Educational Videos are important to ZEC adoption in addition to the other things you mentioned which are actually also being worked on or already exist.
ECC PoS blogs:
We also have well designed wallets that are improving: Wallets - Zcash
And there is currently a team working on a Metamask Style Browser Extension for Zcash that was funded with a grant:
Also the ECC has posted about their focus on UX here:
I definitely agree educational videos is a high priority for adoption.
But, at a cost of $150,000 per video?
In response to a few points about the quality versus quantity argument, I think an important thing to keep in mind is that we are making highly professional videos for wide shareability among general audiences and industry leaders. Youāll notice that in our first video releases people like Barry Silbert, Naval, Chris Burniske, Cryptopathic, etc. shared, commented, and liked our videos. Imo they would not be as likely to share Zcash educational videos that are of lower production value. These are the people that can use these videos as pitch materials for Zcash to other industry leaders and policy makers. Just one right video in the hands of a someone like this could have large effects. If we are talking about more ZEC investing, Barry Silbert sharing a video to other investors and convincing just one of them to invest a million dollars would have the combined effect of getting one thousand normies to invest $1,000 each. If we are talking about policy-making, just one video talking about how Zcash upholds our constitutional right to protection from search and seizure (in the US, at least) could have a lawmaker bring up and advocate for private digital cash like Zcash. If we are talking about the transition from HTTP to HTTPS and how that allowed e-commerce to bloom, just one video explaining that topic and its relation to BTC and ZEC could have a vendor switch from accepting BTC to ZEC.
I think a good qualitative KPI for the success of our videos would be to track which prominent people share or like our work - or if they indeed have an impact on policymakers. For instance, we interviewed Peter van Valkenburgh, and if we make a video about Zcash and constitutional rights, I think it would be reasonable to evaluate its success why whether or not it is useful for him to advocate for Zcash/digital privacy in Washington, D.C. Similarly, the HTTP/HTTPS example, does any policymaker in Washington find that useful when advocating for Web3 privacy - or does any vendor start to adopt ZEC when they realize it is safer for them and their customers? The Zcash ecosystem has substantial connections to industry and regulators, we could evaluate our work in part due to how useful our videos are in communicating Zcash to important decision makers.
Of course, the true challenge is to make videos that are broadly applicable to all audiences, which is something we strive for and mentioned in our long reply ~50 posts into this thread.
IMO, there is no way to know ahead of time which effort will best help ZEC adoption. One of the major benefits to enlisting a team such as ourselves would be that we are willing to constantly iterate and improve by evaluating our own workās metrics and collaborating with the community. We are not a closed-door enterprise. Avid Zcashers such as @rekodi have already reached out and joined our effort, Shawn (refraining from tagging him here to not bother him) will be part of our research team. We review all our work with a large group of collaborators at ECC, ZF, and the greater Zcash ecosystem. We are open to ideas and are committed to working with people.
Also, Zcash has spent the vast majority of its funding on engineering, ZCG funding this effort would not take away from ECCās funding for proof of stake research. Furthermore, if no one uses the Zcash network, POS would result in negative real yield.
I looked at the excel with the topics and here are my questions for the team:
Q1
There are around 50 line items in the excel (General topics) presumably one for each episode. Is the team working on the assumption that there will be 4 seasons and some interesting stuff that came can come out (NU5 breakthrough/ Zebra/Zcash as 4th amendment ) of this would come in Season 3 or 4.
Q2
The first row is about http/https. Does the team believe that adding one more corporate sanitized preachy video explaining importance of privacy (something that has been discussed ad nauseum) adds to Zcash adoption. Is it a knowledge issue (people being unaware about BTC/ETH being transparent) or is the fact that most blockchains still transparent because of apathy/inertia/other technical and legal constraints. How does having one more 10-15 minute explainer aimed towards the lowest information users solve the issue?
