CatalystExplorer 2.0: AI-powered Exploration, Proposal Tinder, & Funding Transparency at your fingertips [by Lido Nation]

[GENERAL] Name and surname of main applicant

Darlington Wleh

[GENERAL] Are you delivering this project as an individual or as an entity (whether formally incorporated or not)

Entity (Incorporated)

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

12

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

No

[GENERAL] Summarize your solution to the problem (200-character limit including spaces)

Iterate on catalystexplorer.com to integrate AI to help voters find great ideas, add rich funding data with on-chain txs, reviewers/moderators can claim their profiles and see participation history.

[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] Please provide here more information on the open source status of your project outputs

catalystexplorer.com is already open source under the Apache-2.0 license. All new functionality will be added to the existing codebase and product.

[METADATA] Horizons

Governance

[SOLUTION] Please describe your proposed solution

The Lido Nation Catalyst Explorer is an amazing tool for Project Catalyst research, dicing and slicing and exporting CSVs of proposal data. In fund 12 the community voted to opensource this tool and have it live at catalystexplorer.com. As the catalystexplorer product finds a life of its own as an open source product, the big idea here is to add missing functionality the community have been asking for. 

The big idea: catalystexplorer.com 2.0. 

For the 2.0 iteration of catalystexplorer.com we will take everything we’ve learned from workshopping the initial product and introduce more tooling to:

• Reduce barriers of entry to voting and finding good ideas (AI + tinder UI)
• Increased transparency into funding data (on chain transactions, funding metrics, ability for teams to volunteer their proposal payment addresses)
• Reviewers & Moderators profiles (with participation history)

Proposal Tinder.

This is a long requested feature that we will finally be bringing to the catalystexplorer experience. Instead of having to see a long list of a thousand proposals we will show voters a tinder like presentation with the ability to swipe right or left to bookmark or shortlist proposals that make a good first impression. The more you swipe, the more we will learn about your preferences to show you proposals you’re more likely to be interested in first.

AI Tooling.

Profiting from all of the research done by Wolfram: “The AI Revolution and Implications to Project Catalyst” funded proposal, we will implement an AI pipeline to power a couple of the most used functionalities of the explorer with more to come over time.Here are the first three we plan to start with:

• Comparing and contrasting proposals
• Asking questions about proposals in any given fund or across all funds.
• Powering the proposal tinder recommendation engine.

On-Chain Funding data.

We’ve been cataloging fund distribution data for as far back as we could go. The plan is to provide an interactive experience for digging into mainnet transactions related to catalyst funding distributions. You will be able to:

• See catalyst funding distribution transactions details for as far back we can gather:
• Dates
• Amounts
• Destination addresses
• Link to see transaction in your favorite explorer
• See USD conversions
• Teams wanting to provide more transparency to the community can tag their addresses.

Catalyst Profiles.

Already on the catalystexplorer you can claim your profile if you are associated with an ideascale account. With a claimed profile you can see all your proposals in one place, add a quickpitch, company information, and mint a free NFT when you’ve successfully completed your proposal. We would like to bring similar tooling for community reviewers and moderators. Moderators & Reviewers will be able to:

• Claim their profile
• See their review history and outcomes 

Stable Open API.

We’ve been supporting other builders in the ecosystem by providing some limited apis for the last 3 funding rounds. With this funding we will overhaul the API to make it stable and OpenAPI V3 compliant. The OpenAPI Specification (OAS) is a standard, language-agnostic interface to HTTP APIs which allows both humans and computers to discover and understand the capabilities of the service without access to source code, documentation, or through network traffic inspection. In other words it will make it easy for more people to build on top of the API.

[IMPACT] Please define the positive impact your project will have on the wider Cardano community

catalystexplorer.com will positively impact the Cardano community by:

More community participation: We will be leveraging AI and familiar user experience to reduce voter fatigue and encourage more community participation. With easier funding distribution data, every community member will be empowered to facilitate greater accountability of funded teams.

Informed Voting Decision: Empowering voters with the necessary information to make educated decisions about which proposal to fund, critical in the Voltaire Era.

