Aping In - DAOS Talk - Coordinape
Primer: In this consolidated summary of the interviews by Fugu, we highlight the actual use cases of Coordinape in 4 different DAOS. Fugu interviewed Frogmonkee from Bankless DAO, KauriHero from Masq Network, RegisIsland from PoolTogether and Jihad from Forefront to find out how the different DAOs fit in Coordinape as a tool to help them allocate and distribute funds in a permissionless, decentralized manner.
What is Coordinape?
It is decentralized payroll management for DAOs
In a DAO, there are no HR or middle management to decide how to allocate rewards
At the end of every epoch (usually 1 month), a project can use Coordinape to allocate points (called GIVE) to any members within the circle.
If a particular member contributes a lot during that epoch, you can give more GIVE so that the member will proportionally get a higher allocation of the tokens set aside for this project
Everything is done openly and transparently and thus it serves as a toolset for DAOs to manage payroll in a decentralised manner
Bankless DAO with Frogmonkee
What is Bankless DAO?
Steward behind the Bankless brand started by Ryan and David
A community that shares the values that Bankless embodies
The goal is to spread this bankless idea as far as possible through 3 core pillars:
Education
Culture
Media
Frogmonkee's role in Bankless
Had been in since the beginning
Taken on a leadership/core contributor role
Involved in meta-level strategy to help the DAO grow, in addition to operations and governance
A writer by trade so the Writer's Guild is the only guide that he is very active in
Why do Bankless DAO use Coordinape and when do they use it?
No idea how to allocate funds in a fair manner
Started looking at different ways to reward contributors
Have no clue on how to itemize and value work on a top-down level
Using Coordinape and tried evaluating work the social way
Used it at the end of Season 0 and had over 80% satisfaction rate in a post-circle survey
Started proliferating as a tool in Bankless DAO
Used it on a DAO wide level
Within Guilds
Within projects
Used it for 5 people all the way up to 200-300 people
Disperse Bankless tokens with Coordinape
Choosing the right compensation model
Still figuring out the right compensation model. Sometimes Coordinape is used, sometimes a fixed salary is used. They also used bounties and payment on a per-hourly rate
Modular stack of compensation tools - Coordinape is just one of them
What problems does Coordinape solve?
Difficult to value work. In a traditional organisation, there are salaried positions, so work can be broken down into roles. But this model does not work too well for DAOs
The majority of people who do work for DAO do so on a part-time basis. Valuing the work done from a top-down perspective does not scale well because it needs to be fair and equal across the board
Coordinape solves this by relying on peers to decide the value of one's work
Also aligns with the ethos of working with a DAO - no centralised authority to decide
How many Coordinape circles are there?
Not sure - DAO used it as a whole but projects and Guilds use their own too
In Season 1, Bankless DAO used at least a dozen circles but is probably much higher than that
For Season 2, expected to see a much higher figure. Probably around 50 circles
Bankless DAO circle
Had the largest circle in Coordinape history
For the end of Season 0, they had over 200 sign-ups, and about 100 people with GIVE to allocate
This Season 1, they have over 400 sign-ups, with 200 people that allocated GIVE tokens
Likes and dislikes of Coordinape
Likes
Using a social game to distribute funds proportional to the value they provide
This model is way more empowering than a centralised authority to decide on the value of work done
When you allocate tokens, you can also write a message to thank people, so there is a social aspect too - builds strong community ties
Likes the transparency e.g. how much people are earning
Can set up the circles in a permissionless fashion now. In the past, have to work with the Coordinape people and they will do it for you
Dislikes
Need to manually make the distribution after the fact
Still need to download the GIVE distribution and then allocate the actual tokens to be distributed
Will be good to automate it within the platform - will be coming out in Coordinape v2
Will he recommend it to other DAOs?
Yes - there is no reason not to use it if you're in a DAO
Matches the ethos of a DAO and is a powerful tool, unless the DAO has a simplistic compensation model
Very fun and interactive experience too
Masq Network with KauriHero
What is Masq Network?
A decentralised privacy-based solution to build a mesh-network
Operates like a traditional VPN and have the benefits of Tor, but combined them together in a peer to peer network which is decentralized
Allows users to surf the web uncensored
The ultimate goal is to let anyone access any content online
The future version is to be 100% Clandestine so users traffic cannot be traced back to them in any way through ISP, intuitions or hackers.
