MGP (Nov 2021): Meta Gamma Delta

Moloch Rises
#1

Meta Gamma Delta $1M Fund
Taking a comprehensive approach to women-led initiatives: inspiring women to enter our world and making space for what they bring! A public good.

Description

We are proposing that MolochDAO become the cornerstone partner of a $1M fund to create an end-to-end solution that attracts more women into the space, creates opportunities for them to succeed and opens the way to their contribution to the blossoming of the ecosystem. We see this as an essential public good.

Manifesto/Vision

It’s easy to see that the solutions that will serve the most people will come from the creativity and work of a widely representative group. True advances in human coordination will involve asking everyone to participate - not only in what the answers are - but most importantly, what the questions are.

The core of our work is to support women in web3. We already do that by providing grants of $5-20k to women-led initiatives.

But we believe that to really move the needle, we need to onboard more women, make sure they get the tools and education they need to contribute and succeed and spur their compensation by funding their initiatives and contributing to significant job placements.

In other words, to fund women-led initiatives, we need to bring more women in the front door and support them when they get here. (It’s not only women that are needed, and we hope this model will inspire others.)

Problem

We all jumped into this space because we were inspired and we could see the opportunities opening out before us. But many of us bootstrapped our way in by working a day job, then working at night on our passion; by getting financial support from family & friends; by being lucky in early investments; or by whatever means we had to buy the time to learn. There will be more like us. But who are we missing? Who is out there who lives on what they earn week-to-week and can’t stop for a learning curve? What would their contribution bring? Would they surprise us?

Solution

We believe that to really move the needle, we need an end-to-end solution:

  • Find potential new talent, and knockdown their barriers to entry
  • Provide robust educational opportunities through scholarships with major educational partners. (This year Consensys provided scholarships for 10 Meta Gamma Delta members to Consensys Developer Bootcamp.)
  • Create or partner on a starter income program that supports women while they are gaining skills and onboarding (3 months for women who are accepted into the program).
  • Provide mentorship and other resources from Meta Gamma Delta and other partnerships.
  • Through these partnerships and our network, help with job placement upon completion of the program.
  • Continue to support women-led initiatives and startups, creating a wider footprint by actively sourcing more projects through hackathons and by other means.

Product Features / Cornerstone Phase

Create the foundational curriculum for a multi-year initiative. Map out curriculum, supporting partnerships, workstreams, compensation / reward models, recruitment, and other necessary tooling.

  • Create paths for different skill sets that are relevant to ecosystem needs.
  • Establish major partnerships in all aspects of the program, from education and job services to mentorship and support services.
  • It’s not a passive service; we need to ramp up bounties and workstreams aimed at identifying good candidates from traditional companies, educational institutions, or related fields, and attracting them to apply.
  • Evaluate and apply compensation models and universal basic income programs to provide financial bootstrapping.
  • Create concrete strategies and systems for identifying women with relevant skills and interests outside the ecosystem, and attracting their interest. This may go from granular (web2 to web3 for instance) to broad (DAOs as the future of work).

Validation

Our validation is our track record and reputation. This is an ambitious project for us, but as a collective, we have the knowledge, relationships, and saavy to build a path for those to come.

Progress

Though the grant is requested to build a new program, this may partially be considered retroactive public goods funding. We have a track record as an early and well-regarded Moloch DAO.

Currently, at about 80 members, we’ve onboarded many of these by mentoring them through the process. We hold monthly calls that cover a wide range of topics from learning about DeFi protocols such as Aave, to discussing legal issues in the DAO space, and even sharing PR tips to get more awareness for your project.

We’ve provided grants to DeFi dapps such as Good Ghosting, publications like The Defiant, and art initiatives like DADA collective.

There is so much more we can do, not only to give women-led initiatives a helping hand but to make sure there are more women building and spreading impact.

Differentiation (from other projects)

  • Meta Gamma Delta has deep roots in the Ethereum community. As a DAO that has a low barrier to entry, we are used to providing support services and mentorship to those new to the space.
  • We propose to launch the most comprehensive diversity initiative we know of to date in Ethereum and the DAO space.
  • Partnerships will be essential to this initiative, gathering assistance from all quarters, but also - importantly - enabling other DAOs, companies, and entities to collaborate on this major public good.