Better experience for Reviewers: Community reviewer is one of the most neglected roles when it comes to the user experience. This will move the needle in that area, bringing much needed clarity to the post reviewing process.

Partnerships & New Ideas: Empowering the community to be able to drill down Project Catalyst knowledge well of ideas with ease will make it easy for budding entrepreneurs to find each other and build a stronger team. Perhaps you’re curious to see if anyone in Project Catalyst ever tried to partner with a German Car Maker. 

Measuring the Impact.

To measure the impact quantitatively and qualitatively, we will use the following metrics:

• User Engagement Metrics: Track the number of visitors, page views, and engagement in the research tools (search, filtering, etc). These metrics will be monitored through web analytics tools, and shared in project reports.
• Community Growth: Monitor the growth of created accounts on the platform and social shares.

[CAPABILITY & FEASIBILITY] What is your capability to deliver your project with high levels of trust and accountability? How do you intend to validate if your approach is feasible?

The same team that brought you the existing catalystexplorer.com, lidonation.com as well as 1694.io is the team that will be delivering this project. Needless to say, governance tooling is kinda our jam. We deliver. 

[PROJECT MILESTONES] What are the key milestones you need to achieve in order to complete your project successfully?

Proposal Tinder

Timeline 2 Month

Milestone outputs

• Conduct user research / workshops regarding “Proposal Tinder” concept 
• Create user stories for Proposal Tinder

Acceptance criteria.

Figma files for UI/UX of the new proposal tinder experience.

Notes from user research generated hopefully covering:

• What the most frictional part of the current explorer.
• What's one missing thing from the current tool?
• Anything else the community wants to talk about.

Evidence of milestone completion

A link to google drive folder containing: 

• Figma files for proposal tinder
• Google document of the notes from user research

At least one Youtube link of community workshops

On-Chain Funding Data

Timeline 2 Months

A: Milestone outputs.

• Conduct user research / workshops regarding On-chain funding data community requirements
• Create user stories for On-Chain funding data.
• Implement proposal tinder feature on catalyexplorer.com

Acceptance criteria

Figma files for UI/UX of the new On-Chain funding data.

Notes from user research generated hopefully covering:

• What the most frictional part of the current explorer.
• What's one missing thing from the current tool?
• Anything else the community wants to talk about.

Pull request in the gitlab project with proposal tinder feature.

Feature is usable on catalyexplorer.com

Evidence of milestone completion

A link to google drive folder containing: 

• Figma files for proposal tinder
• Google document of the notes from user research

At least one Youtube (or twitter space) link of community workshop(s).

Youtube demo of new feature on catalyexplorer.com

Catalyst Profiles

Timeline 2 months 

Milestone outputs

• Conduct user research / workshops regarding Catalyst Profiles.
• Create user stories for Catalyst Profiles.
• Implement On-Chain funding data feature on catalyexplorer.com

Acceptance criteria

Figma files for UI/UX of the new Catalyst Profiles.

Notes from user research generated hopefully covering:

• What the most frictional part of the current explorer.
• What's one missing thing from the current tool?
• Anything else the community wants to talk about.

Pull request in the gitlab project with On-Chain funding data feature.

On-Chain funding data feature is usable on catalyexplorer.com

Evidence of milestone completion

A link to google drive folder containing: 

• Figma files for Catalyst Profiles.
• Google document of the notes from user research

At least one Youtube or twitter space link of community workshop(s).

Youtube demo of new On-Chain funding feature on catalyexplorer.com.

AI Tooling

Timeline 3 Months

Milestone outputs

• Conduct user research / workshops regarding AI tooling ideas and needs
• Setup AI infrastructure
• Create user stories for AI Tooling.
• Implement Catalyst Profiles feature on catalyexplorer.com

Acceptance criteria

Figma files for UI/UX of the AI Prompts and Proposal comparison.

Notes from user research generated hopefully covering:

• What the most frictional part of the current explorer.
• What's one missing thing from the current tool?
• Anything else the community wants to talk about.

Pull request in the gitlab project with Catalyst Profiles feature.

Catalyst Profiles feature is usable on catalyexplorer.com.

Evidence of milestone completion.

