Introduction

Hi everyone! I’m Chris, Client Success Lead at Granted (getgranted.io) and a long-time open-source developer & community builder. Nice to meet you! I’d love to get your ideas and honest feedback on a new concept I'm calling a "12-month Delegated Curators Grant". I've shared a rough draft of the proposal below. Your support and constructive feedback are greatly appreciated!

Summary

At Granted, we believe ecosystem growth initiatives can be executed more effectively with the help of third-party consultants like ourselves — specialists who scout, qualify, and prepare early-stage projects for grants — without requiring re-centralization. Inspired by a long history of experience participating in the free software and blockchain movements that brought us to where we are today, plus more recent innovative new ideas coming from the community’s Kusama / Polkadot Curator initiative, we are confident that with the right approach WAGMI and we don't need to re-centralize to do it!

Our proposal, in short, is to launch a new program to distribute a wave of $1,000,000 in bounties over 12 months* to the highest quality projects building within a narrow range of 4 development tracks that the community reviews and prioritizes quarterly. (*Alternatively, this amount could be distributed incrementally across four quarterly 'top-ups')

Granted would act as the “Program Manager,” covering everything up to and following the approval of project bounties, which is our daily bread anyway. For example, Granted’s responsibilities would include proactively seeking out and rigorously qualifying projects and teams in the web3 ecosystem and building world-class bounty applications tailored to Polkadot criteria prioritized by the community, with extra attention on milestones and KPIs to reduce the time required for Curators to come to consensus on who to fund and whether achievements were made according to plan. Granted would essentially manage all back-office processes, KYC, milestone report publications, etc., supporting the project's needs around blockchain integration, documentation reviews, and so on, as well.

Curators — members nominated by the Polkadot/Kusama community — would remain in control, deciding which projects to approve, for how much, and under what conditions, while the amount of time and energy required to review, approve, and monitor each bounty is reduced significantly. We genuinely believe the Polkadot/Kusama community knows what’s best for the ecosystem, so we ensure this remains a central pillar of our strategy.

For Curators’ efforts, they would be rewarded with 5% of the $50,000 Granted Curators reward pool per project ($2,500), split evenly between all Granted Curators ($500 per Curator), paid in DOT, and unlocked as projects achieve their high-level project milestones/KPIs.

For our efforts, Granted would be rewarded 5% of the $100,000 Management Fee per project ($5,000), paid in DOT and unlocked as projects achieve their high-level project milestones/KPIs.

By splitting responsibilities and creating a balanced incentive strategy that ties payouts to milestone/KPIs achievements for both Granted and the Curators, we ensure that everyone moves together in the same direction while significantly and positively impacting the speed at which growth and innovation in the Polkadot/Kusama ecosystem occurs, reducing decision paralysis, and keeping funds flowing and builders building along the way!

Sounds good so far? Please read on, where I cover the proposal in more detail.

Overview

Delegated Treasury Grant

The program's centerpiece is what we’re calling a Delegated Curators Grant: a spending proposal approved by the Polkadot treasury, managed by Granted and supported by a small, experienced group of ‘delegated curators’ (or ‘topics-based mini-committee’) made of a multi-disciplinary set of subject matter experts (SMEs) who join a new team ("Granted Curators") for the sole purpose of approving high-quality project bounties for teams building on Polkadot/Kusama..

Treasury Spend Breakdown

Total Spending Budget: $1,150,000 (in DOT)

• $1,000,000 for Project Bounties: Between 10-20 Bounties of $50,000-$100,000; paid when milestones/KPIs are completed and approved by the Granted Curators team, with an option to distribute a small starter payment upfront at the Curators' discretion. 
• $50,000 for Granted Curators Reward pool: 5% of a dedicated $50,000 Granted Curators reward pool, distributed per project (max: $2,500), evenly distributed and unlocked as projects achieve their high-level project milestones/KPIs, split evenly between all Granted Curators ($500 per Curator), paid in DOT. e.g., four milestones == up to four reward payouts of 25% per milestone.
• $100,000 for Granted Program Management Fee: 5% of a dedicated $100,000 Management Fee pool per project (max: $5,000), paid in DOT, evenly distributed and unlocked across project milestones/KPIs. e.g., four milestones == up to four management fee payouts of 25% per milestone.

