TEMP Check - Guest Pass to L1 Scholarship

Governance
1

Title: Guest Pass to L1 Scholarship
Author: MissHomie
Date: August 25, 2023
Affiliations: Grants Committee; Governance, Treasury, Ops

TL:DR;

  • Guest Pass needs to be revised
  • a guard needs to be placed for influential members to the DAO, that have been unable to earn their L1 status
  • a scholarship can be placed as that guard.
  • this guard can be used in the form of a tlBANK nft membership

SUMMARY

In the [TEMP CHECK - Guest Pass V2] (TEMP CHECK - Guest Pass V2), a theme has emerged regarding a need for a scholarship program due to the difficulty for some members to earn their L1 membership. This temperature check serves as a potential solution to that problem. The DAO would create a scholarship for qualified members to earn an L1 Membership in the form of tlBANK 40,000 NFT locked for 1 year.

BACKGROUND

I realize via the TEMP CHECK - Guest Pass V2 conversation we are in a runway problem with respect to the sustainability of the DAO. We’ve spent 2 years with Lifetime Guest Pass capability, which has lessened the value of BANK. There are members who have run into issues with trying to earn enough BANK while being able to pay their bills, but still want to continue to contribute to the DAO as a proper member.

These members that have now run into the issue of keeping their L1 status, have typically held L2 status at one point, but have had to relinquish their L2 Status ue to those financial issues. I believe that in order to enact a more constrained guest pass that will be more successful, and less detrimental to members who have their values aligned with the dao, we need to present a financial avenue to help members along.

SCOPE OF WORK (The Plan)

We want to have a process where an genuinely active member of the DAO can obtain this L1 Scholarship. We can do so by following some buffer steps.

  1. Set up a Committee to review applications (or use Grants Committee, if the committee is interested. I would say these members could either be L2 Members, Grants Committe, Multi Sig, or just nice, friendly people :slight_smile:

  2. Set up a Scholarship Fund for 10 members for the beginning season. This will be in tlBANK (this can serve as a guardrail for members to not just use the BANK for financial incentive). That cost will be 400,000 BANK. This will either be in a different multi sig, or perhaps Grants could just earmark the funding out of the project fund

  3. Set up an Application structure. This would essentially need to have the members give a heartfelt, thoughtful application, with supporting documents that will be provided as proof for members that are deserving as L1 members.

(I would forsee a need to have multiple L2 Members Support this applicant (like who seconds the applicant). )

  1. Set up the mechanism to lock up the bank, and award the scholarship recipients the tlBANK nft

  2. Test the process of the scholarship.

SUCCESS OR KPIS

You should eventually see less of an outflow of bank. This is because the worry of not having to deal with trying get to L1, and not having to deal with renewing your Guest Pass. On a psychological level. We can see greater productivity due to less stress.

NEXT STEPS

  1. Gather Feedback from Folks, and amend process as follows
  2. Gain Consensus
  3. If consensus is achieved, move to proposal.
  4. If consensus is not achieved, gather feedback.

Do you Accept this Temp Check?

  • ACCEPT
  • REJECT (with comments)
  • ABSTAIN (with comments)
0 voters
6 Likes
2

Hey all, let me know what you think. We can use this as a starting point to see if this will be a good idea, or if we need to decide on something different.

@patrickworkman :slight_smile:

1 Like
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I’m abstaining, as I would like to see what the input is, instead of adding mine to this.

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4

Awesome initiative and couldn’t agree more that a ‘scholarship’-type system would be a great way to ease the transition for some, as well as incentivize contribution for many. tlBANK enables this wonderful alignment. Great work, and take it all the way homie!

2 Likes
5

Great idea. However a couple of questions:

  1. You mentioned the Application that an applicant needs to give a “heartful, thoughtful” reasoning with supporting docs. Can you provide some more insight into what this application would look like, what is an example of “supporting docs” and how do you weigh/score the applications received to determine which 10 members will receive the Grant?

