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Section 5

$ME Grant Programs & Community Voting

An important step in the decentralization process of $ME is providing the community with a clear outline for how they can apply for $ME Grants that will support the growth of the open-source trading protocols adopted by ME DAO. Our first step in this direction is opening the application for Developer Grants and launching a Community Grant program in the near future. This blog outlines the purpose of these grants and how developer grant applications can evolve from proposals to implementation.

What is the purpose of $ME Community & Developer Grants?

$ME is powering the on-chain economy. $ME represents open-source cross chain trading, minting, and web3 wallet technologies for Solana, Bitcoin, and across EVM. The $ME community, in turn, supports the growth and influence of cross chain trading and these technologies. That is why the community is welcome to propose projects that can support the awareness, growth, and influence of cross chain trading protocols that have been adopted by ME DAO. 

The motivation of this grant program is to accelerate growth of the $ME ecosystem.  This initial grant program will also be the first iteration to build on for future grant programs.

$ME COMMUNITY GRANTS

We’re going to pilot some ideas for $ME community grants, including grants for content creators and active community members. The goal of these grants will be to encourage organic content creation across different channels. The first iteration will involve community members earning $ME for their efforts as measured by a social listening tool.More to come here. Stay tuned!

$ME DEVELOPER GRANTS

Besides community-focused grants, the first two types of developer-facing grants are Developer and IP Contribution Grants.

Developer Grant goals: Incentivize teams to build consumer-oriented dApps that build on top of ME protocols or incorporate ME protocols into existing established dApps. All these dApps should contribute significant unique users, organic activity, and unique liquidity to ME protocols.

Criteria: 

  • A Developer Grant is available to dApps that a) build consumer frontends leveraging ME protocols and b) exclusively provide liquidity into the protocol. For example -  exclusively use the protocols to generate  token or NFT listings and bids.
  • Note: DAO administrator will have discretion to cancel a Grant if inorganic volume or wash trading is detected.

IP Contribution Grant goals: Broaden and strengthen the suite of ME protocols

Criteria: 

  • A Grant can be given in exchange for a significant IP contribution to the $ME Ecosystem. e.g. if novel protocols for fungible token or NFT trading and minting are contributed to the library of open source ME protocols. 
  • A Grant can also be given in exchange for IP that drives more adoption of the existing ME protocols and technology.

What types of Grant proposals fall in line with the mission of powering onchain economy?

All proposals should either:

  • improve the liquidity for the cross-chain protocols the $ME community governs. These protocols can be found here. Proposals that are designed for $ME to incentivize the liquidity of unrelated protocols, for example, are not a good fit for proposals.
  • Provide new IP / technologies that drive more adoption of the ME protocols and technology. For example, other cross chain trading protocols that deliver deliver significant value to existing set of users, and therefore growing the influence of ME protocols

Examples of proposals that do not support the mission include but are not limited to the following:

  • grants to use $ME as rewards to users of platforms that don’t incorporate ME protocols in any way (e.g. play or trade to earn campaigns, airdrops for holders of other tokens). 
  • proposals that seek to integrate $ME protocols on front-ends that will not be perceived grow the users or liquidity of the protocols

Funding, Timeline, and Process:

The Developer and IP Grants will come from the Community & Ecosystem Allocation. As detailed in the $ME Tokenomics post, the majority of this allocation will go directly to users via emissions, and the remainder will be used for ecosystem growth - such as this program.

This program will be the initial iteration of grant programs focused for developers and builders, and as such we will not assign a hard deadline to apply so we can encourage more participation. However, we will look to improve the program with feedback from the community after a reasonable amount of feedback is collected and time has passed with the program being active.

For this initial period, Grants that are obtained through the MIP process will require monthly reporting of progress, spend, and impact by the applicants and will have monthly unlocking of the total grant received to align incentives. The Administrator can recall the grant if no progress is being made and any $ME not distributed will be returned to the Community & Ecosystem Allocation. These results will also be detailed in transparency reports published by ME Foundation.