A link to google drive folder containing: 

• Figma files for AI proposal prompt
• Figma files for AI proposal comparison.
• Google document of the notes from user research

At least one Youtube or twitter space link of community workshop(s).

Youtube demo of new Catalyst Profiles feature on catalyexplorer.com.

Stable Open API

Timeline 2 Months

Milestone outputs.

• Setup AI infrastructure
• Implement AI power proposal comparisons
• Implement AI power proposal prompt to discover a proposal.
• Use IA pipeline to power proposal tinder recommendation engine.
• Stand up OpenAPI endpoints

Acceptance criteria.

Pull request in the gitlab project with AI features.

AI power feature is usable on catalyexplorer.com.

OpenAPI api resources available for others to consume the data.

Evidence of milestone completion. Youtube demo of new AI power features on catalyexplorer.com

Submit link to openapi documentation.

Final Milestone:

Timeline 1 Month

Milestone outputs.

• Final close-out report
• Final closeout video

Acceptance criteria.

Final closeout report is publicly available.

Final closeout video is publicly available.

[RESOURCES] Who is in the project team and what are their roles?

We are Cardano enthusiasts and a growing collective of dreamers who believe in providing insightful education about Cardano in plain English, Swahili, and Spanish. Most online blockchain content is written by and for developers and finance geeks. We break down complicated technical ideas for everyday people, and provide relevant news in quick bites, and build tools that everyone can use.

Our website is a resource for anyone who wants to learn what Cardano is, why they should care, and how they can participate. We want to make these resources accessible to as many people as possible.

Stephanie is a teacher and technologist with a passion for helping non-profits navigate and capitalize on technology. She applies her communication skills at Lido Nation by writing and editing articles, and helping to organize ideas in a way that people can understand.

Darlington is an engineer by day and at all times a dancer, humanitarian, idealist and entrepreneur. Darlington has deep knowledge about blockchain technology and broad experience in the Cardano ecosystem.

www.LidoNation.com

https://www.linkedin.com/company/lido-nation

Darlington Wleh: Co-Dreamer at Lido Nation

Co-Founder of Lido Nation. 

Senior Developer. 

Blockchain writer & Educator. 

Cardano Ambassador.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/profd2004

https://twitter.com/LidoNation

Stephanie King: Co-Dreamer at Lido Nation

Co-Founder of Lido Nation.

Art & Design lead. 

Blockchain writer & podcaster. 

Cardano Ambassador.

Project manager

https://www.linkedin.com/in/phuffyking

https://twitter.com/Lido_Phuffy

Emmanuel Titi: Nairobi Blockchain Lab Developer Lead.

Titi has been on the Lido Developer team at the Ngong Road Blockchain Lab in Nairobi Kenya. Titi leads and manages an ever-changing staff of junior developers who come through our mentorship program to learn about Cardano, skill up on Web3 development, and contribute to active projects.

Donbosco Otunga:Communication and Marketing Associate at Lido Nation

https://www.linkedin.com/in/dbao-don/

[BUDGET & COSTS] Please provide a cost breakdown of the proposed work and resources

• 60,000 Ada Design UI/UX
• 50,000 ADA Senior Developer
• 65,000 ADA Junior Developer: Our Junior developers are a team of blockchain developer mentees at the Cardano Blockchain Lab in Nairobi, Kenya. Our mentees are not paid hourly, but on a project or “ticket” basis for tasks completed. The junior developer project work would be shared among members on the project team. Based on productivity and experience, our junior developers in Kenya earn between $400-$1800/ month, which is a regionally competitive salary.
• 30,000 Ada Server cost, Hosting and Maintenance for 1 year
• 25,000 Ada AI Infrastructure + Maintenance
• 15,000 Ada Project Management

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

“Project Catalyst is the world’s largest decentralized innovation engine for solving real-world challenges.” For the engine to work and churn our impactful innovations, lots and lots of ideas have to be put, tried, and tested. 

Having a tool to make sense of all this data, raises the usefulness and value of Catalyst in ways we can’t even imagine yet.  

One concrete value we can imagine today is a much more informed voter, proposer, and community reviewers.