[GCP-014] Gitcoin 🤝 MetaFest

đź“ś Proposals
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Summary

This proposal is about Gitcoin sponsoring MetaFest Croatia, a gathering around coordination, regeneration & the bigger picture - with $10k.

MetaFest is a 3 day event of talks & panels, but mostly fishbowl panels & workshops, with the last day being an unconference and a load of side-activities.

It’s being organized by MetaGame, a coordination game with the current mission of onboarding more contributors into the DAO & Regen ecosystems.

Abstract

Given huge value-alignment between Gitcoin & MetaGame (as can be witnessed in the similarity of Schelling Point & MetaFest) - I propose Gitcoin joins MetaFest as a sponsor.

In case you have no clue about MetaGame, the overlap is in helping people join the ecosystem & start earning, while spreading the memes of regeneration, public goods & impact DAOs.

MetaFest itself has a few goals:

  • Bring together a bunch of different communities - DOers & regens from crypto & beyond as well as people from the game b & metamodern space - including at least 10-20% complete newcomers to all of these ideas.
  • Have communities meet, create bonds & teach newcomers about their memes & technologies.
  • Onboard & activate young people from eastern Europe
  • Organize a full track of “DAO design” workshops aimed at walking people through the whole process, from setting mission & vision, over MVP to sustainability models.
  • Help a bunch of people start impact DAOs, record & turn the above mentioned DAO track into a full online course - then help a bunch more people start impact DAOs.

Specification

MetaFest is:

  • Happening on the 16th, 17th & 18th of August in Croatia
  • It will bring together ~150-200 people from diverse communities
  • Extremely frugal - budget for the whole conference is ~$35k
  • Regular tickets are $200 (I know you won’t like this but its bear & its the way it is)
    • Disadvantaged & underrepresented communities all get 50% discount codes
    • We’ll also be giving away 20 free tickets to volunteers & helpers
    • Anyone joining with the idea of starting a DAO - free ticket
  • Almost fully funded - currently at ~$25k, Gitcoin is joining as the final sponsor risk-free
  • Almost fully planned & organized
  • Soon!

Benefits

What’s in it for Gitcoin:

  • Well, aren’t all of our goals pretty much what Gitcoin wants as well? :upside_down_face:
  • Gitcoin gets perks like: 16 tickets, logo on the website & in media (incl. livestream)
  • Private room in the fortress for whatever
  • Leafy MetaFest bucket hats & swimming shorts
  • The only sponsor with a booth, highlighted as the main sponsor of the event
  • Gitcoin placement as the sponsor of the DAO course content, launching in October
  • Gitcoin community gets 20-uses 50% discount codes
  • Seeing budget cuts & given Schelling Point is unlikely to happen, it might make sense for Gitcoin to partner with us on spreading the memes of public goods & green pills for much cheaper

What’s in it for us:

  • We get to stop worrying about finding the remaining $10k & focus on making the event the best it can be, give more discount codes, get more newcomers to join etc.

Drawbacks

  • Even though its fairly cheap, there are discounts & free tickets - the event is not free for the most part
  • Its happening in a small city with a small airport - not easy for international travelers
  • Its not a directly Gitcoin-branded event like Schelling Point
  • ???

Thoughts?

Do you see any other drawbacks? If you don’t like this proposal, what would make you want to support it?

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@peth
This sounds like an amazing event and onboarding more contributors to the DAO and regen ecosystems are worthy goals. What I like also about this is that in this bear market your focus on keeping the event frugal is spot on. Collectively we need to trim down the larger expensive events so that we don’t have to ask sponsors for larger pots of cash, entry fees are lower and frugality and focus becomes what sustains us through the bear market, thanks for that. And Croatia is one of my favorite destinations - so that too.

But. According to a quick assessment, this proposal scores a 2.3 on a scale of 2-10 on my independent proposal assessment of the metafest proposal.

This being the case, I could not support or advocate for this proposal as it is.

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Hey hey! Appreciate the kind words & the analysis :slight_smile:

Does the project help Gitcoin to deliver on the stated season priorities?

I tried checking what these are but couldn’t find any info…
Would be good to have this pinned in the proposal category or linked in the proposal template or something, would make it more likely people are mindful of the bigger picture.
Would def consider how we could support the season priorities through a workshop or whatever else we could do.

Does the project have DAO support?

Got 2 but would argue for 4 - “Stewards not engaged but the project appears to address relevant problem Gitcoin should solve”.
This problem being greenpillin more people & onboarding more projects to Allo.
I’m also technically a delegate myself, tho one of the worst ones :joy:. Hopefully more relevant delegates support soon.

Is there project success criteria?

