33 Comments 8 Reposts 4 QuoteReposts 8 Reposts 48 Likes 87 Diamonds

Comments (work-in-progress)

@darian_parrish - Feb 05, 2023
Great write up Ben!

I agree with all except the mention that no one from the community is likely to have an outsized impact on the success of DeSo because it would have already happened(not just because that is hard for the community to hear - we should speak the tough things).

If mentioned purely based on the size of the community, then I would agree. Only 1 in 10,000 - 100,000 people will likely have a materially impact. But I don't necessarily think time in the community is a signal or number of projects built. Many of the HUGE outcomes are on the 4th or 5th project for a founder/creator.

Another thing worth mentioning around Octane/Foundation investing is that I don't think they should invest like a VC. They don't have the time or talent. It would actually be better to take a more naive approach like other blockchains and do close to equal-weight grants. More likely to fund the winner by chance than by choice. There is also a whole bunch of other pull effects that come with spreading the funds wider than deeper so for a protocol, I think grants are a better way.
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@BenErsing - Feb 05, 2023
Great call out, Darian! I agree 100%. I could have articulated a few of the nuances more clearly. I definitely believe there are creators/founders here who have the potential to be successful artists or build a strong business someday. Many already are. I didn't intend to suggest that we're all a bunch of schmucks (myself included). When I say 'outsized impact' I'm not referring to one's general value to the community vibrancy, or building core tooling, etc. All are important - and I personally value everyone who is here engaging, building and creating. There is a difference however between growth, and exponential step-change level growth with the potential to catalyze the launch of a new social ecosystem. Said another way, the difference between relying on DESO to drive growth, and driving growth to DESO. As I know you know, there is also a large component of market timing for this type of growth. That stage in the market cycle has passed - so its now a waiting and survival game until there are clear signals that its possible again. Regarding Octane's approach, I agree - to do it in an optimal way requires a certain experience and time that doesn't currently exist. I don't know enough about how to run a successful web3 grant program, nor do I know of actual outcomes/impact from other chain grant programs. But I agree it be have been managed better and I imagine will be a part of the core team's revamp if/when they relaunch it.
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@DeSocialWorld - Feb 06, 2023
@Krassenstein can be missed on #deso @DeSocialWorld can be missed on #deso And we are sure that even apps like @desofy and @NFTz can be missed on #deso

However, it's not the situation of @Krassenstein reducing their presence that should be evaluated, but the drivers leading to that decision. Because if these are deemed impactful and likely to cause more impact, that would be concerning.

We understand that the DeSo system needs virality at a certain point to make a meaningful global impact in the web2/web3 world. And we appreciate that Core Team is fixing a lot of fundamentals right now. Avoiding the risk of creating a series of disappointments for new users brought in via a substantial marketing effort. But there are some downsides to achieving virality via a "killer app- strategy"
- It weakens the message of DeSo being an ecosystem of apps, with data portability for its users
- It sets a very high bar for the Foundation, close to an all-or-nothing approach, that may become more challenging over time. If the killer app wasn't found the first 5 years, will it ever?
- Even though inviting and challenging to some (new) builders, it may trigger some to start developing elsewhere, experiencing the killer app bar as being too high
- It doesn't market DeSo builder ecosystem as a high-potential & fun breeding ground. It markets DeSo as an elite high-competition environment where you are either the killer app, or you're out

Not sure why the term Octane stills pops-up. That initiative is dead for a year now already. And to what we know, no grant system has replaced it (our view on OpenFund is for a different post). Yes, there are hackathon grants (like Princeton), but these may have some undesired side effects as well. Giving grants to new builders may also be perceived by existing builders, that they are expected to deliver very limited value (else, why not reward them in a certain way). Also, the hackathon awards are an incentive to get started, but by no means what any team needs to create the killer app. So, what's the follow-up?? We don't see that at all. We already referred to the lesson learned not to bring in new users via marketing if the basics are still missing. So, why not apply this lesson to bringing in new builders?

In our view, the Core Team is doing its best to figure out what the builders need, but they overlook a basic step. Just talk to them, talk to us, asking what we experience and what we need. The outcome can still differ from what we desire, but at least we feel seen and heard.

