web3dom #13 - How to take part in Gitcoin Grants

🍰 Gitcoin Grants is a fundraising mechanism for supporting open-source software and public goods. It is held approximately every quarter and involves fund matching for crowdfunding donations. It funds projects from around the world and has been running for several years. The 18th round took place from 2023.08.15 to 2023.08.29, lasting for two weeks.

🍰 Unlike the typical 1:1 donation matching, where you donate one dollar and the other matches with one dollar, Gitcoin Grants uses a "quadratic funding" (QF) mechanism, an extended application of "quadratic voting" (QV) from one of the five initiatives of Radical Markets. In simple terms, quadratic funding sums up the square roots of donations from each contributor before calculating the matching amount. For example:

- Project A found 2 donors each donating $10,000, with a matching amount of √$10,000 + √$10,000 = $200.

- Project B found 20,000 donors each donating $1, with a matching amount of √$1 + √$1... (20,000 times) = $20,000.

While both projects receive $20,000 in donations, Project B receives a higher matching amount. Gitcoin Grants' actual calculation is more complex due to factors like matching caps, yet the core principle of quadratic funding remains the same. The goal is to highlight the significance of people over money and direct matching funds towards projects that are valued by many but lack funding.

🍰 This is a rational approach that resembles a sybil attack in a loose sense where one individual assumes multiple identities to gain advantages in certain voting mechanisms. 

Therefore, Gitcoin developed the Gitcoin Passport for decentralized identity. Donors would have to apply for Gitcoin Passport to verify their identity and get a score of 20 or more (out of 100) to be considered legitimate and eligible for matching. 

Since it's difficult for one person to have more than one Gitcoin Passport with a score above 20, this prevents Sybil attacks effectively. Splitting $100 into 100 donations would just be a waste of gas fee unless you have 100 separate Gitcoin Passports, each with a score of 20 or more.

🍰 Visit the official website and log in using an Ethereum wallet like Metamask to start the application process. 

A decentralized identity means that your identity isn't certified by a single government but by various decentralized organizations across different aspects of your life. For example, linking your Facebook account might earn you 0.689 points (quite the spooky figure, iykyk), and past donations to Gitcoin Grants might also earn you some more points, and so on.

Note that Gitcoin Passport is not an exam, and you don't need to strive for a score of 100. Regular individuals won't achieve a perfect 100 score, but if you engage with society even a little, surpassing 20 points isn't difficult. Of course, the mentioned interactions aren't about IRL activities like having meals or coffee; rather, they refer to online interactions on traditional web2 social networks like Twitter and LinkedIn, or web3-based services such as ENS and holding NFTs, all of which contribute to your score.

If you want a straightforward and quick way to acquire a Gitcoin Passport score of 20 or higher, you can refer to the Gitcoin Passport quick tutorial by 0xYCL.

🍰 To save on gas fees, this edition of Gitcoin Grants is being held on the Layer 2 (L2) network Optimism. Therefore, you need some ETH on Optimism. If you haven't used Optimism before, you'll need to bridge some ETH to L2 using a cross-chain bridge. 

Once your ETH is on Optimism, you can donate with minimal gas fee. Quadratic funding means even a small amount of ETH like 0.001 can make an impact if it's above USD1, except for Global Chinese Community track, donations have to be above USD5 in order to be matched. Of course, the significance is more than just what the donation amount or matching delivers.

🍰 There are many projects, and honestly, I haven't seen them all. Here are some personal favourites that I recommend:

- DHK dao (Web3 Community and Education and Global Chinese Community for Public Goods): Clearly a personal favourite. As you can see, DHK dao has consistently been promoting web3 citizen education in Chinese andactively cultivating these corresponding areas with these two matching funds. Note that the same project is evaluated separately in both tracks, requiring separate donations to match with the funds allocated to each track.

- Liker Land (Matching 1 and Matching 2): This is quite self-explanatory and the only point to clarify is that Like Land is not the same as LikeCoin. – The latter focuses on a decentralized publishing public chain, while the former is a web3 application built upon the latter. Liker Land allows creators to turn articles and books into NFTs stored on LikeCoin, enabling readers to collect and possess them.

- Blocktrend (Matching 1 and Matching 2): An accessible account of text and images on blockchain matters. High quality with stable output, highly recommended.

- Nowhere Publishing: One of the very few publishing houses utilizing web3 technology. They publish DRM-free books. The inaugural book, Works and creation by Dung Kai Cheung, is currently available, with several others in intense preparation.

- W3 Project Hub (Matching 1 and Matching 2): Established in October 2022, this media outlet reports on NFT-related news in traditional Chinese. They emphasize art and readability and aspire to become a watchdog for NFT projects.

- Matters Weekly (Matching 1 and Matching 2): Originating from the Matters.Town community, a team of 6 editors compiles excellent articles each week related to web3 technology and culture for readers.

- DeSci Asia: aims on networking, experience sharing, DeSci education, translation on DeSci in Asia.

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