🌍 EARTHFUND END-OF-YEAR REVIEW

2023 in review: launching the first-ever AI-powered DAO launchpad for making the world a better place

Looking back on an eventful 2023 that saw the launch of the first-ever AI-powered DAO launchpad (and forward to our plans for an even bigger 2024).

👋 We’re EarthFund, the decentralized platform using blockchain, decentralization, AI, and crypto to revolutionize the giving economy and give you more of a voice in the shape of tomorrow.

In this post, we’re looking back on everything we achieved in 2023, from dealing with a turbulent market to building and launching a first-of-its-kind DAO launchpad powered by AI. (Plus, we’re looking ahead to our plans for Q4.)

Happy New Year, Earthlings!

Before we get into our update, we just wanted to say that we hope you and your families enjoyed a great holiday season and a restful end to 2023!

Now, onto the update.

As we mentioned in December’s post, 2023 was challenging (to say the least).

We started the year on a high with the launch of EarthFund 1.0 and a good amount of momentum and positive press coverage. But we were still a new startup starting the uphill climb of launching a new product.

Then Luna crashed. Then we entered a bear market. Then Sam Bankman Fried happened. Then Changpeng Zhao happened.

All of which dominated mainstream headlines and added more ammunition to the “crypto is risky and untrustworthy” narrative.

And for a product with a mission statement that was aimed at taking DAOs and decentralized fundraising mainstream and getting the average Joe involved in crypto, that proved to be a bit of a problem.

And so, rather than the year of explosive growth that we expected, 2023 became a year of learning, pivoting, and strategizing for how to make sure EarthFund could weather the storms of the macro-conditions.

And we’ve come out of it stronger, with a much, much better product and a very clear idea for how to grow EarthFund as a truly decentralized crypto unicorn in 2024:

• We’ve launched the only AI-powered DAO launchpad with best-of-breed UX and feature sets.
• We’ve launched a platform that makes it incredibly easy to launch a decentralized community, find projects that need donations, and grow your community.
• Thanks to the efforts of our decentralized, global team volunteering their time and expertise, we managed to launch EarthFund 2.0 without external investment.
• Globally, there are 17K+ holders of 1Earth. Each holds an average of around $100 in their wallets, on exchanges, or on the blockchain.
• We pushed back the team vesting until mid-2024 to give EarthFund and 1Earth the best possible chance of success.
• We started to further decentralize and grow the team for a record 2024.

2023 in review: a year of lessons and improvements

Q1: Making Web3.0 safer and investigating uptake

In January, we took a big leap forward in making the Web3 space safer and more compliant. Given how chaotic the crypto world was in 2022, especially with the whole FTX mess, it became super clear that we needed to step up our game in terms of security.

So, what did we do?

We got ahead of the curve and doubled down on making sure that every DAO on our platform isn’t just a place to make a difference, but also a safe haven from scammers and all sorts of shady characters. (Believe us, we’ve had our share of dealing with some pretty crafty bad actors over the last two years.)

Let’s break down the cool stuff we put in place:

• Private KYC, Real People Only: Thanks to our partnership with Sumsub, we rolled out a private KYC process. This means each wallet is linked to an actual person so nobody can set up 10 wallets to skew the votes and claim more rewards. It’s a game-changer — it keeps the scammers at bay, stops bots from messing with the votes, and ensures everyone’s legit.
• Multi-Sig for DAO Treasuries: Teaming up with Coinshift, we made sure that any money moving out of DAO treasuries needs a thumbs-up from several DAO leaders. It’s like having a group of trusted friends double-checking everything before you hit send.
• Smart Contract for Grants: We set up this great smart contract that acts like an escrow for grants. It’s like a secure piggy bank that only releases funds to the right projects at the right time.
• Members-Only Discord Channels: We’ve got these private Discord channels where only verified DAO members can chat. They’re all about real conversations, real change, with zero scammers.
• A watchful eye: If you spot something off with a DAO or someone’s acting up, just let our DAO know. They can kick out the bad apples and keep the whole platform a safe place for everyone.

