Last updated 9 months ago
Elevating DeFi with CRCI Reviews & Pledge of Excellence Program
Problem
Inconsistency in DeFi transparency, user protections, and accountability erodes trust, deters investment, stifles growth, exposes users to risks, and undermines the DeFi environment.
Total to date
This is the total amount allocated to Elevating DeFi with CRCI Reviews & Pledge of Excellence Program.
[GENERAL] Name and surname of main applicant
RJ[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)
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)
CRCI's Pledge of Excellence identifies inconsistencies in user advocacy and helps DeFi leaders further demonstrate their commitment to transparency, protection, and accountability.
[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
We're not producing code or content that applies in this context. However, our research results in the form of our CRCI scores, ratings and summaries are FREE for the public.
[SOLUTION] Please describe your proposed solution
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Take our DYOR survey at crci.review/survey
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CRCI addresses core DeFi problems: inconsistency in transparency, user protections, accountability. These issues reduce trust, deter investment, and increase risk, which hinders market reputation and undermines overall ecosystem integrity.
The CRCI is offering the following solutions:
CRCI Reviews, Scores and Ratings
&
CRCI Pledge of Excellence Program
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What are the CRCI Reviews, Scores and Ratings?
CRCI Reviews are built from a first-principles approach to DeFi fundamental analysis. We take this approach to focus on the DYOR domain, which is the first line of research and the most user-accessible.
Our approach is focused on the fundamental spectrum of analysis, and we look at 28 metrics in 8 essential categories. Our CRCI Reviews are intentionally limited to exclusively reviewing publicly available content to easily allow public cross-examination of our opinions.
These categories are scored with our intelligently weighted points system to quantify each of these categories from a qualitative perspective.
This produces the Propsal Rating for the project's approach to it's "pitch," which is a combination of the scores of the first four categories of Social Engagement, Communication of Intent, Tokenomics and Team/Developers. This is critical information, especially in the funding stages of a DeFi project, but extends into the life of the project as a reflection of user advocacy.
The review process also produces the Implementation Rating as an assessment related to the Audits/Track Record and User Protection categories. This covers interactions with the platform and associated documentation, processes, etc. The implementation rating is not a measure of returns, TVL, prices, etc., but of the manner in which it offers clear interactions and how the project is implementing it's solutions in terms of user advocacy.
CRCI Score = Proposal Rating + Implementation Rating
The updated CRCI Score card format shows Proposal and Implementation as independent ratings, but the overall CRCI Score remains a high resolution of the project's overall CRCI Review assessment.
This is meaningful for new projects that are in the process of building their solutions and do not yet have a product available to the consumer. This allows a project to do the work to build their solutions and focus on their Proposal integrity.
When a project offers it's token, in a manner generally available to the public, for any form of funding opportunity, (Public Sale, ISPO etc) it has crossed the threshold of being open to public review.
The CRCI Reviews are helpful from an "investor-awareness" approach to such opportunities, not as a statement of success or failure, but just as a statement of our opinion on a project's current progress in terms of the publicly available content the retail investor has access to.
CRCI Score and Ratings Example
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What is the CRCI Pledge of Excellence?
The CRCI Pledge of Excellence is a commitment of from DeFi leaders to continually elevate consumer advocacy by engaging with CRCI’s objective reviews and actionable feedback, aimed at improving transparency, user protection, and accountability.
It's fair to think of it as a "User advocacy audit" designed to offer a professional, critical, and objective review for the purpose of refinement, something every single responsible DeFi Leader naturally seeks in order to find ways to improve their project.
DeFi Leaders concede that internal assessment is not sufficient for communicating accountability, as heavily invested team members and their community of investors are less likely to offer objective critique. This is also reflected in project budget allocations for the discretionary use of funding to commit to professional third-party code audits in the same way.
CRCI Pledge of Excellence members simply need to continue to build with excellence and submit to CRCI for professional review and actionable feedback, and the CRCI Score will reflect the public evidence of their commitment to user advocacy.
CRCI Pledge of Excellence members will have access to use the CRCI Matrix and their CRCI badges as powerful assets.
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CRCI as an Essential Service
Our target clients are new DeFi projects in their launch stages and every single responsible DeFi project that continues to iterate, update, and improve their products and services.
Just as code audits are crucial for ensuring the security and functionality in DeFi, CRCI provides another essential service aimed at overcoming inconsistencies in project transparency, user protection, and accountability for a healthier DeFi environment.