We will not set a hard budget cap at this time to encourage expansive and entrepreneurial thinking. While we welcome bold proposals, we believe modest amounts of $ME can get a lot done and we would encourage starting out small and proving execution first, and building on that momentum (e.g. any grant that requests 5% or greater of the $ME supply will not be considered). Part of the goal of this program is to learn with the community we can introduce a cap in the future as we receive  proposals.

Anyone is welcome to create a Grant proposal in the ME Foundation Github. The process is laid out in detail on the Github page, but a summary is as follows:

Stage 1: MIP DraftingTokenholders wishing to author an MIP should use this outline to write an MIP on Github. These posts should be made in the discussions section of Github.

  • Title:  The title must be descriptive enough to make it clear what is being suggested
  • Abstract:  A summary of the entire MIP, no more than a single paragraph.
  • Motivation:  A statement on why the ME DAO or the Foundation, as applicable, should implement the MIP.
  • Key Terms:  Definitions of terms specific to the MIP and industry related jargon.
  • Specification:  A detailed breakdown of what the MIP aims to change or implement, and a concrete plan outlining the necessary technologies, steps, and timeline needed to implement the MIP.
  • Benefits/Risks:  A brief analysis of the benefits and risks involved with the MIP.
  • Outcomes: A brief summary of the desired goals and outcomes of the MIP.
  • Cost Summary:  The total cost of the MIP, denominated in $ME and nominal USD terms, broken down as specific as possible, with clear timelines of this spend.
  • Performance Milestones: Detailed performance milestones. As monthly reporting updates from grant applicants is required, it is ideal to align projected milestones to a monthly cadence. 

Stage 2: MIP Community DiscussionDraft MIPs should be submitted on a public governance forum, with the author addressing feedback, questions, and suggestions. Once an MIP has been posted to the MIP Governance Forum, the MIP will initially stay open for community discussion for 14 days.

Stage 3: Administrator Review Period After the completion of the Discussion Period, the Administrator has a period of 14 days to review the submitted MIP to ensure the following: 

  • the MIP is in furtherance of the Mission; 
  • practicality, safety, and compliance with applicable laws and regulations
  • the submitted MIP conforms to the MIP Guidelines which can be found in the Constitution

Stage 4: MIP Submission Requirements

The finalized MIP will then be submitted by the Administrator to the MIP Governance Site for Tokenholder onchain voting.

The Tokenholder author of a submitted MIP may be subject to certain conditions, including any requirements under applicable laws and regulations, and any AML/KYC processes deemed necessary or advisable by the Foundation.

Stage 5: MIP Voting & Next Steps

Tokenholders who have staked $ME may vote on proposals. They may submit “Yes” or “No” votes for MIPs for 3 days.

UPDATE: MIP VOTING QUORUMS

For all MIP votes, the holders of at least 50,000,000 staking power (“vME”) must vote, and the number of “Yes” votes must be more than or equal to 60% of the total votes cast. 

Special note about changes to voting power thresholds: Previously, it was required that proposals would reach 250,000,000 vME voting power in order for them to reach quorum. This number has been revised to 50,000,000  in order to encourage more proposals to be developed from the community.

Following the date of an Approved MIP and absent any Foundation Director veto, the Administrator will work with the MIP author, the Foundation, the Foundation’s service providers, and other parties as needed to implement the MIP. The Administrator will receive status updates from the MIP author on a monthly basis and publish them for the community via the ME Governance Forum, as necessary. 

ME Foundation will have discretion to make grants not exceeding 5% of token supply to support the ongoing maintenance and development of the protocols. As the stewards to the community, ME Foundation will support the community’s proposals development by ensuring all the most beneficial proposals are brought to vote. 

We look forward to hearing proposals from the community to power the future of the onchain economy. Should you have any questions, feel free to make a discussion in the Pull Requests tab of the ME Foundation Github to get started.

Cheers to an amazing journey ahead!