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A Dash brand ATM in downtown Lyon (70 Dash)

thesavoyard

thesavoyard

Active member
Introduction
Please vote!!!

gobject vote-many 5543f43e995ff36fc3c4d1c6c280c3aa4cc3bfe154604e2ffdaa55aa69460b63 funding yes

A pre-proposal to install a Dash branded ATM in Lyon city center.

France has a very low adoption rate for cryptocurrencies. This leaves an opportunity to be the first major accepted digital currency. Dash lacks fungibility for most users and has very low brand recognition outside of the cryptocurrency community

We would be placing a Dash enabled and branded ATM in the Lyon city center.


Why should Dash fund this?

Dash would be branded on the machine. Giving potentially tens of thousands of Dash users easy access. The machine would be BTC enabled but Dash users would have a 2% lower fee for the first few years. Part of the grant would be to prepay the lower fees and part to secure a premium location. With a higher rent means more exposure. Plus, Dash logos on the machine would be permanent. An advertisement that would pay for itself many times over.

Cash to Dash is currently enabled on all General Bytes machines. The sales office informed me Dash to cash would be available in the coming months, most likely summer. The graphics would be installed by the manufacturer so you can be assured of the quality of the Dash logos.

Lyon is a major University city, has a high level of tourism and over 2.2 million people living in the metropolitan area.

I will provide monthly updates on Dash transactions, this will help determine the demand generated by a Dash branded ATM!

Who are we?

My name is Christopher Felix, doing business as disaf.fr (Distributeur automatique France). I own, place, and manage penny press machines in the central France region. I have been in the business for nearly two years and I’m looking to expand to Dash ATMs.

I am American born and have a background in business administration and logistics. In the US I worked for RICOH Logistics USA as an exporter.

I am also an Oxford trained English teacher at the Ecole des Mines in Saint Etienne France. A highly ranked engineering school.

I am currently seeking a certificate in database development and design to improve my technical business knowledge.


My name is Isabelle Felix, I have been a freelance photographer for more than ten years. I contract real estate photography primarily but also provide administrative services to my clients, a local investment firm.

I am French but have lived in the United States and Switzerland as well. I am currently learning web design and development to further my education and provide needed services for my clients.

Grant requested

We would be asking for around 70 Dash. The value of Dash has been more volatile lately so I cannot give you an estimate in Euros. That would include a refund of the 5 Dash application fee. The grant would pay for Dash graphics, a premium rent location and prepay lower fees for Dash users. At 2% lower than BTC, even Bitcoin users would likely buy Dash and then exchange.


It is worth noting that BTCFacile offers partnerships for 2,700 Euros in the area. They offer legal and banking aid to their partners and provide maintenance. They do not have Dash though. A Dash ATM could cost over 25,000 eur in the first year without the existing contracts. I will be carrying the majority of the risk myself.
 
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I like your new proposal. If any statistics can be produced to show it's usage afterwards, that would be helpful information for expanding the ATM locations in future proposals. I would vote yes.
 
To add to your idea, would you consider adding a mining rig into the ATM machine itself?

As the machine sits idle most of the time functioning only as an ATM, you would optimize electricity usage by mining DASH (optimally in a closed pool of similar ATMs), and be able to offer that DASH discount using locally mined coins.

At some point the ATM will accumulate enough stored DASH to afford a Masternode, so you would do well to condider adding this functionality to the machine as well.

An ATM that serves DASH in these additional ways will be extremely useful to our network, and be a game changer.
 
@thesavoyard Even though I already mentioned that I don't believe in crypto ATMs in general, I think I could support this proposal because for me it's not about covering costs of setting up an actual ATM but rather about:
1. advertising Dash via Dash-branded ATM (for general public);
2. potentially gaining some interest via lower fees (for crypto-aware people who were initially looking for BTC ATM for example);
3. (hopefully) collecting some data about user adoption/trends which could probably (dis)prove my assumptions/thoughts about ATM usage :)
With that being said, you'll have my "yes" vote for this one once submitted.

RichardAO said:
To add to your idea, would you consider adding a mining rig into the ATM machine itself?

As the machine sits idle most of the time functioning only as an ATM, you would optimize electricity usage by mining DASH (optimally in a closed pool of similar ATMs), and be able to offer that DASH discount using locally mined coins.

