Proposal Name: Starting the Development of an Improved Community Space
Proposal Category: Ecosystem Fund Allocation
Abstract
This document proposes starting the development process of a new community space to potentially accommodate future communication around AIPs and ApeCoin-related discussions, and to also incorporate verified NFT profile pictures, $APE tips to fellow community members, token-gated livestreams / video calls, and other exciting new social and collaborative primitives.
Motivation
Currently, the ApeCoin forum is built with Discourse, and while this is a fairly good choice as it allows for a great level of customization / restructuring (as shown by the recent proposed changes in AIP-7), Discourse’s overall design and structure is nonetheless inadequate to provide a vibrant place for community members to gather.
A new community space, tailored around the needs of ApeCoin DAO, should be developed with the guiding values of APE Foundation in mind, and as such will have to address the following points:
Crypto-native: What is a governance forum that stands for NFTs more than any other without verified NFT profile pictures? And why isn’t it possible to tip $APE to fellow community members?
Inclusive: To become a vibrant place for community members to gather, it is essential that everyone feels accommodated - including those who don’t feel comfortable participating in the governance process, but instead want to share memes, jokes and other more shallow content, which is crucial in building a sense of belonging and creating a fun environment. To accomplish this, a new community space will have to incorporate chat rooms, while also still providing the typical forum structure found here in Discourse for the governance process.
Rationale
The initiators behind this proposal are two core team members of Decentra, a project which aims to offer stream-gating of community spaces by utilizing a new primitive called streaming subscriptions, building on top of Superfluid’s real-time finance protocol. We’re also experimenting with enabling decentralized organizational structures for communities, where not a single individual controls the community space/server but instead the entirety of community members through the use of tokens.
While our core products, that are currently in development, are probably not of interest for ApeCoin DAO, we believe that by working together with ApeCoin we’ll be able to make a tailor-made solution leveraging our existing community software, which will fit the needs of this DAO and not only strengthen the sense of belonging among community members, but also manifest ApeCoin’s position as a organization at the forefront of web3.
And yes, this is a bold initiative - something weird, something hard, something new. But not shying away from this, not going down the easy path, is what made ApeCoin and the ecosystem Yuga Labs built, so successful. We could keep using Discourse, and accept the trade-offs this brings with it. No verified NFT profile pictures, no integrated token-weighted polls for temperature checks, no chat rooms, no built-in livestream functionality. But preserving the status quo is not what ApeCoin is standing for.
Accepting this proposal does not constitute approval to abandon Discourse, but instead starts the development of a tailor-made community solution for ApeCoin DAO, the migration to which will be subject of another vote once it is ready in Q3/Q4 2022.
Specifications
See below a semi-functional mock-up of how ApeCoin’s new community space looks like leveraging our work over the past months:
FOR DEMONSTRATION PURPOSES ONLY, WORK IN PROGRESS
On top of the existing software developed by us and the custom features we plan to develop tailored around the needs of this DAO, we’ll also integrate all functionality required by ApeCoin DAO to fulfill its mission and be compliant with the governance process as outlined in AIP-1.
- Verified NFT profile pictures and showcase of NFT collection in the user profile
- Our implementation of verified NFT profile pictures will provide the DAO with the option to choose whether or not they want to restrict verification of NFT profile pictures to pre-approved NFT collections, perhaps only Yuga Labs-affiliated NFTs
- This will prevent malicious actors from impersonating legitimate holders and endangering other community members
- Users will be able to opt in to showcase their NFT collection in their user profile
- Our implementation of verified NFT profile pictures will provide the DAO with the option to choose whether or not they want to restrict verification of NFT profile pictures to pre-approved NFT collections, perhaps only Yuga Labs-affiliated NFTs
- Creating a more accommodating space through adding chat rooms
- By combining real-time chat messaging with a forum, we’ll have the best of both worlds - and accommodate all community members, even those who don’t feel comfortable participating in the governance process, but nonetheless are an integral part of this community by creating memes, jokes, and/or other content.
- Implementing $APE tips to fellow community members
- DAO members should be able to show their gratitude to someone participating in the governance process by directly tipping some $APE with only a few clicks necessary, either by visiting the respective user profile or hovering over a post by the user and opening a module
- Built-in livestream functionality powered by live video/audio SDKs
- Not using Zoom and having an in-house solution ensures that, if opted in, only $APE-holders have access to this livestreams / video calls, providing another utility to $APE holders (just think about an exclusive AMA session with Jimmy Kimmel or perhaps a concert)
- Marketplace functionality
- We’ll also provide the infrastructure so that all kinds of products, perhaps even NFTs, can be sold priced in $APE. We won’t administrate this marketplace, and whether this feature we provide will be used is not subject of this vote.
- In order for ApeCoin DAO to continue adhering to the proper governance procedure as outlined in AIP-1, we’ll recreate all features from Discourse that are utilized in this forum and not yet part of our existing software solution:
- A reputation system that doesn’t shy direct comparison with the trust levels found here on Discourse
- Custom token gating of the community, read-only access for non-$APE holders
- Subcategories to rebuild the same nested structure of this forum (e.g. Final AIPs → Implemented AIPs, Accepted AIPs, Rejected AIPs)
- Required approval by moderators to have a post published in certain channels and restricting the editing of proposals in AIP Draft and wherever else required
- Simple polls, but we’re also looking at developing a token-weighted polling solution serving as a temperature check that is directly integrated in the forum
To what extent the infrastructure we develop will then be used by ApeCoin is not the subject of this proposal but should be dealt with later. This proposal is only about the question whether the development process of a tailor-made (community) solution for ApeCoin DAO should be started or not.
Steps to Implement
- Leverage our existing software solution and build custom features for ApeCoin’s use case as specified in Specifications, including but not limited to:
- Verified NFT profile pictures
- Showcase of NFT collection in the user profile
- Implementation of $APE tips
- Built-in livestream functionality
- Chat rooms
- Forum structure as found here on Discourse
- Reputation system
- Token-gating of the community
- Subcategories
- Token-weighted polling solution
To accomplish this in a reasonable time frame, we’re expecting that our two core team members will spend most of their working time on development work associated with these tasks for a minimum of 3 months. One or two other developers will also assist in the development process, but only to a limited extent.
Timeline
We have already started creating various mock-ups as well as reviewing the feasibility of realizing this project and we expect to be ready with all the features mentioned in Specifications no later than Q4 2022, but we will likely have a functional product to which ApeCoin DAO could migrate as early as Q3, granted that this is approved in a future vote.
Overall Cost
$15K worth of $APE per month, paid over a 6-month term
While this monthly stipend is inadequate to cover all the expenses accrued by us over the development phase, we’re considering it nonetheless fair as in some sense we’re also paid through the exposure and prestige that comes along with working together with ApeCoin.
We see this payment as a kind of proof of commitment on the part of this DAO - after all, thousands of work hours will go into this, and even though we might be able to use some of the developed features elsewhere, we reserve the right to do so, a lot of it will only be relevant for ApeCoin.
The monthly payout is subject to us updating the ApeCoin DAO on the progress of the development through a forum post at least once a month.