[Discussion Series] Evolving the Gitcoin Brand: Naming our Protocols & Products

[birdsoar]

Hi everyone, it’s great to see so much discussion happening around names. I’ve been leaning into autonomy on this particular subject, and want to float ideas as our discussion evolves.

There are some excellent points above around creating compelling names in parallel to some of our close collaborators. I agree with that approach. Names can be unique, descriptive, and playful or serious (depending on context). Achieving all of this in one word is possible, and where we probably want to land.

Before diving into to specific names, I’m thinking through this conceptually and want to share ideas around how we can leverage the evolving brand as a framework.

To me, Quadratic Lands is solely a community-building piece of lore. Although the mechanism of QF is deeply rooted in our product suite, the lands themselves are about being a utopia. In contrast, our products and protocols are about providing the structure and support required to make that utopia come true.

If we look at this from the lens of the evolving brand visuals that our designs reflect, we already have a framework for making conceptual brand decisions:

I acknowledge that this is a work in progress, and iirc @Etovardesign has ideas for how to translate this framework with a product focus.

Still, it’s worth filtering the name options through this framework to see where things land - is the name futuristic? optimistic? earth-aligned? regenerative? etc. All of this helps us relate with the biomemetic magic theme.

[birdsoar]

Here is a refresher on biomemetic magic, the thinking behind it and how it might translate to product (the core idea is mutuality):

[jaxcoder]

To follow up with what @kevin.olsen said about ‘stream’ and ‘node’ it may be confusing to developers. I would go in the direction of Base and Allocate like @owocki said, it is very clear to me what they are and what they do just by the name. And of course I am all in on Grants Stack

[carlosjmelgar]

Wow. Blown away by the level of thought, detail and overall effort that has gone into this. I feel like I just earned a degree in marketing.

I love Grant Stack. Clear and concise.

I don’t like Alo based on my previous roles in web3. It rings like Allocation for VCs, private, strategic rounds. Many in the space might make the same connection. We’d have to do lots of storytelling to deliver the growth and development story of Alō.

[jpepper]

I like the idea of using a physical metaphors as the basis of the protocol names, to provide a basis for similar metaphors that can be used throughout UX writing to make the functionality of the product easier to understand, like “stamp” for Passport.

Taking into account @birdsoar ’s Gitcoin Design Matrix, I think it’s important to lean towards more futuristic names in order to encourage action as Alexa suggested, since Grants Stack requires a lot of coordination, organizing, and governance to implement.

Adding onto the suggestions for infrastructure & action-related words mentioned by Alexa:

Grants Protocol

• I like allo and stream, but allo is close to Alo Yoga and Stream is close to Superfluid Streams
• +1 to Arbor and Copia from previous suggestions
• Other suggestions
  • Circulate / Circularity
  • Causa
    • Part of the word for chance in Catalan
  • Backer
  • Commons
  • Cord
    • Reference to tying together community needs, leadership, and builders

Project Protocol

• +1 to Node Protocol due to its descriptive nature and, out of the original proposals, it best reflects the aspect of connection between builders and program owners / ecosystem leaders that Project Protocol allows
• Other suggestions:
  • Pulse
    • Reference to project protocol as a form of community intelligence for program managers, a way to keep a pulse on what the community wants
  • Evolve
  • Compass (also the name of a real estate company)
    • Reference to project protocol as a way for builders to figure out the right direction for their projects to grow
  • Crystallize

[M0nkeyFl0wer]

I like the name Grants Stack for sure.

Alo may confuse people a bit given the Google Allo product that they were pushing pretty hard in the last couple years before the ended it. https://allo.google.com/

A bit of an up hill fight in terms of SEO. Also possibly a confusing spelling thing.

I agree with Kevin that names like Node that have other meanings to devs may create confusion. “If you confuse you lose”. Words to live by.

I will add more re the other names when I have a bit more time.

