ZOMG Google Meet Meeting: September 14, 2021
[Minutes taken by Danika]
Meeting minutes:
Attendance:
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Hudson Jameson
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ML_Sudo
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Shawn
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Chris Burniske
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Holmes Wilson
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Alex Bornstein acting as ZF resource
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Danika Delano acting as notetaker
Notes:
Alex Questions/Updates
- Alex informed the committee that ZF is working on processes for Request for Proposals (RFPs) and standard operating procedures to make things clear; some is new documentation and some members may have opinions. Alex explained that the Foundation usually shares Google docs and Sheets and asked what the best way of sharing these would be so that ZOMG can make sure they are accurate.
- All members agreed to review in Google doc/ sheets form.
- Chris asked if Alex could give them at least 72 hours before any document goes live. Alex replied that 72 hours is not a problem at all as none of the docs are super urgent. He would like to send them to the ZOMG members by early next week and give everyone a couple of weeks to finalize.
- Alex asked if there was any opposition to having Winfred (ZF new Head of Communications) reach out to a few people that received grants to gather testimonials. No members had any objections.
- Alex brought up the topic of publicizing grants i.e when ZOMG awards a grant or a grant is complete. He asked if the comms person could use the ZOMG Twitter handle or if they would Tweet on behalf of the Foundation and have a ZOMG member retweet with the ZOMG handle; he asked if they had opinions about how the two Twitter accounts play off each other.
- Hudson said that the process should specify that grantee approval news is not posted to Twitter immediately; perhaps X days after it’s approved in a meeting this has to be done so it holds people accountable to a timeline to communicate with the grantee.
- Holmes replied that in an ideal scenario a ZF comms person would be the one to notify grantees on the forum and ZOMG would include in the minutes what they want to say to grantees; the helper person would post a congratulations post on the forum and they would handle replies on the forum and publicize; they put everything into motion so they don’t have to worry about who does what first. He said they can add the ZF comms person to the ZOMG Twitter account so they can use it as well as ZOMG members; ZOMG wanted someone in this role to manage social media.
- Alex stated that the person to do this would be the incoming Ecosystems Relations Manager and he is fine with him managing the forum communication and Twitter announcements when he is onboarded; in the meantime, ZF would love to get things posted immediately. Alex proposed Winfred wait to post until a ZOMG member announces they have approved a grant on the forum and, in the future, the ZF representative will manage the full cycle.
- Holmes commented that it would be great if grantees add a Youtube video and suggested that they require all grantees to make an artifact (YouTube, blog post, etc) to spread the word about the grant and to make the case that they are doing a good thing. Alex agreed that any content and publicity would be an improvement. Hudson commented that it’s good for ZOMG work alongside ZF. Alex replied that the goal is for ZF to take the action, ZOMG to look it over and provide feedback and then ZF will finalize.
ECC Acceleration using GPU Compute on Mobile devices
- Shawn reminded the committee that there are still questions about the usefulness; there are some discussions (above Shawn’s understanding) between Hanh, Deirdre, and Str4d on the forums suggesting that maybe it won’t work the way Hanh thinks it will happen, but there’s still more discussion happening.
- Hudson commented that he is excited that some ZOMG candidates are more technical.
- Holmes agreed that it’s hard to follow; the info posted will affect Hanh’s milestones but they will need to wait. Hudson advocated waiting for Hanh to respond to Holmes’ question;iIt doesn’t look like he’s in a rush. Shawn said he is okay with waiting. ML said that she’s not sure if this is the highest impacting thing to do. Shawn agreed and added, especially if he is transitioning to a BTCpay server.
Paying Hanh for phase 3 for CoinPayments
- ML explained that there were 4 phases in the CoinPayments grant; Hanh realized that CoinPayment was not going to work with him; ZOMG has already agreed to pay for phase 2 but he is now asking to be paid for milestone 3 because he had already done the work for it; ML said the work has been done but she doesn’t like paying out phase 3 when it was closed at phase 2; ZOMG needs to be fiscally responsible; his work should be converted into something that is usable. All members agreed.