I’d say the main success criteria are these:

  • Percentage of newcomers in attendance & greenpilled (at least 10-20%)
  • Number of newcomers that join regen projects &/or DAOs (at least half)
  • Number of people that start projects & Gitcoin grants
  • All workshops recorded & turned into a course on starting projects, including starting a grant on Gitcoin

Thoughts?

What is the probability of success? Is the team known?
2, there are no links to the project

Damn :joy: - sorry about that!
Here’s the link & will add to the proposal itself: https://metafest.wtf

This might actually be the metric we score highest on,
reasons being:

  • Team does have a history, we did InterCon, Fork The World, MCON, MCON2, MetaFest & MetaFest2 over the past 3 years, totaling 400+ sessions.
  • My main project raised >$20k through Gitcoin grants & was #3 in the round
  • Past performance =/= future performance but we raised most of the money, booked almost all sessions, the venue & equipment etc; so at this point its almost guaranteed to be a success
  • Team is somewhat known too; one of the members worked at Gitcoin (Yalor), I’ve been on Greenpill & know a bunch of people over here @connor @Colton @krrisis @owocki @Pop @ceresstation @griff @DisruptionJoe (whom I haven’t met IRL yet but is attending) & probably more - :crossed_fingers: at least one of them will back me up here :rofl:

Does this project contribute to meaningful and relevant Innovation?

  • For starters, I’d say the ability to organize a 3 day conference for $35k is an innovation.
  • We’re also innovating by trying to make a proper mix instead of a crypto echo chamber; bringing in decentralized organizers & regens from outside of crypto, bringing people from the game b/metamodern space & a significant % of newcomers.
  • Finally, we’re innovating by having a full DAO Design Track, helping people start & design organizations.
  • Aaand by turning that into an online course which will be running in cohorts from October.

One metric I found a bit weird was “Does the project help Gitcoin achieve sustainability via mission-relevant income or cost saving?” with 1) being “project has no or low income potential” - there is no “project offers cost savings” option… Here I’d say we offer a very cheap alternative to shelling out $270k for Schelling Point.

Also, is the assessment independent or the criteria?
If the assessment is independent but criteria official, that’s another thing that might be good to pin or add to the proposal template thread to help people when formulating proposals.

Anyway, hope this improves our score!

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Thanks for submitting this proposal @peth. I’m a supporter of events that combine vibes, impact and onboarding. The budget for the event and funding request are definitely in line with market conditions.

Some suggestions to strengthen this proposal:
This event might coincide with the next grants round. It would be cool to have the team commit to onboarding attendees to Gitcoin Passport and the live grants round. This could be a win-win; creating meaningful and quantifiable impact for Gitcoin + exposing the projects you plan to onboard to hands on experience with QF via Grants Stack. This could also open doors to additional funding through future Gitcoin Citizens rounds.

Content creation: Creating content around onboarding and contributing to the round while at a festival sounds very Degen to Regen. Capturing this vibe through content would be a cool way to encourage more of this.

Can you share how many tickets have been sold? This could be a good metric to help determine the potential for success of this event.

ROI could be based on number of passports created + participants contributing to the live round (if it coincides) + content creation + grantee onboarding.

Include more details on existing partnerships and confirmed speakers. Forum readers might be familiar with those names and could help convince delegates to support.

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Compared to some other events Gitcoin has supported in the past the requested amount here is very low, and the impact could be at least as high.

I would vote yes on this proposal for all the reasons you stated, now more than ever bringing the community together is crucial. We need to support the builders, and I also really appreciate the low cost of the total event, plus support to disadvantaged/underrepresented communities.

One note: I hope something can be added to really support Gitcoin directly, as carlos suggests:

I’m aware Gitcoin is suffering during this bear market - like any other project - but as this is a minimal cost I hope this will get a yes, with a few tweaks to the proposal.

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Yes! thanks and I will add that to the v2 of this tool. For now, this is likely our best representation of 13-5-5.

Love the pushback, this criteria is arguably the most dynamic. The more stewards that pile on support for the project, the higher this one goes.

I like SMART goals in relation to success criteria - so some of these could be sharpened up. But more more specific to Gitcoin, as a steward with a chunk of owned GTC, I would be looking for the direct Gitcoin impact. I am all for growing the ecosystem (first and second points) but with GTC near an all time low, I am looking for refined Gitcoin impact. Your third bullet point comes closest to this, but I would ask - for $10K how many new grantees could we deliver?

yes, that changes this part of the assessment :slight_smile:

Agree, this is an innovation and you deserve credit in this area for sure. In the bear, lets live frugally and when the bull comes around again, we continue to live frugally. I personally think Gitcoin needs to be 110% focused on our top three priorities of Allo launch and success, Grants program and Passport and the DAO has to relentlessly eliminate all other distractions.