At some point the ATM will accumulate enough stored DASH to afford a Masternode, so you would do well to condider adding this functionality to the machine as well.

An ATM that serves DASH in these additional ways will be extremely useful to our network, and be a game changer.
Click to expand...

From engineering point of view, you want some piece of hardware/software to do one specific job and you want it to do that job the best way possible. Trying to do many things at once is not a good way to design things in general. As for optimising electricity usage I think this would work only if you would pay for the fact of using electricity and not for the amount of electricity you consumed - "idle" means low electricity consumption/cost, "mining" means huge electricity consumption/cost. Also consider heat and noise as additional factors. There is no reason to mine crypto in the city center somewhere in the middle of the Europe imo.
 
Thank you all three for the feedback! I think the idea of monthly usage reports is brilliant. It will help make decisions on later proposals, if ATMs are a good use of treasury funds! I'm going to wait until tomorrow before I officially submit the proposal, just to see if I get any more questions or concerns!
 
I know these things are never simple but I'd love to have one of these at the next Anarchapulco - I'm actually quite interested in being responsible for such a thing...
 
UdjinM6 said:
From engineering point of view, you want some piece of hardware/software to do one specific job and you want it to do that job the best way possible. Trying to do many things at once is not a good way to design things in general. As for optimising electricity usage I think this would work only if you would pay for the fact of using electricity and not for the amount of electricity you consumed - "idle" means low electricity consumption/cost, "mining" means huge electricity consumption/cost. Also consider heat and noise as additional factors. There is no reason to mine crypto in the city center somewhere in the middle of the Europe imo.
Click to expand...

I hear you and generally agree RE engineering perspective - I would argue that in this case we are talking about just three already well defined functions, not new solutions. Putting three functions under one hood isnt too much to ask :)

The sound of one mining rigs cooling gear inside of a good ATM casing shouldnt be too loud? Anyway thats definitely a design consideration, and not insurmountable.

Lastly i would argue that the purpose of having DASH ATMs scattered throughout the E.U. is to spread the acceptance and use of DASH. If those same machines also mine, they add to our overall hashrate, securing our network. If those machines form their own pool, the overall added hash is greater, strengthening the network even more.

Add to that the next level of the DASH network, the Masternode, and the machine itself does everything DASH needs, everything Dash users need, and give a healthy profit to the operator.
 
My proposal is live, please go and vote!

gobject vote-many 5543f43e995ff36fc3c4d1c6c280c3aa4cc3bfe154604e2ffdaa55aa69460b63 funding yes
 
IMO, after having already experimented with a Dash ATM in Panama, we already have some data on whether using treasury funds are well spent on ATMs and that answer was no. In addition it's not like this is entirely new to the industry. I don't think Bitcoin ATMs have done much of anything for Bitcoin (compared to a really easy, cheap service like local bitcoins or wallofcoins where your chances of being near to a location to buy are astronomically higher than being near to an ATM), and are generally not profitable.

That being said, I wouldn't consider it the end of the world to collect even more data on the subject, to avoid spending even more money on it later. It would have been unthinkable 2 months ago to spend this much on another Dash ATM, but since we seem to be drowning in an abundance of resources now the sting doesn't seem as bad. I don't think I'll be supporting this proposal, but I hope you succeed if it passes.
 
I'll be voting no.

I object to the idea of funding someone else's business. The amount of Dash being requested is enough to buy a machine that could conceivably reap alot of profits for the operator. If we had a way to structure this as a very low cost loan to be paid back I think it would make more sense. Or if it were lowered significantly to simply cover the marketing expenses.

I've done a fair amount of due diligence on ATM machines in the U.S. and they can be quite lucrative. The problem here (especially in my home state) is the KYC/AML regulations are truly onerous.
 