- Shawn added that he should close out CoinPayments and start fresh with the BTCpay grant.
- Holmes stated that ZOMG needs to be explicit that at any milestone ZOMG can cancel the grant if anything changes in the circumstances of the grants; grantees shouldn’t run ahead of milestones and be expected to be paid for it as ZOMG did not get the chance to pull the plug. ML replied that she doesn’t think it’s something they would have to worry about with others, they just need to have a conversation with him. Holmes replied that it’s good to be explicit about these things; this is a weird corner case and ZOMG can put in language and they can refer to it if it comes up again; Holmes volunteered to propose language and a place to put it.
Elemental ZEC – UI Component Kit and Payment Processor
- Hudson explained that this grant Utilizes the BTC pay system; originally they submitted a proposal that was too broad; with their skillset the applicant can build something that’s modular; others can build a use-case on components. Shawn asked if Hudson was suggesting they team up with Hanh. Hudson said it could be cool and he will make a note to talk to them about Hanh.
- Hudson said he is in contact with the developer and he thinks they can get it done and the budget isn’t too bad; there is a question if it interacts with Hanh’s work.
- Chris stated that he likes it; it’s clear and they give a background; they are an experienced open sourced developer; he doesn’t have an opinion on how it overlaps with Hahn’s projects but he wants them building things for Zcash.
- Shawn commented that they are a good developer and, judging from the content of the proposal and ideas of teaming up, there’s more conversations to be had.
- ML disclosed that she has to recuse herself from discussing this grant as there is a conflict of interest.
- Holmes said he likes it; in the first milestone they propose to collect feedback from other people and that contains all his concerns; he could say yes now.
- Hudson said that he would want them to connect with Hanh first. Shawn agreed, especially since they just posted the application an hour ago.
- Hudson volunteered to talk to Hanh and the applicant.
- ML brought up that she thinks DC wrote something in his free time that may be related so she’ll ask DC to take a quick look.
- Hudson pointed out the grant is for $253K; he didn’t fully understand it but he thinks it’s a Zcash website for Joomla users.
- Shawn explained that it’s like wordpress; if you go to wordpress.org it has some functionality and you can add plugins for CoinPayments or BTCpay and this grant is proposing using Joomla to have a native ZEC component and sounds kind of interesting but can be redundant if there are already plug-ins that support ZEC; Shawn asked how many websites that use Joomla want to use Zcash integration; the applicant is proposing to hire a bunch of professionals, how did he come up with $253K if he is having professionals do the work for him?; that seems questionable.
- Chris agreed that he doesn’t like it when they have to assemble a team and that team is contingent on the grant money; he asked, how do you approve when you don’t know who they are?
- ML shared that she doesn’t mind them creating a team; the grant is well written and the video makes it clear, the biggest problem is the demand; ZOMG should add a requirement to prove the demand; it is really interesting but the demand/market is not there.
- Holmes agreed that the demand and market is not there and it is also an indirect way of doing it.
- Hudson asked if there are other plugins that use Zcash integration and if there is any indication of demand; they can just say no or ask questions.
- Shawn said that because they don’t have a fully assembled team and the niche of Joomla, he says no.
- Hudson also said no.
- ML voiced that it’s unlikely, but she’s curious if they can prove the demand. All members agreed that they should ask.
- Shawn added that if they show demand and can reduce the scope and deliver a more simple product it would be more palatable.
- ML volunteered to respond.
Zcash + Open Index Protocol Integration (Ztube)
- Shawn Explained that contributors can upload video content, but hosting of the video content is not in the grant; there is discussion about who they are providing content to; it is app based only and people can upload video content like Zeme Team did with paying for gifs.
- Hudson said he’s having trouble seeing the value for how complicated it is; they are using PIN to store the metadata and it uses BTC and RVN and stuff.