[M0nkeyFl0wer]

I’m wondering if we might want to use a creative name followed by a descriptive name to reduce confusion. For example Alo - The Gitcoin Grants Home Base. Or something like that which does a better job of describing what it does for the users.

I’m finding that grantees are already getting pretty confused between grants hub and grants explorer. Im worried we are going to have so many names and some of them not a clear description of the functionality that it will lead to even more confusion.

Not going to the same web page to create a grant that you do to apply to a round or donate to a round is going to have a learning curve for sure.

I wonder how these decisions will play themselves out in terms of domain names and the flow of traffic between things.

I’m a bit confused about which names are being changed and which are not.

Is Grants Hub still grants hub? Grants Explorer? Round Manager?

I see 3 proposed names here: Grants Stack (replacing grants suit), Alo (replacing grants protocol), and Node replacing (project protocol).

Is the intention for these protocol names to all be public facing? Are the names for the protocols different than the names of the individual tools (and their associated domain names) within these protocols?

This honestly feels more confusing as opposed to easier to understand.

When describing this to grantees or donors on a twitter space what will they need to know what will we say. Go to grants hub to create your grant and then apply to the round in explorer? Donate to the round in explorer? Find opportunities to get involved in a round… somewhere?

As a round manager what do I need to know? Manage the round in round manager? Support grantees onboarding in grants hub and explorer?

The protocols are the overarching infrastructure connecting these pieces together into a cohesive whole. I get that and I’m excited about it. Maybe we are saying as a round manager you will have access to all the tools in the Gitcoin Grants Stack and these are connected using the Alo protocol and the Node protocol? Something like that?

Just trying to imagine how I will share information about these new names with our 3 different audiences and what they will need to know to participate.

[alexalombardo]

Great thoughts here - we will DEFINITELY be having one liners/headlines for the Stack and the Protocols.

With regard to Grants Hub/Grants Explorer - we won’t be using these names anymore, per my initial note. We will be referring to the different functions within the Grants Stack - but it will all be Grants Stack.

See info from my original post:

You may be wondering what happened to previous names: Grants Manager, Grants Explorer, and Grants Hub. Grants Stack is comprised of several dApps built on top of our new protocols plus the Passport integration. These names were for those individual dApps. For now, we’ve aligned to not name the individual dApps, but instead speak to their functionality in the context of the Grants Stack (Manager, Explorer and Builder.) We will no longer be referring to the individual dApp names (although it’s likely just out of habit those names will continue to come up - but we’ll be socializing a robust glossary soon that will reinforce the transition away from these.)

And this:

You might also be wondering why we don’t mention our new protocols - or why they aren’t part of the naming of the Grants Stack. We’ve aligned on not going too far into the underlying tech powering these dApps, as that will be part of the protocol marketing strategy, which is more focused on ecosystem partners and developers at this stage. For this reason, we are thinking about the Grants Stack name separately from the protocol names.

In terms of domain names and navigation, we will look to amend these so it feels cohesive. Additionally, the visuals will also be cohesive across Grants Stack, so it will feel like a seamless experience. This will evolve much more once we are out of Alpha Rounds.

Additionally, the marketing of the Grants Protocol will be mainly directed at developers. In terms of how we message this to the end user, it will be more like “Grants Stack - built on our open, permissionless, modular protocols” and then the specifics about the Protocols can be accessed on our website, where devs can also access docs.

Hope this helps clarify.

[jon-spark-eco]

Thanks for all the work that has been put into this discussion.

I think Grants Stack is great.

I think my favorite of what I have read is Base for the Project Protocol. I go to my Base to strategize and prepare as a grantee.

Base also makes me think of a Basecamp. That took my mind to an Expedition. Groups pool and allocate funds into an Expedition and Grantees start at the Base(camp) and go on Expeditions.