This is exceptionally important. If this were positioned to replace an existing effort (and that cost would go away) I would agree it has cost savings potential. But 1) This looks like incremental spending and 2) I think applying the same criteria to any future Shelling Point under a GCP proposal would be 100% appropriate.

This is 100% independent. Both the assessment and the criteria. Just me, N=1.
For context, posting GCP request is a newer process for Gitcoin and as we have done about 10-12 of these so far, my own past assessments were not consistently as rigorous as they should have been. In good times, I might be ok with that, but as a GTC token holder - I think we need to be more choiceful.

I developed this semi-qualitative independent proposal assessment (a reapplication of portfolio management tool) and I intend to use going forward. Anyone is encouraged to use, fork, or help me improve.

if this goes to vote, I will redo the assessment.

Thank you @peth for the proposal, your response to this project, and all that you do in the web3 space. People who have passion like you are what make me bullish on web3.

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Chiming in a little late here, but the event @peth is putting on is well worth the sponsorship, MetaGame has been around for ages and building Community and Tech steadily, I was working with them in 2018 and participated in many of their Grants funding rounds, they are super cost effective with all the funds that come to them and continue to build regardless of fan fare.

I would be in strong support of Gitcoin aligning with MetaFest, as Gitcoin and MetaCartel have always been frens :handshake:t4: let’s keep the connection strong and support more grass roots events around the world :earth_americas:

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Thanks for the proposal @peth

I am a strong supporter of the work @peth has done with MetaGame and I certainly do believe that MetaFest will build on top of this. That being said, I would like to echo some of the points that @carlosjmelgar mentions about onboarding attendees to Gitcoin products. Perhaps a part of the ask can be used to run a QF round to compensate the onsite crew?

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We’re at about 150 people currently, I’m confident we’ll get another 50 over the next few weeks.
There are already more people buying now as the event gets closer & we haven’t even started publishing locally yet…

Will do!

Def will add a Gitcoin grants session for helping people create grants if this goes through. @DisruptionJoe will be there so he might be interested in helping lead it.

As for using QF to compensate the crew, I’m afraid it would only complicate things as the crew is miniscule + as it currently stands, won’t be getting paid anything whatsoever :joy:

Most importantly…

Is this enough feedback & iteration to move to proposal?
What’s the next step?

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Hey @peth - to move forward. we use Gitcoin DAO Governance process v3 as our guideline. In short, to move to snapshot, it needs to be posted for 5 business days, and it requires comment from five stewards. By my count, these are the 5 stewards who have commented: shawn16400, carlosjmelgar, krrisis, Yalor and jengajojo. This being the case, you are good to go. Please make any final adjustments to your proposal (is it helpful if you retitle it to [Revised Proposal… ) and when you are ready, let me know and I can post it to snapshot for you. Note, I am ooo this week, so might take me a wee bit to get it posted when you are ready.

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Awesome, thank you!

Couldn’t find info in the Governance process doc you linked but I assume any delegate can turn it into a proposal, or does it have to be you?

Normally wouldn’t mind waiting for next week but asking because its pretty urgent (the event is in 23 days & this will be a significant part of the budget so really need to know if its gonna happen or not, right about now :joy:)

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I believe it needs to be a core member of the snapshot, so not any delegate can do it. Let’s see if we can ping a core members @krrisis or @Maxwell might be able to help

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Given the five Steward comments and five days on the gov forum, I am moving this forward to a vote on snapshot.

You can find that vote here: Snapshot

Def love the Metafest team - early supporters and OG regens in the space :pray:

I will be voting no for this as I don’t think the Gitcoin team has the budget to attend (flights and things), and so the room, booth, tickets and our general presence will be lacking. When we sponsor events, I would want to make sure we can attend and represent in full force. This is just my .02 gwei though

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Ok so the onchain proposal is going horribly worse than the forums would have suggested.

I’m pretty surprised & wondering what’s the rationale behind giving $180k to Zuzalu but refusing to give meager $10k to MetaFest.

The way I see it:

  • Zuzalu

    • Got $180k from Gitcoin
    • $82k going to 3-4 organizers
    • An exclusive event in an elite resort
    • Mostly focused on longevity (at least thats what the proposal said), which has nothing to do with Gitcoin related topics

  • MetaFest

    • Needs $10k from Gitcoin
    • Organizers not even getting paid
    • Inclusive grassroots event giving away a lot of free tickets
    • Mostly focused coordination & regeneration, all public goods, all big topics in Gitcoin

To recap:

  • Zuzalu got over $1m from Vitalik alone & close to or over $2m? in total for organizing this exclusive event (which goes against Gitcoin’s outlined values) in an unnecessarily expensive elite resort, paying San Francisco prices in a country with $10k GDP per capita.
  • MetaFest needs $35k in total, as it currently stands, the final $10k will be paid by organizers who have been working 6 months for free.
  • Zuzalu could have happened without Gitcoin’s funding & for cheaper. MetaFest can’t go any cheaper & desperately needs the final $10k.