  2. Are there any follow-ups with members who receive L1 Grant status? And why is the length of the Grant locked tlBANK 1 yr for 40K BANK? Shouldn’t it align with either 40K BANK for 6 months or 80K BANK for 1 year? And, what if the member does not (after Grant locked tlBANK term) still does not have enough BANK earned/purchased to keep their L1 status? What is the process/rules regarding can they re-apply for a GRANT tlBANK again?

  1. How many Committee members will serve on the Guess Pass Grant committee, what is their length of time for serving, and what are the Committee member’s requirements (and process - i.e. selection or voting on Snapshot) to serve on the Committee?
4 Likes
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@coffee-crusher

thanks for the questions, this is what i need to get this idea refined.

A couple of ideas here:

I’m not good with weighting processes so I would need help with getting this nailed down. But here’s my thought.

  1. proof is needed to show effort towards the cause. We can take it from a level of “importance” standpoint.

  2. The amount of people “seconding” their application can help. 6 Level 2’s can work better than 5, 7 can work better than 6, 1 is probably not going to work at all.

  3. Notoriety is always a benefit. The more notoriety the better (like if you have published bankless publishing articles, that’s a boon)

  4. 10 is not a hard set number. I just picked 10 because it s a round number. I wanted to also use 10 because its not a huge dent in the treasury (400k versus 4 million? easier to swallow)

I am HOPING that this would be a kick off towards self sustainability. There should not be a need for a person to apply for a tlBANK grant again after the process. This boost should be able to help the BANK price level up due to the slowing of outflowing bank. I likely misunderstood that 40,000 gets held in tlBANK for 6 months. Ill verify that to be sure.

  1. this is another thought that needs to be investigated further, but as i’ve suggested in the temp-check above, I could envision being L2, Grants, or perhaps a member of Governance. What do you think would work if you were looking at a committee for this?

regarding time limits, I would suggest 1 season at the shortest, 1 year at the longest.

what do you think about this? what are your suggestions?

1 Like
7

Hi @homie , great ideas and flushing out the concept. I totally believe that a scholarship program is needed, and I love the idea of tlBANK NFT worth 40K.

Basically, by anyone applying and receiving an L1 membership, the DAO is giving them a 40K BANK value, and it should be locked into an NFT that is not sellable/traded.

I’m still a little confused on what is “proof to show effort”? That could include # of bounties completed or Coordinate earned.

Your second comment about the total amount of people seconding their application. Yes, but I don’t even think I know 6 L2’s good enough that would 2nd me, so how would a Guest (or someone who was an L1/L2 but lost status due to selling their 40K or 80K BANK) be expected to obtain 6 L2’s to second them? It probably should be more attainable for 2 or 3 L2’s.

I’m not sure of the “notoriety” comment, since that is hard to measure. How many articles in BP that you publish as a Guest, and what about Guests who join other guilds/dept’s or projects, what are their measurements? You have to make it common among all Guest members regardless of what action (task) they complete to show commitment to bDAO.

I think 10 per season is a good number to start off with. But that means 400,000 BANK that is budgeted for locking tlBANK NFT for recipients. And, 40K BANK locked for tlBANK is for 6 months L1 status from the grant.

And, that also means that if it’s 40K BANK value for a tlBANK NFT for 6 months, what happens after that? To keep their L1 status, they would have to earn (or purchase) 40K BANK to keep their membership. What happens to the 40K BANK time locked in the NFT tlBANK? Does that go back to the Scholarship Grants committee in their multi-sig to re-use for another season?

Regarding who is on the Scholarship Committee, I would recommend an odd #, like 5 or 7 members, in case of a dissenting vote. And there has to be a review process. Submissions accepted during Season # x and then L1 Scholarship winners become activated in the following Season? Or, applications accepted during the Season and will be approved (or rejected) by the Scholarship committee in the same season. I also agree that at least one seat should always be held by someone from the Goverance committee, 1 from the Grants committee, and 3-5 L2s who could serve 1-2 seasons. I think 1 year is a lot to ask for any Committee role holder.