Funds that remain unapproved for distribution at the end of the program period will be returned to the Treasury unless an extension or top-up is provided.

Curators: Granted would openly invite SMEs from the broader Polkadot/Kusama ecosystem to apply to join the Granted Curator team for the program, whose sole responsibility is to review and approve top projects and represent the interests of both individual tracks and the ecosystem as a whole. Granted’s employees would not be eligible to join the Curator team and will not have a vote approving project bounties or milestone achievements to avoid introducing conflicts of interest.

Using a 3 of 5 multi-sig on Polkadot Mainnet, the Curator team would break down as such:

• 1 of 5 - One Polkadot OG to cover the ecosystem as a whole (i.e., a member of the W3F).
• 4 of 5 - One Community SME per each of the four prioritized Tracks.

Important: All payouts and rewards are gated on successfully delivering milestones/KPIs. No win, no reward!

For example, imagine the following scenario:

• Granted scouts and finds a fantastic project called Acme.xyz, verifies their claims, KYC's the team, drafts their Bounty application, and submits it to the Curators.
• Curators approve the project for $100,000, with four 1-month milestones of $25,000 each.
• After one month, the project completes its first milestone/KPIs.
• Granted submits a thorough milestone progress report to the Curators for review.
• The Curators approve the completion of the first milestone.
• The Curators distribute the 1st Bounty milestone payment via an approved 3 of 5 multi-sig transaction.
• In addition to the bounty payout, the first reward/fee payouts are triggered:
  • Curators receive the first payment of $500 to be split evenly between all Curators, which is 25% of $2500 (5% of $50,000).
  • Granted receive the first management fee payment of $1250, 25% of $5000 (5% of $100,000).
• The project continues to develop according to plan, and the remaining bounties are completed, approved, and distributed by Curators based on milestone progress reports provided by Granted to facilitate the decision-making process.
  • Curators/Granted receive the remainder of their rewards/fees allocated for this project, paid per milestone achieved.
  • Once the final milestone is completed, Granted will also publish a final progress report and the milestone reports.

Community Criteria: To ensure alignment between Granted Curators and the Polkadot/Kusama ecosystem, Granted would invite the community to participate in a quarterly public Community Criteria survey to identify the top four grant development track priorities. Project applications introduced to Curators by Granted for approval would be required to fall into one of the top 4 categories selected by the community! For example, the initial set of tracks could be as follows:

Development Tracks

1. Protocol & Infrastructure 

2. GameFi 

3. DeFi 

4. Privacy & Identity 

Program Governance

• A quarterly public survey would be issued to the Polkadot/Kusama community to discover if there is a demand to update the Community Criteria or Tracks or replace Curators.
• The Granted Curators would make critical decisions to approve projects and bounty distributions independently based on Community Criteria, community feedback, community surveys, and reports/information supplied by Granted.
• Granted would publish all Curator decisions within 72 hours for transparency, not including weekends/holidays.
• Where not defined otherwise, we would design processes that align as closely to the new strategy announced recently, such as how the initial Treasury Spending Proposal is approved and Polkadot Curators are nominated and approved, etc. We’re happy for any guidance and support to achieve alignment with existing processes as seamlessly as possible.

Program Reports

• Granted Curators' decisions would be concisely summarized in a progress report and shared bi-weekly. Including these KPIs:
  • Number of proposals reviewed/decisions made
  • Project application summaries
  • Bounty amounts granted.
• Approved project milestone achievements/KPIs, including key project performance metrics highlights, would be shared bi-weekly. Including these KPIs:
  • Milestones completion rate.
  • Number of users onboarded.
  • TVL
• Granted would submit one program-level progress report per quarter summarizing the most recent quarter’s activity, including any additional KPIs required from the community.
• Granted will submit one program-level progress report summarizing all previous activity at the program's end, including any additional KPIs required from the community.