Other thoughts along this line of thinking:

• Campaign (for all the D&D players)
• Mission
• Adventure
• Voyage

Also, I want to add to what Ben voiced above. We need to think about how this is described in public. Currently, in the Climate Alpha Round, we have a lot of confusion about the Hub and Explorer and what each is for. Grantees go and set up a grant and assume they are done and aren’t trained yet to think now I need to take this grant and apply to the ______ Grant Round Protocol. The names are important but they play heavily into how we describe the overall Grants Stack to the public.

[M0nkeyFl0wer]

Thanks very much for the reply. So can you help me imagine out how I would describe this to grantees. They would go to Alo to set up their grants and Node would be where donors go to donate?

Is the full name Gitcoin Alo? Just Alo? Where does the name Gitcoin fit into the mix here.

And the Round Managers would be using Node to make decisions about which grants are in the round? No distinct name to differentiate the back end? I suppose in a sense they could think of it as the admin panel for their round even though its actually a different site?

Would the tweet to potential donors be go the the Gitcoin Node page for the climate round here: node. gitcoin. co/climate (or whatever it is) ?

[M0nkeyFl0wer]

I like Base too. Although it kinda reminds me a bit too much of Basecamp which is a pretty popular scheduling tool (as well as a company that does a lot of content creation about remote working and coordination). So we would need to somehow navigate that.

My primary thing here really is just being clear. I hate to be negative (especially as a Canadian… sorry). Just a bit worried about how we communicate this clearly to community members. Often things sound and feel different when you start trying to explain it to a potential user of the tools.

[juanna]

Is there a reason we’re trying to separate the Gitcoin brand from the new grants protocol with this new name?

We are offering the same thing as we have in the past-- a quadratic-funding mechanism – just properly decentralized into a protocol product rather than manually running thru our team on cGrants. It’s doing the exact same thing as we were, but automated.

To me, this is a confusing step to take. I can understand in branding situations like Lens separating from Aave, so that they could take their respective spaces in socialfi and defi. Those are two completely different products in who occupy different web3 verticals.

If someone could explain the need for the separation of Gitcoin and “Base/Project/Alo/etc.” [Protocol] it would definitely help me contribute more meaningfully to this naming discussion.

Also, with this new name that will be decided upon–will that entail new branding? I wonder if that would be the best use of resources, vs improving on the microsite / interviewing / fine-tuning our current brand.

I worry that a new name will confuse partners–are we offering a new product? What is the value-add of this new name, and what is the purpose to separate it from our well-established Gitcoin brand?

If we’re trying to use this to help name the product suite like Round Manager, Grants Hub, Explorer–my two cents would be to keep Gitcoin and add flair to the product names, like Gitcoin Bibliotheque, Gitcoin Kontrol Center, etc.

No need to fix what’s not broken!

[Tapassahoo]

nice one , i love gitcoin all . github gitcoin

[alexalombardo]

Thanks very much for the reply. So can you help me imagine out how I would describe this to grantees. They would go to Alo to set up their grants and Node would be where donors go to donate?

All of this will be shared as part of the forthcoming marketing updates around Grants Stack and Protocols.

Additionally, there will be a glossary circulated for further clarification in upcoming weeks.

And the Round Managers would be using Node to make decisions about which grants are in the round? No distinct name to differentiate the back end? I suppose in a sense they could think of it as the admin panel for their round even though its actually a different site?

From the front end side of things, Round Managers, Donors and Project Builders are all engaging with Grants Stack, which is the interface(s) built on the protocols. The domain names will likely not include protocol names. We will need to sort the back end out with GPC.

Would the tweet to potential donors be go the the Gitcoin Node page for the climate round here: node. gitcoin. co/climate (or whatever it is) ?

Would the tweet to potential donors be go the the Gitcoin Node page for the climate round here: node. gitcoin. co/climate (or whatever it is) ?

Again, this will be further sorted once names are selected, but the protocol name does not need to be in the domain (for example, we currently have grantshub.gitcoin.co - grants hub is the dApp built on what we have been calling Project Protocol)

We will share updates on the domain names soon.