KauriHero is the project manager
How did Masq Network transit to Coordinape?
A very decentralised organisation with people working in different places and time zones
Did meet up with different groups and worked in clusters
Pre-coordinape days were very scattered and running payments for work in a spreadsheet
Was searching constantly for a way that is more decentralized
Went from having no systems, just record-keeping to Coordinape
When did Masq Network start using Coordinape?
Epochs can be defined for the circle of users
For Masq, each epoch is for 2 weeks and runs for 4 days
Anyone who had contributed to a project will be in the circle and they can vote over 4 days to allocate GIVE tokens to others, based on the work each had contributed
Been using Coordinape for the last 4 months
The circles started small. Begins at around 4 and now stands at 10 as they grow
What happens after an epoch is over?
They used a new feature released several months ago, where users can add skills onto their coordinape profile to describe what they are strong at e.g memes, trolling
Changed the name of GIVE to MASQIES, a play on their MASQ tokens
To make sure those who are new will not mix up with MASQ tokens
After the epoch is done, he and another co-founder will look at the distribution of the MASQIES and disperse the reward tokens a few days later
Coordinape v2 will have distribution all within the app, so it will save some time and effort on their part
Gas will sometimes be too high, so they have to wait for a better time to disperse
Favourite thing about Coordinape
Very easy to onboard people now by vouching
Is a feature where new members are added in and if other members back the decision, the new member will be added to the circle
Allocate map - can see visually in a network who are gifting to who and from where
Very easy to sign in and use
The team behind Coordinape listened to all the feedback and improved it
How do they make sure people allocate in Coordinape?
Made the whole thing like a game to make it fun
Added Coordinape Discord bot in their Discord, renamed it Masq Ape or something like that. They also added a Coordinape channel too
When the epoch starts, the bot will show who had not given so all of them will start to harass those who had not allocated
Just a fun way to remind people to use the Coordinape
Do they recommend Coordinape to other DAOs?
Yes - a no-brainer for DAOs
They have been transiting towards a DAO so Coordinape is a great platform to make a move towards it
Have a great document with all the reasons why they had started this
Snapshot takes care of decision making, but there is no democratic on-chain way for budgetary management. Coordinape solves this issue
Gives power to the contributors to decide how best to allocate rewards for work contributed
PoolTogether with RegisIsland
What is PoolTogether?
A prize savings account in Ethereum and Polygon
Everyone puts their money in, pool them together and invests in DeFi protocols like Compound or Aave
Whatever interest earned in a week is given to one or several winners
If you don't win the prize, you'll still keep the money and roll it over to the next prize period
A good way to save money and have a chance at winning a lottery - up to a million dollars to be won per week
He is a community contributor who joined a year ago
Have a PoolTogether Inc, that is by the creators and they have their own employees
Also have a PoolTogether DAO
How did they start on Coordinape?
Started a committee and they found Coordinape
Joined as a volunteer
Before Coordinape, they were using Collab.Land tipbot. Some of the committee members are drawing a salary but other members are not paid, so they have to apply for a grant and have a governance proposal to pass it
Coordinape is interesting because it has a social consensus compensation, not a set salary
The work you do, the more recognition by peers and the more you get paid
When do they use it?
Every 2 weeks they will use Coordinape
Been using it for 3 months and he had just applied for a grant to continue using it for the next 3 months
Grant was approved, so they will continue using it for the foreseeable future
What did he like best about it?
Super simple to understand and use
Like the Allocate map to see visually where the GIVE are going
Uses Coordinape to see what the skills of different people are, so he can find the people he needs to do certain things
After they started using it, there is an increase in the number of tangible projects or content that had been created
Recommended to other DAOs?
Yes - morale for the community is way higher
On the day the funds are distributed, people are super excited
Forefront with Jihad
What is Forefront?
