An internal debate within the Aave DAO has sparked questions about who controls the protocol's interface and who benefits financially from it. Earlier this month, Aave Labs integrated CoWSwap into the app.aave.com interface, replacing the Paraswap route previously used for collateralized swaps. Representatives pointed out that this prevented swap-related fees from flowing into the Aave DAO's coffers. However, Marc Zeller of ACI argued that while the monetization revenue from the aave.com frontend should have been supporting the DAO, the CoWSwap solver's reliance on external free flash loans bypassed Aave's infrastructure, further reducing DAO revenue. Aave Labs countered that Paraswap surpluses were never a mandatory right stipulated by the protocol and would naturally disappear once the routing logic changed; other frontends remain permissionless, and the DAO is free to build or fund its own interfaces; the future will more clearly distinguish between the economic model under protocol governance and independently funded product decisions. (CoinDesk)