Thank you both for the feedback. In the EU Bitcoin ATMs have had variable success. France has a low adoption rate of cryptos, even among young tech-savvy people. I teach engineering students and most of them own no Bitcoin and are unaware of altcoins. So it is a little more risky than the US. Also, the startup costs are higher due to stricter regulation and many businesses being leery of something so different. I'd like to add holgum that I could partner with BITFacile who manufactures Bitcoin only ATMs for a fraction of the cost. So a Dash ATM carries more risk and cost than a BTC ATM. BitFacile means Bit Easy, they handle most of the complicated legal work. I am betting on Dash in the long run though!
 
holgum said:
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I object to the idea of funding someone else's business.
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IMO one of the things budgeting system is good for is to provide some bootstraping and to cover some risks for those who try smth new. If you see things from this point of view, it's not a big deal to fail 10 times at small scale and then finally succeed with some idea which then can be scaled or at least can be used by others as a reference to start on their own. Yes, $7K sound quite expensive but it will be used to lower fees if I get this proposal correctly i.e. operator will not be able to extract much profit out of fees and we'll cover that from our budget. This can potentially attract a bit more people. Or at least we'll have an idea what's the right answer to "Let's setup/subsidize ATMs in <some country>".
 
holgum said:
I'll be voting no.

I object to the idea of funding someone else's business. The amount of Dash being requested is enough to buy a machine that could conceivably reap alot of profits for the operator. If we had a way to structure this as a very low cost loan to be paid back I think it would make more sense. Or if it were lowered significantly to simply cover the marketing expenses.

I've done a fair amount of due diligence on ATM machines in the U.S. and they can be quite lucrative. The problem here (especially in my home state) is the KYC/AML regulations are truly onerous.
Click to expand...

I agree with this statement, however the upfront cost to get AML compliant in New Jersey has surpassed the cost of the machines 10 fold. In order to profit the machines need as much fee as possible to still make sales. Even then you need a FLEET, not just 1 ATM. I will be submitting a mirror proposal for the USA but with ZERO FEE, if one of these will be funded I hope they will both find funding.
 
Miner237 said:
I agree with this statement, however the upfront cost to get AML compliant in New Jersey has surpassed the cost of the machines 10 fold. In order to profit the machines need as much fee as possible to still make sales. Even then you need a FLEET, not just 1 ATM. I will be submitting a mirror proposal for the USA but with ZERO FEE, if one of these will be funded I hope they will both find funding.
Click to expand...

It's an interesting concept a no-fee Dash ATM. I don't know how it would work though. Would you ask the Dash treasury to cover all the costs, from now until the end of the life of the ATM? There's a lot of work involved as well. Are you going to work on a volunteer basis, if so for how many years can you work for free? How will a machine that makes no money, pay its own rent and armored car service?

The reason why cryptocurrency ATM fees are relatively high is not to steal from customers. It is because it is a high-cost prospect. As adoption increases, the volume will increase allowing margins to drop. It is better to base a plan on sound business principles in my opinion. The customers will get lower fees in the long run, but for the short run an investment needs to carry its own weight.
 
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Update: I have secured Loomis as my armored car service. That's generally the biggest hitch. Since we were able to get it so early, the ATM may go live in the Spring!

Please vote! gobject vote-many 5543f43e995ff36fc3c4d1c6c280c3aa4cc3bfe154604e2ffdaa55aa69460b63 funding yes
 
@thesavoyard it is definitely something that would require a lot of research. I wouldn't want an ATM operator to be unable to make a profit or at least a living for the trouble. However, I am not against subsidizing ATMs so our customers can get easy access to Dash on the cheap. But if this were done, it would have to be well thought out. Right now, we're only talking about 2 machines, your's and Brian's for a limited time, I think??

But it's a great sandbox to see if we can come up with something more permanent.
 
The proposal is looking good, I look forward to posting pictures of the ATM and transaction statistics! I'll be looking to expand to Paris and Amsterdam!
 
Hello TheSingleton, I certainly can give an update. It seems that negotiations with the SNCF (French train company) have fallen through. The representative stopped replying. I'll keep at it just in case she went on another long vacation. I've also been working on placing the ATM at the mall next door which is our second choice. Tomorrow I'll be scouting for a third option, which would be in a shop in a high traffic area. Basically, as soon as we have a location we will be ready to place the machine. Unfortunately, Wannacry didn't help our cause at all. I've actually encountered a dozen or so potential locations where the manager hasn't even heard of Bitcoin, when they google it, the first page is full of bad news.

Not to worry though it's only a matter of persistence. There's bound to be a store or coffee shop owner that wants people with pockets full of cash coming in every day.
 
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