Performance reports, surveys, etc., will be published on the Polkadot Community Forum and the Polkassembly Discussion board, or otherwise as agreed with the Polkadot/Kusama community.

Program Metrics/KPIs

• Project Applications
  • Granted submits at least two unique applications per track monthly for approval (eight projects per month) unless funds are otherwise exhausted.
• Milestones/KPI Achievements
  • Granted Curators approve at least one project per track per quarter (four projects per quarter).
  • The turnaround time for the Curator's decisions to approve project applications and milestones/KPI achievement is five days (not including weekends).
• Success Metrics:
  • Individual projects will also have their own set of project/milestone KPIs, which will be approved by the curators' team and reported on by Granted according to the schedule mentioned above.

We appreciate that we're asking for a lot of trust here. To compensate for this, we would like to be clear that if Granted fails to meet an approved Program Metrics/KPI, Granted will self-submit an ad-hoc report describing the situation with a proposed follow-up action. Also, the Polkadot Treasury can decide to prolong the deadline, make adjustments to the program, or cancel it, forcing all undistributed funds to be returned to the Treasury. This ensures strong accountability measures are in place to catch and react to any aspects of this newly proposed program that need tuning.

The Granted Guarantee

1. Quality: Granted’s soulbound purpose is to find and fund the top projects in web3!
2. Qualify: Granted will complete a rigorous review and KYC for all projects and teams.
3. Optimize: Applications and project milestones will be prepared hand-in-hand with the Granted team to ensure only high-quality, easily understood applications that Curators can decide on with confidence will be submitted.
4. Experience: We will remain agile and adapt to the latest trends and lessons learned quarter by quarter, with a team of multidisciplinary SMEs who collectively understand the ecosystem as a whole, are deeply knowledgeable about each track, and are highly capable of integrating with and deploying on Polkadot/Kusama.
5. Focus: Incentives will remain balanced, so Granted, Curators & project leads move in the same direction at all project development and milestone delivery stages.
6. Efficient: Granted handles the initial project scouting and all back-office program management processes so project teams and Curators can remain focused on delivering high-quality results that help bring innovation and adoption to the Polkadot/Kusama ecosystem.

That's it for now. :) Thanks for your time and attention. I hope this concept pleases you, encourages your support, and opens up discussions in the community.

About Granted

• Website: https://getgranted.io
• Linked-in: https://www.linkedin.com/company/get-granted/ 

GetGranted.io is dedicated to providing strategic grant funding for Web3 projects. Granted’s primary service includes offering expedited and preferred access to valuable grant programs, including Aleph Zero, SKALE, Tezos, and more popular networks in the Web3 ecosystem. The platform streamlines the grant application process, making it more agile and efficient for users and Web3 foundations.

About Chris Ward (@GrantedChris) - Client Success Lead

Chris's career is a testament to his deep involvement in the open-source software movement and versatility across various tech domains. He began by spearheading public education programs in under-developed regions, successfully promoting the adoption of open-source software in rural Africa and Central America. His ten-year tenure at Red Hat saw him progress through pivotal roles, from Sr. Quality Engineer to Developer Advocacy Lead, culminating as the Community Event Lead for DevConf, a prominent global open-source event series attended by more than 3000 community developers each year. Chris then spent 2 years at MADFINGER Games, where he led the Community & Customer Success teams supporting the acclaimed mobile FPS title Shadowgun Legends. More recently, he worked at Zeroknowledge.fm podcast, delving deeply into the technical nuances of applied cryptography and the problems of privacy and scalability on the blockchain, before designing developer programs for the Decentralized Data Cloud at Cere Network, a Substrate-based L1 blockchain.

Changelog

* February 2: I updated some formatting, bullets, and spacing.