[alexalombardo]

As we move from being an Impact DAO to an Impact and Protocol DAO, our product roadmap will continue to evolve.

With these protocols being intertwined but also able to standalone (and have more funding mechanisms than QF and go beyond just grants,) the thinking was around giving them distictive names and identtities .

If you take a look at the original post, Grants Protocol is all about pooling resources and community allocated funding, whereas Project Protocol is more a project hub where project owners can store information, build reputation and apply to rounds. While we will likely not fully “market” Project Protocol at this early stage in time, there is a potential future where this will be an entirely separate protocol with many other applications beyond being part of running a grants program, and therefore we have been exploring giving it its own name.

Also, with this new name that will be decided upon–will that entail new branding? I wonder if that would be the best use of resources, vs improving on the microsite / interviewing / fine-tuning our current brand.

This work is already underway and encourage you to take a look at the docs/links cited in the original post to follow along with the brand evolution work

I worry that a new name will confuse partners–are we offering a new product? What is the value-add of this new name, and what is the purpose to separate it from our well-established Gitcoin brand?

Gitcoin the brand will still very much be a container for these other “products” - our protocols and programs - in the same way Adobe or, for example, is a container for their sub-brands/products.

If we’re trying to use this to help name the product suite like Round Manager, Grants Hub, Explorer–my two cents would be to keep Gitcoin and add flair to the product names, like Gitcoin Bibliotheque, Gitcoin Kontrol Center, etc.

We’re not seeking to name anything beyond Grants Stack, Grants Protocol and Project Protocol currently.

Appreciate your further suggestions regarding names - feel free to add them into the Notion here

[juanna]

So to summarize, the distinction between the two

Grants Protocol: (assuming the grants rounds will be run here)
A place for pooling resources + community-allocated funding to support projects

vs

Project Protocol:
A place where owners store their project information, build reputation, & apply to various funding rounds

To me, the two products described above are both software which directly compliment each other in the same vertical–decentralized, community-oriented funding in web3.

A similar comparison to Alphabet’s software offerings could be Google Pay (payment system) vs Google Drive (file storage). They can interact, stand alone, but both still contain Google in the same because they both serve the web-based software vertical.

Looking at the slide deck, I can see the argument for Alphabet’s Platform Branding structure, but please remember the company was called Google until 2015, when they began acquiring different companies in order to expand their brand across untouched verticals.

However, even in 2023, if you take a look at Google’s product offerings, the most recognized/popular apps on here all have G or Google in the name. We can see that the product names directly appeal to user recognition of Google’s historical reputation by explicitly including Google or G before the function–Gmail, GSuite, Google Maps–and it has been instrumental in each product’s smooth adoption.

Also note the other sub brands under Alphabet occupy extremely distinct verticals–ex: Calico - biotech, Verily - research, Google - software, Nest - hardware, GV - ventures.

It took us years to develop the Gitcoin Grants Protocol, and even longer to create a uniquely positive-sum reputation in this chaotic space. Although I have no doubt we have a great roadmap of incoming products, we should first focus on making this current product suite as successful as possible, not trying to prepare for future products that haven’t even been made yet. As someone who interacts frequently with builders in this space (& I’m sure many contributors relate to this experience), the way people’s face light up when you mention working with Gitcoin feels incredible and makes me really proud to represent this DAO!

Although Gitcoin has existed in the ecosystem for a considerable bit of time, zooming out, we are still incredibly young in our business stage having been founded in 2017. Would warn against imitating the actions of these web2 titans who have been going through many business cycles, product launches, and acquisition since the 90’s/00’s.