So, that’s how we kicked off 2023 — by creating a safer, more democratic space for our community. It’s all about building a space where everyone can chip in, share ideas, and make a difference, without any worries.

February: Investigating why people were starting but not launching DAOs

In February, we took on a bit of detective work to figure out why a lot of people were starting DAOs on our platform but then holding back on launching them.

It was a month of digging deep, chatting with our community, and tweaking things to make everything tick better.

Understanding User Hesitation

Here’s what caught our eye: 250 folks had their DAOs ready to go but didn’t press the launch button. This wasn’t a total surprise. When you’re pioneering a project like ours, it’s normal for users to test the waters before diving in, especially when there are gas fees involved.

Looking at the Bigger Picture

We suspected the overall market uncertainty was making people hesitant. Starting a DAO isn’t just about the initial investment; it’s about the time and energy you put in. With the market being a bit shaky, it’s understandable that people might pause, wondering if their hard work will attract enough followers.

Reaching Out and Rethinking Onboarding

But we didn’t just sit around guessing. We reached out to those who began the DAO process, keen to understand their hesitations. Their insights were invaluable, helping us refine our onboarding process to be more intuitive and reassuring.

Addressing Crypto Concerns

The fear of speculation and market losses is real in the crypto space. We’re all about creating a safe and positive experience. So, we shifted our focus to create a loss-less platform where the emphasis is on earning through participation, not speculating on tokens.

Redefining DAO Token Usage

We reworked our DAO token system. Now, when someone buys tokens, their investment directly supports the DAO’s activities, like marketing or staffing. It’s a more stable and impactful way to use funds, steering clear of the speculative game.

The market started to turn?

Despite these challenges, we got some encouraging feedback. International Policy Digest called 2023 “the year of the DAO,” highlighting trends that align perfectly with our approach. It was a reassuring nod that we were heading in the right direction.

Proactive Enhancements

We were busy fine-tuning our platform too. Making photo uploads optional, simplifying the grant-claiming process, and even developing an oracle for a smoother experience. Plus, a series of small but impactful UX and copy improvements to make the user journey smoother.

The path forward — EarthFund 2.0, DAOs powered by AI

In March, we realised that small tweaks weren’t going to be enough to stand out in a market in crisis. We needed something bigger. So we embarked on an exciting journey towards EarthFund 2.0, with powerful AI-powered DAO creation.

Reflecting on the Challenges

We had to face the facts: the number of DAOs launched through our platform just wasn’t meeting our expectations.

Several factors were at play. The crypto market, still reeling from events like the FTX scandal, created a general sense of unease. The recent SEC actions against celebrity crypto endorsements added to the wariness, particularly for newcomers to crypto.

Identifying Our Shortcomings

While external factors played a role, we recognized issues within our control impacting user engagement. Despite a smooth onboarding UX, users were getting stuck at the critical step of adding content and images to their DAOs. This “Blank Page Syndrome” was a major blocker, with less than 5% of 338 started DAOs completing their landing pages.

Addressing “Choice Overload”

The process of setting up a DAO on our platform offered extensive freedom, but this abundance of choices led to what’s known as the “Paradox of Choice.” Our users were overwhelmed by the decisions needed — from token design to writing a manifesto. We realized we needed to simplify these choices without compromising the spirit of Web 3.0.

The Start of a Revolutionary Idea

All of this insight and reflection brought us to a simple question: with all the buzz around AI, what if we integrated with AI to make it easier than ever to launch a DAO? With a few clicks, users would be able to generate token image and graphics, write headlines, craft manifestos, and more.

So we built a rough-and-ready proof of concept and found that you could build and launch entire DAO — complete with content, images, a minted token, suggested grants, treasuries and smart contracts — all in about 25 seconds.

The Psychology Behind Our Approach

One of the reason we are so bullish on 2.0 is that it’s built on a strong foundation of tried-and-tested user insights. Cognitive psychology shows us that shifting users from a creative to an analytical mindset makes the DAO launch process more intuitive and less daunting.

Why? Because editing and refining AI-generated content is much easier and less mentally taxing than creating something from scratch. (We used a lot of Cognitive Load Theory and Daniel Kahneman’s two thought systems to focus on reducing the cognitive burden on our users and ensure a smooth customer experience.)