Download our CRCI Pledge of Excellence Summary PDF
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Take our DYOR Survey at crci.review/survey
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[IMPACT] Please define the positive impact your project will have on the wider Cardano community
We're directly addressing the challenge of the free-for-all environment that cryptocurrency was invented to facilitate, and the free reign of bad actors and otherwise ill-prepared projects in how they have access to user-funded investment opportunities.
The DeFi space is currently plagued by hype and opportunistic actors, distracting users and diverting engagement from genuine innovators, and overshadowing legitimate DeFi solutions.
Inconsistencies in transparency, user protection, and accountability are symptoms of the lack of standards in DeFi, where there are no established pre-requisites, when presenting retail consumers with investment opportunities and DeFi services.
DeFi projects often raise money via token sales or other means based on underwhelming or incomplete proposals that would otherwise not even earn an audience if they were to ask for funding in the traditional finance world!
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Take our DYOR Survey at crci.review/survey
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In DeFi there are generally no safeguards in place, and mistakes in web3 are permanently recorded to the blockchain. As such, it's even more critical that our DeFi builders embrace every opportunity to build with excellence and strain to demonstrate accountability in every possible way that exceeds the expectations of traditional finance.
This "wild-west" ecosystem is limiting itself with the absence of the opportunity to be held accountable to a professional third-party accountability initiatives based on a first-principles approach to DeFi fundamental analysis.
A culture of accountability to code audits is a natural extension of the commitment to advocate for the user, and this energy should naturally extend to the off-chain processes and operations of our DeFi builders.
The CRCI was developed to fill this critical gap in the DeFi environment.
The manifestation of the objectives of the CRCI would see better projects, with more retail access to better content and a higher level of consistency in transparency, user protection, and accountability, which would improve the DeFi environment for everyone.
We want to face all the compelling arguments for why this isn't a positive and valuable initiative and why any DeFi project would object to the opportunity to validate and further demonstrate their commitment to user advocacy in this way.
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[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?
We've been applying and refining the CRCI Reviews with over 2 years of research and development.
You can see our live research results at our website, crci.review.
CRCI standardizes DeFi tokenomics for an easier-to-understand breakdown so projects can more effectively be compared. There are many nuances to tokenomics distrubution to determine what makes an approach "good" or "bad". We feel they fall on a spectrum that can be roughly categorized as "better" or "worse," and this is an ongoing study.
We've collected a lot of data to find trends in the ecosystem, and we want to help the user be aware of the comparative data.
As mentioned earlier, the CRCI exclusively reviews publicly available content.
This is to ensure that the reviews and opinions of the CRCI are directly auditable by the community in that we have equal access to the same objective content under review. We find that if there are any differences of opinion on this same data, that can produce very productive conversations and help further encourage consumer research and improve the CRCI approach.
As an accountability initiative, reputation is a powerful motivator for building a brand and for long-term success. It's also advantageous to have an attitude of humility and exploration in the pursuit of helping facilitate a better DeFi ecosystem.
As a point of comparison, we're offering features and services generally not available from any other source.
For a closer view, Download our CRCI Pledge of Excellence Summary PDF
Just as with code audits, the CRCI is designed in a way that responsible DeFi builders can seek objective professional reviews, make adjustments, and publish updated content that directly impacts their CRCI Score and serves as publicly verifiable and auditable evidence of the effectiveness of the initiative.
-------------------- RISKS --------------------
CRCI could be received as a replacement for individual due diligence or the implications of investment advice.
We do not offer risk ratings. Risk assessment is subjective and personal. CRCI offers our opinions on how projects perform in the 8 categories we cover, only to be taken as a contribution to the considerations in your personal risk assessments.
CRCI Scores, ratings, or opinions could be considered, on their own, as an assessment of potential success or failure.
Projects can fail for a variety of reasons. Success and failure are not events, they are processes. We help investors identify DeFi leaders in transparency, user protection, and accountability, but at this time we do not comment on product market fit, competitive landscape, investment potential, or viability. We are not offering opinions on projected success or failure.
CRCI business model may be considered susceptible to conflict of interest considering it's the same approach as that of professional code audit firms.
Unfortunately, this would require the attitude that professional efforts, brand recognition, repeat business opportunities, and reputation are not sufficient incentives for objectivity, which we acknowledge the business-minded community rejects, even in the cypher-punk energy of web3.
However, to address this perception, we only review content that is publicly accessible, and the community can directly audit our opinions because they have the same direct access to the content we review. We specifically welcome this cross-examination to generate valuable discussions regarding DeFi research and accountability.
