Catalyst Interactive News Journal

Catalyst Interactive News Journal (CINJ)

Newspapers and journals typically work from top to bottom, from writers and editors to readers. The publisher decides which articles should be read by the public. The printed stories are often hard to prove and trust––the information is diluted with words that sell––sources are often scarcely available. Stories from the grassroots that could share their learning and wisdom from their unique position, all the way to the top, are not acknowledged. Because of this, readers are told what to consume without an opportunity to contribute in a meaningful way to their informational environment, even as they are the ones who live, experience, and see with their own eyes the world around them up close and first-hand.

Our proposal aims to explore alternatives––possibilities that give the readers the choice of how much they would like to participate in what they are reading––with a format that seeks to start small, evolve, and increase over time. We will focus on "out of the ordinary protocols," putting in place easily repeatable mechanisms that are agile: adjusted and adapted as needed, the overall design focuses on a flexible and dynamic design and evolution.

Most important is that over time, the readers are empowered to become voters, writers, and perhaps, if the community decides, they will also edit and perhaps build video pieces out of the stories later on that can improve and enhance the experience for all. This helps to blur the lines between the top and the bottom so that this truly becomes an effort of distributed decision-making.

Design.

The design of CINJ will be based on an interactive website. The community itself can submit content like articles, documentation, or videos. Site users can vote on submitted content to decide which stories or articles should appreciate a continuation.

The Journey of an article by Voting.

The process is quite simple. Submitted articles will start in the Backlog (A.1). The highest voted articles in the Backlog will be published as short stories (A.2). The highest Voted short stories will become Brief Stories (A.3). The highest voted brief stories will become main stories (A.4) and so on…. As submitted short stories may need support in being edited on their journey, the CINJ Team will support submitters in editing their articles to ensure that the voters receive high-quality stories and articles.

(A) Submitting Articles.

In this news journal, everyone will be allowed to submit their articles. All submitted articles will be visible to everyone in a news journal backlog. The submitted articles in the backlog will pass through a voting round. In this first round, the voters decide which backlog stories will be published on the news journal website. The submitted article's journey on the site will pass through the following categories.

Categories.

(A.1) Backlog ( Character limit = 1000 Characters )

(A.2) Published as short stories ( Character limit = 1000 Characters )

(A.3) Published as Brief stories ( Character limit = 2500 Characters )

(A.4) Published as main stories ( Character limit = unlimited Characters )

(A.5) Published as Movies/Reportage ( Character limit = unlimited Characters & playtime )

(A.6) Archive of highest voted stories ( Character limit = unlimited Characters )

(A.1) Contains max 30 articles per epoch

(A.2) to (A.4) contains max. 10 articles per category

(A.5) Contains max 1 Movie per month

(A.6) will not have any contain limits as it serves as Archive.

(B) The Journey of an article by Voting.

The process is quite simple. Submitted articles will start in the Backlog (A.1). The highest voted articles in the Backlog will be published as short stories (A.2). The highest Voted short stories will become Brief Stories (A.3). The highest voted brief stories will become main stories (A.4) and so on…. As submitted short stories may need support in being edited on their journey, the CINJ Team will support the submitters in evolving the articles over iterations to ensure that the voters receive high-quality stories and articles.

(B.1) Voting on submitted stories in the backlog

(B.2) Voting on short stories

(B.3) Voting on brief stories

(B.4) Voting on main stories

In the beginning, the website will be set up on WordPress, where several already existing voting plugins are available. Over time the goal is to bring the news journal voting process on-chain.

(C) Criterias - Transparently Verified information & content

All submitted articles have to fulfill several criteria as we want to make sure that submitted content follows a trackable, accountable and transparent process.

(C.1) Each submitter has to submit their articles via the CINJ git

(C.2) Each submitter has to link direct sources to verify submitted content

(C.3) Each submitter needs to hold a Daedalus, Yoroi, or other ADA based Wallet

(E) CINJ Voting Epochs/Cycles

The Epoch of a voting process lasts 5 days. This timeframe is chosen as Stake Pools operate in the same timeframe, and we definitely aim to set up a CINJ Stakepool in the future. Getting used to this time cycle allows us to adjust reward distribution by a matching timeframe to Stakepools. Rewards can be easily distributed.

Epoch duration

(E.1) voting on (A.1) last 5 days

(E.2) voting on (A.2) last 5 days

(E.3) voting on (A.3) last 10 days

(E.4) voting on (A.4) last 10 days

The described voting process is a first mature draft and will be adjusted and evolved over time and earned experience.

(I) Incentives for submitters - the CINJ Treasury & Rewards

As we want to reward the community for their engagement by submitting articles to edit and add content on the article's journey, CINJ aims to establish its own treasury from which engaged submitters will receive rewards.

The treasury will be located on a Yoroi Wallet, the wallet's balance will be public and transparent. Everyone can see how much ADA the treasury is holding at any moment, as the balance will be shown on the CINJ website.