Empowering Users to Focus on Impact

Another reason we were bullish is because we know that not all people who want to make a difference are writers, strategists, designers, smart contract experts…

(Even the smallest non-profits have a few people focusing on their strengths.)

So EarthFund 2.0 became a platform that empowers users to focus on high-level decisions and the impact they want to create rather than getting bogged down in hex codes, word choices and the nuances of the blockchain.

(Of course, users can still engage in the creative process if they choose, but now they also have the option to let AI handle the heavy lifting.)

Q2 & Q3: Building for the future with EarthFund 2.0

From April to August, it was all hands on deck at EarthFund as we hustled to bring EarthFund 2.0 to life. It was a rollercoaster of innovation, brainstorming, and some really cool tech integrations.

Let’s dive into the big updates and cool new features that we rolled out.

AI-Powered Community Creation

The introduction of an AI assistant to EarthFund 2.0 was a major leap forward. We understood that the process of setting up a community — from token design to manifesto creation — could be overwhelming.

Our AI assistant now provides suggestions and templates, acting as a springboard for creativity. This tool ensures that while users have a helpful guide, they also retain full creative freedom to make their community unique.

Overcoming Blank Page Syndrome

We transformed the intimidating task of starting from a blank page into an interactive, guided experience. Our AI now generates initial drafts for community overviews and manifestos based on user input. It’s like having an ever-ready brainstorming partner, helping users articulate their vision without the pressure of starting from scratch. This approach makes the creative process more approachable and engaging.

AI in Token and Logo Design

Token and logo design is where many of our users felt stuck, often lacking the technical skills or resources to create something impactful. With EarthFund 2.0, our AI takes the essence of a user’s idea and translates it into a visual representation. This AI-driven design process not only saves time but also opens up a world of professional-quality design possibilities for all users, regardless of their artistic skills.

AI-Powered Grant Suggestions

Choosing the right projects for funding is crucial for the success of any community. Our AI-powered grant suggestions tool scouts and suggests legitimate, verified non-profits that align with the community’s mission. This feature significantly reduces the research time for users and ensures that the projects suggested are credible and worthy of support.

Claiming and Collaborating on Communities

The 24-hour window to claim a community encourages a dynamic and fluid ecosystem of ideas. Unclaimed communities become opportunities for others, fostering a culture of collaboration and shared stewardship. This feature has led to an exciting marketplace of ideas, where the best and most compelling projects get the attention and leadership they deserve.

Building Anticipation with Waitlists

The waitlist feature has added a new dimension to community building. It allows community founders to gauge interest and build a base of potential members even before launch. This anticipation not only helps to create buzz around a new community but also gives founders insight into the potential reach and impact of their project.

Reframing the Concept of DAOs

Shifting from “DAOs” to “decentralized fundraising communities” has been more than just a name change. It’s about aligning with our vision of creating a platform that is inclusive, community-focused, and legally sound. This shift has helped us to better articulate our mission and make our platform more accessible and understandable to a broader audience.

Rethinking Joining and Contributing

We’ve reimagined the entire process of joining and contributing to communities. The direct correlation between donations and community goals means that every contribution has a tangible impact. The stablecoin-like nature of governance tokens simplifies participation, making it easy for members to understand their role and influence in the community.

Enhanced Participation Rewards and Encouraging Engagement

Our new rewards system is designed to foster active participation. By linking rewards to participation, we encourage members to be more involved in decision-making processes. This approach not only incentivizes engagement but also ensures that the rewards are distributed more fairly and aligned with the level of involvement.

Community Visibility Through Democratic Voting

The leaderboard feature democratizes the visibility of projects on our platform. Communities are given the spotlight based on the collective decisions of our users, creating a fair and engaging way to promote deserving projects. This feature has been instrumental in building a sense of community ownership and pride.

Social Features and Discord Integration: Building a Community Network

Adding social network-like features and improving Discord integration were key steps in enhancing the sense of community on our platform. These features enable users to connect, follow each other’s activities, and engage in meaningful conversations. The upgraded Discord bot facilitates better communication and collaboration, making EarthFund a more integrated and interactive platform.

