AIP-124: Thank APE: Decentralized, Automated Rewards for Valuable ApeCoin Contributions

[Bernard]

Great Proposal @thrivegiraffe and thanks for putting so much work into this, and great to see the group of OG Apes getting involved in the board! Excited to see where the vote moves. Also Kudos for the visual presentation

While I am in favor of contributing a dedicated budget to reward member participation. I would move away from granular incentivization for small tasks towards:
(1) Compensation for tangible, outcome-driven contributions(like SafeDAO is spearheading atm)
(2) Retroactive compensation for great stuff being built, or great community worklike it is standard in many high-quality DAOs.

My two key concerns with the proposed auto-validation and rewarding of participation:

1. In my view, the key reason why people are not participating (“less than 7% have accounts”) is that they just don’t know how to get started. I have been working with several DAOs in the ecosystem and they all face this problem. Onboarding is hard - but it’s more an educational problem than a financial reward problem.
2. Financial rewards for granular-level tasks have never really worked out for DAOs (or NFT communities) due to misaligned incentives. Financial mercenaries are real in the space and I’d be extremely cautious to attract community members for the wrong reasons / dilute the currently great quality of the ApeCoin Forum.

[thrivegiraffe]

Hi @Bernard it’s nice to meet you and thanks for the kind words!

@Bernard

Thanks for putting so much work into this, and great to see the group of OG Apes getting involved in the board! Excited to see where the vote moves.

Thank you, also, for your feedback. These were my three takeaways:

1. You recommend incentivizing bigger, outcome-driven contributions - possibly retroactively.
2. You believe the #1 reason people don’t participate is they don’t know how to get started.
3. You are worried about “financial mercenaries” in the space.

Here are my quick reflections:

1. Yes on supporting bigger, outcome-driven contributions! This isn’t an issue at all. It’ll be the job of the Thank APE board to evaluate community feedback + community data, and ensure the contributions we reward are routinely updated to be aligned with the value our community wishes to create.

2. We agree that ApeCoin can do better onboarding. We can support that - and plan to support that - with Thank APE. Still, “getting started” is only part of solving for greater participation. To do that, people need to build lasting habits aligned with creating value for ApeCoin. That takes more than education. It requires, among other things, that our community is valued and feels valued for the contributions they make to ApeCoin (… and that’s what Thank APE does!).

3. We also agree with your worries about “financial mercenaries” in web3. That’s why we built the tech to address bots, bad actors, and lazy actors. I’ve shared extensively about our tech and approach in various replies in the thread above - and, long story short, we feel confident that we can largely dissuade financial mercenaries… while persuading values-aligned community members to contribute!

Again, thanks so much for your nice words and great feedback. I hope the above is helpful! - Daniel

[Harry]

Got the opportunity to have a call with @thrivegiraffe this week to talk about the AIP.

Appreciate the extensive posts, logical graphics and track records for validation. Below are my initial feedback:

Pros

• Active participation of the DAO
• Track record with existing case studies with BanklessDAO
• Good retention stats
• Opens up possibilities to support other approved AIPs

Cons

• Customization of bot prevention is needed

Jason Choi

"Token incentives are a top-of-the-funnel user acquisition tool but does not help with user retention.

There’s no replacing a good product. If your underlying user experience is bad, people will still leave after the rewards run out.
"

• From Jason Choi, Ex-Spartan Group.

Many of the commentators above share concerns that echo with Jason. Perhaps the use of the metrics from BanklessDAO, and other communities that are using ThriveCoin’s model would help strengthening the thesis above.

[thrivegiraffe]

Hi @Harry, I appreciate your kind words. I enjoyed our conversation, and I’m excited for future collaborations too! I’ll do my best to quickly address your feedback:

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@Harry

Pros

• Active participation of the DAO
• Track record with existing case studies with BanklessDAO
• Good retention stats
• Opens up possibilities to support other approved AIPs

Thanks for all the wonderful stuff you listed in your in your “Pros” reflection. It’s been really exciting to see and feel all of the excitement around our work and the impact we can make for ApeCoin!

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Re: “Needed” Customization of Bot Prevention

Cons

• Customization of bot prevention is needed

I’m excited to give a little more color on the one con!

