The Dash Budget is not a venture capital fund

[jimbursch]

The Dash Budget makes grants to grow the Dash ecosystem. Even though these grants look like investments, they are not investments. While it makes sense for MNOs to evaluate proposals as if they were investments, ROI is not and should not be a major factor, simply because meaningful ROI is impossible to calculate. Also, ROI is short sighted.

I think there is nothing wrong with using the Budget to subsidize private ventures that hold the promise of making a valuable contribution to the Dash ecosystem. However, we need to be cautious of private interests that really just want to use the Dash Budget to subsidize a venture that can't garner venture capital investment on its own merits.

The Budget is best used for projects that can fall under the category of "infrastructure" which takes a long view of the development of Dash.

 

[Koromoto]

Unfortunately the treasury attracts plenty of con artists looking for free money. I also believe grants should be used in infrastructure and marketing but it all should be managed and supervised by the Dash Foundation not by individuals trying to hit the jackpot.

Key points that should be researched:

- Tangle
- Exchanges
- Fiat/Dash frictionless conversion
- Tokens
- Contracts
- Minerless confirmation
- Lower fees
- Simple wallets
- World Commerce
- Merchant adoption
- Advertisement

But instead of giving money to an individual/group to blow it up in hookers and booze while showing cooked books to the investors, the "Department of Treasury" should appoint an advisor that will oversee the development of the project, allocating resources on demand. Will it be easier to manage? Absolutely not. Will it reduce the signal to noise ratio? Absolutely yes.

I don't like giving money for the next big conference in the best hotel with the best food and the best speakers, or the gimme some dash and I'll implement it in my exchange kind of proposals. These are the kinds of things one should do on their own money looking for one's own profit. Also, putting a pretty face in your profile to appeal for the dominant male crypto investor is the sign of a scammer. A couple of days ago in the welcome thread came a guy to say hello and got zero likes, just after him came a (supposed) girl with a nice avatar and she got ten likes in less than one hour. I am not saying she's a scammer just that human behaviour is so easily manipulated specially when there is free money involved.

My two cents.

 

[bhkien]

Even Dash has largest budget in among many coins, but it still need to focus.

 

[feedbands]

Unfortunately the treasury attracts plenty of con artists looking for free money. I also believe grants should be used in infrastructure and marketing but it all should be managed and supervised by the Dash Foundation not by individuals trying to hit the jackpot.

But instead of giving money to an individual/group to blow it up in hookers and booze while showing cooked books to the investors, the "Department of Treasury" should appoint an advisor that will oversee the development of the project, allocating resources on demand. Will it be easier to manage? Absolutely not. Will it reduce the signal to noise ratio? Absolutely yes.

I don't like giving money for the next big conference in the best hotel with the best food and the best speakers, or the gimme some dash and I'll implement it in my exchange kind of proposals. These are the kinds of things one should do on their own money looking for one's own profit. Also, putting a pretty face in your profile to appeal for the dominant male crypto investor is the sign of a scammer. A couple of days ago in the welcome thread came a guy to say hello and got zero likes, just after him came a (supposed) girl with a nice avatar and she got ten likes in less than one hour. I am not saying she's a scammer just that human behaviour is so easily manipulated specially when there is free money involved.

My two cents.

I agree, the way this currently operates is crazy and there could be much greater strength with increased accountability. Dash should have someone, or a team of someones in house working with all the proposal owners.

That's not to say that many proposals are not strong. At the end of the day I would rather have the proposals funded and have some bad apples in there with the good than no proposals funded at all. But yes, the current structure will no doubt attract people looking for a jackpot and not looking to strengthen dash. How best to align these motives?

What an experiment we are witnessing. Its tough to witness it at times because in my mind I can see so clearly what Dash needs. We need to be signing up merchants. We need to be educating crypto investors. We need to be creating controlled and guided environments for people to spend dash.
And instead we get branded campervans and airplanes. I'm not knocking these proposals but it seems so out of touch with what dash actually needs and potentially indicates conflicting motives between the proposal owner and dash. Who is it really benefitting?

Why not have someone from Department of Treasury fly out and meet with proposal owners to make sure things look properly aligned? Why not make this happen before large proposals are even approved?