Responsible DeFi Leaders may not want to embrace or prioritize the CRCI Reviews and actionable feedback specifically designed to help refine their projects.
It is reasonable to assume bad actors would avoid accountability measures to maximize short-term gains with minimal effort. When a project asserts that self-assessment is sufficient and dismisses the value of professional third-party accountability, it can cast doubt on their commitment to user advocacy.
This attitude would be inconsistent with what is expected from true leaders in the DeFi space. Until now, there has not been the opportunity for professional reviews and actionable feedback in this way. The CRCI was created to fill this critical gap in our ecosystem, and we're honored to offer this support for our DeFi Leaders, where their existing efforts can be validated.
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Take our DYOR survey at crci.review/survey
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[PROJECT MILESTONES] What are the key milestones you need to achieve in order to complete your project successfully?
Milestone 1: The first milestone will be selecting which projects get sponsored for a CRCI Pledge of Excellence 12 month membership with Catalyst Funding.
We're opening up the selection process and criteria with input from the community.
Applicants may be selected due to financial need, popular vote, suboptimal existing baseline CRCI Score, or other criteria TBD.
Acceptance criteria:
We will be able to submit a written confirmation of the projects selected to close out milestone one, that they are agreeing to the membership features (pictured below), and that they have signed the CRCI Pledge of Excellence Service Agreement.
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Milestone 2: This second milestone will be the published baseline CRCI Scores and ratings for each of the projects onboarded through Catalyst funding. We will post these CRCI Scores on our website at crci.review.
With four Catalyst funded projects in our Pledge of Excellence program, we will have the opportunity to demonstrate the value of our initiative by guiding DeFi projects to produce content that will be more consistent in terms of transparency, user protection, and accountability.
In this case, we have a built-in path of milestone outputs as the CRCI Score adjusts as the project advances. It is the initiative of the DeFi Leaders to implement adjustments wherever possible to align with the CRCI actionable feedback.
Acceptance Criteria:
- The published baseline CRCI Score for DeFi project one
- The published baseline CRCI Score for DeFi project two
- The published baseline CRCI Score for DeFi project three
- The published baseline CRCI Score for DeFi project four
- This entails going through the content from the 8 categories we review.
- Social Engagement
- Communication of Intent
- Tokenomics
- Team / Developers
- Audits / Track Record
- User Protections
- Industry Accolades
- Cumulative Demerits
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Final Milestone: The continuous work of the CRCI involves ongoing updates on the progress of published content from CRCI Pledge of Excellence members. As projects make changes that can impact their CRCI Score, they receive priority CRCI Review updates to reflect these changes.
This milestone will be built on the published results of the actionable feedback from the CRCI Pledge of Excellence engagement with each project. In this way, this will be a community-auditable assessment of the value of the CRCI Pledge of Excellence program, where CRCI Scores are adjusted in step with published improvements to the DeFi project.
Acceptance Criteria:
- The updated CRCI Score for DeFi project one
- The updated CRCI Score for DeFi project two
- The updated CRCI Score for DeFi project three
- The updated CRCI Score for DeFi project four
- This entails re-reviewing updated and PUBLISHED content from the DeFI project in any or all the domains of:
- Social Engagement
- Communication of Intent
- Tokenomics
- Team / Developers
- Audits / Track Record
- User Protections
- Industry Accolades
- Cumulative Demerits
It's worth noting that CRCI Pledge of Excellence members are not exempt from receiving potential demerit adjustments to their CRCI Score. We take great care to appropriately consider project failures of any kind, and our priority is the consumer and user advocacy in our CRCI Scores.
[RESOURCES] Who is in the project team and what are their roles?
CRCI is always looking to find like-minded people in our ecosystem with a passion to see a higher-quality DeFi environment.
We have to push the limits of what it means to offer a caliber of DeFi products and services that surpasses the experience and expectations of traditional finance. We have such strong innovators in our space, and we need to remove inconsistencies in user advocacy to invite the new wave of users.
If this initiative resonates with you, please reach out!
w: crci.review
X: @crci_review
e: crcireview@gmail.com
Backstory
Hello and welcome! I’m RJ and my journey into the world of crypto started with curiosity, FOMO, and a bit of bad timing. Back in early 2018, right after the excitement of the 2017 crypto bull run, my first crypto purchase was Charlie Lee’s Litecoin and if you don't understand that reference, I bought the top. Like many who started at that time, I watched as my initial crypto investment dropped by roughly ~80%.