For the record, customization is just one of a number of bot mitigation strategies we use (you and I only covered this one in our conversation). I’ll list other strategies where customization isn’t needed below.

Additionally, the customization piece is designed as a feature / benefit. It’s very easy to do, and helps us quickly evolve to address any bot activity. We believe this a big, innovative “Pro”!

Below are four of our bot and bad actor mitigation strategies:

a. Granular community control over rewarded activities [this is the customization bit we talked about]
b. System designed to incentivize activity within one account
c. Delayed review and reward states supporting additional layers of detection
d. Spectrum of oversight for reward verification

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Re: Jason’s Words About Token Incentives as a Top-of-Funnel User Acquisition Tool

@Harry

"Token incentives are a top-of-the-funnel user acquisition tool but does not help with user retention." From Jason Choi

Jason is brilliant. But he is wrong on this one. Let’s walk through a simple token incentive use-case for our ApeCoin forum to show exactly why he is wrong:

• Earn APE for joining ApeCoin Discourse forum [top of funnel]
• Earn APE for making a proposal comment valued by community members [middle of funnel]
• Earn APE for creating an AIP idea valued by community members [past middle of funnel]
• Earn APE for passing a final AIP on Snapshot [end of funnel]
• Earn APE for implementing an initiative that tangibly increases member retention [end of funnel]

Tokens (e.g. rewards) incentivize the behavior communities wish to incentivize. They incentivize top-of-the-funnel user acquisition… when they are designed as top-of-the-funnel user acquisition tools. They incentive retention… when they are designed as user retention tools.

• The optimal question is not: “What is the value of token incentives?”
• The optimal question is: “What are we valuing with token incentives?”

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Re: Jason’s Words About Not Replacing a Good Product

@Harry

“There’s no replacing a good product. If your underlying user experience is bad, people will still leave after the rewards run out.” - From Jason Choi

I absolutely agree.

This is a variation of an oft-quoted line in VC and entrepreneur circles. I’ve used it too with many of the entrepreneurs and community leaders I’ve mentored over the years.

But it isn’t an argument against rewarding community members (it was confusing for him to combine his first top-of-the-funnel statement with this one). It is instead a reminder that because rewards can’t replace a great product, we must use rewards to property incentivize our community members to make a great product!

Ultimately, with ApeCoin, our community is our “product” - and the easiest way to make it great is to thank the people who make it great. At the end of the day, that’s all Thank APE does. We’re thanking community members for contributions that our community values and that create value for our community. In other words, we’re thanking community members for contributions that makes our product great! - Daniel

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PS I love this stuff. Like many on our team, I’ve spent much of my adult life building products that incentivize community-building at scale for large brands like Google or KPMG, governments, nonprofits, educational institutions, and - of course - distributed communities. If anyone has deeper or even random questions or thoughts, my “door” is always open for a conversation. Just message me. I’ll respond!

[Gerry]

I like what you’re trying to build

[HighDee]

This is a great idea! Love the overall proposal, contribution from social media platforms is superb.
Also concerned with the abusers and bots.

Thanks!

[0xSword]

@HighDee The good news, when it comes to the bots, is that changes & adjustments can be made by thrive & thank ape committee on the fly & with each “season”. They’re all really responsive & are active community members. I think we’ll be fine there!

[thrivegiraffe]

@Gerry

I like what you’re trying to build

Thanks @Gerry. Your support and kind words mean a lot to us. Also, your banners are epic!

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@HighDee

This is a great idea! Love the overall proposal, contribution from social media platforms is superb.

Thanks @HighDee. We love this community, and we’re excited to help create enormous value and utility for ApeCoin!

[thrivegiraffe]

I just had two questions relayed to me from the Special Counsel. I shared these answers with them, and I want to make them available on the forum too!

Question: What are expected award amounts?

Answer
Expected award amounts should be enough to incentive community members to offer their time and talents to help drive demand for the DAO. The amounts differ depending on contributions being rewarded. Below is a sample of how the amounts might differ:

• Join ApeCoin Discord forum ------------------------- Sample expected reward: x
• Vote on a proposal on Snapshot -------------------- Sample expected reward: 4x
• Make AIP reply liked by 10+ Members ------------ Sample expected reward: 10x
• Create AIP commented on by 20+ Members ---- Sample expected reward: 20x

Actual reward amounts are approved by the Thank APE advisory board based on a set of criteria (which they’d love to share / align around with the counsel if desired). On a monthly basis, the board plans to continuously optimize reward amounts based on data and feedback.

