Arbitrum Short Term Incentive Program for Games

[Soby]

The Arbitrum STIP program was mainly focused around DeFi, but didn’t include gaming.

Arbitrum should be the home for gaming in Web3 and we have the resources to make that happen.

I’d like to put together a working call so we can discuss what a gaming STIP would look like.

[tnorm]

Would love to dedicate a week of the incentives working group call to help brainstorm this.

Could we organize between @TreasureDAO and the other gaming protocols to help schedule this when everyone is available?

[bflynn]

Would love to join the working group. Definitely would love to see more games supported by the DAO

[karelvuong]

Absolutely and we’ve talked about this at length with many teams + have some perspectives on this. Would be great to tee up for shortly after October 30 so we can get Treasure’s Arbitrum Representative Council (ARC) formally ratified and up and running (going through DAO vote right now).

Good thing is we can learn from the STIP process while also tailoring it to games. Will require a very different treatment and something we should change is to not only incentivize existing games / studios on Arbitrum but also attract and bring new ones to the ecosystem.

[dk3]

There is also the ~200k to be allocated from AIP-3 via Questbook but I don’t think they have made any distributions yet. Maybe when ARC is up and running they can provide guidance to projects submitting proposals to @Flook. Another option for pre-launch and early-stage projects.

[Flook]

Looking forward to joining this working group! Let’s get a date on the books for the first week of November?

[SavvyDAO]

Strongly support this initiative driven by @Flook, @karelvuong, @tnorm and @bflynn.

STIP needs comprehensive data across project size, vertical, and maturity for program review, and unfortunately not enough gaming protocols were funded to truly get a robust sample and learnings.

[Djinn]

Looking forward to this as well. This is a huge opportunity to empower a significant portion of DeFi, and to bring additional users to the ecosystem immediately.

I know that one of the top questions teams ask themselves is ‘Polygon is gaming right?’.

Having the position to challenge that assumption with a strong incentives program would be a very solid start.

[tnorm]

@Soby @karelvuong

Figured I’d brainstorm what you (and other gaming folks) might want to talk about on next weeks call. How does the below sound for a vague agenda?

• Introduction to Gaming:
  • Generic Breakdown of how gaming on blockchains works (i.e. what are some generic dynamics, value flows, user flows, etc. that take place to help folks understand where incentives may help).
• What are the Challenges the Gaming Ecosystem Faces on Arbitrum?
  • Challenges for Ecosystems (Treasure DAO, etc.)
  • Challenges for Games
• How Might Incentives Help Solve Those Challenges?

Also happy to sync up this week if you wanted to brainstorm a more structured presentation, etc.

Want to make sure the time is valuable/well spent.

[Flook]

(Sharing the 1-pager discussed on this week’s open governance call)

Game Development and Incentive Program (GDIP)

Goals

• Fund game studios for development costs
• Distribute ARB incentives through games on Arbitrum
• Acquire data and metrics associated with growing gaming on Arbitrum
• Learn best practices for incentive programs run through the Arbitrum DAO

Methods

• Milestone based funding centered on KPI’s
  • WAU, MAU, Average Session Length, User Retention, etc.
• Cycles of proposal review, 25 proposals per 3 week cycle
  • Raffle system to decide which proposals fall into which cycle
• Transparency into development spend
  • Monthly burn
  • Who’s handling funds
  • Expected impact
  • Even more invasive transparency on spend (which developers, how much, etc.) if the DAO deems it necessary
• 2 Separate categories (projects fall under 1 of 2)

1. Arbitrum native projects
2. Projects looking to migrate to Arbitrum

• Maximum Funding Amount for the entire GDIP agreed upon before the proposal goes live

Questions

• How should the voting process differ from the STIP to avoid issues such as over-allocation?
• Should proposers delineate their dev cost % VS their incentive % themselves or should it be an amount set forth in the proposal itself? (An example being 50% for dev costs and 50% for incentives)
• Where is the line between ARB incentives being a temporary boost to grow the user base and it being a farmed for those incentives? Do we require any time:incentive guidelines therein?
• Does the funding get approved all at once, or do we incorporate goal posts (or sth of the like) to be met and reviewed after a certain amount of time? How does this differ as to where the funds are going (dev cost/incentive/marketing etc.)?
• Does the cycle of proposal review also mean that funding timelines will be different for projects in different tranches? What if the funding is depleted before another cycle of proposals can be reviewed?

[alx]

I have created a defi platform project that combines the 3 basic principles of the program. It is a mining platform for tokens and nft. It will encourage users to keep collections of gaming tokens and nft. Users will find new uses for their token and nft collections. Currently, only the basic smart contract that will be used on the platform is ready. Can I apply for a grant?