🕋 MetaSys
🤔 Why MetaSys?
If you're going to build a better future, you should probably build it in a decentralized way or else it likely won't end up much better.
😬 DAOs - not quite there yet
We weren’t happy with the way DAOs currently work.
They are pretty much command & control based, with commands simply being given by token holders rather than CEOs.
They are decentralized, but decentralized in what way exactly? If the weight of your vote is based only on how much money you have, then what the fuck are we doing?
Now, I’m not saying there should be no politically centralized & strictly voting-based DAOs. That might make perfect sense for grant giving or investing DAO, but it's just not optimal for actually building things.
Having to vote on everything is cumbersome & having a mass dictating what to do kills all the front-line morale - where’s the autonomy in that? Not to mention design by committee - you don’t want that.
So, we flipped it:
- Give anyone able & willing the autonomy to create value however they see fit.
- Let them claim rewards based on time contributed & impact of work.
- Yeah, no voting. Its all “yes” by default.
- If disputes arise, they are solved through discussion.
- If unresolved, vote as last resort - 1 person 1 vote.
After a while, we found a system to make the process smoother; create value & automatically get rewarded, no claiming needed.
😱 Enter Sourcecred
For those who still haven’t heard of it, Sourcecred is this magical tool for tracking value creation inside open source projects. It hooks onto github, discord & discourse, then spits out scores based on interactions.
Alright alright, it's not magical! The results weren’t always perfect, and, as a matter of fact, still aren’t; there’s always some human judgement & fine tuning needed - but the thing is a gamechanger, let me tell you.
- We were the first to fully utilize it besides the Sourcecred team itself
- We were the first to implement the Discord plugin
- The first to mint tokens based on scores earned
- & the first to add these tokens inside an AMM pool, making them liquid
There is little if any governance; the system is about getting out of people’s way and making the value-creation2value-capture as seamless as possible.
We do still vote from time to time, but mainly when it's a matter of taste: like deciding on which version of the logo we’ll adopt - and of course, its still democratic.
🐙 MetaSys Core
Combining these building blocks you get a minimum viable stack for building decentralized organizations. Also, the most capital efficient way of building crypto projects so far.
- Sourcecred - for tracking value creation
- Aragon - for minting reward tokens
- Balancer - for mediating between active & passive supporters
Do note that Sourcecred is the only critical piece, the token minting & distribution system can be swapped out for other DAO frameworks & the market making mechanism for other AMMs.
We predict an exponentially growing number of dApp & DAO builders to be using a variation of this system in 2021, partially because we'll be promoting the fuck out of it and helping people get it up & running 🙃
Anyhow!
🧩 How it all fits together:
- You have people converging around an idea, exchanging thoughts & creating value through platforms such as Discord, Discourse & Github.
- You have Sourcecred, tracking value creation through these three platforms & rewarding value creators with XP.
- Once every X, you mint a fixed number of tokens & allocate it to the people earning XP, based on their share of XP earned.
- You add these tokens inside a liquidity pool along with ETH or DAI, allowing people to buy or sell the token without affecting the price so much.
- Build more awesome shit & repeat the cycle.
It sounds so simple now, but it took time to pioneer this way. We’ve spent most of the first year putting it all together, making sure that it works and that the people are happy. Then we spent a few months getting the system validated by investors by reaching the $1m marketcap in record speed after adding enough liquidity & validated by players, by them not dumping it.
Hovering around $50 for almost 2 months after a 10x pump - not bad at all.
- What I think investors like: Tokens made through this system are rewards for completed work, not a promise of future work.
We’ve blazed the trail and others will follow.
⚖️ Costs & Benefits
Costs: It takes real time & effort to get the whole system up & running. Not something you’ll want to do for your hackathon project - at least not until after you decide to turn your hackathon project into a DAO.
Benefits: You don’t need co-founders from day1. Once you find them, you don’t need to trust them & you barely need to know them. Also no need to worry about the equity split up-front as it gets dynamically allocated based on effort. No need think up & evaluate all the tasks, no need to negotiate salaries or even go through the hiring processes.
🤔 What are we doing with it?
Running the system successfully for months now; what for?
Well, you know, the overarching idea is to build a decentralized society, a real-life mmo-rpg, an anarcho syndicalist utopia or however you want to look at it; 14 Reasons People Are Playing MetaGame.
But pretty much everything we’ve done as a community so far has been accounted for & incentivized by this system.
To begin with:
- We put together the rest of MetaSys & built up an awesome community.
- We organized a conference, a hackathon & a shitton of other smaller events.
- We started this wiki - meant to be all about building decentralized organizations.
- We built MyMeta - profiles to be used by anyone who wants a members directory for their DAO or simply just a decentralized profile page.
- We're using it to build the MetaOS.
🤔 What can I do with it?
No, but seriously, it can be used for building & running pretty much anything. With great power comes great responsibility & all of that.
Though the UX is terrible, you should be able to build & run any kind of decentralized organization and do it in an extremely capital efficient way 🤷♂️