[Formal Review][RGP - 19] - Drips Org Proposal 2024

[lftherios]

Author(s):	@lftherios
Type:	Org
Created:	2023-11-06
Discussion:	[Discussion][RGP - 19] - Drips Org Proposal 2024
Status:	active

This is the official Formal Review Draft for RGP-19. Please formally review the proposal and vote in the Snapshot poll by 17:00 CET - Monday, November 27th )

TL:DR; In response to the feedback that we received:

• we made minor changes to the definitions of the metrics we use
• we added a link to our Etherscan contracts so folks can monitor funds currently in the contract. We will also share a more detailed Dune dashboard the moment Dune resolves their issues with event ingestion.
• we slightly increased the budget requested from $1,103,645 to $1,183,278, as a few contributors committed to more hours for 2024.
• we added a link to the MOU between Radworks and Drips.

Purpose

The team’s mission is to enable FOSS developers to financially thrive.

In short, the Drips Org is taking on the problem of FOSS sustainability. We develop novel protocols, tools and applications that enable new value flows for developers, allowing them to receive funds from their users.

Our current focus is on establishing Dependency Funding as a new norm for Web3 communities to fund their critical software dependencies.

Strategy & Roadmap

Strategy

Our strategy for 2024 remains “funder-focused,” meaning that we prioritize funder needs in our execution with the goal of (a) attracting more funders and capital to Drips directed towards their critical software dependencies and (b) onboarding more FOSS projects that can claim those funds and choose to further distribute them to their software dependencies.

KPIs

1. Number of organizations using Drips to fund their critical software dependencies
2. Total $ value deposited in Drips
3. % $ value collected by recipients
4. % of projects that have claimed and also choose to distribute funds to their dependencies
5. Funder retention

Yearly Objectives

• 20 orgs in total that use Drips in 2024 to fund their dependencies
• $10m deposited in the Drips protocol

Roadmap

Following our “funder focused” approach we plan on working on the following topics:

Introduce the option to KYC recipients before they claim funds.

This currently acts as a blocker for several organizations that consider it a hard prerequisite for funding their critical software dependencies. We plan to integrate with an existing provider that offers this optional capability.

Multi-party Drip List creation

This addresses the friction for a group of people to collectively agree on the items of a Drip List and the associated percentages. We believe that this feature can provide a much smoother user experience for DAOs to fund their critical software dependencies.

Scaling notification of recipients

Currently, we handle this manually through Github issues, Twitter, and email, but this isn’t scalable. We aim to automate some of this work to notify more users that funds are waiting for them and encourage them to claim them.

Partner with well-known orgs & co-create topic-specific Drip Lists

This initiative aims to explore the possibility of using Drip Lists as a curation mechanism for funding FOSS work. The idea is to partner with well-established organizations to (a) create a Drip List specific to a topic, (b) bring awareness to recipients for the work they are doing in this topic, and (c) fund it.

An example would be partnering with the EF and the Tor Foundation to create a privacy-specific list for the Ethereum community. In this scenario, privacy-related FOSS projects, researchers, and engineers contributing impactful work in the domain will be selected, and a campaign will be created to fund this Drip List.

Migrate to Chainlink’s decentralized oracle network

This aims to replace our current dependence on a selected group of Chainlink Oracle providers with their decentralized network of oracle providers. Although this is not yet on the main-net, we’ve been working with their team and will be ready to migrate when they launch it. This work is considered important as it minimizes the risk of oracle misbehavior and, consequently, the risk of loss of funds.

Lowering the barrier-of-entry for claiming

We plan to leverage account abstraction so that users can claim and manage projects without a pre-existing Ethereum identity, increasing the velocity of funds.

Attract funders beyond established DAOs

In 2024, we plan to expand our focus beyond well-established DAOs, which is our current segment. Specifically, we aim to do partnership and product work to attract funders from the following market segments:

• Existing DAOs (current focus)
• DAOs to be formed: Convincing teams about to launch their native token to commit to a scheme where they pay it forward to their dependencies for the next few years.
• Well-funded web3 companies: Expanding beyond DAOs to attract “off-chain” actors from the crypto industry (crypto exchanges, wallets, etc.).
• Traditional tech and finance organizations: Exploring opportunities, such as the recent commitment from Van Eck to fund Protocol Guild with 10% of their profits. This segment is less defined, and we aim to further define our strategy for this market later in the year.

Quarterly Objectives

For Q1 2024 we want to:

• attract 5 new orgs that fund their critical software dependencies
• additional $1m deposited in Drips

Organizational Structure

We have established a Swiss non-for-profit association that we call the Public Goods Association that is the recipient of funds. The founding members operate as a committe based on simple majority (3 out of 5).

The Association is an independent legal entity with legal capacity. It is governed by Swiss law. The official language of the association is English.

