Project Rockstar - the MAIN hustle

The ultimate end-game of decentralisation is the Empowered Individual over The Organisation.

Decentralised investing in high-potential individuals

Not a traditional "microlending" model, but rather a decentralised "investment" model - where talented individuals can raise funds to further their own careers through training and tech equipment (laptop, etc). "Time-tokens" are issued by each individual fund raising smart contract, allowing for voting & distribution of funds to individuals as needed.

This project contributes to solving the adoption of ADA by becoming the primary "bank account" for highly skilled individuals such as software engineers, lawyers & doctors to fund their career investment, receive mentoring and support, and eventually deliver high demand services to employers.

Mechanism

Future "Rockstars" can pitch for funding, based on a proposal of training, equipment, career path. Investors commit to providing funding. If the proposal targets are reached, ADA are held in a "treasury" and $time tokens are released to investors proportionately (each representing 1 hour of actual work by the Rockstar) with some kept back as rewards / incentives for the Rockstar to reach certain milestones. ADA is never distributed to the Rockstar directly, but rather through a "partner / supplier" ecosystem to ensure it is used correctly, and these payment events are voted upon by Investors (based on their $time token holdings). Investors are able to trade tokens, but also "cancel" them - receiving back a proportion of the ADA remaining in the proposal treasury - meaning that $time tokens will always have a "minimum" value - ie the proportionate value of the ADA in the treasury at any point in time. Of course, the idea is that the value of the $time token is also linked to the value of that 1 hour redeemable for actual work performed by the Rockstar - e.g. Lawyer, Doctor, Data Scientist, Cloud Engineer - and therefore becomes an effective means of accessing / investing in this class of skill.

Keep in mind that $time token are specific to each individual - ie they would have a separate minting policyIds backing them - per proposal (in Plutus speak) - which is such a perfect fit!

Partner / Supplier Ecosystem

There is huge potential for bridges to be built to other decentralised businesses, such as a few that are already being contemplated for Fund 6. For example, funds raised in a Rockstar contract could easily be disbursed into a Tutorchain contract via a bridge, allowing for training to be provided with a reputable tutor or mentor. Other partners could provide contracts for certifications (e.g. Plutus Pioneers, AWS, or PluralSight), and others could provide raw resources, such as access to cloud computing infrastructure for machine learning training. 

Partners & Suppliers would have to be managed and vetted via a decentralised mechanism, and this is where it becomes a little more complex as to exactly how this happens - and therefore the initial idea is to maintain a list of pre-vetted partners, and slowly allow the model to evolve (such as how Cardano block producing was initially bootstraped in a centralised way). Probably something like Atala PRISM would help here, providing some sense of identity for both Rockstars and partners.

$time token trading

Investors could have many reasons for buying $time tokens, but probably there are two main reasons. 

Firstly, they might genuinely foresee a demand for a particular skill at a future date - for example a Bank might be embarking on a multi-year cloud transformation project, which they predict will require a large amount of cloud engineering skills. They could therefore choose to invest in a number of Rockstars who have cloud engineering on their career path, buying up that time at a reduced price, and then holding those $time tokens until they have matured and redeeming them for delivery on their cloud projects. This would be an alternative to a traditional "intern" model, or graduate recruitment programme. 

The second type of investor could be more of a pure speculator - someone who has identified a trend, and wants to invest early in the trend. For example "how do i go long on cloud computing?". With Project Rockstar, you simply buy up $time tokens that fit your predicted skill, and then take part in mentoring and growing those individuals along a path towards increasing the value in the individual. At some point into the future you can then sell those tokens to whoever requires them at that point in time, or convert them fluidly into the next big demand skill, and continue the cycle. Everyone wins.   

Development Phases

Development will be split into 2 major phases, with the intention to build some momentum from a simple, but fully functional MVP in phase 1.

Phase 1 - MVP of basics

This will be developed through the funding provided by Fund 6. Still to be fleshed out in more details, but high-level components include:

• Simple "parameterised" proposals (Plutus/Marlowe smart-contracts)
• Simple portal to Pitch, Invest and Launch (fund raising portal)
• Simple DAO functionality (principle proposes, investors vote, disburse, cancel and redeem tokens)
• Fixed, vetted, 3rd party providers (training, certification, equipment, etc - maybe start with centralised vetting)

Phase 2 - High value next steps

The next iteration under consideration, highly flexible and based on demand

• Open 3rd party providers (based on some sort of decentralised vetting process)
• DEX for trading of time tokens
• Remote video conferencing facility, allowing for direct redemption of time tokens 1-on-1 between principle individual and token holder, potentially including a scheduling, project management and team management (i.e. allowing for more than 1 individual redeeming time in parallel for a single investor)

FAQ Zone

Clarifications based on some great questions and discussions with the community

How is this not digital slavery (ie selling an obligation for future work)?

$time tokens can be considered "obligations to work" - but of course this model would not work as the Rockstar could simply run away and make themselves unavailable. The model is not yet fully described in the proposal, but the idea is that Rockstars would "earn" $time tokens back as they "work" with a token holder. Keeping in mind that $time tokens are "cancellable" against the treasury, they actually represent real world tangible value (as opposed to "hype" value in the example of humanipo). For example, if the Rockstar works 10 hours, she earns 10 $time tokens, which can be cancelled at her treasury for 20 ADA each (and obviously the ratio of $time to ADA is dependent on the launch parameters of her contract). Of course the Rockstar could also re-sell those earned $time tokens back to the market at a higher value, should the "hype" mean there is a higher demand for that particular skill.

The idea of capturing real value (via ADA) into the contract is key to this - there is no need to generate hype - you can simply look at the value of the treasury and divide it by the number of $time tokens in circulation - and thats the minimum value of that $time token (taking into account funds provisioned for spending against the career path - but i'm trying to keep it simple). As the value of the skill in the market increases, the value of the "hour" of time would increase, more trading/earning would occur, and therefore more value would be captured in the treasury in a feedback loop, lifting the minimum value of the $time token. Eventually the Rockstar could even earn back all of their $time tokens, and decide to exit by cancelling the full set, redeeming all the value in the treasury - this would be analogous to "retiring" in the real world. 

It should now be clear that this model is very inspired by Cardano's own treasury model, including the Catalyst mechanism!

Another important factor is to limit the total supply of $time token - my initial thinking is approx 1,000 per Rockstar contract. This is close to 6 months of full-time work for an individual - which feels like a manageable time horizon. Of course this needs testing, and it's possible that a much smaller value would work better to try to find a good balance between total value of treasury vs incentive to hold/earn tokens. Testing would take place with the first cohort of "pilot" Rockstars.