@thechaingamer - Special Council Nomination 01/2024

Help & Resources Prior Elections
1

Personal Information

Discourse ID: @thechaingamer

Twitter: x.com

Country of Residence: USA

Educational Background: Dual Degree - B.A. in Economics & B.Sc in Computer Science from UT Austin

Professional Background:

I am a part of the founding team of NVG8 (nvg8.io) a web3 mapping company that raised 7.625M in a seed round last year from Kraken, Alan Howard, Outlier Ventures, Distributed Global and others. Navigate is a GIS data platform that makes maps smarter using AI & crowdsourcing.

I am a part of and have been covering web3 gaming for several years now.
You can read some of my articles here: Bored Ape Games on Chain — Forgotten Machine

I am currently serving as a member of the TreasureDAO’s Arbitrum Representative Council. TreasureDAO is the largest ARB holder and thus a significant voice in the ArbitrumDAO.

I am also a Brand Ambassador for ZenAcademy/333 Club.

After graduating, I moved to Seattle and worked at Microsoft for roughly 3.5 years, then moved back to Austin to work for an A.I. startup called SparkCognition. Joined the company at about 10 people and a 50MM valuation to its current valuation of 1.4B (SparkCognition, which develops AI solutions for a range of industries, nabs $123M | VentureBeat).

Boeing is an investor in SparkCognition whom I worked with closely in the creation of a new joint venture called SkyGrid - owned 50/50 by SparkCognition and The Boeing Company.

SkyGrid’s mission is to build a next-gen aerial operating system for UAVs. I was a founding team member of the company and the Chief Product Officer. Earlier this year, I exited SkyGrid as Boeing acquired a majority stake in the company.

It was my passion for games that led me to pursue a degree in Computer Science and I have been running an indie game dev studio, Forgotten Machine for several years.

Including my LinkedIn profile here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ali-husain1/

Nomination Statement

Concise statement on why you are running for the Special Council

To help realize our mission of making $APE a metaverse currency with a focus on gaming.

Motivation

Details on your motivation for becoming an ApeCoin DAO Special Council member

There are a lot of opportunities to grow the $APE ecosystem, especially at this point in time when we are still in a bear market. We can bring indie builders on board and create a powerful gaming ecosystem around $APE. Once that is done, the sinks needed for $APE will come automatically.

I would highlight Parallel and the Forgotten Runes pre-alpha earlier last week as prime (no pun intended :D) examples of creating games, free to play, with great sinks. We don’t yet have that in the $APE ecosystem and it can be easily done if we onboard the right builders with the right incentives.

I believe my contacts and contributions in the web3 gaming space will allow me to add significant value to the ApeCoin DAO council.

Rationale

Share relevant experience and skills that will bring value to the ApeCoin community

Experience in large tech companies (MSFT) + loads of experience in the startup industry. Building prototypes, moving fast, trying out many different things and being able to pivot quickly to what works and away from what is not working.

Extensive experience in managing and growing tech teams and working with stakeholders, internal and external to make fast progress on projects.

Significant experience in fundraising for traditional tech companies. Dealing with investors, pitching, etc.

Specifications

Further describe relevant experience, including crypto and governance participation, and/or ideas for DAO improvement

TreasureDAO ARB Council Member

Treasure Evangelist, brought BitMates and others to the Treasure/ARB ecosystem

333 Member, ZenAcademy Brand Ambassador

NVG8.io Founding Team Member - raised 7.625M for a seed round

Building the first opensource Treasure gaming cartridge - self funded: https://www.ruffionreborn.xyz

You can read about the reasoning behind building something like Ruffion Reborn here: The One About Building The First Homebrew Cartridge For The Nintendo Of The Metaverse - TreasureDAO- Issue #8 — Forgotten Machine

Part of many Web3 gaming communities - Treeverse, Parallel, Bitmates, ARB ecosystem, Treasure, Axie, Voxies, EtherOrcs, GoG, Real Agents, Forgotten Runes, Pixel Vault, and obviously all the Yuga ecosystem games - 10KTF, HV-MTL, Otherside, etc.

The key thing, in my humble opinion, is for the DAO is to start with small tangible projects and make quick progress. Have builders build in public and engage the community in reviewing these projects, having demo days, etc.

The best way to do that would be to create a simple website where casual community members can keep up with projects that are being funded and built without having to deep dive into the forums and reading all the AIPs. That is how we make this exciting and get more people engaged.