1 Like
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This is an interesting point! I could potentially find 6 L2s, but I can see what you mean by it being difficult. I picked 6 for this sort of reason;

The scholarship process could work smoothly or be a disaster right? My idea is to try and protect the DAO by making this scholarship an attainable, but challenging project. Having a high number of “seconds” can help narrow down the application field, or show the importance of networking and interacting through the course of your guest pass experience.

You would be explaining what KPIs and tasks you’ve completed while showing links to show examples of what you’ve completed.

You’re right. I used BP as an example because it’s outward facing and it’s simple to show as evidence. This is going to be anything that has been done in any guild, department, project, or collective that is DAO related.

This is interesting! It didn’t cross my mind :joy:. This really is a great point though.

So there’s a couple of ways we can use this.

  1. The wing and a prayer approach: hopefully they just decide to keep locking their bank because they were given this membership for free.

  2. Perhaps there could be a mechanism where this particular scholarship NFT locks for longer than 6
    Months.

  3. The experiment works where bank pricing could be high enough where the member can now get by without having to sell off their tlBANK, or the now unlocked bank.

A year can be tedious, you’re right.

So I believe the idea would be to have it kind of coincide with the revised guest pass approach (even though that temp check failed) so they would need to have the suggestion made in the season they’re renewing their guest passes, with the decision made for the activation to happen in the next season.

Regarding the committee. I would say 1 gov member, 3 L2s, 1 GC. That would probably work.

I suppose there would need to be a reward on that standpoint. However I’m not sure.

What do you think?

9

While a scholarship sounds like a great idea, I’m actually against the idea of time-limiting a guest pass at all, so I’ll just point out that this proposal sounds labour-intensive which would make it difficult to maintain.

We can’t even get 7 people to commit to our Grants Committee in the midst of this bear market…next season we will have 6. Even then, committee members have difficulty doing everything the job entails. Personally I wouldn’t want to take on another committee in addition (I can’t speak for others).

Is there a way to do this with fewer people? That could make it easier to maintain.

3 Likes
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How many do you think?

11

Also, to add to the conversation, would you like to discuss why you’re against the idea? It could help others make a decision towards this idea. Or it could
help them solidify their belief for it.

Also, if you’re against the idea (limiting guest pass); what do you think an alternative solution would be?

This could be as good a spot as any to find out what’s better if there is better.

12

I’m against it because I like how inclusive the DAO is right now. Anyone can earn membership. That’s awesome!

I acknowledge the issue with guest passers not upgrading to L1. It’s a problem. One solution is to time-limit the guest pass. Another solution is to make L1 much better than Guest Pass so it’s worth it to upgrade.

How? I put some ideas here: TEMP CHECK - Guest Pass V2 - #51 by links

Here’s some more ideas:

  • Guest Pass can only be paid in tlBANK
  • Only L1 and above can hold compensated roles (ie guest pass can only get bounties)
  • Only L2 and above can vote on bDIPs
  • L1/L2s get commemorative NFTs every season

For me, limiting Guest Pass time is a zero-sum mindset. I’m in DAOs for the infinite game, so I would prefer an infinite game solution

2 Likes
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A infinite game solution would not limit options. Your options actually seem a bit more limiting than just limiting the guest pass ironically.

But I may not be understanding this right.

Constraining time still gives guest passers access but gives them a time limit.

Your suggestion gives them as much time as they want but cuts off any meaningful access?

You still don’t solve the problem.

14

Isn’t access to the Discord and ability to make BANK through contribution meaningful? This is a path to membership and a way to harness the energy of people who are aligned with the Bankless mission. Seems meaningful to me.

What would meaningful access mean to you?

i guess that depends on the problem are you trying to solve.

My suggestion above encourages Guest Passers to become full members. That’s the problem I’d like solved.

