'What The DAO?' Twitter Space

[GENERAL] Summarize your solution to the problem.

Build an organic weekly audience through Twitter Spaces that participates, listens, & learns through interviews of DAO builders, tool makers, & avid members––all working on the Cardano Blockchain.

[GENERAL] Summarize your relevant experience.

Benjamin Hartin is a memoir ghostwriter, journalist, blockchain enthusiast, & Proposal Assessor.

His experience includes:

• 10+ years of research
• 1000s of hrs of combined interview experience
• 1.5+ yrs of investing, learning, & working in both the Cardano & Catalyst Communities

[GENERAL] Requested funds in USD.

[IMPACT] Please describe your proposed solution.

-The Solution-

Benjamin will host weekly Twitter Spaces over four months, engaging with a significant guest in the Cardano DAO space during each episode, with interview questions aimed at the following four main categories:

1. The latest news on DAOs
2. What they are building
3. Their decision to use Cardano
4. Highlights & areas of learning using Cardano

The Space will include a 45-minute one-on-one interview and a 15-minute Q&A session for audience members.

____________________________

Perceiving the problem: With no space for people from all over Cardano and beyond to access consistent and educational interviews of people currently working on and in the Cardano DAO space.

Why my approach?: My background in research, scriptwriting, interview, and the blockchain space are skills needed for the Twitter Space I’m describing. The ‘show’ itself (a pilot for a future Twitter Space/podcast when this one is successful) will be advertised through several “Cross-Chain” spaces, Discord groups, and Telegram channels. It will soon become an easy choice for individuals looking to learn why Cardano should be their “go-to choice” for building their DAOs, or participating in one or more already up and running on Cardano!

Who will participate?: At first, Cardano and Catalyst members interested in the topic. Through cross-chain promotions in several social media spaces, we should see an influx of new members weekly. We’ll aim at a total of 100 consistent listers by the end of our four months and will record and share the Episodes for our archive and future listeners to enjoy.

Implementation: 

Research: 6 hours are allotted per month for research, analysis, and scriptwriting, where we’ll determine the latest interests & questions about DAOs overall and schedule guests who will be able to speak to those curiosities, as well as questions in our 4 main categories (listed above).

Audience participation: There will be an element of audience participation in guest selection, though creating expectations beyond that simple statement could make managing our schedule tricky. As this will be our first run at this Twitter Space, we’ll learn a lot about what the possibilities are and be able to give finer detail in future seasons of our Space. 

Product: We will record, archive, and publish all 16 episodes of our What the DAO? Twitter Space. They will be able to be accessed on my personal Twitter account (@cardanobenjamin) and other areas created for distribution. These will be limited at first and, over time, will be built out, first with low-cost solutions, and later after the minimum viable product (MVP) is successful, we’ll advance our offerings in future funding rounds.

Outcome/results: We hope to end with a consistent live listening audience of 100 active listeners who also participate in the Q&A sessions. We’ll also be listening to new ideas about where the Space could go in the future beyond the scaling ideas we’ve already come up with (written about below!).

[IMPACT] Please describe how your proposed solution will address the Challenge that you have submitted it in.

The Challenge setting for DAOs <3 Cardano asks, “How can we make Cardano the go-to Choice for building DAOs?”

I can think of no better way than to showcase several current builders, etc., who others can come to and learn from, ask questions, and potentially collaborate with in the future!

What the DAO? will be a fun, inviting, and consistent space that participants will learn to love and connect with from week to week. This continual engagement, and growth over time, will broaden the base of knowledge and assist listeners in finding out what they need to know to get on Cardano to build and participate in the DAO space.

The next part of the same setting asks, “What tools can we provide to enable effective DAO’s Creation & Operation?” What the DAO? answers by being a great tool to spread awareness and bring new creators and operators to the space!

[IMPACT] What are the main risks that could prevent you from delivering the project successfully and please explain how you will mitigate each risk?

The risks would be 1. the user base not growing, 2. guests falling through, and 3. Q&A sessions having too few questions from the audience. Here is our prevention plan for all three.