Team

  • Meta Gamma Delta DAO was summoned in 2019 and has approximately 80 members currently. We have web3 entrepreneurs, developers, DeFi experts, …We have the capacity to provide meaningful mentorship in various aspects of Ethereum. Meta Gamma Delta members are accomplished in their areas of expertise.
  • Partner DAOs - we propose to partner with other DAOs to fill out the workstreams. We will need a variety of people to design and implement this ambitious program. We may look to Raid Guild cohorts, Metagame, Padawan DAO, and others - and create not only workstreams for their members but also a meaningful trade of value in terms of mentorship and opportunity.
  • We will engage with other diversity initiatives such as Panvala’s Women-Led Coalition and Jovian to inform the development of this work.
  • Upon receipt of the cornerstone grant, we will form a working group of 5-10 MGD members to jumpstart this initiative.

Grant Request

$100,000

We are looking for 10 partners at $100k each to generate, grow and sustain this action-oriented, impactful and directed initiative. Our cornerstone partner will seed the ground and help us attract 9 more visionary supporters of inclusion. This is just one more way Ethereum makes an impact on the world at large.

What the Funds Are For

MGD has been an all-volunteer operation. To deliver on a project of this magnitude, we will need to conduct a discovery phase, create paid workstreams, recruit skilled workers and create a pilot program to test the concept:

  • Create a pilot program for 3-5 women for the first round of the program in about a year.
  • Partnership development
  • Program development: develop structure around the path from onboarding through education to job placement or startup initiative, and create paths for developers as well as some specific non-technical paths in areas of need for the ecosystem: marketing, project management, business development, etc.
  • Recruiting program including incentives and bounties
  • Documentation of all of the above, with detailed milestones and budget for successive phases.
  • Success metrics and questionnaires for an ongoing assessment of the program

The timeline should be about a year, with the first three months dedicated to mapping out the rest. We will make all of our work products public and accessible so others may track our progress and copy our models as desired.

Help Requested

Aside from funds, we will ask MolochDAO members for help creating relevant partnerships, providing advisors to the project, and to provide mentorship to our program participants. We appreciate your consideration and would be proud to list MolochDAO, a DAO known for firsts, as our cornerstone partner.

Additional Resources, Links, Portfolio

https://twitter.com/metagammadelta

2 Likes
#2

Can you please clarify how much of the funds will go to operational expenses vs grants?

Also, what is the plan if you don’t get $1M? What can and cannot be done?

#3

Thank you! These are great questions. An estimated 20 - 25% of the funds should be used to assemble a working group who will create a roadmap for the program. That would include designing the program, setting up partnerships, creating workstreams and recruiting qualified helpers, detailed budgeting and milestones, and related research and due diligence. The other 75% would be to actually set up the pilot program, recruit 3-5 women into it, and run it. No matter what funding is received later (or not), we’d create a pilot program, run it with a real group of women who onboard, and use its results as an output - recording its impact, its methods, what could be improved, reviews from the program participants, etc. With that in hand, we could pursue grant funding again, or solicit corporate sponsorships. These results will be available publicly so others could also replicate or evolve the work using our program & results. I hope others will join MolochDAO in this project. This is one of those opportunities for DAOs to rock the world! Thanks for asking!

#4

Thanks for the explanation.

By “the funds” you mean the $100k, not the $1M, right? Do you have an estimate of the number of hours needed, hourly rates, etc.?

These funds go directly to the women? At what hourly/monthly rate?

#5

To be clear, the details will need to be decided in the first phase by a concentrated committee of Meta Gamma Delta, who will create the map for the program, milestones, budget, and key partnerships. We will share all of this transparently, including workstreams, labor & expenses, compensation structure, recruitment plans, etc. At this point, MolochDAO would be investing in Meta Gamma Delta - our knowledge, contacts, track record, our understanding of women in web3, and our end-to-end vision. A typical non-profit grant proposal might be created ad hoc by a proposal writer representing a centralized group. The vision here is to do this in a DAO-centric way, creating this program via MGD from our group’s experience and vantage point. These questions are quite reasonable; and this is why those details are not in the proposal.

In general, though - yes, this funding would be intended to create the program and then provide funds directly to the first 3-5 women in the program. Later fundraising will be to extend the program to more women and one could expect that more of the funds would support the program that was built and tested. Partnerships will be a major element, as well as funds. Hope that helps!

#6

I love this proposal, I think this is MUCH needed. I’ve been a supporter of MGD and watched it grow into a powerful force for women.

I would also support a pledge of this type to MetaCartel, let us know how we can arrange something to be a follow on funder of this initiative.

1 Like
#7

We have just posted this on Giveth as well for others to consider. Thank you!

