Representatives

Representatives are Kakitu accounts that vote on the validity of transactions on behalf of accounts that have delegated their balance weight to them.

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What Representatives Do

1. Receive blocks — monitor the network for new blocks that need confirmation
2. Vote — sign and broadcast vote messages expressing support for valid blocks
3. Propagate votes — pass votes from other representatives to the rest of the network (PRs only)

Representatives do not: - Hold other users' funds - Have any ability to block or censor transactions - Earn rewards or fees

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Delegating to a Representative

Every account can delegate its balance weight to any representative. Delegation: - Is free (costs no KSHS, just a change block with PoW) - Can be changed at any time - Does not move your funds

# Change representative via RPC
curl -s -d '{
  "action": "account_representative_set",
  "wallet": "WALLET_ID",
  "account": "kshs_YOUR_ACCOUNT",
  "representative": "kshs_REPRESENTATIVE_ADDRESS"
}' http://localhost:7076

When an account is first opened, the representative defaults to the account address of the first block's representative field.

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How to Become a Representative

Any node operator can become a representative. The steps are:

1. Run a Kakitu node with enable_voting = true
2. Set the representative field in your node's config to your kshs_ address
3. Ensure that address's private key is available in your node's wallet
4. Ask others to delegate their balance weight to your address
5. Keep the node online with high uptime

A new representative starts with zero weight and grows as more accounts delegate to it.

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Principal Representatives

A Principal Representative (PR) holds at least 0.1% of online voting weight.

PR votes are rebroadcast by every node that receives them, giving PRs network-wide reach. Non-PR votes count toward quorum only for the nodes that directly receive them.

Becoming a PR requires accumulating significant delegated weight. The network typically has 10–30 active PRs.

To check current PRs:

curl -s -d '{
  "action": "representatives",
  "count": "100",
  "sorting": "true"
}' http://localhost:7076

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Choosing a Good Representative

When choosing who to delegate to, consider:

Factor	Why it matters
Uptime	Representatives that go offline reduce network quorum, slowing confirmations
Infrastructure	Good hardware and connectivity = faster vote propagation
Decentralization	Delegating to smaller reps improves network resilience
Transparency	Operators who publish their uptime and configuration are more accountable
Not self-custodied by an exchange	Exchange reps create centralization risk

You can view representative stats at explorer.kakitu.org/representatives.

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Representative Lifecycle

graph LR
    A[New representative created] --> B[Zero voting weight]
    B --> C[Accounts delegate to it]
    C --> D[Weight accumulates]
    D --> E{Weight >= 0.1% online?}
    E -->|Yes| F[Becomes Principal Representative]
    E -->|No| G[Regular Representative]
    F --> H[Votes rebroadcast by peers]
    G --> I[Votes count locally only]

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Offline Representatives

The network tracks online voting weight using a rolling window of recent vote activity. Representatives that have not sent a vote recently are excluded from the online weight calculation.

If a large representative goes offline: - Online voting weight decreases - The quorum delta (0.67 × online_weight) decreases proportionally - Network can still confirm transactions, just with a reduced set of voters

This is by design — the network remains functional even when some representatives are offline.