Merits of a Proposed Idea for Cardano

[GENERAL] Name and surname of main applicant

Ben Mattson, Rome Viharo, & Jacob Billings

[GENERAL] Email address of main applicant

bmattson2035@gmail.com

Additional applicants

Rome Viharo

Jacob Billings

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

Yes

[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.” .

Aiki Wiki is a protocol and project that has emerged within Big Mother DAO and has received funding from this community as well as development.

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

No

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

This is still to be determined. Potentially some outputs will not be open source, and this is conditional on development decisions by the executive team.

[METADATA] Category of Proposal

DAO

[METADATA] SDG rating

SDG Goals

16 - Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels

17 - Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development

SDG Subgoals

16.10 - Ensure public access to information and protect fundamental freedoms, in accordance with national legislation and international agreements

16.6 - Develop effective, accountable and transparent institutions at all levels

16.8 - Broaden and strengthen the participation of developing countries in the institutions of global governance

16.a - Strengthen relevant national institutions, including through international cooperation, for building capacity at all levels, in particular in developing countries, to prevent violence and combat terrorism and crime

17.16 - Enhance the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development, complemented by multi-stakeholder partnerships that mobilize and share knowledge, expertise, technology and financial resources, to support the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals in all countries, in particular developing countries

17.17 - Encourage and promote effective public, public-private and civil society partnerships, building on the experience and resourcing strategies of partnerships

Key Performance Indicator (KPI)

16.10.2 - Number of countries that adopt and implement constitutional, statutory and/or policy guarantees for public access to information

17.16.1 - Number of countries reporting progress in multi-stakeholder development effectiveness monitoring frameworks that support the achievement of the sustainable development goals

[IMPACT] Please describe your proposed solution.

Breakdowns in any form of consensus or online communications is a consistent problem spread ubiquitously across all digital and online communities, and unintended consequences seem to continue to emerge as communities introduce more decentralized structures for funding and governance.

To put it plainly, human beings are in conflict where conflict does not need to arise. This is primarily because our environments introduce subtle competitions which may run counter to the collaborative nature of the community mission. Additionally, this affects our access to reliable or verifiable information which often is drowned out by misinformation and even disinformation.

Aiki Wiki is a platform for mutually resolving consensus-building, at scale. It applies a unique innovative form of logic called “9x3 Narrative Logic” to online conversations that have a disagreement of some kind. It allows disparaging parties to work through disagreement in such a fashion that resolution becomes the only outcome of the system. It can accomplish this without the need for any third party and does not require voting or any advanced LLM systems, the entire process is entirely computational and psychological.

This introduces a new form of governance and even a fun new way to apply rankings to social media communities, “win-win” governance that is generated from collaboratively writing an article or a proposal within a community. Such a system can bring thorough resolution to commercial systems, legal systems, and online communities.

Our key technical innovations are in the computational algorithm itself and its adaptability to any online or virtual environment. It identifies the natural psychological components in a digital system and applies narrative structure and a natural language, turning any event or chaotic system into a fully functioning and resolving narrative.

The scope of such a system is vast in any governance system, any community, especially decentralized communities that rely on voting algorithms which can produce instability. The output of such a system is only mutual resolution. The resolution can be extended into a legal process such as a legal contract or a smart contract which governs distribution.

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

We propose supplying an automated governance infrastructure improvement for present and future Cardano DAOs, dApps, and communities. Aiki Wiki meets demand from builders and communities within the Cardano ecosystem seeking to remove friction from governance processes by upgrading to a trustless, decentralized and automated conflict resolution process which guarantees win-win value generation for all parties.

Cardano is of unique and keen interest to our community, primarily for its academic acumen and alignment of values with our small community. In addition, Cardano is tackling a key problem that is core to our system, governance. 

Merits of a Proposed Idea: We propose building a third party integration into IdeaScale specifically, a third party that has a web3 wallet sign in to members of Cardano to evaluate or propose ideation on Cardano or funding. We believe that this can seamlessly evolve to assist Cardano in creating “Minimum Viable Governance” as we pilot and build out our system.

Governance and Decision Making: In decentralized communities like Cardano, governance is one of the most critical aspects. Aiki Wiki could support “Minimum Viable Governance” and create a type of room or chamber in your system that would serve as an excellent place for stakeholders to engage in critical negotiations and decision-making conversations to shape the direction of the Cardano platform. The resulting consensus articles could serve as a basis for implementing changes in the protocol or the community rules.

Conflict Resolution: Conflicts and disagreements are inevitable within a decentralized community due to the diverse set of stakeholders involved. This platform can provide a structured process for conflict resolution, transforming disagreements into solutions.

Tokenized Incentives: The token system in this design can be integrated with Cardano's native cryptocurrency ADA. Collaborative tokens could potentially be treated as a form of on-chain governance voting rights or redeemed for ADA or other rewards, thereby incentivizing positive collaboration and meaningful contributions to the community.

Ideation and Exploration: Algorithms for a "Question Room" and "Talker's Corner" can foster the ideation and exploration of new possibilities. These rooms can serve as hubs for brainstorming and discussing novel ideas for DApps, improvements to the Cardano protocol, or other community initiatives.

Community Building: Aiki Wiki supports multiple approaches to discourse: from forthright and earnest (Rational Consensus Room), to poetic and personal (Talker’s Corner). This `big tent’ approach aims to foster a sense of community. And, by encouraging large-scale discourse, our aim is to enhance engagement and strengthen the community as a whole.