There are a lot of things we appreciate in what Core is doing. And yes, many effects we experience today are triggered by decisions 1-2 years ago. Some of which have been corrected by now. But we do not only want to say hallelujah and hype when we have concerns as well. We voiced some of these via this response.

Happy to continue our dialogue on @Vibehut

cc: @darian_parrish @Goldberry @markvanzee
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@BenErsing - Feb 06, 2023
Excellent points. "it's not the situation of @Krassenstein reducing their presence that should be evaluated, but the drivers leading to that decision." I agree. Of each of the "things you need to believe..." points that I listed in the post, this one is my largest concern, and it plays into your other good point about "overlooking a basic step...talking to us".
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@DeSocialWorld - Feb 06, 2023
Thanks for replying... in the coming period, we are working on a new funding round... if you are open to it, we would appreciate your guidance here. But please feel free to say no as well to our ask
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@BenErsing - Feb 06, 2023
I'm happy to provide general guidance on the funding environment right now and what investors are looking for. Several people have mentioned interest in this, so I'm going to host a broader discussion / open Q&A.
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@darian_parrish - Feb 06, 2023
Agree overlooking the most basic step of talking to current and former builders on DeSo is a mistake. Such low hanging fruit to better understand what is needed. Core team seems to talk to colleagues over customers when it should be both.
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@NowAndThen - Feb 08, 2023
Take that 5th paragraph and quote-repost it with multiple hashtags and core team names. You can't get any more to the point than with that paragraph.
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@DeSocialWorld - Feb 08, 2023
It's not our style to call names and make a lot of noise in the way you suggest. We rather have a calm and open dialogue. That said, @mossified may wanna read that 5th paragraph 😉
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@mossified - Feb 08, 2023
I've been fairly transparent about the goals for the Princeton competition here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1jwUEbaYquxwKmtkxOVk0umaFXoSy5Pp1H9XOH5ztBbU/edit and initially noted here: https://diamondapp.com/posts/58199119503ed4fbb4de0755109732003b7e1c2a0a264cbdf2438d9539fcc1a7?feedTab=Hot&tab=posts and here around developer experience and incentives: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1RVLm6LnoBR7EihcWV4b_qXBY78XGjyxDqtR5bEnMYnU/edit The goal with Princeton competition is not to produce killer apps or favor new builders. It's to see if it can be used as a GTM strategy for fundraising, attracting institutional capital and pipelining deal flow, and to see if it gets builders to commit to their projects as opposed to the 2-day hackathon model. The other goal is to see if we can scale this at low-effort and low-cost, compared to something like Solana Labs which spends around $1-3m dollars on these hackathons which is a third of their annualized revenue ($8m) — and likely why the SL team has only ~30mos of runway left. We just don't necessarily believe in continuing to throw millions of dolllars at problems, when we'd rather throw dozens of ideas, some initial capital or resources, and test them at low effort and low cost before attempting to scale, even if it comes at the cost of public scrutiny. Ultimately, it's outside investors that will need to fund the growth of the DeSo Ecosystem for the long-term to sustain, and it will be bold and ambitious founders with innovative and exciting ideas that unlock this. The DeSo Foundation will make sure that DeSo is an easy and attractive place to build (see my DevEx strategy doc above), it just requires some time before all the pieces are glued together. The fragmentation of these pieces is what lead to the most frustration, as I don't think DeSo in the last two years was ready on a fundamental level to sustain ecosystem development. Neither was Ethereum, nor was Solana, or Polygon, in their first few years. However, crypto is global & permissionless, so you can't stop anyone from trying nor would we want to. Overall, this Princeton competition is another step towards *testing* that hypothesis, which is what @LuisEddie & @BenErsing articulated in their posts (eg. core teams ability to test and learn), and a philosophy that the core team shares on the general approach of being experimentation and first-principles driven. Run the experiments, learn from them, see why they don't work, go back to first-principles, try to iterate on fixing root problems so it leads to more sustainable growth (which doesn't exist in crypto) over hyped growth (which is all of crypto). Overall, it's just important to align and understand on goals and expectations, and I am not asking for folks to agree, but just to understand as it will ease the frustration. And trust that the team has a lot of signal — we are not riding blind. Everyone on the team pays very close attention to other ecosystems, not to mention the bevy of seasoned investors or other seasoned crypto founders in our network who share insights and advice. It is extremely easy to get caught up into the smoke-and-mirrors trap in crypto but the reality is that there's a $3 trilion dollar industry (at its ATH), and still the top 25 apps have less than ~1m DAU. I have still yet to see a usable and retentive application in crypto that's not a wallet/portfolio tracker or something to do with staking crypto to get yield from it. This is the ultimate problem DeSo is trying solve for the app ecosystem, and one that crypto desperately needs for it to be taken seriously by the mass. A problem much larger than any individual or team.
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@DeSocialWorld - Feb 08, 2023
We value your extensive and thoughtful reply. Even though we made a side remark about Princeton (basically asking what the follow-up is for participants after earning a grant), our most important point was: don’t assume what engineers/founders need, talk to them, talk to us We realize your time is scarce here, and you won’t be able to talk to everyone. And certainly will you have opinions on what’s said and asked in those talks. That’s all fine We rather have: we listened to you, but we decided differently Instead of: we created this for you, and us arguing why it doesn’t help us We’ve all come a long way. And you have made some big step ups. We appreciate that. And we’ll all get there one day Thanks for taking our comments serious 💙💪🏻
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@NowAndThen - Feb 08, 2023
Your message is especially respectful, which is why I suggested that it be shared.
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@DeSocialWorld - Feb 08, 2023
🙏
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@gaby - Feb 09, 2023
@DeSocialWorld have you considered exploring other chains (as a backup plan)?
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@DeSocialWorld - Feb 09, 2023
Yes we have
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@gaby - Feb 09, 2023
Ok. It’s good to have a plan just in case. 🙏
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@DeSocialWorld - Feb 09, 2023
Just in case
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@MFS - Feb 07, 2023
It's not cool that they aren't sharing those drivers, imo. Like Whaleshark and all others, heavily invested, they want the rest to continue their work, while they move on...
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@DeSocialWorld - Feb 07, 2023
https://desocialworld.com/posts/3f9c76bb5eed6aae78932b20a6127b4b9df17b644079bdd5c1838ec3ea55c32a
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@MFS - Feb 08, 2023
TY
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@DeSocialWorld - Feb 08, 2023
Wlc
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@LuisEddie - Feb 06, 2023
Great write up Ben. Thanks for the tag, and always willing to share my thoughts. I may not be as involved as some users, but I believe in the protocol and support of the initiatives by the core team/devs.

