Community-driven content production

A collab platform for community-driven content production based on content models with built-in token-based governance on content and models

Our team has been exploring for 6 months the challenging task of educating people about Cardano's technology through the Infoblocks project.

Knowledge is the basis of empowerment
Despite the great growth of the cryptocurrency market at the beginning of this year, a recent report from Cardify has shown that a third of new investors don't know how crypto works. [1] The same report also showed that more than a third of investors researched cryptocurrencies for less than a month before buying them, and a quarter was looking for short-term gains. The evidence suggests that the possible price increase of a currency attracts many new investors in a typical FoMO effect, fear of missing out, a psychological phenomenon characterized by a generalized apprehension that others may be having rewarding experiences that you are missing out on. [2]
A key part of mass adoption relies on education about blockchain technology and its innovation possibilities. Regardless of the occupational field or level of education, knowledge about blockchain technology basics allows people to make better decisions about investing their money and time. But more than that, it opens the door to understanding the socio-economic transformation towards decentralization that we are living, preparing people to act in this new decentralized economic infrastructure actively.
Nevertheless, producing high-quality educational content takes time, planning, and a lot of work by people from different knowledge areas. The speed of technological advancement in the blockchain and cryptocurrency industry also makes the production of educational content on the topic even more challenging, requiring a lot of study time to wade through the vast technical background and translate it into an affordable and accessible message that suits a wider audience.
To reach more people globally, the educational content produced has to be available in English and several other languages since most people worldwide are not proficient in English. The translation job is not simple and involves specialized translators who can effectively understand the technical definitions and translate the message.
Another key factor is that the content a creator wants to produce is not always aligned with what is most valuable to those who will consume it. Producing content that is not valuable to the audience is a labour effort that benefits neither the creator nor the audience, so there must be an active feedback process from the community consuming the content.

Our proposal solution
To address this problem, we are proposing a collaborative platform to organize community-driven content production based on predefined content models, letting the community decide what is most important and should be prioritized and automatically allocating the creative production work among the enrolled contributors. The community governance layer, built through a custom governance token, allows stakeholders to decide what content should be covered by contributors and how content models can be improved.
The goal is to allow the community to participate in the decision making process and content creation. Hence, the platform and governance serve as a tool to ensure that the content produced is consistent with what the audience expects and demonstrates how blockchain can empower communities and change the structure of organizations.

The Infoblocks project
Over the past 6 months, our team has been iterating on the production of informative and educational content in the Infoblocks project, in an effort to explain certain aspects of how the Cardano network works. In order to determine the topics, we relied on frequently asked questions that we have observed in the community.
Our initial approach was to explain the concepts in a ludic and visual way. For each content (Infoblock), we created an infographic distributed as a static image, a base text detailing the content in more depth, a video with simple graphic animations and narration based on the text, and an interactive slide used for the video production that also works as a self-guided reading of the content. Now we hope to use Infoblock as the first model of content to be produced by the platform.

The collaborative platform
This proposal's ultimate goal is to build a platform that can accommodate a variety of content models, relying on a wide range of diversified contributors and an active community to support them. But to start more realistically, we want to use Infoblock as a first model of content to be produced by a group of carefully selected contributors. As EveryBlock Studio, we plan to start with management and responsibility for the platform and content, and gradually decentralize the control mechanisms to empower the community by putting in place an Exit to Community (E2C) strategy. [3]
The main features of the platform are listed below:

• Any contributor can propose an Infoblock Idea, clearly describing the goals of the content and providing references to help contributors better address the topic.
• With Cardano native token and token locking feature, we want to build a token-based governance layer to allow the community to vote on Infoblocks Ideas regularly. The most voted ideas are then developed in the next cycle of content production.
• Each Infoblock has a limited budget — composed of governance token and ada — to be distributed between the contributors according to their roles.
• During content production, each part of a work is peer-reviewed by randomly selected contributors who share the same role.
• When allocated to carry out some part of the work, the contributor receives a reward at the end of the content production (governance tokens and ada). The Infoblock budget is distributed to the contributors who participated in the production in proportion to their work's difficulty, predefined by a contributor proportionality scheme. The scheme is also subject to change by the community.
• Each content will have an associated address to which users can also tip the Infoblock to reward contributors for their work directly.
• To summarize, in addition to voting for Infoblock ideas to be developed, the community can also vote to make changes to the Infoblock content model and the contributor proportionality scheme. In the future, the community will also be able to vote to assign or revoke roles to new contributors and propose new content models.
• A stake pool of the project can be established to financially support the content producers. The profit pool margin will compose the fund that pays contributors for each piece of content produced. The amounts collected from the cost per epoch parameter of the pool will be redirected to EveryBlock Studio, responsible for the infrastructure's operation and maintenance.

Roles of contributors
The initial roles that were appointed based on our experience producing the Infoblocks are as follows:

• Basic User. Can submit ideas for Infoblocks and tip the Infoblock.
• Writer. Write the base text and text for the image.
• Translator. Translate the base text and all text strings to your language.
• Narrator. Record the audio narration in your language.
• Graphic Designer. Create all the graphical elements of an Infoblock, including the Static Infographic.
• Video Producer. Produce a video based on the base text, using the elements created by the Graphic Designer.

Cost structure
The requested fund in this proposal has the purposes of:

• Paying for the development of a web platform for managing users, ideas and infoblocks.
• Paying for the development of governance tools.
• Establishing an initial fund to support the contributors.
  The project is expected to be developed over 6 months with Brazilian workforce. The compensation values were estimated based on the expected amount of work for each position and the average Brazilian salary. The way we plan to allocate the requested resources is described below:
• Web Developer. $ 1000 * 6 = 6000
• Blockchain Developer. $800 * 6 = 4800
• UI/UX designer. $ 800 * 6 = 4800
• DevOps. $ 400 * 6 = 2400
• IT infrastructure. $ 200 * 6 = 1200
• Budget for incentives. $ 3000
  Total = $ 22200
  References
  [1] https://www.cnbc.com/2021/03/04/survey-finds-one-third-of-crypto-buyers-dont-know-what-theyre-doing.html
  [2] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0747563213000800
  [3] https://www.colorado.edu/lab/medlab/exit-to-community