What problem are you trying to solve with this scholarship? It feels like this proposal was written to plug holes in the idea of a time-limited guest pass (ie you are solving a problem of a potential solution to a problem).

Rather than solving a chain of problems associated with a time-limited guest pass, I am suggesting we attack the root problem by making L1 more attractive than guest pass. This scholarship doesn’t do that.

2 Likes
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True

I think what you want to do is decide on what meaningful means to each person. It also needs to see what bounties mean to each person.

I am open to seeing how I am wrong, but this is coming from the other angle that still doesn’t solve people who have been here for a while, with a role holder status or something if the sort, by cutting off their ability to continue doing what they’re doing at the level that they are doing it.

For example. What you’re saying is, okay cool you want to be the role holder that you’ve been for the length that you’ve been even though you had to lose your L1 because you can’t afford it? Great! It’s going to cost you the L1 membership that you can’t afford anyway to continue working.

My point is, you’ve come at it from a different angle, and you’re now EVEN more going to have a need to plug the hole.

I’m not saying you’re wrong, I’m saying we’re still not there yet with your suggestion.

16

Yeah some of the examples I gave were a pretty big change. The important ones to me are mainly around proposals and voting.

I think having L1 to submit or vote on a proposal shows a certain alignment with bDAO. Either you are investing in bDAO by buying tokens or you have earned and saved tokens via contribution.

Having to be L1 or above to submit proposals would also mean that each DAO unit would have to have at least one L1 in it, which (hopefully) means at least one member who is invested in bDAOs long-term success. This would (hopefully) prune off DAO units who no longer have bDAO’s long-term interests at heart.

If we set the right access at each level, we will create a “winnable game” for all contributors with each level as a milestone oR achievement. Example: Guest Pass is the entrance, L1 is achieved when you accrue BANK, L2 when you have accrued BANK and social trust. I write a bit more about it here: An Idea for Long-Term Contributor Alignment

2 Likes
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How are you contributing if you’re blocking off access to make decisions, vote, participate in discourse, and the like? Would it be a matter if completing the tasks that can be piecemealed together for L1 and L2 members?

If a person can’t afford L1, spends countless number of hours in this DAO trying to pick up bounties (which are harder… not impossible) to come by due to a falling price of the governance token (which is an odd thing to say as I think about this some. ) is that person less than an a L1 or L2 that bought their membership?

This idea now considers them unworthy to participate in governmental discourse. I’m really not a fan of blocking access for voting purposes in an area that is concerned ‘less centralized’. You start taking away rights to vote, taking away more aspects of a persons digital freedom comes with it. That’s concerning.

If a guess pass member who spent the last however many seasons relying in this to get by (figuratively punching the clock, so to speak) but are just not able to save and pay their bills, I think there should be a way to help.

That way doesn’t become paying them in locked bank, that way does not become paying them less, or stripping away what they’ve had.

That is, unlessp you help them get connects to higher paying organizations, or access to assistance, or something . (Maybe not assistance but maybe to guides that can help them learn to succeed)

In my perspective. Neither idea is ideal, and neither idea feels “decentralized”, but I’m beginning to question the idea of what decentralization really means, anyway.

One idea gives them a shot at still trying to make an effort to get their L1 membership. This particular way you’ve presented gives a vision (to me) as a true division of the haves and have nots.

The way you’ve just presented gives me the feeling that while there is an interest of having people go bankless, it can only be done by this way of relegating people who can’t afford it to do lesser types of work than others.

However. Perhaps there is a way to form the bounties to be truly meaningful tasks. Would that also mean that L1s and L2s would still dipping into the same bounties? (I don’t forsee this being an issue, but could you come into a situation where there’s simply not enough work to go around?

As I know you to be a person who truly cares, I wonder if there’s a need to tweak some aspects of this to get a greater result, also tweaking some aspects of the guest pass v2 for a greater result.

I’d venture a need for a middle ground so there’s a way to generate the interest you speak of, in a way where we don’t leave anyone (or as many as we can) behind.

