Round 2 / Funding the Commons

With 11 international conferences since its inauguration in 2021, Funding the Commons is a referential event series across strategic markets for PGF innovation. FtC has also been organizing successful builder residencies, numerous public goods funding hackathons, as well select impact pilot projects leveraging the tools platformed across its ecosystem. Within the web3 ecosystem, FtC has established itself as the premier conference for PFG advancements, specifically targeting builders and innovators within the Filecoin and IPFS networks.

By providing a platform for these individuals to showcase their work and connect with public goods funders, FtC has been instrumental in fostering collaborations and bringing to light the contributions of the Filecoin community to a broader audience. This initiative has bridged the gap between Filecoin and the wider public goods funding ecosystem, encompassing both web3 and web2 spaces, thereby facilitating an environment where ideas and methodologies for sustaining open-source projects can flourish and evolve.

This was more evident than ever before with our 10th conference that took place in Tokyo July 2024. Indeed, this event marks the continuation of our community building initiatives in Asia (Taipei 2023 being the first + our Chiang Mai residency the second), and we are now in the process of producing 3 additional events in Bangkok in the coming week (IRL Hackathon, Design Jam, our flagship FtC conference (~ total of 750 attendees expected across all events).

We are seeing a very tangible interest from local governments, academic, media sources, as well as international groups like UNICEF’s Office of Innovation, in our ability to spotlighting real-world use-cases that can be used as fuel for policy advocacy. With FtC Tokyo, we successfully invited public sector leaders to participating in our event programming - including Tokyo Governor of Yuriko Koike, Mr. Masaaki Taira (member of the House of Representatives and leading regulator of web3 and AI in Japan, who participated in a panel with our CEO), and Audrey Tang, former Minister of Digital Affairs of Taiwan.

Tokyo was also a testament to our ability to entrust local teams to lead the curation process, as well as collaborate on event production. Over the course of many months, we partnered closely with DeSci Tokyo, Plurality Tokyo, Fracton Ventures, Code for Japan, Mitsubachi to bring this event to life. Total attendees: 538. Recap video: https://x.com/FundingCommons/status/1850842192455065649

Through our IRL and virtual events, hackathons, residencies, and public goods funding experiments, we connect builders and residents to the Filecoin ecosystem, fostering direct collaboration and innovation in decentralized technologies for public goods.

Since 2024, Funding the Commons has inherited Sustainable Blockchain Summit (SBS) and is now building on the legacy of this second conference series focused on exploring new models & mechanisms to better steward planetary commons through Earth Commons.

In Zurich, we hosted a private dinner bringing together the climate finance world. Multiple Filecoin & IPFS builders participants attended, including Alan Ransil from Devonian Systems, David Dao from GainForest, and Frederic Fournier from Open Forest Protocol. These builders had the opportunity to connect with diverse players from the Swiss Central Bank, the Swiss climate venture and private equity ecosystem, a member of the board of the International Monetary Fund, as well as with multiple representatives from family offices around the country.

Number of guests: 32 •⁠ ⁠Organizations Present:

• IBM

• International Monetary Fund (IMF)

• University of Zurich

• ETH Zurich

• Bank for International Settlements (BIS)

• BIS Innovation Hub

• Dow

• Filecoin Foundation

• Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership

• UNDP Financial Centres for Sustainability (FC4S)

• MSCI

• LGT Private Banking

• Liechtenstein Bankers Association

• Swiss Fintech Innovations

• Global Infrastructure Basel Foundation (GIB)

• Swiss FS-CSC

• Opportuna VC

• MyClimate

• Golem Foundation

• Open Society Foundation

• Crowther Lab

• Infinitas Capital

• Decoland

• SimplexDNA

• Nature Tech Collective

• Silvi

• Devonian

• Cherty

• State Secretariat for International Finance (SIF)

• NatureFinance

• MPower Ventures AG

• Hyphen Global

• Green Fintech Network

• Green Digital Finance Alliance (GDFA)

• Open Forest Protocol

• Gain Forest

• Operal AG

• Blockchain Trust Solutions AG

• InvestConservation

• Frigg

  • Chiang Mai Residency - First Impact Metrics
    • List of builders integrating Filecoin or IPFS who benefited from the residency:
      • Elizabeth Griffiths: NFT.Storage. Github.
      • Bitbeckers: Hypercerts. Github.
      • Devansh Mehta: VoiceDeck (launched at FtC residency!). Github.
      • David Dao: GainForest. Github.
      • Duke Jones: Identikey. Github.
      • Prajjawal Khandelwal: Adafel. Github.
      • James Farrell: Akashic. Github.
      • Shyam Sridhar. Github.

