[Proposal] Passport Season 20 & 21 Budget Request

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[Proposal] Passport Season 20 & 21 Budget Request

This seeks funding for the Gitcoin Passport workstream for Seasons 20 and 21 (Nov 1, 2023 - Apr 30, 2024). The proposal has been reviewed and coordinated with CSDO and key Stewards, namely, @kyle @meglister @Viriya @vinayvasanji. We still want your feedback and find it crucial to optimize our roadmap.

TL;DR

Gitcoin Passport aims to be the go-to solution for web3 identity management. In Seasons 20 and 21, we’ll concentrate on five key pillars:

  1. Effectiveness: Improve identity scoring models
  2. Adoption: Grow to 1.5M passports
  3. GTC Utility: Strengthen GTC-based identity and community ties
  4. Data: Enhance and aggregate Sybil detection and data sets
  5. Partnerships: Increase both API and onchain partnerships

Outline

Gitcoin Passport is the premier solution for easy-to-use identity management tools that protect communities from Sybils and bots. Our easy-to-use app makes it possible for web3 citizens to establish credibility and build online reputation while preserving privacy and user control and our API lets web3 communities access a powerful layer of security with just a few lines of code.

Recent Achievements: In Season 18 and 19, we identified early signs of product-market fit, marked by a 3x user growth and a 6x increase in GTC Staking.

Objectives for Seasons 20 and 21: This table lists the milestones and deliverables we plan to tackle. While they are in a loose priority order, their final sequencing is still under evaluation.

Initiative/Project Outcome Milestone/ deliverable
Improve Effectiveness Enhance the scoring model Develop a scoring model with <10% Type I errors (False positives - Sybils are classified as human)
Grow Adoption & Usage Expand user base Increase Passport count to 1.5M from a baseline of ~700k-750k
GTC Utility Strengthen GTC-based identity and community ties

Double GTC staking to 2M GTC

Double the community stake addresses in the GTC social graph to 25k, up from a current baseline of 12.8k
Data Improve Sybil detection

Validate known humans

Create a 3rd labeled category		 Identify > 1M Sybils

Catalog > 20,000 verified human users

Develop modeled insights to classify bots, suspicious activity, or reputational attributes
Partnerships

Increase API integrations

Onboard onchain partners

Partner > 70 API users from a baseline of 30-35

Engage > 5 onchain partners from a baseline of 0

Note: The milestones are subject to change as we continue to assess the most effective order of implementation.

By focusing on these objectives, we aim to fortify Gitcoin Passport as the go-to solution for identity management in the web3 space.

Milestone Update(s)

Season 18 Update for S19 Budget Request

In Season 19, our growth was slower than expected, reaching 700k total passports which is 70% of our target of 1M. However, we exceeded expectations in GTC staking, hitting over 1M GTC against a target of 450k.

We’ve also expanded our service offerings to include onchain Passports. The $2 mint fee saw good uptake, with almost 11k users moving their Passports onchain, even without partner-driven incentives.

Milestone Report for Past Season

Legend:
:green_circle: Success/Completed/Shipped
:yellow_circle: Incomplete but will hit goal/priority changed
:red_circle: Incomplete, will not hit goal
:black_circle: Cancelled

Initiative/Project Key Results Value Delivered
Passport Holder Experience Improvements :red_circle: 699,000 Passports Reached 70% of target, yet proved scalability. Business Development is now crucial for adoption.
GTC Staking Improvements :green_circle: 1,034,000 GTC Staked Surpassed the goal by a large margin. Demonstrated that identity staking enhances GTC utility.
Revenue Experiments :green_circle: 12.5 ETH /~$20k USD Initial revenue achieved through mint fees, validating our revenue model.
Onchain Scoring :green_circle: Launched on OP Over 11k Passports moved onchain. $2 mint fee well-received.
Research Custom Community Experience :green_circle: New endpoints & parameters Enhanced adaptability for integration partners, based on their feedback

Observations:

  • While we fell short on passport adoption, we found success in GTC staking, revealing a clear path for utility.
  • Revenue streams are starting to show promise.
  • Despite lacking full utility, onchain Passports gained surprising traction.

By revisiting our milestones and assessing both successes and shortcomings, we’re armed with invaluable insights for strategizing in the upcoming seasons. For more granular details on our past work and future plans, please refer to our previous budgets for S17 and S18 & S19 budget request, as well as the S19 Amended Budget Request and Passport Roadmap.

Feel free to ask for further clarifications or discuss any points in greater detail. Thank you.

Budget Update for Season S20

Our financial strategy aims for stability; hence, we are maintaining a nearly flat budget for S20 compared to the revised S19 plan, which already saw a 16% decrease.

Team Composition

Full-Time Contributors: 8

  • Developers: 4
  • Product Manager: 1
  • Data Scientists: 2
  • Workstream Lead: 1

Part-Time or Shared Contributors: 8

  • Support: 2
  • Design: 1
  • DevRel: 2
  • DevOps: 2
  • Operations: 1

Key Changes

  • Executed a headcount reduction to maintain budgetary discipline.
  • Slashed the DevRel budget by 45% impacting our ability to fund bounties and hackathons.

