Birtchart NFTs as a Service: Integrating Cardano into New Age Spirituality

[GENERAL] Name and surname of main applicant

Cagil Acarbay

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

Individual

[GENERAL] Requested funds in ada

15000

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

4

[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)

We will build a platform to book and deliver personal astrology consultations. Once a consultation is completed, a personalized unique birth chart will be generated and given to the client as an NFT.

[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?

No

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

Not an open source project

[SOLUTION] Please describe your proposed solution.

Astrology

Astrology is a pseudo science and practice that suggests a connection between celestial phenomena and events occurring on Earth, as well as the personality traits and characteristics of individuals. It is based on the idea that the positions and movements of celestial bodies, such as the sun, moon, planets, and stars, can influence human affairs and shape individual personalities.

Astrology dates back thousands of years and has been practiced by various cultures throughout history, including ancient civilizations like the Babylonians, Egyptians, Greeks, and Mayans. The practice of astrology involves creating horoscopes or birth charts, which are diagrams that depict the positions of celestial bodies at the time of a person's birth.

Birth charts

A birth chart, also known as a natal chart or horoscope, is a map of the celestial positions at the exact moment of a person's birth. It serves as a fundamental tool in astrology and is used to interpret and analyze various aspects of an individual's life.

The birth chart is typically represented as a circular diagram, divided into twelve sections called houses. Each house corresponds to a different area of life, such as relationships, career, finances, and personal identity. The signs of the zodiac are also indicated along the perimeter of the chart, with each sign occupying a specific portion of the circle.

The birth chart includes the positions of the sun, moon, and planets in the zodiac signs and houses. It provides information about the individual's personality traits, strengths, weaknesses, potentials, and life events. Astrologers analyze the relationships between the planets, signs, and houses to gain insights into various aspects of the person's life, including their love life, career path, health, and overall life purpose.

To create a birth chart, we need the date, time, and location of a person's birth. The date of birth provides the position of the sun, moon, planets, and other celestial bodies within the zodiac signs. The time of birth is crucial because it determines the positions of the planets in the different houses of the chart. The location is needed to account for the specific geographical coordinates, which can affect the rising sign or ascendant.

The Problem

People often seek guidance to navigate their personal and professional lives, and astrology can provide valuable insights for understanding feelings, behaviors, and life patterns. The astrology industry is large and growing:

The global Astrology Market Size was valued at $12.8 billion in 2021, and is projected to reach $22.8 billion by 2031, growing at a CAGR of 5.7% from 2022 to 2031. [source]

With more and more individuals turning to astrological consultations for such guidance, and more going online, there is a great opportunity to establish services directly on the blockchain, reaching the entire world as the user base rather than be a limited local practice.

The Solution

We will build a platform to book and deliver personal astrology consultations. Once a consultation is completed, a personalized unique birth chart will be generated and given to the client as an NFT. This serves as a memorable keepsake for the client and also stands as a testament to the astrologer's reputation and service quality.

The solution includes:

• booking website for astrology consultations
• taking payments in ADA
• minting NFTs through a 3rd party minting service
• sending birth chart NFTs to customers
• an NFT display and gallery for the birth chart NFTs

This will be a proof-of-concept solution, with a single consultant, the proposer Cagil. NFT minting, sending to customers will all be handled manually. The website will be a simple marketing website that shows what it is all about, and allows booking a consultation with Cagil.

We will utilize Cardano to mint the birth chart as a unique non-fungible token (NFT). The NFT will contain the relevant birth chart in IPFS and refer to it in the metadata, and a unique identifier that proves its authenticity and ownership, and details of the astrologer who gave the consultancy. 

The Future

With this proposal we want to validate the business model of astrology consultations delivered through Cardano. This will establish the first step in turning the idea into a full on marketplace where astrology consultations with reputable astrologers can be booked. The next step will also include a custom NFT display to highlight the many moving parts of the birth chart, to make it more attractive to astrology users.

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

According to the "Astrology Market By Type, By Mode, By End User Generation: Global Opportunity Analysis and Industry Forecast, 2021-2031" by Research and Markets, the astrology market was valued at $12.8 billion in 2021, and is estimated to reach $22.8 billion by 2031. This is a growing industry and if the last two years have shown anything, the interest will grow. Cardano can become a pioneer in this intersection as these services can introduce a new group of people to the Cardano ecosystem.