Q3
Something similar can be said about most of the other rows ā Fixed supply/ importance of decentralization / Zk proof high level explainers /Zcash being the first zk chain that helped some other projects. Unless the aim is to target absolute newbies none of these help drive the conversation in any meaningful way and will have a shelf life of less than 2 months. Literally every chain has some version of Zk proofs now. More importantly, they all sound boring and will not generate any buzz. For beginners we already have āWhy zcashā video which the team built. Do you think these videos will help in increasing the use of shielded pool or would they be retweeted/shared by the influencers and forgotten next month. Can we count how many shielded transactions were sent/ wallets downloaded after every video. Views is a meaningless metric. NFT drop had around 1k shielded transitions and the buzz was obvious.
Q4
What is the teamās opinion on doing 2/3 under discussed Zcash specific videos only. It is not uncommon to greenlight a pilot or a two episode test before committing to a full season in the television industry.
Zcash moat comes from being the only current chain that can theoretically work under the most adversarial conditions (unlike BTC/ETH etc). This coupled with mainstream adoption with good wallets/UI is what gives Zcash value. This is under represented in any of your topics. We need more examples/documentation of when zcash would ve worked best under the most provocative use cases (irrespective of ideology). Basically demonstrate examples of politically neutral money in an engaging way and not have one more video about the difference between Crypto, Coins.Tokens, ICOs (Row 30).
The current list of topics is a catch-all list. We have worked on it a fair amount, but would dedicate the most time to settling which topics to cover first during the āSeason Mappingā phase of our grant, which would occur before we started writing the episodes. There are an infinite number of things one can do to make a YouTube channel, you never know what you might get into, the key is to be flexible and consistent. We are focused on Season 1 right now, with the only thought to later seasons being that we would reserve topics that are more specialized, or first require an initial video, for later.
Iām not too aware of 10-15 minute videos that go over the relevance of HTTP/HTTPS to transparent versus encrypted blockchains and specifically highlights Zcash as the modern day HTTPS. Would be helpful if you could point out which ones you are thinking of. Perhaps one that includes Edward Snowden?
As a side note, I asked Paul Brigner, ECCās DC regulatory expert how he explains privacy in Web3 to people in DC, and he said the HTTP/HTTPS analogy was often the most helpful. Although we may all be well-versed in the analogy, the vast majority of people do not have any idea what HTTPS is and how it relates to Web3, including policymakers.
Many people have already attested to viewing older videos as a basis for their understanding and involvement in crypto/Zcash.
I think finding ways to increase shielded txn usage at different points in the campaign is a great idea. For example, Charlie from ECC mentioned to us in a call that ECC could perhaps share some of their reserved NFTs with us to be given out as community events associated with our campaigns. Hiring a community events strategist like Kevan would allow us to come up with as many creative ways as one can think of to increase shielded usage. However, wallet downloads and shielded txns are not sybil-resistant, just like views and subscribers. As mentioned above, other KPIs like testimonials and real-world usage of the videos in important discussions about the future of cryptocurrency may be more objective, if only qualitative.
Agreed, we view our first two videos as pilots.
I could not agree more. The right to privacy is the foundation for many laws, which, at least used to, protect a womanās right to abortion, or provide the basis for the illegality of anti-sodomy laws. Privacy is also most important under authoritarian regimes or unsafe environments. We are well aware of these topics and probably didnāt outline them as much in our rough topics list since it was obvious to us we need to cover them. We have been put in touch with folks like Moe Ghashim, one of the leaders of a Crypto in Context program in the Middle East, who can be interviewed to talk about how privacy is critical in places like Syria that have undergone revolutions against authoritarian governments. The importance of privacy for the most vulnerable is at the top of our minds.
Hello @37L and members of the Zcash community!
Zcash Media has demonstrated their commitment to educating and promoting Zcash to aid in the adoption of financial privacy to as many people as possible who can watch their videos and enjoy their content on the various social networks that Zcash Media is on.
Their actions, ideas, audiovisual material, content and presence in this community have not only demonstrated that they believe deeply in Zcash, but in the possibility of delivering continued value, creating content that can be useful for all of us today and for several years to come, as well as for new members of the crypto ecosystem and others who have been in it for a while, but are not yet aware of the potential of Zcash.