Concluding Statement

Summarize your statement as to why you are the best choice for Special Council

In summary, I would say I would bring a lot of startup, engineering and management experience to DAO. My strengths are being able to move fast on things and engage with the right people to help do that.

I believe that is what the APE Special Council needs right now. We need to move quickly, disrupt, cut losses on projects that don’t work and invest more in projects that do work. Also, we need to encourage indie builders, especially indie game developers to come and build with $APE, and hopefully on $APEchain as we move towards it.

Thank you,
Ali
BAYC #2455

3 Likes
2

Reserved for additional content.

3

Reserved for additional content 2.

4

Hi @thechaingamer, I am asking all candidates the following same questions:

If elected, what is the one item you feel passionate about and would like to see accomplished during your tenure within the DAO?

What is an area of expertise that you will be bringing to the table?

Are there any factors in your life that may limit your time and ability to serve? (Running a business, extensive traveling, secret agent for the SEC, etc…)

What is your least favorite thing right now with our DAO in its current state?

Currently, many of the proposals are determined by large wallets, there are many grumblings about it though I stand neutral on this; if possible, would you change this? and if so, how and why?

Will you be an active participant in the DAO even if unelected?

Thank you and best of luck,

F/S

1 Like
5

Hi @foxSlightly,

Thank you for the question!

If elected, what is the one item you feel passionate about and would like to see accomplished during your tenure within the DAO?

The one thing I feel super passionate about is that the DAO needs to move fast and onboard good indie game developers that build using $APE and eventually on $APE. I also think it makes sense to push for a testnet for $APE as an L2 or even L3.

What is an area of expertise that you will be bringing to the table?

Experience in big companies and startups. Being able to move quickly, getting different groups onboard to try things out and pivot quickly when needed. Experience in tech/econ and indie game development + DAO experience and web3 gaming experience.

Are there any factors in your life that may limit your time and ability to serve? (Running a business, extensive traveling, secret agent for the SEC, etc…)

I spend many hours a day in the web3 world so there is nothing that would limit me from contributing to the DAO in meaningful way, IMO.

What is your least favorite thing right now with our DAO in its current state?

I have not been very active in the DAO in the sense that I haven’t voted or commented too much. Mostly just lurked. I think the one thing I would say I like the least is the slowness with which we are moving. I understand why that is, but I do think it is something we should endeavor to fix.

Currently, many of the proposals are determined by large wallets, there are many grumblings about it though I stand neutral on this; if possible, would you change this? and if so, how and why?

I can understand the frustration with this, but to be honest I would not say this is something I could do anything about initially or would even prioritize during my first term, if I am elected.

No voting system is perfect, but one way to look at this is those who hold the most $APE are the ones who either bought and held $APE or got a ton of Yuga assets early on and held onto them. I do not feel it is unfair for them to have a bigger voice. Mind you, this is probably not in my personal best interest :smiley:

Will you be an active participant in the DAO even if unelected?

Yes. I will be trying my utmost to further our vision to become the coin of the gaming metaverse!

Thank you,
Ali
BAYC2455

P.S. I got a similar question on Twitter from @Sheftali. I’m including that response below.

The APE Foundation created the Special Council as a Board for the ApeCoin DAO. The formal role of the Special Council is already defined, but this is how I understand it.

  1. Being responsible in how the ApeCoin DAO treasury is spent

  2. Create value for the ApeCoin DAO members

A very simple way to measure value being created is “$APE go up”, however the way that $APE goes up, IMO, is by following through on our vision of making $APE the currency of for games.

That’s where I believe my experience can help.

  1. Background in Computer Science, Economics – worked at MSFT before moving to startup in Austin, TX where I’ve been over the last 8.5 years (details in my application).

  2. Entered crypto in 2016 and entered NFTs primarily because of my interest in what they could do for gaming. (As a result, I faded punks and was heavily involved with the Axie ecosystem :D).

  3. Became an early member of TreasureDAO (started as a Loot deriv) when it was released, and have been a very active part of the Treasure community on Arbitrum.

  4. Most recently became a part of the Treasure Arbitrum Representative Council which votes on behalf of the TreasureDAO on the other AIPs :blush:. TreasureDAO is the largest holder of ARB AFAIK.

  5. Been building indie games since my college days and I continue to do so.

One of the things I’d be most excited about seeing the ApeCoin DAO doing would be to move quickly in onboarding good game developers and enabling them to create real value in the ecosystem.

Would love to chat more if you have questions!

1 Like
6

Glad to see you have rich experience with Web3 gaming and startup projects. Good luck!

1 Like
7

Thank you, Michael. You as well!

1 Like