Note: This was a strategic move to achieve a >20% overall reduction, making room for a dedicated Data Science role focused on Passport.

Funding Period: This updated funding proposal targets Season S20 and S21, spanning from November 1, 2023 to April 30, 2024.

We encourage governance stakeholders to provide feedback and raise queries, as your insights are crucial for our ongoing improvement.

Thank you for your attention and participation. Feel free to dive deeper into any areas of concern or interest.

Funding Request for Seasons S20 & S21

Requested Amount: Gitcoin Passport is requesting an allocation of ~1,251,581 GTC, equivalent to approximately $1,101,392, to cover both S20 and S21. This includes reserve and rollover funds.

2023.11 2023.12 2024.01 S20 2024.02 2024.03 2024.04 S20 S20+S21
Total GP Budgeted Spend $149,239 $170,864 $158,489 $478,591 $169,864 $178,864 $166,489 $515,216 $993,807
33% Reserves $159,529 $171,737 $331,266
Past Season Treasury Balance $223,681
Total S20&S21 Request $414,439 $686,953 $1,101,392

Budget Evolution

S17 S18/19 Amended S19 S20 (Projected) S21 (Projected)
Passport Budget $515,254 $589,846 $494,116 $478,591 $515,216

Note: The GTC amount requested and reserves will be updated based on market conditions when this proposal moves to Tally, using the lower of the current price or the 20-day moving average.

Budget Breakdown

Breakdown staffing, contracting, operational expenses

We have meticulously accounted for upcoming expenses, aiming for a lean but comprehensive budget. Our 16-member team comprises roles in Product, Design, Engineering, DevRel, Operations, and Support.

S18 (Actual Spend) S19 (Projected Actuals) S20 (Requested) S21 (Requested)
Contributor Salaries $373,791 $318,102 $341,674 $349,799
Contracting (Dev Ops, DevRel, design) $114,192 $70,969 $75,192 $99,192
OpEx (Software subscriptions, gas, audits, travel, professional development) $31,835 $42,236 $61,725 $66,225
Total $519,818 $431,307 $478,591 $515,216

Revenue & Reporting

  • All revenue generated will either return to the DAO treasury or roll over into the next season.
  • Throughout the season, we’ll transparently report to CSDO and Stewards on revenue, currency adjustments, and other critical metrics.

We Want Your Input

We welcome your expertise in several key areas:

  • Suggestions for integration partners.
  • Introductions to potential onchain pilot programs.
  • Participation in user interviews.

Your novel ideas for expanding the reach of Gitcoin Passport are invaluable.

Thank you for your time and insights; your input makes us better.

12 Likes
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It’s exciting to see the progress Passport is making, especially in GTC staking! I’m supportive of this budget.

3 Likes
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Appreciate the thought that’s gone into goal setting and Passport growth in this budget. Also excited to see growth in GTC staking and revenue gen last season!

I’m supportive of the budget!

1 Like
4

Great progress. Increasing revenue, utility, and adoption, while maintaining a relatively flat budget is an impressive achievement under these market conditions. I also appreciate the thought that went into this proposal. I’m supportive of this budget.

That said, I recommend that the workstream lead consistently evaluate the pace of achievements against targets this season. If necessary, they should consider budgeting for and onboarding a FT BD contributor next season to accelerate progress towards the goals set.

1 Like
5

Thanks @vinayvasanji !!

That’s a good point about dedicated BD within Passport. We’re really trying hard to hold budget flat and I’m feeling quite confident with the work @azeem has been able to do so far, but we’ll keep that in mind if we find we’re struggling with partnerships.

2 Likes
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I’m overall completely supportive of this budget!

2 Likes
7

Really looking forward to this next phase of Passport. It feels like we have a lot to tackle to get to PMF but are seeing traction with increased number of holders, having successful revenue experiments and overall growth of adoption. Onwards!

1 Like
8

The Passport team has an immense challenge ahead of them tackling one of the biggest problems in the Web3. That said, I couldn’t be more confident about the individuals that are currently staffed to take on these challenges and doing so with rigor and focus. I will be voting ‘yes’ to this budget proposal.

2 Likes
9

I’m supportive of the budget and interested in participating in user interviews.

2 Likes
10

I support this budget and plan to vote yes for it.

Passport has improved by leaps and bounds over the past few seasons – both UI-wise and in increasing the cost of forgery for sybils / airdrop farmers. The combo of passport + cluster-match QF feels pretty powerful right now!

I appreciate this team’s openness when it comes to assessing where targets have been met and fallen short. I also appreciate the strong focus on partnerships and creating revenue + utility for GTC. It was cool to see passport emerging as one of the top apps on Optimism and using Ethereum Attestation Service last season!

That said, there are two things on my mind that I’d like to see more attention paid to.

First, the UX remains a polarizing issue. Last round, there remained frustration from experienced Ethereum users and newer folks alike. Growing the user base =/= improving the UX. I love the vision of an “easy-to-use app that makes it possible for web3 citizens to establish credibility” but I’d also like to see some user data from outside Gitcoin’s core community to gauge how close we are to this.