As a member of The Global Ambassador Program I deeply believe in the need for educational and marketing resources in any scenario, bear market or bull market. We know that this bear market stage will end at some point and what we have cultivated right now will pay off in the future, regardless of the negative opinion that exists right now about cryptocurrencies in general. I believe we can show to the global crypto community, and new Zcash members, that a cryptocurrency like this is not about a price on the market, but about its social, economic, technological and cultural value for current and future generations. With Zcash Media we have a resource that can help us make this possible. It is not the only one, but it is a very useful and effective one.
So itās not just about educating about Zcash, but about the value of blockchain technology and privacy-oriented cryptocurrencies. Therefore, there is no good time to educate audiences, any time is a good and necessary time, especially when there is so much misinformation, negative news and little or no education as is happening now. It is time to educate and help people learn how to create and manage value in their life from private money with Zcash.
I am one of the Zcash ambassadors who has benefited from these videos as a resource to inform, educate, create content, interact and create awareness about the value of Zcash in social networks and the Spanish community. Nowadays audiovisual content is one of the most demanded in the digital world, so we need resources of this type and quality as the ones created by Zcash Media.
I understand that the budget for some may seem high given the current market situation, or perhaps, in any scenario. But the future results in conscious and intelligent adoption of Zcash thanks to the possibility of having a constant educational and marketing resource, will allow in a few years to receive a greater value in the adoption of Zcash than the budget that today is invested in financing this proposal of Zcash Media.
I commend the Zcash Media team for their honesty, creativity and transparency. A comprehensive and detailed project that is very well explained.
I hope this proposal is approved and that we continue to educate and promote Zcash adoption with the help of Zcash Media.
This is not true.
There are copious amounts of academic research on what drives innovation adoption, and how to drive it.
I recommend everyone to research a bit on the topic before making up your minds on whether or not to support this grant.
What research are you referring to? Links? Always happy to educate myself further 
.
Search for Daniel Khaneman research on behavioural economics (he even won a Nobel prize for it), Clayton Cheistensen on innovation management, and if you prefer something less dense but still scholarly go for Kim and Mauborgneās āBlue Ocean Strategyā.
High quality educational videos to explain Zcash are great, but we already have them.
Zookoās tweets encouraging people to go and ātake zecwallet for a spinā very likely did a lot more to drive adoption of zcash than these additional expensive videos ever will.
Thereās really no need for expensive videos beyond the ones that have already been produced, and that are great.
Yeahā¦ By the third video, there was already a drop in views of more than a half. After 12 more videos, how many people will still be interestedā¦
My major issue with funding this grant is that it prioritizes marketing over UX.
I think a good example to show that UX should be prioritized over marketing is Steve Jobsā example.
Replace āOpenDocā from this video with āZcashā and that seems like the current situation to me. Zcash has the best privacy and encrypted transaction tech, and now this grant is a massive marketing pushā¦. while UX is still not great.
Field of dreams building will only go so far imho. There will be a time for large marketing spend, but I think Zcash needs to prioritize UX first.
So when you say āZcash UX may improveāā¦ that scares me because if the UX does not improve then we will never reach critical mass adoption.
āYouāve got to start with the customer experience and then work back to the technologyā -Jobs
āWhat incredible benefits can we give to the customer?ā¦. NOT starting with sitting down with the engineers figure out what awesome tech we have and then how are we going to market itā -Jobs
To be clearā¦in my viewā¦ this grant is basically doing what Steve Jobs said NOT to do.
Iām 100% behind funding this grant.
Just to touch on a couple of points in this thread:
Quality matters for adoption, because weāre trying to talk to people outside of the crypto nerd community. Sorry to use a stereotype, but getting some young male tech guy whoās already interested in cryptocurrency to pay more attention to your particular coin is not the same as getting all the other people in your world onboard. Zcashmedia videos are the only videos I have ever sent to people in my life who otherwise have no clue: my realtor, my massage therapist, my cousins, etc. I want the value of Zcash to be understood by lay people. Thatās the adoption I care about.
