m excited if there is somewhere you challenge it as well.