Question: Why 200k APE to reward?

Answer:
Thank APE was created with the intention of creating significant value, utility, and demand for the DAO. To do that, we need to work with enough APE to be able to show a real shift in core metrics for the ApeCoin DAO.

Here are some metrics from when we created the proposal:

• Less than 7% of APE holders have accounts on our forum
• Less than 2% view the average AIP Draft post (with < 0.03% commenting on average)
• Only about 1% of voting-eligible accounts actually vote on any given Snapshot proposal.

Without getting into the math (which we can if it’s needed) we believe 200k APE is a number that can reward enough value-creating activity to visibility influence our engagement and demand in the DAO.

Additionally, the 200k amount was based on our review of the size of the ApeCoin community across networks, current adoption rate on common platforms, and ballpark adoption goals. It ensures enough funding for the program across the desired 6-month pilot.

With that said, community funds need only be dispersed at the end of each Season, which means that we are not required to use those funds. If contributions aren’t actually made, any unused funds wouldn’t have to leave the treasury.

[Balou]

catching up, seems well put together as a proposal but at the heart of it, financially rewarding participation will backfire in my opinion, quality will get lost and to the outside world this will draw the DAO in a negative light. Hurdles required for participating also seem low, and potential reward pool very high - which makes things worse imo.
Others have already said this reading through the comments but I think a simpler POAP, badges and Thank You NFT’s airdropped would be a better place to start than straight to financial.

[thrivegiraffe]

@Balou thanks for your feedback. I appreciate your perspective!

The core of your feedback seems to be, in your words, “financially rewarding people will backfire.”

@Balou

financially rewarding participation will backfire in my opinion

This isn’t a novel concept. Communist regimes practiced variations of withholding for years - only rewarding the people at the top and letting everyone else work with little rewards for the good of the country. Most assessments are that they had little success. But it’s not how ApeCoin DAO works and it is not how human behavior words. I’ll address both points below:

1. It’s not how ApeCoin DAO works.

The purpose of the DAO is to engage in governance processes that disperse ApeCoin to people in ways that drive our collective vision forward and increase value and utility for ApeCoin holders. People make proposals, they ask for ApeCoin / $$, and then - if the community votes yes - they receive those funds.

The DAO works this way because it’s been demonstrated for centuries - long before web3 - that the best way to create value in communities is to invest in those same communities. “Invest” means not just investing in people at the top. It means investing in everyone - from paying engineers to build stuff to funding education for kids. Without investment, communities largely fail.

If as a DAO we believe that, in your words, “financially rewarding participation will backfire”, that requires reimagining how the DAO functions at the most core, basic levels - and the outcome wouldn’t be good. It also requires reimagining how humanity functions. We’ll get to that next!

1. It’s not how humanity works.

The reason communities (and businesses and nonprofits) often succeed with investment and largely fail without it is because all humans share a hierarchy of needs that was famously described by Maslow (and also by many others):

To spend more of our time creating real value in our communities - like innovating, problem solving, contributing our talents, building extraordinary relationships, having tons of fun - people need to have a certain basic set of needs met. They need shelter, food, healthcare, education, etc. In our society, they get that through rewards or compensation for their contributions.

Those communities that decide that people don’t need to be rewarded for the contributions they make to the community are immediately disqualifying all of the people who may want to create immense value for the community, but can’t actually do it… because they must meet other obligations to fulfill their basic needs first.

This is why great innovations and value-creation tended not to happen in communist countries. It is also why small nonprofits (which I’ve spent years of my life supporting) have such a hard time creating sustained, meaningful value. When you don’t reward and recognize people appropriately… you don’t get many people capable of helping for sustained periods of time.

I’ll repeat that last line because it’s so important:

When you don’t reward and recognize people appropriately… you don’t get many people capable of helping for sustained periods of time.