Now is the best time. Videos like this gain like an investment. This is a ābest time to plant a treeā situation. For one thing, views accumulate and seeds are planted in minds. People will remember something that struck them later, at the right moment. Second, you can never anticipate when the Zeitgeist will be highest for a given concept. When the right thing happens in the news, you want the video that addresses that to be already made so you can link it. Itās too late to decide to make it after the fact. This is the groundwork that needs to be prioritised before the next bull run.
Iām linking my response to the original proposal, and also quoting the first and final paragraph.
āFully in favor of this proposal, weāve been crying out for years for high quality educational content and marketing campaigns to spread information and cut though the noise.ā
āIāve been really impressed with 37L since they came into the Zcash ecosystem, they seem to be here for the mission. We need a louder voice if we are going to empower everyone with economic freedom, I think 37L can help us find our voice.ā
I am also fully in favor of this new proposal, for main reasons see linked post / quotes above.
From reading the responses on this thread so far, I think most people are in agreement that the videos released to date have exceeded expectations, production quality has been excellent, 37L have handled themselves with integrity and have already started forming strong relationships with many Zcash stakeholders.
And I think most people who are not in favor of the proposal have an issue with the cost, and these are valid concerns.
Sidenote: I love that so many in this community are so prudent when evaluating grant proposals. It shows to me that they want whats best for Zcash long term and want us to get the best bang for our buck.
Butā¦ I still believe we should approve this team to continue putting out amazing content, I think the 37L team can be a huge asset to Zcash.
Of course we still need to put a major focus and emphasis on the technology and user experience. With ECC switching focus a bit to user experience I think that will be improving soon based on their excellent track record! When Zebra starts to reach feature parity weāll see more technical outputs from the ZFND team.
But we also need to increase our efforts in marketing and educational outreach.
Iāve been around here quite a while, and for as long as I can remember many many voices have been saying WE NEED MORE MARKETING for Zcash, now we can have that.
I truly believe 37L are best positioned to fill that gap.
My final point, the main purpose of this slice is to fund Major Grants, lets continue to do that.
This is amazing! I too have shared these video with others I typically wouldnāt due to the high quality of the videos. On the topic of shareability I wonder if there is interest in also creating a āsnack sizedā series of videos. Short 2-3minute videos (in landscape). Maybe outside the scope/budget of this grant but maybe not. Just an ideaā¦
UX never improving scares us too. But our work will take a long time to plan and execute, do we really have so little faith in the folks hard at work on UX that we canāt imagine improvements over the next 14 months? If our grant were somehow stopping someone from improving the UX, I would agree that the priorities were wrong. But, AFAIK, we are not hurting anyone with this work and it is not mutually exclusive with efforts to improve UX.
Another point this reminds me of is the fact that there is no magic wand to wave to automagically find the people that will come and work on every item in our collective wish lists. IMO it is unrealistic to say āok, first we hire a perfect team to make the ultimate wallet. Then, we bring back in 37L to release more videos when we are ready for them. Thenā¦ā Finding qualified people is hard - they donāt come and go at the drop of a hat. We are here, now, to continue our work bringing Zcash to the world and to dedicate a large portion of the next 1 year+ of our lives to helping Zcash on its way to becoming a household name.
It is interesting to me that you find Steve Jobsā example to be supportive of not spending on vision communication. While the point of focusing on customer experience is well taken, imo if anyone can be used to discuss the power of communication to drive a product to the top of the market, it is Steve Jobs.
What I took away from the video you linked was the need to focus and say ānoā to things that engineers may think are cool, and instead focus on what mass audiences want. To me, a better analogy to this discussion would be if we were proposing a project that, although other engineers may like, would not go to improving UX. Since we are not proposing to make a tool like OpenDoc, I think the relevance of that Jobs clip to this discussion is not clear, and is more in the eye of the beholder.
The creation of snack sized videos is actually in the budget! We budgeted for every video to be broken down into short, stand-alone segments that will be used to supplement the full length video releases.