It would be a shame if premature branding additions diluted the Gitcoin brand, because we have been the forerunners in decentralized funding space. Definitely an OG blue chip brand in web3 funding at this point. Many projects/teams in this space will jump at the opportunity to use Gitcoin-branded, created, tested, & approved software. The branded house structure like Adobe’s or Google’s native apps makes the most sense right now given our product suite offerings + current reputation at this time.

But also noticed we already lowkey have a Platform Brand structure with Schelling Point (distinctly different vertical–irl conference event) and supermodular? both not explicitly mentioning Gitcoin in the name (although frequently interacting w/ Gitcoin communities & causes). Although these web2 brand structures are great examples for us to learn and draw inspiration from, we don’t need to imitate. Gitcoin is a unique, recognizable brand name that has plenty of mileage left IMHO.

[alexalombardo]

Hey everyone! As some of you may have heard, after much discussion around this feedback, MMM and GPC aligned on two final names: Grants Stack (for the set of dApps that act as the interface(s) for our protocols) and Allo Protocol (for Grants Protocol.)

We feel these names are mission aligned, positioning aligned, audience aligned, and values aligned. Additionally, both are easy to pronounce, to read/write, and in the case of Allo, is ownable if we choose to trademark it in the future (since Google has abandoned theirs.)

Next up, I want to share some additional background on the selection of Allo Protocol** specifically. Beyond aligning with our original naming criteria, this name adequately addresses many of the points made here around function and brand.

1. Function Forward/Descriptive: It is a direct shorthand for allocate or allocation; thus it directly communicates the primary function, the distribution (resources or duties) for a particular purpose (this is the definition of allocation, and the definition of allocate is TO distribute resources or duties for a particular purpose); we will be dialing up the use of the word allocation in other marketing materials including the marketing brief to ensure this correlation is crystal clear

2. Mission/Vision/Worldbuilding: Allo and the concept of allocate/allocation ties into our overall mission of empowering the funding/building of shared needs; additionally, it connects to our overarching vision for a better world; if we think about it in the context of existing names, it also complements Passport well (passport being your passport to this world, and allocation being the way you get the funds you need to build what you need to get there) - so in this sense it still maps to the Quadratic Lands meme while simultaneously not undermining the biomemetic magic concept we’re exploring as the evolved brand direction (more info will be shared this week on the brand evolution work)

We felt it was important to give this protocol a name separate from Gitcoin, since the Gitcoin brand is already so much bigger in mission, vision and product landscape vs. that of this particular protocol.

That said, we do intend to leverage the credibility and equity of the Gitcoin name across all of our protocols - some of this will be accomplished through certain shared aspects of our overarching Gitcoin brand identity, but will also be done with intentional copy (e.g., saying Gitcoin Allo Protocol when introducing it for the first time, or eventually saying Allo Protocol by Gitcoin - again, more to come here as we finesse these details)

Next up we are working on a glossary of terms that will further clarify naming and copy conventions. We will also be sharing updated product information for the Grants Stack and Allo Protocol.

You might be wondering - what happened to Project Protocol? For now, as the protocol is in its infancy, it will continue to live almost as part of Allo Protocol until it is ready to be spun out (I welcome @nategosselin, @michelle_ma, @kyle, @kevin.olsen to elaborate here!)

Moving forward, we hope to leave even more time for discussion and consideration around things like names and greatly appreciate your continued input!

[kyle]

I am pretty excited about the new anming and uniting Project protocol / Grants Hub in the Grants stack and Allo.

Thanks for these details! I am so glad we are delivering on, and making decisions after lots of research and debate! (no shade at all, its been a lot of hard work).

[birdsoar]

Yes! A comprehensive and documented approach is the best. Kudos @alexalombardo and everyone who participated in this discussion.

[ccerv1]

Just want to say that I listened to the Greenpill pod with @J9leger @connor @nategosselin this morning and heard the Allo name drop for the first time … and it was goooood! Congrats on coming up with an amazing name!

(There was a moment of doubt where I thought it might be “Aloe” like the plant but am glad to see that’s not the case)