  Additionally, progress on the Akashic project marks a significant milestone in Funding the Commons' efforts. This ambitious project aims to construct a digital archive of refugee stories on IPFS and Filecoin, safeguarding the memories, stories, and cultural heritage of refugees worldwide. Akashic's use of the decentralized and censorship-resistant properties of IPFS and Filecoin perfectly aligns with Filecoin's mission to offer a durable base for the preservation of human knowledge and history, ensuring these narratives remain immutable, accessible, and free from central oversight.

  During the residency, multiple residents contributed to the Akashic project, while coordinating closely with Kickstarter’s crowdfunding protocol team to cement the partnership and accelerate the development of the platform and integration of Kickstarter’s crypto stack.

  Moreover, Akashic was benefited by the presence of the technical leads from Refunite and Holonym. Refunite is a platform that helps reunite lost families, comprising of over 1 million registered users, and reaching 100 million+ individuals across Africa, many without government-registered ID’s. Holonym is a digital identity protocol. The three teams worked together to prototype a digital identity system for refugees and stateless persons, which will be an essential component for Akashic to practically serve its user base, a large percentage of whom cannot pass traditional KYC. This digital identity system would enable refugee creators to have an immutable identity, which can be linked to both crypto wallets and media stored on Filecoin.

  Lastly, as part of the ongoing hackathon, Funding the Commons subsidized an Akashic-related bounty posted by Numbers Protocol in order to incentivize more builder participation in creating an immutable archive of refugee-created media.

  • Virtual & IRL Hackathon - Tracks building on PL / FF
    • Funding the Commons has posted $4,000 in Filecoin bounties from our own treasury in our ongoing hackathon, which concludes 7 November. The Decentralized Storage track, and all challenges and bounties can be viewed here.
    • Numbers Protocol, which leverages Filecoin and IPFS in numerous ways, has also posted thousands of dollars in bounties, and Funding the Commons has provided matching funds of $1000 towards these bounties.
  • Bangkok Conference: Funding the Commons <> Earth Commons
    • Full agenda + speaker lineup
    • We decided to pick a location adjacent to the Filecoin Dev Summit (same building, different floor) to allow for cross-pollination of talent, and traffic and to maximize our participation in the success of PL LabWeek.
    • List of PL / Filecoin speakers platformed on the agenda:
      • Juan Benet x Protocol Labs
      • Danny O’brien x Filecoin Foundation
      • James Tunningley x Protocol Labs, Architect Systems
      • Alan Ransil x Devonian
      • Caitlin Moore x Cherty
      • Numbers Protocol
      • Holke Brammer x Hypercerts
      • Raymond Cheng x Open Source Observer
      • Shady El Damaty x Holonym
    • All talks will be recorded for posterity + social content will be captured on site by a professional media team
  • A pivotal aspect of Funding the Commons' dedication to supporting public goods builders is the creation of the Builder Basic Income Fund on Drips. This initiative serves as a concrete mechanism to offer continuous financial support to developers, allowing them to concentrate on adding value within open-source ecosystems without the burden of financial uncertainty. By ensuring a steady income for builders, Funding the Commons not only aids individual creators but also sets a new standard for public goods funding, encouraging other entities to adopt similar supportive measures. Funding the Commons currently supports three builders on this Drips list, all of whom are alumni of our residency. Drips has matched Funding the Commons 1:1 to boost Builder Basic Income.
  • YouTube Channel
    • https://www.youtube.com/@Funding-the-Commons
    • Video content around the public goods ecosystem, with 35 talks from our last conference in Tokyo.
  • Public Goods Town Halls
    • Last Town Hall link: https://lu.ma/pgtownhall5
    • We’ve been running a free, monthly event to bring the public goods community together, with over 100 sign-ups on average and 40-50 participants. This allows us to keep conversations going between live events and to follow ecosystem builders and their projects.
  • Sustainable Blockchain Summit —> Launch of Earth Commons
    • 2024 programming & updates

Additionally, progress on the Akashic project marks a significant milestone in Funding the Commons' efforts. This ambitious project aims to construct a digital archive of refugee stories on IPFS and Filecoin, safeguarding the memories, stories, and cultural heritage of refugees worldwide. Akashic's use of the decentralized and censorship-resistant properties of IPFS and Filecoin perfectly aligns with Filecoin's mission to offer a durable base for the preservation of human knowledge and history, ensuring these narratives remain immutable, accessible, and free from central oversight.