#8

Dear Meta Gamma Delta team:

I think that Meta Gamma Delta has a really important mission and support its vision. I have two problems with this proposal though. If one of them is resolved, I would likely vote yes.

Problem 1: How the fund is governed is vague.

If Meta Gamma Delta expects Moloch DAO to be a partner, without sharing any detailed budget in advance, then I think what is actually being created with the 10 partners would be like a MGD Trustee DAO. MolochDAO should have to ability to pay tribute into the MGD Trustee DAO, have voting/governance rights for how the money is spent, and ability to ragequit and return the funds to MolochDAO. That’s how I would see a partnership working personally.

For example, the MetaMoloch initiative has some proposals for how governance can work, with delegates and a gnosis safe which I think can potentially be applied here as well: MGP (Nov 2021): MetaMoloch - A Grant Matching and Ecosystem Development Initiative

Note: I think the gnosis safe should add the zodiac plug in for rage quitting though.

If you technically set it up for Moloch DAO to actually be somewhat of a DAO member of Meta Gamma Delta via at least a multisig and some multisig delegate governance outlined, similar to MetaMoloch, it would solve this problem.

Problem 2: There is no budget or clear project plan.

My expectations for how things should work in Moloch DAO is we fund projects that have clear deliverables, timelines, and budgets. (I think exceptions can be made to this expectation though, if we come up with consistent methods/processes/tools for handling partnerships, as specified in Problem 1).

Conclusion:

There is the part of me that is personally biased to want to bend these internal rules I have personally established, since I really find the work that MGD is doing as super important for this ecosystem, but I think it’s equally important to be as consistent as possible with how we manage our treasury in Moloch DAO. Our membership base is barely active and able to review the proposals we have right now. And it seems like proposals are getting more and more different — which is super exciting and fun to see, but then makes it really confusing for how to really evaluate proposals and give people feedback in a fair and consistent format.

If Moloch DAO wants to have a variety of proposal types - e.g. DAO-to-DAO partner proposals, guild proposals, project proposals, then I think we need to probably work on establishing review criteria and standards or different proposal types, because I find it very challenging to understand how to review things in a way that is fair and consistent across the board.

For me to vote Yes on the Meta Gamma Delta proposal I would like to see one of the problems above addressed. Either governance/multisig is prioritized and set up (and hence Moloch DAO can start to build a standard for how we handle DAO-to-DAO relationships) or a more detailed budget/project plan is established before requesting funding.

Best,

Stellar Magnet

1 Like
#9

Fair points! I understand that we could address ambiguity by adding rage-quittable governance. But my worry about this is that it creates the illusion that the funders will have voting rights over the step by step building of the project. Also, although it might be unlikely, a funder could leverage funding by saying “if you don’t do x, we’ll ragequit”, where x may or may not be right for the project. I think to produce what we want to create in the way of impact, Meta Gamma Delta must drive the needs and requirements, while partnering to complete many aspects of the project.

The reason I think MetaMoloch is a little different is that there’s grant matching involved. So both orgs have an equal stake. The same structure with Moloch and Meta Gamma Delta might create a power differential (and this would be true of other large funders as well). But - like MetaMoloch - this could be configured in tranches so you can see deliverables being met before approving the next tranche. Definitely open to making an adjustment in that way.

I take the point that this grants round brought in a lot of different kinds of proposals - some solicited and others not - and how to consider them might need work.

Thanks for raising this issue, it’s an interesting one.

#10

:white_heart:MetaGammaDelta :white_heart:
I think the whole community would greatly benefit from a Moloch<>MGD partnership. Moloch should be eager to support radical inclusivity and diverse agendas as much as possible. That being said, I am unclear about what the funds will specifically be used for and remain eager to learn more details about the scope of the long-term vision. If the ask is $100k for a year of programming with the first 3 months dedicated to laying the foundation, perhaps the grant could be divided into installments in relation to milestones? I would 100% support $30k to provide the MGD team the breathing room to elaborate on this vision. I also firmly believe that we might leverage our community resources to attract more attention to this initiative (and others in our pipeline) in order to attract fund matching from other DAOs and align the ecosystem on this purpose.

1 Like
#11

Thank you for considering this proposal. We’d like to withdraw it for now. We are headed into a planning phase, so by the next Moloch grants round, we should be able provide the requested detail on the scope of the program, budget, milestones, etc. Your points are valid and proposing again a bit later in our process will be better. Best wishes to all the other proposals!

#12

We think our project is going to have tremendous impact! So we will be excited to talk with you about it further in the future.