1. I’ll be promoting in cross-chain groups on Twitter, Discord, and Telegram. Between that and ensuring guests that people are excited to hear from, I feel we have the basis for a good start. Learning will necessarily be a part of the process, and I’m enthusiastic about gaining that perspective and solving any issue.
2. Potential guests are already being contacted. I’ll invite them to be listeners in all our Spaces, and bring some up to the stage to speak, in case a scheduled guest is absent.
3. Q&A sessions will always have a list of related questions written for that time in case there are too few questions from the audience.

[FEASIBILITY] Please provide a detailed plan, including timeline and key milestones for delivering your proposal.

Roadmap

1 Month: Research, plan, schedule guests, and host weekly Twitter Spaces. Beyond this, there will be admin work on web presence for the show and advertising to several groups mentioned above. Guests for month 2 scheduled.

2 Months: Continuations in all categories in month 1, several more episodes of our Space, and guests for Month 3 scheduled.

4 Months: Wrapping up the season with our final episode, create an outcome document and video for Catalyst, and begin drafting a new proposal for further funding to continue What the DAO?!

[FEASIBILITY] Please provide a detailed budget breakdown.

Time period: 16 Weeks (4 months)

Budget:

Research, Analysis, Scriptwriting @ $70/hour

6 hrs/month x 4 months = 24hrs

• 24 hrs x $70 = $1680

Preparation/Hosting @ $45/hr

2 hr x 16 weeks = 32hrs

• 32 hrs x $45/hr = $1440

Admin Work @ $20/hr

1.5 hr/month x 4 months = 6hrs

• 6 hrs x $30 = $180

Web presence

Estimated cost for four months of work on and actual advertising, and other technology incidentals

• total estimate $550

Total: $3850

Note: The prices above reflect rates charged to recent customers for similar work.

[FEASIBILITY] Please provide details of the people who will work on the project.

This agile project focuses on building this MVP for future iterations and growth. As such, the ‘team’ this early on is just myself. The guests I’ll host will be participating on their own with the incentive of being an early contributor to the conversation, promoting their products, DAO(s), and helping build this learning process for the greater community.

Benjamin Hartin, host-to-be of What the DAO?, is a creative, musician, and a writer engaged in individual transformation & societal change. For him, his time on Cardano is an extension of both and an opportunity to learn from its vast community and educate others to utilize Cardano through participation in the blockchain and Catalyst. Benjamin is also an active PA.

https://www.thewriterbenjamin.com

[FEASIBILITY] If you are funded, will you return to Catalyst in a later round for further funding? Please explain why / why not.

Yes. We plan to use the What the DAO? Twitter Space as a pilot for a Twitter Space/Podcast that we’ll seek funding for in a future fund after we’ve established success with this first season of What the DAO?

By the end of year one, we are looking to potentially grow into several languages/time zones to have Asian, African, and South American hosts running at least a once-per-month Twitter Space (or equivalent in the region) within one year from the start of What the DAO? This first season will help us gauge what is possible and network in various communities to find the needed collaborations for scaling success.

[FEASIBILITY] Are you or any member of your team working on any other proposals in this Fund9?

[FEASIBILITY] Are you or your team working on any other proposals from previous Funds?

[AUDITABILITY] Please describe what you will measure to track your project's progress, and how will you measure these?

• We will measure active/live listeners on each space
• We will also measure total listens across the 4 months (live listeners and those who listen after the fact)

[AUDITABILITY] What does success for this project look like?

We are looking for engagement and growth in in the What the DAO? Twitter Space to be our measure of success. The more people contributing to the conversion and engaged in concrete experience, the better.

• We aim to have 30 live listeners by end of month 1, 50 by end of month 2, and 100 live listeners by Month 4.
• We aim to have at least 10K listens across all 16 episodes (both live listeners and those who listen after).
• We will also look to our audience members who participate in our Q&A’s and all other engagement across our social accounts to “take the temperature” of our listeners. This will help us determine the cause for turnover or repeat listeners. From these learnings we plan to iterate and become a more welcoming space for all who wish to learn about DAOs on Cardano.

[AUDITABILITY] Please provide information on whether this proposal is a continuation of a previously funded project in Catalyst or an entirely new one.

No. This proposal is not a continuation of a previous proposal.