18

Tell you what though @links , it proves that this is an interesting conundrum we have here.

There’s likely good in everyone’s suggestions. I definitely know that there would need to be work done to consider a scholarship, but I’m optimistic that there are people who’d probably want to help.

19

Starting with, I love the ideation! This has created some great discussion.

I voted no though, because while I think the idea of a scholarship program sounds nice, I don’t think it is a good idea.

What would be better is either, refining our onboarding, or a mentorship/internship program that would facilitate helping people learning, and earning their way into the DAO through valuable contribution.

Which is 100% what the DAO needs, and supports the mission of onboarding people into web3(through learning, building their skillset, their work portfolio, etc).

A scholarship program doesn’t fix this.

There are plenty of opportunities at the DAO, and I think a mentorship or work stream that identifies valuable contribution opportunities and helps people get involved in them, would be more useful than handing out BANK (even tlBANK) through a scholarship.

I really think in regards to this there are two categories:

  1. If people are having trouble earning L1 they could use some help identifying valuable contribution some identification and refinement of opportunities can be done. For example:
    • Governance dept is high level issues
    • OPS is the heartbeat of the DAO
    • PM Guild trains in how to get involved on projects
    • etc…
  2. A number of contributors have chosen not to maintain L1 because they sell their BANK (which is their right).
    • Importantly, a scholarship doesn’t help with this.

For 1, this is an opportunity for refinement.
For 2, these members have a choice to value their BANK, the DAO, and L1, or the immediate financial benefit of selling. Both are fine, but earning BANK is a perk of the DAO, as is the governance rights it grants.

Ultimately the DAO is working to sustain itself, SO THAT later it can sustain itself and others.

On the larger, I think that local contribution work streams solve the challenge of earning into the DAO, by vetting and qualifying the work being done at the place it is needed.

If people are having trouble earning BANK, they may not be identifying opportunities well and a mentorship can help with this.

Otherwise, a scholarship just seems a BANK handout, without additional valuable contribution.

3 Likes
20

Or… an airdrop :thinking::wink:

Fair! What it sounds like here, is that a culture is trying to change without assisting those who get lost in the crossfire. (If there isn’t a solid plan that helps onboard people, and helps them combat the legitimate issue of dealing with everything from the lower incomes of some countries in Africa, the ridiculous inflation of other countries North America, etc)

I can definitely concede that a scholarship may not be helpful based on the issues you’ve described. But…

How does any aspect of what’s being suggested cover the ethos of helping 1 million people go bankless?

A fair assessment! So what does help with this? I’ve seen some governance calls. You’re right, there is definitely some help needed there, but what actionable tasks can be derived for a person to earn bank? PM guild, is a good idea. They’ve done well in there.

OPS, I’ve seen people try and get in there. But, I’m unsure about plans around that as well.

How do we complete the proper amount of tasks, how do we truly work to help folks who are financially constrained (I notice you aren’t mentioning the financially constrained element, because a person can not maintain their L1 because they don’t have a choice. we have to realize that it’s out there)

This is a great point. Building marketable skills. You’re looking to basically earn a membership to join a mastermind. While it’s not as expensive, this idea is textbook mastermind group. Or BNI, basically.

So while i understand your opinion, and I thank you for it, this gives me some new concerns.

I must state that a decision needs to be made regarding whether you want to create an ethos that helps people gain skills to go out and be gainfully employed in web3, and gain financial independence (which I’ve often heard as the ethos of bankless) I’ve seen some towards the beginning of my time in bankless dao, I haven’t seen as many now.

Or you want to stick with the ethos of just helping 1 billion people go bankless

Based on your idea above, id more so suggest not limiting guest passes, and instead heading more towards @links idea. That said, if you aren’t interested in airdropping tokens (which can get tricky) you’d have to instead make the decision to have meaningful bounties that help people actually learn, and not busy work.

1 Like