Concentrating informations about dReps

[GENERAL] Name and surname of main applicant

Benjamin Ben Zvi

[GENERAL] Email address of main applicant

benzvibenjamin@gmail.com

Additional applicants

Liam Bodin

[GENERAL] Please specify how many months you expect your project to last (from 2-12 months)

6

[GENERAL] Please indicate if your proposal has been auto-translated into English from another language.

No

[GENERAL] Does your project have any dependencies on other organizations, technical or otherwise?

No

[GENERAL] If YES, please describe what the dependency is and why you believe it is essential for your project’s delivery. If NO, please write “No dependencies.”

No dependencies

[GENERAL] Will your project’s output/s be fully open source?

Yes

[GENERAL] If NO, please describe which outputs are not going to be open source. If YES, please write “Project will be fully open source.”

Project will be fully open source

[METADATA] Category of proposal

Other

[IMPACT] Please describe your proposed solution.

The Catalyst community could find it difficult to find a good dRep that is truly representing their opinion. People actually don’t want to take the time to analyze every project seriously to vote well, and they would prefer to delegate to an actively involved dRep. Sadly, there’s a lack of good description of the dReps, and there are several new ones that appear.

The main issue that we found was that it is really hard to find the different dReps, even with some research, there is no information about the different dReps and their purpose. 

Our goal is for now to try to group the information about the different dReps by making them come to us, we would like to incentivize the different dReps to come and give us some of their information by the bias of a form that they will need to fill up. All the info will be summarized in a doc or/and an Excel file that will be shared to the community and visible for all. 

In our opinion, this will bring a lot more voters to delegate their voting power since the information on “Who is voting with my name?” will be very clear and accessible for everyone.

For the marketing and advertising of the website, we have a few ideas in mind : 

• During the TownHall, we want to be speakers so we can talk about our project and incentivize some dReps to come to us
• Use the help of the Challenge team of the dRep challenge to do some communication and help us contact some existing dReps
• Being shared by the dReps themselves 
• Talk about it when presenting Catalyst in other proposals or contexts

It will be beneficial for the dReps to come to us so I think if we do our communication well we shouldn’t have any problem to group them. Moreover, there are around 300 dReps, the ones that will follow up on us would be the most active ones and will be much more exposed to the community.

Projects for the Future : 

Our vision for the future funds would be to create a website that groups all of the dReps that we have worked with with some information and details.

The second option would be to collaborate with Catalyst and add the information that we gathered on the voting app, so everything is 100% open and accessible for everyone and the dReps would have much more visibility.

[IMPACT] How does your proposed solution address the challenge and what benefits will this bring to the Cardano ecosystem?

“How much did it contribute to increasing the number of delegates to dReps?” This is a key metrics of the success of this year's challenge around dRep improvement. We truly believe that our project can be the main solution for bringing a great answer to this question.

We also believe that this project can be a really amazing dRep related initiative that will improve the Catalyst ecosystem.

Our solution will make it easier to understand and to choose where to delegate the vote. Delegating a vote can be difficult because of identity. People don’t want to give their voting power to someone that is not representing their opinion well. Unfortunately, they don’t necessarily have the time to analyze the projects to vote with their own beliefs. Doing a website that is bringing them light on the existing dReps, their impact and main beliefs, and why it could be interesting, would definitely allow the Catalyst community to be more involved through its voting power, without having to take too much time.

To finish, the fact that there are more dReps and votes can be a kind of “good pressure” for the proposers, that could incentivize them to bring quality to their proposals in the next funds, which is also good for the Catalyst ecosystem.

[IMPACT] How do you intend to measure the success of your project?

We will measure the success of the proposal based on several aspects : 

• The number of dReps found
• The diversity of expertise domains from these dReps
• The accuracy of the information (how truthful it is)
• The feedbacks given from the community about the planned project for Fund 11

[IMPACT] Please describe your plans to share the outputs and results of your project?