The challenge’s aim to build new and interesting products on Cardano matches well with this proposal. This is an almost untapped area in blockchain, and has a lot of potential to drive growth and productivity. It also brings a completely new use to NFTs, providing personal value to astrology customers, allowing them to collect their personal birth charts. 

[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 project requires a knowledgeable astrologer to deliver the consultancies. Cagil has all the capabilities to do so, as a practitioning astrologer with 3 years experience, and a background in astrology as a learner for 15 years. She tries to understand different schools of astrology and their principles to create a cohesive analysis. She is a student of New Paradigm Astrology since 2021, had several education programmes: such as Gonca Kalabalık Evolutionary Astrology 16 week seminar, and Ceren Ece Yalçın Astrology Education Certificate in 2023. She has analyzed more than 200 birth charts in her practitioning career.

Beyond astrology skills, the proposal requires a basic website to be built with AI tools, or WIX, or wordpress, simple to do. And a capability to mint and send NFTs. All of this Cagil can easily learn to do. Chakhan, the advisor, will teach her all of this functionality, help build and launch the website.

See team section for more info on both.

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

Develop Landing Page and Consultation Website

• Develop user interface (UI) and user experience (UX) for the portal
• Build using an AI tool or a tool such as WIX, wordpress
• Add in functionality to book sessions, give wallet address
• Promote sessions

Acceptance Criteria:

• Website online, can book sessions through website

NFT minting

• Develop metadata for birthchart
• Learn how to mint birthchart NFTs
• Learn how to send NFTs
• Test the process to mint and deliver NFTs
• Start consultation sessions

Acceptance Criteria:

• Can mint birth chart NFTs, process ready from booking sessions to delivering the NFTs, all tested, first consultation session on the way

Get customers, grow

• Start delivering NFTs to customers
• Host more consultations
• Iterate on the process

Acceptance Criteria:

• At least 20 consultations made, 20 birth chart NFTs minted and delivered

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

Cagil Acarbay

I have been interested in astrology since high school, and started taking different courses and studying astrology professionally in 2020. I see astrology not as a way to predict what’s going to happen, but as a way to understand the human psyche, what motivates the way we act, think and feel. When used in this manner, astrology can be a great tool in understanding ourselves, our patterns and behaviors. I've been a member of New Paradigm School of Evolutionary Astrology since 2021, learning from one of the industry's best, Kaypacha. Attended evolutionary astrologer Gonca Kalabalık’s Introduction to Evolutionary Astrology course in 2021, Ceren Ece Yalçın’s Birth Chart Reading course in 2022, and Ceren Ece Yalçın’s Boutique Astrology Course which will be concluded in August 2023. I’m also a certified Tarot reader, and a Kundalini Reiki Master. I graduated International and Global Politics from Middle East Technical University in 2015. Since then, I’ve been working as a digital marketing and localization specialist in the SaaS industry.

Çağkan Acarbay//Advisor

Co-founder of littlefish Foundation. In Project Catalyst and involved in Cardano since Fund 7. Organization building, governance, token engineering with long term interest in economics, game theory, behavioral psychology, political science, and history. 3+ years experience as a Backend Developer. Python, REST, Postgres, data modeling. Electrical and Electronics Engineering Major.

I am the advisor on the project and will help Cagil by build the website, teach her how to mint NFTs, make sure she can build and deliver the proposal.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/çağkan-acarbay-b2210b136/

https://github.com/cagkanacarbay/

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

The budget covers the work done by the team to deploy the website, promote, and deliver the proposal. We require 15000 amount to cover Cagil's expenses to build this fulltime.

Budget = 15000 ADA

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

With this proposal, Cardano buys an astrology platform. This is an untapped market for Cardano that potentially has a lot of growth. If there is a viable business model here, it will be discovered with this proposal, and this may lead into an astrology consultancy marketplace that has the potential to dramatically impact Cardano.

The cost of 15000 ADA is entirely to cover fulltime work on this project for Cagil. This is 6000USD (at 0.4ADAUSD) for 4 months, which is her monthly earning at her full time job. With this she will be able to go full time on this work, and switch to a career here as she establishes this business.

[IMPORTANT NOTE] The Applicant agrees to Fund 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