The relevance is that the current UX of [shielded] Zcash (aside from YWallet/WarpSync) is not good enough for mass adoptionā¦ and yet the grant in this thread is one of the largest grants everā¦for marketing (not UX).
The point is ā¦we still have things backwards (which Jobs was saying). The UX for syncing a node, the UX for rescans (excl warpSync because thatās quite impressive and fast), the UX for and application of viewkeys and payment disclosures, the UX for institutional use-cases around reporting and compliance, the UX for interoperability, the UX for shielded multi-sig, the UX for converting to a stablecoin or way to pay billsā¦. All of those need to be addressed and the experience simplified where possible/feasible.
So, again, hypothetically, this grant passesā¦ and we get tens of thousands of new usersā¦ that will only be half of the road to success. If those new users funnel from the videos to current featured or āofficialā wallets, then the majority will end up bouncing/defecting because those UX topics above arenāt solved yetā ie use of [shielded] Zcash is still too complicated for the average person or missing UX elements.
For example, hereās a thought experiment for the community. What if this grant were rejected, and 2.75 ZEC were given to 10,000 new users instead. (Iām not suggesting we do that but thatās about $1.8 million). What would happen to those new users? Many would fail to set up zcashd and renege; many would just hold or sell it transparently on Coinbase/Gemini/etc; many would try to use ZecWallet/lite/mobile but get confused.
āVision communicationā is important. But I would argue that the recipe for Jobsā exceptional vision communication was that (especially later in his career) he presented a distilled vision AND then followed through by releasing a product with good UX within hours/days of walking off stage. classic Jobs: wouldnāt it be great to (fill in blank) ā¦ well order the all new (fill in apple product) after my talk 
We are simply not there yet on the product side of Zcash; so in my opinion, itād make more sense to invest in UXā¦ and ask this grant team to reduce their budget and number of proposed videos.
@z.yodler I appreciate your thoughts here. I can definitely tell that you, like everyone else here, cares about seeing Zcash succeed. For now, Iāll save the point by point response and just say that Iāve had this exact conversation with many Zcashers over the previous week and many people do think the UX is good enough for new users, at least for now - while others, like yourself, are worried about it.
One partly formed thought before signing off for the night, which may be something that the devs might not particularly love to hear (please forgive me!), is that there is something to be said for pressure. If indeed Zcash gains a ton of new users for any reason (especially if its because they actually have learned why Zcash is important and want to use it), then there will be actual, real-world stakes for improving the UX, implementing scalability, etc. Right now, a lot of these conversations are theoretical. And while its nice to be building things you think you might need, thereās nothing like actually battle-testing things against a wave of people depending on your technology. To be clear, I am not advocating for a āmove fast and break things approachā and I believe the world-class engineers of Zcash, from everything Iāve been told, have designed Zcash extraordinarily well to be as future-proof as possible. I am simply pointing out that part of the necessary feedback cycle for improving any product is having actual users pressuring you to succeed.
Now the Community is exploring NFT with just few budget and good ZEC incentives with PR and promoting and if the community can take the price to at least 15 ETH on floor. i believe the community will have more than 100k new users.
Videos like this are what I think we need more of. Electric Coin Company should reach out to the creator and ask for a cut of the Zcash part only for distribution @joshs
Free, Informative, and Simple
Spending $1.8 million does not feel responsible to the project in its current state. Iād also draw specific attention to questions about how that would be paid. Would that pay out in Cash only, or Zcash only, or a blend of both units of money?
If this can be paid out entirely or close to entirely in existing $USD funds, I am generally in favor.
If these funds are paid in ZEC weāve got to consider what risk this creates toward coin distribution (giving centralized control to deep pocket buyers)/ and a negative impact on spending in a few years (supposing that ZEC can eventually reclaim value near $200-300 a coin or more, then the fund in affect has sacrificed upwards of $4,000,000-5,000,000 of additional spending power)
Spending this much ZEC in a bear market, during a low liquidity cycle means that we are turning over valuable, discounted assets to Barry Silbert types who prey on distressed zodlers.