Those were the days of the ICO mania, where hype was common, and there were many promises to revolutionize “Trillion-dollar” industries with little accountability or transparency. The market was a wild west, very interesting but often unforgiving, especially to newcomers like myself. This tough experience was humbling and I was forced to slow down and take the time to better research the crypto ecosystem.
Why CRCI was Founded
Fast forward to 2021, I remained frustrated by the lack of clear guidelines on how to evaluate projects. My research over the years led to me feeling overwhelmed by whitepaper fatigue, so I set out to create what I couldn’t find: a structured, reliable way to analyze DeFi investments from a fundamental analysis point of view. This led to the creation of Chromahex Research and Confidence Insights Corp (CRCI). Our mission is simple: to establish standards of transparency, protection for users, and operational accountability in the DeFi space.
Here at CRCI, we don't just review projects. By drilling through over 25 metrics, we look to understand the fundamental details of tokenomics, the strength of project teams, and their implementation of user protections. We believe that, just like in traditional finance, the pillars of a successful investment are rooted in diligent research and a clear understanding of both the opportunities and the risks.
Our Commitment
My personal experiences have deeply influenced the values at CRCI. I know firsthand how daunting the crypto world can be. That’s why we are committed to providing free insights that anyone, whether a seasoned investor or a curious newbie, can consider when making educated decisions. Our reviews and services are designed to highlight not only the strengths of a project but also its potential weaknesses, ensuring you have a holistic view before you invest. Through this approach we are perfectly positioned to offer DeFi projects, educated, professional and actionable insights on what ground they still need to cover. It's a win, win for everybody.
At CRCI, we champion DeFi builders that embrace refinement and a commitment to accountability with our CRCI Pledge of Excellence program. We are not here to sell you on any project. Instead, we offer our research as a tool for your own decision-making, a guide to help you navigate this exciting but complex landscape with greater confidence and to quickly identify DeFi projects that build in ways that align with your values and expectations.
Demand Evidence of Accountability
Always insist on evidence of accountability in any investment decision. Always look for third party professional code audits and professional operational accountability reviews. Crypto is still wildly unregulated and the consumer is directly exposed to bad actors and ill-prepared projects that thrive on hype which significantly dilutes the reputation of the DeFI environment and the positive impact of legitimate innovators in our space. We are here to help you quickly identify DeFi leaders that prioritize their users and investors by doing everything they can to demonstrate their commitment to accountability.
RJ
CRCI
Project Lead
[BUDGET & COSTS] Please provide a cost breakdown of the proposed work and resources
Considering the positive impact the CRCI has in terms of its potential to positively shape the DeFi environment, there is a risk that the introductory pricing significantly under-represents the need and the value of the initiative.
With the impending bullrun, all eyes are going to be on Cardano DeFi and we have the opportunity to show real initiative and leadership, above and beyond the incredible technical achievements of our DeFi innovators.
We need to leave no excuse and no questions about all the ways our DeFi environment is industry-leading in terms of technical achievements, and check all the boxes for discerning newcomers looking for third-party validation that our DeFi projects prioritize the consumer in every possible way.
In the spirit of accommodating as many of our DeFi innovators as possible, we want to offer attainable introductory pricing for the first cohort of projects onboarding to the CRCI Pledge of Excellence, and present the overwhelming value for money from the Catalyst Fund.
[VALUE FOR MONEY] How does the cost of the project represent value for money for the Cardano ecosystem?
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The scope of the potential impact of the CRCI Reviews and CRCI Pledge of Excellence is an industry-shaping initiative.
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The effort required to build the CRCI initiative has taken a noticeable amount of resources in terms of research and development and requires a further commitment of expertise and time to offer our services.
It's impossible for a DeFi project to reproduce the services we're offering even if they could hire a dedicated full-time team member (80k+ USD) to focus on this domain.
No existing alternative options offer our suite of features and services, at any price range.
Certain rating protocols are beyond the control of DeFi projects, leaving them unable to have a voice and improve on the ratings they receive. The CRCI Reviews and Pledge of Excellence program are built to offer authentic actionable feedback for which they can publish recommended updated content that would directly improve their CRCI Score! We want to elevate our DeFi innovators, advocate for their community of investors, and improve the DeFi environment.
With your vote, you will directly support four DeFi projects in the Cardano ecosystem, with the opportunity to further refine their projects in terms of transparency, user protection, and accountability! There is nothing to lose!
Thank you for your vote and your support!
And don't forget to...
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w: crci.review
X: @crci_review
e: crcireview@gmail.com
