I think about GTC in three ways - Voting rights, Protocol Utility, Regen Signaling. This is just my personal perspective from the vantage point I have… I would encourage others to fork this or to present their own thinking.
It’s worth noting, this is not investment advice and I do not believe folks should speculate on the token. If you need/want it because it has utility to you, it is available via lots of means (partnerships, open market, DAO contribution, hackathons/contests, grants, etc.)
Voting
We know that there is value in having a voice in how funding for public goods are allocated. GTC voting is how capital is allocated from the Grants Matching pool. this creates an incentive to have and hold GTC so that you can direct funds to the projects you care most about. There are parallels to how rewards from Maker and other protocols are used in bribes to garner votes, etc.
The Grants protocol will likely have a fee similar to the way the existing platform does (to fund public goods). those fees that accrue (what percent) and how to use those fees will also be up to GTC holders to decide.
Protocol/Token Utility
GTC is an integral part of a couple of experiments we have today. GTC Staking on Identity is an important part of Passport and will likely be important in helping determine a “price of forgery” (a new score we are evaluating to reduce sybil attacks).
We have mocked up other grant curation mechanisms that are based on GTC staking (as a signal of legitimacy for a grant - though not the only signal as we are also exploring impact certificates, etc.). We don’t have a lot of details to share on this yet, but we know that lots of folks have had problems finding the best grants to fund. incentivizing that curation is also on the roadmap.
Regen Signals
Holding GTC is a signal for support of public goods. Some of the “best” community members have and hold GTC, and as a result GTC gating exists on our swag store and also in a couple other places we are exploring. I see holding GTC as a signal to your dedication to funding and supporting public goods (same signals as when staking on identity or projects with GTC). We want to offer reasons to hold GTC as a regen signal, but we are early in our thinking here as well.
Each of these buckets offer reasons to have, hold and use GTC. This is how I think about the utility and uses, but I am just one opinion. Some of these uses are not yet built, but we want to experiment more in the near future (with the protocol launches).