Hey everyone.
This will be my final report as Community Lifeguards Coordinator. January was a month of transition, and momentum in the CSM community continues strong.
January 2026 Activity
To quickly update on what happened in January before diving into the transition, community support continued throughout the month, and we supported some new tools that emerged from the community. To be specific:
Community Staking Roundtables
- Blockops: Presented their AI tooling for node operators
- 0xDespot: Demo of his CSM community dashboard
Grants given in January
In January we issued two grants for a total of $5,000.
The funding supported tools critical for ICS and useful for the community.
- High Signal: $3,000 for continued support through 2026.
- Retroactive grants: $2,000 retroactively awarded for the CSM Dashboard, a great tool that has seen usage by the community of stakers.
There was also support provided for operators in CSM and members of the LCST program, most of which completed the course and are ready to move to Mainnet!
Other areas like satellite communities, events and day-to-day operator support will still be taken care of by broader efforts from Lido contributors now that there’s no need for full-time CLGs.
What’s changing
After two incredible years serving as a Community Lifeguard, it’s time for an update on my journey with Lido.
When we started as CLGs, our goal was to build a strong community of independent node operators in Lido. And the mission has largely been accomplished.
The foundation is solid, the community is thriving, and operators are helping each other at a level that makes full time CLGs less necessary.
As of February 2026, I’ve joined Lido Labs as a Product Manager for Lido Core. I’m excited because I get to help the community from another angle, helping ship products and features to improve the staking experience in Lido & Ethereum.
What’s next
Grants will continue. Community members can reach out to get support for community contributions, I will still be in charge of those as part of my work. What’s changing is the structure and priorities.
In the coming days I’ll post a separate proposal with structural changes to the CLI, moving toward a grants-only model without ongoing CLG compensation or OpEx.
Thank you
Serving as a CLG has been an incredible journey. Node operators are some of the most engaged and knowledgeable members of the Ethereum community, I’ve learned a lot and enjoyed all this time helping Ethereum decentralize. And I’m even more happy that I’ll continue to do so!
Payment Request
For contributions delivered in January 2026, I’m requesting the CLI Committee consider payment to:
0x06Fb051a46cC49D99Be778BDd6Dcd3519d3820db