Informing AI development: We will seek to evolve our algorithm into a single AI mediator that can walk pairs of individuals through disagreements into resolution by retexturizing what each view in the dyad “means”. If AI incorporation becomes a priority within the Cardano system, this platform can serve as a valuable resource for training and aligning the AI, as previously discussed, potentially allowing Cardano to ultimately have a resolving AI system permeate their ecosystem.

Documentation and Knowledge Base: Something like a "Book of Agreements" would serve as an evolving documentation of community consensus, which can be referenced by new members to understand the ethos and values of the Cardano community.

In summary, this innovative design can provide a powerful tool for community-led decision making, conflict resolution, and fostering collaboration and innovation in a decentralized context like that of Cardano.

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

Our first measure of success is allowing a small group to engage around a single idea and, through our algorithm, produce an output of what we call “Contextual Completeness”, or three ways with which to view all proposals or concepts, allowing for a thorough “narrative consensus process” to complete itself.

We can measure the success of our piloting by the number of resolutions that are produced by using “Merits of a Proposed Idea” pilot.

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

Publicly available online documentation will be available on for each Milestone output. In addition, so that we can meet communities where they are in terms of more specific/contextual needs and questions, we will consistently hold Twitter Spaces and AMAs which also allow our team to address questions in real time while sharing our vision for the wider application and potential of automated dispute resolution. 

Results generated from this project are indicators for how Aiki Wiki will best scale on additional blockchains, including how we can most effectively communicate the nuances and depth of the protocol, and which kinds of community stakeholders are best suited as onboarding stewards.

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

Aiki Wiki is based on 20 years of research and development of a consensus protocol that applies principles like trust, honesty, integrity, transparency and accountability as a function of a design environment, such that all of our projects and members also follow this protocol.

To build trust with Big Mother, we suggest setting up a multi-sig and using the principles of Aiki Wiki to hold both sides in a continually collaborative and open state.

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

Our main goal of the project at this stage is to introduce ourselves to the Cardano development community and encourage members of Cardano to use our “Merits of a Proposed Idea” to review the governance potential of Aiki Wiki into the broader Cardano ecosystem.

Additionally, Cardano is of interest with our community primarily because of the high degree of mathematical and scientific acumen amongst the community, and we seek to further research and development of the win win protocol for the web within the Cardano community. For example, our project was accepted into the NSF SBIR program, and we delayed the invitation to submit for Phase 1 for lack of research partners. With members of Cardano, we could return to the NSF grant and further research the many capabilities of our system.

Regarding quantitative tracking measures, it is ultimately the decision of the DAOs and other communities which onboard Aiki Wiki whether or not, and at what frequency, the platform is utilized in resolving conflicts. For this reason it is difficult to set quantitative goals since to do so would be to set expectations for what is ultimately the decision making of the members of any given DAO within the ecosystem. However, our goal is to represent and iterate Aiki Wiki as a maximally available public good which amplifies the sense-making capacities across all DAO contributors processes on Cardano.

We do expect initial adoption as a function of our existing partnerships and connections, and that as these initial communities onboard Aiki Wiki, we will be able to leverage their feedback in generating network effects and flywheel adoption as the utility of the protocol is continually demonstrated. To this end, our purpose is always to onboard communities through our decentralized Merits of a Proposed Idea process, which moves from basic conversation with initial interested stakeholders, to video demonstrations and Q&A of the product with interested community members, and finally a governance vote for onboarding of Aiki Wiki as the default dispute resolution process.

[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.

Milestone : October 20 - November 10, 2023: Pilot first coded implementation of underlying 9x3 narrative logic and formulation of consensus article which has integrated across all contributed view points. Deliverable to Cardano within 30 days per specs.

Milestone 2: November - December: Scoping Twitter-like feed using Aiki Wiki protocol in order to demo integration of conflict resolution on Twitter/Twitter-like social media.

Milestone 3: December - January, 2024: Pilot & testing with dev team.

1. Explore and define leading opportunities for scaling Aiki Wiki adoption on Cardano
2. Discord integration for blockchain communities
3. Develop community integration targets based on trajectory to-date

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

Milestone 1

• Output: Plutus code implementation for 9x3 narrative logic
• Outcome: Base capability for scaling Aiki Wiki across Cardano’s social layer. 

Milestone 2

• Output: Initial demo of Twitter-like dispute resolution and ranking UI
• Outcome: Base case for Twitter integration complete

Milestone 3

• Output: Demo of Aiki Wiki integration on Discord
• Outcome: Cardano communities have the capability of integrating Aiki Wiki into Discord for dispute resolution.

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

Milestones 1: $22,000

• $9,000 - Executive team (project management, fundraising, community engagement, reporting)
• $8,000 - Developers
• $3,000 - Legal
• $2,000 - Travel

Milestone 2: $19,000

• $9,000 - Executive team
• $8,000 - Developers
• $1,000 - UI
• $1,000 - Legal

Milestone 3: $19,000

• $8,000 - Executive team
• $8,000 - Developers
• $2,000 - UI
• $1,000 - Legal

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

• Executive team monthly expenses provides support for project management, partnership formation and fundraising, and reporting.

• Developer expense is estimated based on complexity of the project.

• Travel expense is based on projected flight and lodging costs for one month.

[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