With that said, It is unfortunate that the K brothers stopped their daily videos. It is not easy, especially during the bear market, which impacts blockchain sentiment and support. I think their feedback is valuable and should be taken into consideration by the core team. However, I do not believe their involvement will determine the outcome of the DESO protocol, nor does it question my support. Things can constantly be improved on, and that is what feedback is for.

Timing is very important - The longer you delay your ask (user to join the platform), the more significant the impact will be (delivering a valuable product). I personally do not think the timing is right for marketing and dev funding. Improving the protocol should continue to be the focus until we are at a point where we can build a product-market-fit DApp that users will use. I also think we are 1-2 years away from mass adoption, where most individuals embrace blockchain and digital wallets and see the need for a decentralized alternative (not to mention the regulatory clarity).

I remain neutral when it comes to funding. I personally do not rely on capital to build something, but if I did, I would focus on the “how” and not the “why.” If funding were to be made by the core I would hope that extreme DD would occur. If a startup is asking for funding, I would look at its track record for success before releasing capital from a VC point of view. I think OpenFund solves this issue for others that don’t meet that criterion and where the community can show support.

I think the core makes the right decisions despite some noise. I have never been so bullish. I think we will be well positioned when the time is right for dev funding, marketing, and increased DAUs. Until then, I like the constant improvement the core team is making. I think these decisions will compound over time, and the market cap will reflect in the future.

These are just my thoughts, and none of this is financial advice.