Last thought
I do not believe it should be controversial to say people deserve to be rewarded and recognized for the contributions they make to our community. The impact - if we look to nearly every kind of community that exists on this earth - should be more engagement, more value created, and more demand created for ApeCoin.

Additionally, if we’re on this forum, it’s likely that we already agree: We are practicing this principal with every vote for a proposal that asks for APE or $$.

Thank APE simply allows us to scale our impact: it allows us to reward and recognize all the value created in the DAO. It allows us to steward people from being passively interested to actively engaged in this community that we all care about. It allows us to make ApeCoin everything we know it can be!

Again, thanks for your feedback. I’m happy to discuss more with you anytime! - Daniel

[Balou]

Thanks for the thorough response! My comment relates to financial rewards for task driven activities - the kind outlined in the proposal.

It wasn’t a blanket statement but I should have been clearer.

[ChrisL]

When I saw the incentive rules, I had a question in my mind (not sure if it was asked before since the proposal was created months ago). Will the incentive only be applied to new activities or old activities will also be rewarded? For example if I had a reply liked by 10+ members months ago, will I receive rewards when this function is implemented?

[Apeancestor]

@thrivegiraffe

When you don’t reward and recognize people appropriately… you don’t get many people capable of helping for sustained periods of time.

I totally agree! The ApeCoin DAO could set a budget for different activities, and this type of activities should be considered, implemented, and funded accordingly and annually to keep the ApeCoin ecosystem alive and healthy!

[thrivegiraffe]

@Balou

Thanks for the thorough response!

Thanks you! I really appreciate and value your contribution to this conversation @Balou!

@Balou

My comment relates to financial rewards for task driven activities - the kind outlined in the proposal. It wasn’t a blanket statement but I should have been clearer.

Thanks for the clarification. It means we’re probably aligned!

Also, feedback from you and others in the ApeCoin community leads me to believe the Thank APE board might want to start by de-prioritizing some of the smaller tasks (e.g. following ApeCoin Twitter) and prioritizing ways to contribute that create more direct value for our DAO (e.g. substantive feedback on Discourse, etc.).

We’ve built Thank APE with exactly this kind of learning and need for flexibility in mind!

The contributions our community values will continue to evolve as we evolve. So an important role of the Thank APE tech and the Thank APE board is to listen to the community, look at data, and evolve rewards to continuously support and reflect the growth of our DAO!

Again, thanks so much for your feedback! - Daniel

[thrivegiraffe]

@ChrisL, thanks for your question!

@ChrisL

Will the incentive only be applied to new activities or old activities will also be rewarded? For example if I had a reply liked by 10+ members months ago, will I receive rewards when this function is implemented?

Yes, the tech can support retroactive rewards - if desired. When people first connect their wallets, we can offer one-time automated retroactive rewards. We can apply different sets of rules to how this is applied depending on how the Thank APE board / community wishes to implement! - Daniel

[river]

Hey ApeCoin Community,

@thrivegiraffe has made changes to their proposal. You can check out the changes by clicking the pencil icon at the top right of the post.

Follow this Topic as further updates will be posted here in the comments.

- river

[moonkt]

Hey ApeCoin Community,

@thrivegiraffe has made changes to their proposal. You can check out the changes by clicking the pencil icon at the top right of the post.

Follow this Topic as further updates will be posted here in the comments.

• moonkt

[12GAUGE]

This is an AIP that brings a ton of value and should be integrated into almost every other proposal as a means of onboarding and encouraging participation. Once this AIP passes Forever Apes is excited to collaborate with Thank Ape and plans to implement a circular strategy to reward our community and contribute to the Thank Ape treasury. Daniel and team have created a really unique platform that will benefit the whole DAO.

[thrivegiraffe]

Thanks for the kind words @12GAUGE. You and Forever Apes have been exciting contributors to ApeCoin. We’re excited to collaborate with you, with all other proposals in the DAO, and with the whole community to encourage decentralized contributions that drive real, long-term utility and value to ApeCoin and ApeCoin members!

@12GAUGE

This is an AIP that brings a ton of value and should be integrated into almost every other proposal as a means of onboarding and encouraging participation. Once this AIP passes Forever Apes is excited to collaborate with Thank Ape and plans to implement a circular strategy to reward our community and contribute to the Thank Ape treasury.