Streamlining the Grant Process

Our focus on simplifying the grant-claiming process and enhancing the proposal system has made it significantly easier for both grant recipients and community members. This streamlining of processes not only makes EarthFund more user-friendly but also adds a layer of transparency and trust, which is crucial for any fundraising platform.

These months have been about more than just technological advancements; they’ve been about creating a platform that is intuitive, engaging, and deeply connected to its community. EarthFund 2.0 represents a significant step towards a future where decentralized fundraising is accessible, impactful, and seamlessly integrated into the lives of its users.

Q4: Launching 2.0 and planning for a BIG 2024

In October, a week ahead of schedule, we launched EarthFund 2.0 into the world.

At the time — and still today — EarthFund is the only platform that lets you do all of this from one place:

• Build a decentralized community in seconds
• Use AI to generate content, images, token designs, and suggest real-life recipients for grants
• Automatically set you up with a Snapshot voting system
• Automatically mint a ERC-20 token with its own smart contract
• Automatically create your own smart contract that automatically processes grants, votes and rewards
• Create your own ENS domain and EarthFund domain
• Set you up with a Safe (formerly Gnosis) multi-sig wallet
• Set you up with Coinshift treasury management
• Give you customizable tokenomics so you can decide how much to reward your community
• Give you smooth, intuitive onboarding for community members and co-founders
• Let you KYC your members to grow a community safe from scammers
• Set up an automatic rewards process that rewards users in USDT
• Give you a listing on the EarthFund ecosystem and discovery page alongside communities from Deepak Chopra and Megan Pormer
• Give you promotion from EarthFund on X (formerly Twitter) (with lots of blue-tick followers, like Mark Cuban) and in our press coverage
• Give you your own private Discord channel on the EarthFund server that’s reserved for your token holders and community members
• Give you a quick and easy way to list your token on CoinMarketCap and Etherscan
• Report communities that don’t fit the EarthFund ethos

Decentralizing our team

As soon as EarthFund 2.0 went live, we started thinking about growth.

Now we’ve launched 2.0, we want to build to expand the team with a new board and new team members (across marketing, business development, etc…) to really push EarthFund to new heights in the next year.

So, if you know anybody across the worlds of Web3.0, entrepreneurship, philanthropy, etc… that would like to be part of running, leading and growing this incredible platform into THE go-to platform for decentralized fundraising and making the world a better place, hit them up.

Get them into Telegram. Get them to follow us. Get them to fill out this Typeform 👇

Our roadmap for a big 2024

Q1 & Q2: Growing the team and growing the treasury

Our first — and biggest — objective for 2024 is to bring more people into the team.

In Robert Cringely’s book Accidental Empires, he describes the inevitable changes in personnel needed for a company to be successful in different stages of a business’s growth.

The first group of team members are commandos. These people are fast, dedicated, and do whatever it takes to innovate and build new products that can disrupt the marketplace. But they’re often so focused on innovating and doing new things that they’re less interested in the growth and solidification stages of a company that comes afterward.

The second group is called infantry. It is their job to come in after the commandos and establish a successful market presence for the start-up and its product.

And we want to build our infantry.

We couldn’t be more grateful to our team of commandos who have worked so hard and volunteered so much time to the project (some of whom will be sticking around and joining the board), but now it’s time to transition EarthFund away from the move fast and break things mentality and into the grow fast and make money phase.

As such, we’re going to be headhunting, hand-selecting and interviewing people from across the Web3.0 space — including our own Telegram group — to find dedicated, brilliant people to help do everything from market the product to hosting AMAs to pushing PR stories to chasing biz dev opportunities to growing our communities to continuing to improve the platform.

From there, we will look for ways to grow the DAO treasury (which currently sits at $1.2M).

This will involve everything from speaking to our contacts at exchanges to running promotions to asking investors to contribute some of their 1Earth to the treasury to help ensure the long-term success of the project.