Founding Members

lftherios (current project lead)
json (product & application development)
jtourkos (product, SDK & application development)
everett (product & application development)
brandonhaslegs (design)

Contractors

IgorZuk (smart contract development)
earthwindfirewater (partnerships, research & strategy)
LukeF (partnerships)
Project Jasmine (operations)
Abbey Titcomb (partnerships)

Contributors

• lftherios (project lead)
• json (product & application development)
• jtourkos (product, SDK & application development)
• everett (product & application development)
• brandonhaslegs (design)
• IgorZuk (smart contract development)
• earthwindfirewater (research & partnerships)
• LukeF (partnerships)
• Project Jasmine (operations)
• Abbey Titcomb (partnerships)

Communication

• https://www.drips.network/
• Discord
• twitter.com/dripsnetwork
• Drips · GitHub
• Quarterly Radworks community calls

Reasoning & Analysis

Drips empowers builders to sustain their contributions to the commons (Free and Open Source Software) by generating new value flows based on their impact. In essence, we believe that our efforts enhance the incentives for building FOSS by redistributing wealth towards the most impactful FOSS projects. This is an integral part of the Radworks mission, contributing to the cultivation of internet freedoms.

Reporting & Success Criteria

1. Number of organizations using Drips to fund their critical software dependencies
2. Total $ value deposited in Drips
3. % $ value collected by recipients
4. % of projects that have claimed and also choose to distribute funds to their dependencies
5. Funder retention

We will share a link to a Dune dashboard as soon as possibe. Dune is currently having issues ingesting our event data. On the meantime you can monitor the total $ value deposited on the protocol here under "Token Holdings: https://etherscan.io/address/0xd0dd053392db676d57317cd4fe96fc2ccf42d0b4

Through Q2 2024, the Foundation Org will provide monthly financial reporting to Radworks on behalf of the Foundation, Radicle, Drips and Grants Orgs. Therefore, starting in Q3 2024, the Drips Org will publish monthly financial reports on Radworks-granted funds spent by the Drips Org.

Retrospective

Drips Org 2023 Retrospective

Drips Org Retrospective 2023 Objectives What did we accomplish this year that aligns with the objectives and goals set at the beginning of the year? Q1/Q2-23 Publicly launch Drips v2 contracts and application. Integrate social-linking (verified credentials + oracles) within the Drips app. Research multi-chain governance options in order to potentially deploy Drips v2 contracts on more EVM networks. Build & ship “Continuous D…

MOU

MoU: Radworks & Drips Org

This document outlines the current relationship between the Drips Org and Radworks. It is supplemental material for [Discussion][RGP - 19] - Drips Org Proposal 2024. Scope & Objectives This document defines the relationship between Radworks, a networked organization that facilitates the governance, stewardship, and deployment of the $RAD treasury, and Drips, a project building a decentralized toolkit for open-sourced funding processing. Specifically, this document describes the grant …

Timeline & Budget

The total budget requested for 2024 is $1,183,278.

Specifically:

Description	Budget
Contributors	$1,405,421
Marketing	$325,809
Offsites	$30,000
Accounting	$9,307
Operations	$12,740
Total	$1,783,278

This includes budget to bring on a marketing lead for Drips.

Budget carried over from last year

There will be an estimate of $600,000 left over at the end of 2023.

Requested budget

1,783,278 - $600,000 = $1,183,278

Fund Management

We plan to use a multi-sig (gnosis safe with 3/5 signatures) with founding members as signers. We won’t use a bank account. Crypto to FIAT conversions will take place through Skyline Digital and that’s why you see the fees on our budget.

The Drips Org - also the “Grant Recipient” of Radworks, if this proposal is passed - hereby agrees to use the amount granted by Radworks in support of fulfilling the purpose outlined in the “Purpose” section above. The Grant Recipient understands and acknowledges that the awarded amount may be used only for this Purpose. Furthermore, any part of the grant that goes unused in the calendar year outlined in this proposal (for 2024) will either be returned to the Radworks Treasury (by March 2025) or rolled over into and applied towards the Org’s 2025 proposal and future grant from Radworks.

Technical Implementation

The proposal will transfer 1183278 USDC to the Public Goods Association multisig, which is controlled by five signers, with a three out of five quorum.

Signature:
transfer(address,uint256)
Calldata:
address:
0xcC7d34C76A9d08aa0109F7Bae35f29C1CE35355A
uint256:
1183278000000
Target:
0xA0b86991c6218b36c1d19D4a2e9Eb0cE3606eB48
Value:
0

0xA0b86991c6218b36c1d19D4a2e9Eb0cE3606eB48 0 "transfer(address,uint256)" 0xcC7d34C76A9d08aa0109F7Bae35f29C1CE35355A 1183278000000
``

[shelb_ee]

Snapshot Poll Results

This proposal has PASSED with 5.3M $RAD in support of the proposal. It will be submitted on-chain this week for a final vote.

See final results here: Snapshot