CC @nader @mossified
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@LuisEddie - Feb 06, 2023
I mirror the same sentiment for your statement below: "In order to scale the ecosystem exponentially, certain foundational building blocks need to be in place. Those building blocks were not in place when BitClout..." We have come miles from where we were in the BitClout days. I think these building blocks will set the foundation for some disruptive DApps to be built on. I am glad the @deso foundation has made good decisions with their treasury and burn rate. Not a lot of startups can say the same, unfortunately.
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@Designsta - Feb 06, 2023
Luis it would be great to get you on Stori x
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@LuisEddie - Feb 06, 2023
Doing it now 🤗💙
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@BenErsing - Feb 06, 2023
A thoughtful perspective, well said.
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@deann4ik - Feb 06, 2023
Totally agree with you!
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@kuririn - Feb 06, 2023
From my perspective and the feedback of many people, it's not about funding at all, it's about community support and some decency. Trust has been broken. If someone doesn't care, why sacrifice so much? Web3 should be a community first and have higher principles, not just growth and profits. If the strategy is different that’s ok, but don’t expect everyone to applaud. It’s not something many of us signed up for. We want to co-create, influence the future and not be passive observers that are mistreated.
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@Goldberry - Feb 05, 2023
Thanks for tagging me asking for my thoughts. It’s definitely a gut punch. The community did heavily lean on the Krassenstein’s ability to summarize and share the highlights. We are a very diverse crowd with different interests and I think most everyone (for the most part, even if just selfishly) is cheering on the protocol.

I don’t know what the future holds, but I’m here to see what happens.😌

I’m glad Ed & Brian are still here and that’s a big win, imo.
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@BenErsing - Feb 05, 2023
So true. I'm very glad they're still here and with their reinstatement on Twitter and their new podcast, I can't blame them for needing to refocus energy.
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@markvanzee - Feb 05, 2023
I like to think that the loss of the Krassenstein brothers was the result of the poor planning and the core team not thinking things through during the early days of the project. In particular, core team went ahead with the Octane fund without thinking about how it would look like, how it would run, and the effort required to make it successful. The Octane fund didn't produce the results the core team was looking for, causing them to shift and create a lot of collateral damage (i.e. pissing off the Krassenstein brothers).

Fortunately, the core team has transitioned to thinking things through more and creating the foundations that will solve current issues over the long term. Some examples: Creating dev docs to help with the dev issues, having a website strategy for new users to learn what DeSo is, building a better long term fundraising tool in OpenFund, making a monthly blog to communicate with the community.

To me, the issues today are the result of poor decisions from 1-2 years ago and the good decisions today will start to pay off next year.
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@BenErsing - Feb 05, 2023
I think that's fair. I do agree that how things have played out has been unfortunate and immensely frustrating for many. In my mind it's less of it being a 'poor decision' from 1-2 years ago, and more a natural learning curve and maturation of the project, team, etc. to today.
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@markvanzee - Feb 05, 2023
Oh yeah, totally agree with that. I guess what I was getting at was that the lack of foresight, maturity, etc led to poor decision making that resulted in negative consequences that played out over the next couple years. Now that the core team can see how these decisions played out over a multi-year timeframe, they can learn from this and make better decisions that have more positive long term results.
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@mossified - Feb 06, 2023
+1 to all of the above (also to the original post from @BenErsing) Would also add that 2020 & 2021 were the definition of poor-decision making all around due to the cloudy atmosphere. I don't think it's unique to DeSo Foundation (tons of companies estimated wrong), but regardless, yes we should own it, learn from it, and put fixes in place (as we have been doing) to improve upon it. The experiments must be run, and failures must be faced, in order to find a greater path forward. This is the law of startups IMO, a layer-1 with a token doesn't change that.
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@pandamistake - Feb 06, 2023
that was a very thoughtful piece, thanks for sharing ben. i'm building deso's next killer-app. i do not exaggerate. it is similarly an all-or-nothing project. before i picked deso, i was searching for the blockchain that would need such a killer-app so it would act as a lightning rod to its ecosystem. this is the thought process that led us to deso.

but as i continue to build, the architecture changed to detach dependence on deso. this is not because of technical flaws, of which plenty exist (and worked around), but because of the leadership style.

at the end of the day, we have to ask the important question: is the current leadership capable of building a vibrant and thriving ecosystem? and how is that possible if they are fumbling the bag this badly with an already existing, enthusiastic, *and* supportive community? because, my success depends on deso's overall success in a feedback loop. it's really crazy to watch how mismanaged every opportunity has been.

the folks here want nothing more than for deso to succeed. every single complaint i've heard has been centered around a strong desire for deso to be at its potential that so many of us envision.

when will core learn? can they learn? that is my primary concern.