Trying to be the port of entry for web3
Started off as a media DAO that was doing data and information aggregation, as well as publication
Branched out into the world of social token and social DAO support by building tooling for those DAOs
Focusing on onboarding new members to the Forefront DAO and then channelling them to other DAOs that are better aligned with their interests
Forefront has good relationships with most of the large community DAOS in the space e.g. FWB, Bankless
Jihad is a core contributor - involved in the Writers Guild and high-level DAO strategy, treasury, ops and org design
Reminds Fugu of his conversation with Frogmonkee from Bankless
Forefront took inspiration from different DAOs - FWB has Seasons, Bankless has Guilds
Been in Forefront around Apr 2021, when the token dropped. Had been through Season 1 and beyond
The transition from pre-Coordinape to Coordinape
Season 1 of Forefront happens after the token was launched
A very rough semblance of a DAO is what they had before after the token launched
They had a token and were trying to find uses for the token
The core team was planning the action items and the DAO design for Season 1 and it took about 1.5 to 2 months
People had an expectation that they are going to be paid for their work
Had a few bounties paid for individual tasks but no easy way to pay for high-level design work by contributors
Coordinape allows them to retroactively pay contributors within the confines of the group of core contributors who were working to set up the DAO design for Season 1
Had a definitive group of who was working on Season 1's planning and execution
Had a budget in mind for how much Forefront tokens to distribute
The work had already been done
Coordinape is very good for retroactive contributor rewards than it is for proactive contributor rewards
Tried it for Season 1 and was wildly successful. Had gone for 2 epochs so far and both were very good
What are Seasons and Guilds in Forefront?
Seasons are like time-boxed periods where there are high-level priorities outlined for the DAO, like a sprint in software engineering
Guilds are the individual teams that are working on specific subsets of those high-level priorities that are outlined
E.g Writers Guild is responsible for all the content production that Forefront is putting out, Culture Guild is focused on internal community work and Growth Guild is focused on product development and growth
Season 1 has a high-level priority to have an education content library and this is delegated to the Writers Guild
Each Season lasts for 3 months
Currently in an off-season period - allows them to deal with any changes in infrastructural issues within the DAO because it had grown so much after Season 1
Customisation of Coordinape for Forefront
They have no hard and fast rules on how to allocate GIVE
The name GIVE remains and they did not change it because the name is aligned with their philosophy
Trying to experiment with new stuff like doing a live Coordinape round rather than an asynchronous epoch where people can allocate their GIVE over several days
Wants to have a 1.5 hr session where each person takes turns allocating their GIVE live so that people can hear feedback on the GIVE they are receiving and why they are allocating their GIVE the way that they are
The notes part is fascinating. Each person can write short comments while they are allocating GIVE
Thinks that if they can do Coordinape rounds on a smaller scale at the Guild level instead of the entire DAO, it could be a lot more interesting
Might also experiment with requiring everyone to give comments together with the allocation of the GIVE
Other ways to allocate rewards?
For Peer to peer allocation, they used Coordinape
Have other tools for contributor rewards like
Bounties for doing a specific task
Base contributor allocation - get x amount of Forefront tokens per month if you are officially onboarded as a contributor
Project level allocation - similar to bounties but on a more macro scale e.g. leading a 6-month long project and getting rewarded in tokens
Going to reduce the centralized allocation part and increase the usage of Coordinape
Best things about Coordinape
After the epoch, he likes to examine the visualization of the social graph and see if that fits in with what he experienced throughout the season
What's interesting?
You can see whether the Guilds leads are giving to more of their own members or to others, who are the star members etc
From the perspective of a core contributor, he will look at whether to give more ownership over the projects they are working on and more financial upside
A powerful tool to see what value transfer looks like at the DAO level
Validates existing assumptions and recalibrate how one thinks about the DAO at large and make changes based on those results
Received very wholesome, positive and meaningful comments
Will he recommend Coordinape to other DAOs?
One million per cent yes- he had been recommending it to all DAOs
Depending on the DAO's goals and structure, there could be other tools they can use for allocation but have not met a DAO that should not be using Coordinape at least for some situations
For retroactive work done prior to the launch of the token, Coordinape will be good
Knowing there will be rewards retroactively at the beginning of a DAO will make it easier to focus on building the DAO and getting work done
Links
Special thanks to Fugu who had arranged the interview:
Bankless DAO:
Masq Network:
PoolTogether:
Forefront:
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