Second, I worry that Passport could be over-indexed on Gitcoin’s use case and at risk of being eclipsed by solutions that assign a Sybil / reputation score without any additional interactions required by users (eg, Trusta Labs) OR are highly optimized to creating a community-specific web of trust (eg, Optimism’s badgeholder referral system). I’d kinda like to see one of those marketing “competitive analysis” matrices and see where Passport rates its feature being strongest – and then really driving hard on those requirements.

Again, I am impressed by this workstream, its ability to ship fast, experiment towards PMF, and drive revenue. I will be voting yes – with high hopes for what this team accomplishes in the coming seasons.

3 Likes
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I love how much progress this team demonstrated this past season! I support this budget and am excited to see the progress this team will make in the seasons to come

1 Like
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Thank you for the detailed feedback!

Passport has improved by leaps and bounds over the past few seasons – both UI-wise and in increasing the cost of forgery for sybils / airdrop farmers. The combo of passport + cluster-match QF feels pretty powerful right now!

Thank you @ccerv1 we’ve worked hard on the trying to improve the end user experience!

I appreciate this team’s openness when it comes to assessing where targets have been met and fallen short. I also appreciate the strong focus on partnerships and creating revenue + utility for GTC. It was cool to see passport emerging as one of the top apps on Optimism and using Ethereum Attestation Service last season!

Again thank you! We had aggressive targets and while it was disappointing to not hit our goal of 1M Passports, I’m VERY proud of what the team was able to accomplish in the last 2 seasons.

First, the UX remains a polarizing issue. Last round, there remained frustration from experienced Ethereum users and newer folks alike. Growing the user base =/= improving the UX. I love the vision of an “easy-to-use app that makes it possible for web3 citizens to establish credibility” but I’d also like to see some user data from outside Gitcoin’s core community to gauge how close we are to this.

Got it. Good perspective. I don’t think we’re fully done here! I do think that the UX and the overall effectiveness can be at odds at times (e.g. the harder it is the less likely we’ll get Sybils). Part of the current experiments and learning are around improving the experience for humans while also making it harder for Sybils. We haven’t always gotten this balance correct. We’re starting to develop a hypothesis around a smaller number of better stamps. We’ll have more on this over the next couple of months as we learn more.

Second, I worry that Passport could be over-indexed on Gitcoin’s use case and at risk of being eclipsed by solutions that assign a Sybil / reputation score without any additional interactions required by users (eg, Trusta Labs) OR are highly optimized to creating a community-specific web of trust (eg, Optimism’s badgeholder referral system). I’d kinda like to see one of those marketing “competitive analysis” matrices and see where Passport rates its feature being strongest – and then really driving hard on those requirements.

We’re in agreement here. I’m very concerned that the current product might be too much friction (given you point above) for end users and that could reduce our adoption. We’re exploring, with the new data scientists we’ve hired, lighter weight options including both additional APIs and data sets to improve the ways partners can work with Passport. We could end up with a major product pivot, or a new product, it’s too early tell at this stage. It’s not in the roadmap (yet) as we don’t have anything concrete here.

2 Likes
14

All, given the 5 days + 5 steward comments we have moved this to Snapshot to start voting. Please cast your vote!

3 Likes
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I will be voting yes on this proposal, and looking forward to S20/21 of Passport.

Things I’ll be following closely:

  1. How does Passport evolve with the recent additions of cluster mapping/data analytics/data science skills to the team?
  2. How does Passport respond to “no friction” competitors in the market that can provide sybil resistance without the overhead of users having to create stamps.
  3. How does the market perceive Passport as an offering? Passport has been called “KYC” or “doxxing” by some on twitter, and I don’t think thats really accurate as Passport has been designed with privacy from the beginning. How can we shape the markets perception through education?
3 Likes
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Update, thank you all, the budget passed! Snapshot Vote has passed with ~92% approval rate.

Metrics:
2179 unique votes
~6.2M GTC tokens cast.

Thank you to all the voters for participating in our governance and the proposal reviewers for going deep on this budget!

3 Likes
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I (owocki.eth) am a member of the Gitcoin WalletGuard. :shield::shield::shield:

I’ve verified that the code on the tally proposal matches the intent of the Tally S20-21 proposal.

If you are interested in joining the Gitcoin WalletGuard click here.

2 Likes
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@Jeremy Where can I find the Passport multisig address? I am trying to verify the Tally, but I do not see the Passport wallet address or a link to find it in the proposal.

1 Like
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Hey Jon, it’s in Tally, but you can find the direct link to it here: Tally | 0x19E50fA5623895D5a2976693eaFF5C2F879510ed

2 Likes
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I (jonruth.eth) am a member of the Gitcoin WalletGuard. :shield::shield::shield:

I’ve verified that the code on this proposal matches the intent of the proposal.

If you are interested in joining the Gitcoin WalletGuard click here.

3 Likes
21

Excellent work great innovative results.

1 Like