ps. the hackathon may not produce killer-apps, but it made deso docs get in shape and that's a huge positive and i'm all for it
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@BenErsing - Feb 06, 2023
Thank you for sharing elzubeir. I'm excited to learn more about what you're building. "is the current leadership capable of building a vibrant and thriving ecosystem? and how is that possible if they are fumbling the bag this badly with an already existing, enthusiastic, *and* supportive community?" It's a very valid question. I've thought a lot about this as well and agree it is a material concern. While progress is being made, it would appear the focus to date has been less on supporting community developers, and more on developing the desired core capabilities in-house, similar to how a traditional corporation would. That in turn impacts how resources are allocated to fostering and supporting community-led efforts. My expectation is that focus will shift once the foundational elements are in place. We're already starting to see some early signals of that with the dev doc re-deployment, etc. And @mossified has been doing a good job engaging with regular updates, etc. All that said, I agree. Of each of the points I listed about "what you have to believe, to believe DESO has a chance", this one gives me the greatest pause. The good thing is, it's something that can be hired for - when the timing is right.
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@pall3n - Feb 06, 2023
Great piece Ben, thanks for sharing your thoughts.

While no one creator (or duo) may have the reach to alter the outcome of DeSo alone, they can cause a domino effect. Although un-likely, it has crossed my mind. If the most bull-ish creator decides enough is enough, then that could cause others to question things too. Especially if they feel like; wow, even these two people that have been so vocal and consistent have been let down or ignored (just saying some could perceive it that way) then that will definitely happen to me and so why stick around. Again not saying that will happen but just that a small wave can turn the tide.

I agree with @darian_parrish regarding an alternate Octane approach to. Like you I am not to sure on the success rate others are seeing however a social protocol needs apps in it's ecosystem and if they do not have in-house VC talent it seems like a way forward. Rightly or wrongly the competition is better incentivising devs to their playgrounds and if that continues DeSo may not survive.

The best tech and vision will not win if no one uses it.

I know from my own perspective that I am looking at the alternatives, exactly as you say "building ... requires very challenging decisions about how to allocate resources in order to maximize the long-term potential outcomes". Saying that, I am very excited to be getting close to bringing out a revamp of @huh_so very imminently and look forward to getting creators using it and hopefully providing my own bit of value to the ecosystem.

Also, I would love to take you up on your @Vibehut offer so will reach out soon.
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@BenErsing - Feb 06, 2023
I agree - their feeling utterly disrespected (which I've since come to learn following my original post, and am now taking into consideration), is a big issue. I look forward to checking-out a revamped @huh_so.
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@pall3n - Feb 06, 2023
Oh I was not aware of that either actually. That is a real shame for them.
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@SeanSlater - Feb 05, 2023
Great write up Ben, and I agree with what you've said.

I replied with some thoughts on @StarGeezer's post here, https://diamondapp.com/posts/81125336b39b288df024732f1338a14d917370b7996dac71ad8b5a5ad1dc0369

All in all, I'm not worried. The mistakes of the past will haunt us for a little while yet, but as long as we're learning and moving forward I'm still as passionate and excited about the platform as I was last week.
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@BenErsing - Feb 05, 2023
Thanks for sharing. Looks like we're of a similar mind. Tough situation, no fun, things certainly could have been done differently, but all in all not the end of the world.
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@leojay - Feb 05, 2023
DESO needs to increase the DAU. without users, the best app has no meaningful existence.
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@BenErsing - Feb 05, 2023
I agree ecosystem wide DAUs need to increase. I don't put that responsibility on the core team though. Their primary job is to ship a unique protocol and primitives that can be built on (i.e., ERC-20 standard on Ethereum, launching the ICO wave). Anything beyond that is outside their responsibility, but they do have the largest incentives to do it themselves in the event others are not.
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@leojay - Feb 05, 2023
So who do you think should figure out how to increase DAU?
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@BenErsing - Feb 05, 2023
Acquiring customers/users is the responsibility of an app/startup just like it's always been. Any additional users gained from being built on DESO and part of the ecosystem are just a bonus.
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@pall3n - Feb 06, 2023
100% agree. DAU is app level, not protocol. DeSo foundations audience are devs, not consumers.
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@CarlMcCarthy - Feb 05, 2023
Gut punch. Core team needs to change, people keep leaving DeSo and there aren’t any new users signing up.
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