What does "stakeholders govern the protocol" exactly means?

Question

I read that Tezos can also be used as votes for features in the Tezos development process. Is that related to which phase of process? Making feature requests in repo, accepting ones or sitting in meetings with the crew?

The website of Tezos states proudly:

In Tezos, stakeholders govern the protocol.

but what does this fancy words mean in reality?

(these can also mean only the baking process, but somehow I understood from some other source, that it relates not only for slave like following the protocol but implementing things on top of it and I am interested in what is that all about. Mainly how the tezos govern the software process, if that happens.)

Answer 1

"Stakeholders govern the protocol" is what it says, there is on-chain governance process where amendments to protocol are voted by stakeholders. An overview of how it is done can be found here. It is a 3 step process. In first step filters out best proposals among many via stakeholder voting. In second step, a vote decides inclusion of protocol in test network. In final step, when the changes run smoothly in 2nd phase, a final vote decides the promotion of proposal to mainnet.