Our key milestones for Q1 & Q2:

1. Rewrite the EarthFund handbook to get the team ready for a fully decentralized approach to running EarthFund
2. Expand the team with new team members dedicated to growing EarthFund into the giant we all know it can be
3. Create new internal groups to independently handle marketing, PR, product, biz dev, etc… for a decentralized approach to growth
4. Create mechanisms and strategies for growing the treasury to spend on growing the profile of EarthFund

Note: because we’re going to be working with quarterly objectives, the EarthFund updates will move to quarterly too. Of course, we’ll still post in Telegram and on social media when anything happens!

Q3 & Q4: Marketing, PR, and launching more DAOs

It’s no secret that adoption of the platform has been slow thanks to macro conditions, but we believe that with a big push, we can change the narrative.

Once we have our team of dedicated, goal-oriented Earthlings in place, Phase 2 will be all about growth across marketing, PR, and product.

Marketing objectives:

Digital marketing blitz: We want to deploy an aggressive digital marketing campaign, using SEO (introducing an EarthFund blog, for example) social media, and targeted ads. The focus will be on highlighting EarthFund’s unique value proposition to attract potential investors and users.

Content Marketing: Develop high-quality, informative content that addresses the evolving landscape of blockchain technology and the role of DAOs. This will position EarthFund as a thought leader in the space and help us target SEO keywords like “start a DAO”, etc…

Community Engagement: Strengthen our community outreach by engaging with users on platforms like Reddit, Discord, and Telegram. Conduct AMA sessions with key team members to build trust and raise awareness.

Public Relations Efforts:

Media Outreach: Establish relationships with leading tech and finance publications to secure features and interviews. Emphasize EarthFund’s innovative approach to decentralized funding and its potential to disrupt traditional venture capital models.

Partnership Announcements: Attract and promote strategic partnerships with other blockchain entities and tech companies to boost credibility and market presence.

Event Participation: Participate in key industry events and conferences to network and showcase EarthFund’s vision and offerings.

Business Development Focus:

Launch more DAOs: marketing isn’t the only way we want to grow EarthFund, we also want to start reaching out to established non-profits to talk to them about launching on the platform. (Piggybacking on the success that Deepak Chopra, Megan Pormer, and other non-profits had using our technology.)

Strategic Alliances: Form alliances with influencers, advisors, and industry leaders to gain insights and foster collaborations that will propel EarthFund’s mission.

Platform Improvements: Continuously enhance the EarthFund platform based on user feedback and market trends, ensuring it remains at the forefront of DAO launchpad technology.

DAO rewards: we want to work with the new team to create a reward structure for EarthFund DAO members similar to the rewards structures of the communities on the platform. (Get rewarded for doing good.)

Investor Relations: Strengthen relationships with existing investors and attract new investors through targeted pitches and demonstrations of EarthFund’s growth potential and impact.

(Plus, of course, we will continue to pursue those exchange listings on major exchanges.)

TLDR: we’re gearing up for a BIG 2024

After a 2023 that saw its fair share of challenges but resulted in a HUGE update of the EarthFund platform, we’re all incredibly excited about what 2024 has in store for our project.

As a project, EarthFund has the technology, the press coverage, the high-profile connections, the business acumen and the headline-grabbing, feel-good vision of helping ordinary people save the world.

The next step of sending EarthFund to the moon? Finding more people who are just as passionate and dedicated to that vision as we are.

Does that sound like you? Or somebody you know?

Let’s chat.

Together, we can help grow the platform, get listed on more exchanges and bring individuals, non-profits and philanthropists onto the platform to raise money and change the world.

Let’s build a better tomorrow, together.

New to EarthFund? Here’s everything you need to know 👇

Start a world-changing community with its own token.
Join a community of like-minded people.
Donate crypto to change the world.
All from one place.

EarthFund takes the power of centralized organizations like governments and global charities and gives it to communities dedicated to causes.

It allows everyday people like you to affect change. And using crypto and the blockchain, it lets you have a voice in decisions and fund the causes you believe in.

Powering it all is the 1Earth token, an ERC-20 token that can be staked in exchange for governance tokens that give you a voice on the platform.

By buying the token and joining the EarthFund DAO, anybody in the world will have a vote on how the EarthFund treasury is used to fund planet-saving projects around the world.

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