$70,000 donated to Counterparty - How best to spend it?

https://counterparty.io/donate/

The Counterparty General Fund (18BfbQ8kXcL8dwjYmX5fhyZs1YefxLFHG9) holds

  • 5800 XCP ($61,000)
  • 2.6 BTC ($9200)

The Counterparty general fund will be used at the direction of the Counterparty Foundation (after a vote) and are used for initiatives which advance Counterparty forward.

I’m reaching out to the community to hear what YOU think is the best way to spend these funds.


EDIT - Updated list of suggestions:

  • Counterwallet bug fixes
  • Counterwallet UI/UX overhaul
  • BTC DEX module on Counterwallet
  • Introduce A assets (let named assets begin with ‘A’)
  • Trezor / hardware wallet support
  • Broadcast bitcoin fee so traders can hedge risk of a “high fee event”
  • My comment: Good idea. Wrote down how it can be implemented
  • Marketing, a video like augur video, that explains in clear terms the value proposition of counterparty
  • Micropayments development.
  • Explainer video for counterparty.io to explain what CP is in easy to understand terms
  • Hiring a marketing firm like vanbex.com to determine the best way to market CP and onboard users and projects (not focus on pump price)
  • Secure booths at specific bitcoin/blockchain based seminars to help expose ppl to CP
  • Turnkey solution for online vendors
  • DEX for services
  • Getting btcpaymarket.com working again,

It could be used to run a price feed or some type of regularly scheduled broadcast that people can bet on.

e.g. broadcast the BTC denominated transaction fees paid to Bitcoin miners in the previous block (or N-5 block). This could become a way for traders to hedge risk of a “fee event”, or just of rising fees.

I think it should be used to make Counterwallet the best it can be, also turn on BTC trading on the DEx.

2 Likes

BTC on the DEX, wallet UI improvements and marketing. Im of the mind that ease of use, eliminating the XCP learning curve needs to be overcome. Unfortunately, I don’t have any good suggestions as to how the quintessential “Grandmother” can look at the CP platform, and with very little guidance, be able to navigate the processes unassisted. On the other hand, if it is made too easy, then it may damage the complex business models that have and will spring up around the platform.

I think the general fund should be used for marketing CP and gaining users, not for fixing random bugs or making improvements to the protocol or UI as that is what the CIPs and community bounties are for. All of the above suggested fixes could have CIPs or bounties raised for them… I think we should not be tapping into the general fund for misc updates.

I am of the mindset that a the general funds should be spent on :

  1. Explainer video for counterparty.io to explain what CP is in easy to understand terms
  2. Hiring a marketing firm like vanbex.com to determine the best way to market CP and onboard users and projects (not focus on pump price)
  3. Secure booths at specific bitcoin/blockchain based seminars to help expose ppl to CP
1 Like

It’s important to me that the awarded funds get used in a way to help the community grow by giving its users the tools they need to succeed.

I believe that if you spend time and effort rehashing and exchange over and over again then that’s exactly what users will see counterparty as just trade value. There are so many other aspects of the usefulness of the system. A great improvement to the function of a XCP exchange would be to introduce the asset picture into the UI. Not just a thumbnail, but a preview of the asset being trading on the DEX, whether it’s a memory card or rust or Pepe. Yet, this is not within the parameters of the scope of the responsibility of the developers. However, updating standards to include the official JSON namespace for which all devs can process the linked full resolution files representing the assets would be the most cost effective and within the scope of responsibility.

I would like to see some real development in the community, by the community, and for the community. Who better understands the wants and needs of the XCP landscape? (((Not some firm)))

One thing which would vastly increase the usage and adaptation of XCP would to make a turnkey solution for online vendors. An opensource shopping cart template which anybody can install on their own web hosting and then swap out the template asset name so that they can instantly accept counterparty Bitcoin and their own store currency with minimal effort. But again, this is not the responsibility of the Foundation to make service products, I assume.

To the best of my knowledge, it is the responsibility of the Foundation to foster the development of the ecosystem through ways which can be beneficial to any user. Taking into consideration the situation developing above it is certain that a different type of DEX should be created. One in which users can buy and sell services. This system should be peer to peer and not based on a website perhaps implemented through the protocol itself. The most important part of this process would, of course, be the witness as any transaction would need at least one or two third-party witnesses to verify that the service was done and the conditions were met. Volunteers are verify they understand the scope of the project before it begins. To help foster the growth of this whole counterparty ecosystem it is imperative to connect people who are dedicated to offering services within the space to make the space greater.

This would be the best use of funds in that it would have an exponential effect on the ecosystem itself directly by unifying everyone’s effort with cohesive directions. In the bigger picture what will be achieved is the marketing for counterparty in general via the individual products and services offered through the network and the service/products resulting from the work shared there. In today’s day and age of e-commerce, the next generation doesn’t need to be specifically told if they’re on a blockchain they just need to have it work. So when counterparty helps connect people to get projects done, then the projects get out in the greater world of real life usage cases, then these other projects will inevitably lead back to CounterParty.

In essence, the Marketing will be achieved by the development and promotion of community users who are better connected because of community efforts. And the thing is, the MARKET will decide what to implement. Plus with this avenue, smaller objectives can be achieved for the Foundation through its own job orders. That all being said, opensource projects should be given preference or incentive within the system.

:smiley:

Get XCP listed on Chinese exchanges. They will require a nice little “donation” but these guys will do all the marketing for you :yum:

https://bter.com/trade/xcp_cny
Looks like XCP has been there since this time last year at least, if not more.

Bter is small. Enlist XCP on BTCC, Jubi, ChBtc, Huobi and OkCoin.

Imagine a big volume Chinese exchange here. There’s not enough XCP around to meet supply.