During the residency, multiple residents contributed to the Akashic project, while coordinating closely with Kickstarter’s crowdfunding protocol team to cement the partnership and accelerate the development of the platform and integration of Kickstarter’s crypto stack.

Moreover, Akashic was benefited by the presence of the technical leads from Refunite and Holonym. Refunite is a platform that helps reunite lost families, comprising of over 1 million registered users, and reaching 100 million+ individuals across Africa, many without government-registered ID’s. Holonym is a digital identity protocol. The three teams worked together to prototype a digital identity system for refugees and stateless persons, which will be an essential component for Akashic to practically serve its user base, a large percentage of whom cannot pass traditional KYC. This digital identity system would enable refugee creators to have an immutable identity, which can be linked to both crypto wallets and media stored on Filecoin.

Lastly, as part of the ongoing hackathon, Funding the Commons subsidized an Akashic-related bounty posted by Numbers Protocol in order to incentivize more builder participation in creating an immutable archive of refugee-created media.

• Virtual & IRL Hackathon - Tracks building on PL / FF

  • Funding the Commons has posted $4,000 in Filecoin bounties from our own treasury in our ongoing hackathon, which concludes 7 November. The Decentralized Storage track, and all challenges and bounties can be viewed here.
  • Numbers Protocol, which leverages Filecoin and IPFS in numerous ways, has also posted thousands of dollars in bounties, and Funding the Commons has provided matching funds of $1000 towards these bounties.

• Bangkok Conference: Funding the Commons <> Earth Commons

  • Full agenda + speaker lineup
  • We decided to pick a location adjacent to the Filecoin Dev Summit (same building, different floor) to allow for cross-pollination of talent, and traffic and to maximize our participation in the success of PL LabWeek.
  • List of PL / Filecoin speakers platformed on the agenda:
    • Juan Benet x Protocol Labs
    • Danny O’brien x Filecoin Foundation
    • James Tunningley x Protocol Labs, Architect Systems
    • Alan Ransil x Devonian
    • Caitlin Moore x Cherty
    • Numbers Protocol
    • Holke Brammer x Hypercerts
    • Raymond Cheng x Open Source Observer
    • Shady El Damaty x Holonym
  • All talks will be recorded for posterity + social content will be captured on site by a professional media team

• A pivotal aspect of Funding the Commons' dedication to supporting public goods builders is the creation of the Builder Basic Income Fund on Drips. This initiative serves as a concrete mechanism to offer continuous financial support to developers, allowing them to concentrate on adding value within open-source ecosystems without the burden of financial uncertainty. By ensuring a steady income for builders, Funding the Commons not only aids individual creators but also sets a new standard for public goods funding, encouraging other entities to adopt similar supportive measures. Funding the Commons currently supports three builders on this Drips list, all of whom are alumni of our residency. Drips has matched Funding the Commons 1:1 to boost Builder Basic Income.

• YouTube Channel

  • https://www.youtube.com/@Funding-the-Commons
  • Video content around the public goods ecosystem, with 35 talks from our last conference in Tokyo.

• Public Goods Town Halls

  • Last Town Hall link: https://lu.ma/pgtownhall5
  • We’ve been running a free, monthly event to bring the public goods community together, with over 100 sign-ups on average and 40-50 participants. This allows us to keep conversations going between live events and to follow ecosystem builders and their projects.

• Sustainable Blockchain Summit —> Launch of Earth Commons

  • 2024 programming & updates

• Testimonials (Optional)

  "I'm super excited about UNICEF’s relationship with Funding the Commons, and we see eye to eye when it comes to values and the things that we believe in. We see eye to eye thinking about technology in a positive way, that technology actually can do something for good.”