- Chris pointed out that one of the applicants, Ryan Taylor, is a known entity in ZF; it looks like it’s sleeving content in and he is not as interested in this as elemental ZEC; he pointed out that it would be the second largest grant.
- ML stated that she is not hot on this one.
- Hudson agreed with Chris that they are proposing to sleeve ZEC in OIP publications; it’s a big grant and he’s not convinced of its usefulness.
- Shawn pointed out the cons listed are it’s not moderated so any content can be uploaded to it, good or bad.
- Holmes said he would like to spend more time looking at it; his overall intuition is that it doesn’t feel like the grant is coherent and he doesn’t have as much confidence as he’d like; it doesn’t seem to make Zcash stronger/more useful, it is more of a proof of concept; there is something good about creating video content and he has a high bar; he suggested they see if they want to make YouTube related content for Zcash; the current grant doesn’t seem to make the Zcash ecosystem stronger.
- Shawn said he’s a no because of the content and price.
- All agreed to say no.
- Holmes volunteered to respond.
- Chris added that it’s not a rational price and there is a lack of additiveness to the Zcash protocol.
A stablecoin for the Zcash Community
- Chris said the applicant asked him to hop on a call to talk about scaling; he said he hasn’t taken it because he doesn’t want to take it if ZOMG members are totally closed; he observed that they haven’t had any volume in the last 24 hours; there is conversation about how to integrate ZEC into ETH DeFi; if he looks at this and Thorchain, they are the same amount, and, if he had to do one, he would go for Thorchain (he acknowledged ZOMGis not required to choose just one); he asked if everyone was closed or if he should take the call.
- Shawn said he wasn’t in favor because it’s built on RenZec so he’s still a no.
- Holmes also said he’s still a no because anyone that wants to do DeFi could use RenZec right now so this wouldn’t add anything to it and doesn’t bring us closer to having a private ZEC stablecoin.
- Hudson also said he’s still a no and said if Chris wants to put it on hold to talk to them, that’s fine but he, personally, wouldn’t take the call unless it’s just for courtesy; they would have to show a track record of low liquidity and prob have ZSAs to have a rigid stablecoin that will bode better than what they are trying to do.
- Chris decided to politely decline online.
Thorchain
- Chris informed the members that the applicant posted an update on the forum; they talked about how it was a blessing in disguise that it got pushed back and they plan to start development in Oct.
- Hudson asked if it was Aditya from Nighthawk.
- Chris pointed out that they are running for ZOMG which is great but they will need to abstain from a lot of grants; they said that they are going to update the budget and timeline but he’s not sure if they did that; Chris stated he is a yes for Thorchain.
- Hudson commented that he is leaning toward a yes but he needs to know if they updated first.
- Holmes said he is a yes; the only reason he was hesitant before is because they had open grants.
- ML said she is pro-Thorchian but she wants to evaluate the quality of work before they approve. Christ asked when they will get it. Holmes replied that he can evaluate it.
- ML asked, if they didn’t have resource constraints, who is best to evaluate?
- Holmes replied that the ECC wallet team could look at the Nighthawk wallet grant and could probably look at BlockExplorer, with enough time; basically engineers with product experience that know about Zcash stuff; someone less qualified could evaluate BlockExplorer but they could have a RFP for evaluating the wallet.
- Alex voiced that this is why Requests for Information (RFI’s) are the ultimate goal - to have experts ready to provide input when needed.
- Holmes agreed; he suggested they write up a RFI now to test that process. Alex replied that it will take a few weeks and he wouldn’t want to hold up anything; ZF is days away from sending a RFP/RFI template for ZOMG review.
- Chris commented that they can delay the decision because it doesn’t look like they’ve updated the budget and timeline.
- Shawn asked ML if she wants to hold out until they evaluate the other grants. ML replied that she does based on the evaluation balance and it’s prudent to approve later.
- Hudson agreed and reiterated that they hadn’t updated the post.
Also, welcome