As we want to start small, the incentives for submitting articles might be quite low but will definitely rise over time if the treasury allows.

(I.1) Submitters receive 5 USD when their submitted articles in (A.1) are voted to be (A.2)

(I.2) Submitters receive 10 USD when their submitted articles in (A.2) are voted to be (A.3)

(I.3) Submitters receive 15 USD when their submitted articles in (A.3) are voted to be (A.4)

(I.4) Submitters receive 25 USD when their submitted articles in (A.4) are voted to be (A.5)

Rewards per Epoch ( available )

10 Articles from (A.1) to (A.2) = 50 USD

10 Articles from (A.2) to (A.3) = 100 USD

10 Articles from (A.3) to (A.4) = 150 USD

10 Articles from (A.4) to (A.5) = 250 USD

total = 550 USD

Rewards per Month

total = 3300 USD (6*550)

Rewards for 3 Months ( 1 Catalyst Funding round )

total = 9900 USD (3*3300)

All rewards will be distributed in ADA

For future Catalyst Funding rounds, we definitely aim to include an NFT Business model and own tokens for the CINJ if the project leads to a successful project and requires a more complex rewarding system.

Logo NFT Competition: 

Be part of history in the making - Create an NFT logo for the Interactive Catalyst News Journal (CINJ)

With the current CINJ Logo/Profile image as a temporary one, we will launch a competition allowing the global Cardano community of creatives to submit their ideas for a logo that captures the imagination, vision, and mission of CINJ.

Entries would be free of charge and require sign-up on the website (1 entry per wallet address). The submission would have to be sent as an NFT and meet certain pixel dimensions for optimum usage across platforms.

Submissions will be accepted within a time window (First month of Fund 7), with the community voting for their favorite ones!

Using smart contracts, the prize funds of $1000 worth of ADA will be sent to the wallet that submitted the NFT and received the most community votes by the deadline!

Impact.

The impact of this project is definitively defined as the design of the first distributed news journal on Earth, which is built in a way hoped to create a certain influence on the journalistic environment of the future. In other words, the impact is seen as we eventually use the Cardano Blockchain and ecosystem as the platform for the Renaissance of the Newspaper; in this way, revolution is defined as a new transparent, trackable and measurable impact itself.

Feasibility.

This proposal is quite easy to realize as the design is based on already existing off-chain applications & plugins (WordPress, GitHub). The growing Team is committed to steering this proposal through its evolution successfully.

The rewarding model is easy to realize as ADA Wallets are available, and the distribution of rewards can be made manually in the beginning by the CINJ Team.

Auditability.

As the news journal will be designed on a website, the achievements and evolution can be constantly tracked and documented. We offer as well to provide a bi-weekly breakout room in the Catalyst After Town Halls to allow the community to interact directly with the team.

Roadmap

September 2021

Providing breakout rooms in After Town Halls and Swarm Sessions to include the community in the design and framework process.

October 2021

Analyzing voting with community feedback

Setting up the first draft of the CINJ website

Setting up CINJ Community platforms. (Discord, GitHub)

November 2021.

Test runs on submitting & voting on articles by the News journal Team and community

Establishing feedback loops to increase the quality and format over iterations

Announcements & PR campaign to invite community members to submit their articles via Twitter, Telegram, Discord

Announcing NFT Logo Competition

Submitting follow-up proposal for Project Catalyst Fund 7

December 2021.

Moving the Newspaper Onchain

Test runs on submitting & voting by the News journal Team and community

January 2022.

Release of official Onchain CINJ version 1

The Team.

Razali Samsudin: is an Educator, Editor, Digital Economy, Blockchain & Sustainability Researcher, Social Entrepreneur, Wada - UN SDG and Education Coordinator, Co-Founder of Sustainable ADA & Catalyst School Core Member https://www.linkedin.com/in/razali-samsudin/

Felix Weber: Networker & Community manager ( Catalyst Swarm ), T&M's elected representative for the 1st Catalyst Circle, co-founder of Catalyst Swarm, co-initiator & coordinator of the Eastern Hemisphere Town Hall, Catalyst School Core Member & School Ambassador

Benjamin Hartin: Manuscript ghostwriter and co-writer in the autobiographical genre. Freelance ghostwriter for high-profile newspaper & journal articles. Business owner for 21 years

Budget.

• WordPress Website estimated costs for 12 months = $600

• Business Account = $20*12 months = $240

• Domain = $10

• Plugins = $300

• Elementor = $50

• (I) Incentives for submitters - the CINJ Treasury & Rewards = $9900

• 3 Movies = $4500

• Movie (documentary) creation by 1 Movie per month (1 Movie = 1500)

• Logo NFT Competition Prize = $1000

• Project management, Product management, Administration for 3 people over 3 months = $9000

Requested funds in USD: $25,000