We will share the Excel sheet with all the data gathered from the contacted dReps (contact, their domains…) 

We will also share information about how our researches are going through the monthly reports as well as gather all the information on the closing report / video. We’ll also explain the methods we used to check the information if those are not publicly published (for instance, we checked the diploma of a dRep owner, but he doesn’t want to share his identity). 

[CAPABILITY/ FEASIBILITY] What is your capability to deliver your project with high levels of trust and accountability?

We are both involved in the Catalyst community, and have a lot of connections with other involved people. The dRep owners are logically people that are involved in Catalyst, so we have great chances to find them.

The project is principally based on deep research, which can be driven by us, as we already know well the process of Catalyst. This project is the first step of an overall project of democratization of the use of dReps, and the biggest step will be the project in Fund 11 described above in this proposal.

The accountability is principally based on both qualitative and quantitative data as the work is mostly to find a community of dReps owners, and have their information. So the metrics will be numbers of respondents, accuracy of information (how much we have been able to check their veracity), number of different expertise…

[CAPABILITY/ FEASIBILITY] What are the main goals for the project and how will you validate if your approach is feasible?

The main goal is preparing the better we can the project for Fund 11. For doing this, we need a lot of information about the existing dReps as well as attracting the news dReps to send their information to us when they launch. 

We will validate our approach through the number of respondents and the rate of really truthful information (information that we had the occasion to ensure with documents)

[CAPABILITY/ FEASIBILITY] Please provide a detailed breakdown of your project’s milestones and each of the main tasks or activities to reach the milestone plus the expected timeline for the delivery.

Month 1-2 : 

• Create the form, ensuring that every needed information for the website project is given, and that this is enough varied 
• Create a presentation of our project for Fund 11 to explain why we are holding the actual project

Month 3-4 : 

• Contact Daniel Ribar to have a presentation moment in one of the Town Hall 
• Communicate a lot about this initiative to find dReps owners in the community
• Have an after TownHall session to get some feedback and answer questions from the community
• Look in every community more or less linked to Catalyst to find the owners 
• Collect the maximum informations through our form

Month 5-6 : 

• Check the informations and reach again the dRep owners that sent it 
• Verify the “sensible” information by asking the owners to prove these (diplomas, professional experiences in some fields…)

[CAPABILITY/ FEASIBILITY] Please describe the deliverables, outputs and intended outcomes of each milestone.

The deliverables are the excel sheet as well as the closing reports of the projects. This project doesn’t have a lot of outcomes as the real big outcome is expected in the next fund. 

[RESOURCES & VALUE FOR MONEY] Please provide a detailed budget breakdown of the proposed work and resources.

• Marketing and communication (research of the dReps, contacting some people, promote our project) : 40 hours x 115 ADA = 4600 ADA

• Verification : 50 hours x 115 ADA = 5750 ADA

• Preparing the forms and the presentations = 10 hours x 115 ADA = 1150 ADA

• Gather and verify all the information on our doc = 40 hours x 115 ADA = 4600 ADA

• Organize partnership with Catalyst and dReps to be put under the light : 30 hours x 115 ADA = 3450 ADA

• Stay in communication with the dRep and help them to improve their system thanks to received feedbacks : 30 hours x 115 ADA = 3450 ADA

Total : 23000

[RESOURCES & VALUE FOR MONEY] How does the cost of the project represent value for money for the Cardano ecosystem?

This could be a huge opportunity to improve the ecosystem of Cardano since it will incentivize the Catalyst community to delegate their vote more often, which is a key feature of Catalyst and its good running.

The costs represent the work time that is needed from us to create a quality solution for the referencing of dReps. This work needs time because we really want to have truthful information, and ensure the capabilities of the dReps owners to really represent the opinion of the vote delegators. 

[IMPORTANT NOTE] The Applicant agreed to Fund10 rules and also that data in the Submission Form and other data provided by the project team during the course of the project will be publicly available.

I Accept