As a long time Gitcoin fan & donator still holding my airdrop, I find this massive discrepancy in values outlined & values executed, troublesome & pretty disappointing.
Honestly, it hurts my brain & would love to have some clarity.

Tried DMing you specifically @azeem & @Viriya because I see you both supported Zuzalu but not MetaFest, so would love to hear your thoughts on this. Would also love to hear from @meglister as you were the first to pull the trigger…

There is at least 1 Gitcoin person going & that one is the third highest ranking Gitcoin Steward (Joe). He’s probably not the only one & its a 150 person event, so def don’t need “full force” to cover it. Also could give the rest of the tickets to the Gitcoin community…

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Hi @peth , sorry to hear your frustration and apologies for not engaging on the forum before I voted. I will make a habit of doing that in the future!

I can’t speak to the Zuzalu vs MetaFest support as I joined GitcoinDAO after Zuzalu concluded and did not participate in that vote. I personally did not vote to support MetaFest as I did not believe there was clear or direct ROI to our essential intents (Allo launch & success, Program success, Passport growth.) Gitcoin is experiencing a decline in token price & impacts of a market downturn and recently cut workstream costs by 20% (Update on Gitcoin Workstreams and Budgets). Under these circumstances, I do not personally feel that we should support GCPs that do not have direct ROI towards those essential intents. Event sponsorship is very hard to directly attribute ROI in general, especially when there are not product or BD reps at the event to capture feedback or interest.

For the future, there is a forum post going up shortly that should outline some more background on this thinking, and give examples of the kinds of things that impact those EIs.

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@peth. Thank you for trying to push this forward. I know it is a struggle and sometimes hard to see logic within a fluid community that is reacting to new realities.

I think your comparison to Zuzalu is compelling and should make all token holders think about past spending and ask if it was the best use of resources. I acknowledge my own bias given I voted against Zuzalu, but did not speak out against the spending more vociferously.

I have redone my assessment and your score moved from a 2.3 to a 4. An improvement, and I thank you for the revisions, but I will still vote against this proposal.

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Thank you, I think that makes sense.
We definitely would have had all 4-5 projects that come out of the DAO Design Track also create Gitcoin grants (as this piece of feedback on Allo was shared before), but I understand that that + the online course branding might not be enough ROI.

The frustrating bit is mainly the Zuzalu comparison. Giving 200k to Zuzalu but then being like “nope, cant give 10k” for an event that’s actually more values-aligned with Gitcoin. 80k for 3-4 salaries vs 10k to not have negative salaries :rofl:. Just doesn’t sit well. I hope the ones who voted for Zuzalu but voted against this will have some explanation.

Thats fair @shawn16400, thank you for reassessing. You voted against Zuzalu so I definitely appreciate the consistency there. Maybe the whole community realized supporting Zuzalu with 200k was a mistake after having to let go some of the Gitcoin employees - on the other hand, the difference in budgets is vast & 10k wouldn’t make or break Gitcoin but definitely broke our budget.

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Thanks for being an active member of the community and prosing this sponsorship opportunity. I really value your participation and interest in promoting Gitcoin at Metafest. I believe this would have been an easy pass in different market conditions. You raise good points in relation to Zuzalu. It’s also important to realize that market movements are unpredictable and that decision was taken before the GTC token marked new all time lows, which has resulted in the DAO reassessing all spending, including reducing head count by 20% as Meg noted.

Funding opportunities are scarce across the entire industry, not just Gitcoin. Many grants programs have shut down all together. I would like to offer some guidance on best practices before and during the upcoming round so you’re well positioned to perform well during GG18, which is fast approaching. This is a great fit for web3 community and education. You won’t get the funding in time, but it could provide funding to retroactively pay event contributors.

You can also do some integration of Gitcoin products during the event, which could position you well for future Citizen Rounds.

It’s not helpful now, but something that could have helped this proposal pass is showing Gitcoin related integration from past events. This could have allowed the DAO to consider potential impact without having core team present. Maybe you can achieve this during the upcoming event and help secure future sponsorship.

Please reach out to me if you would like to jam on ideas to mobilize your community to show their support during GG18.

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I will be voting no, not because I don’t want this event to succeed (I do!), but because the DAO has limited resources and an ambitious roadmap right now. Moreover, given @kyle’s comment about other members of Gitcoin not attending, this just doesn’t seem like a good fit.

Best of luck and I hope the event is still able to proceed without Gitcoin!

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