The Power of Community Engagement in Octant
Big thanks to all of the projects who have gone through the process of joining us for Epoch One.
As we venture into the very first round of Octant in Epoch One, I wanted to share some tangible experiences that we had from our pre launch event, Epoch Zero, as well as a general sentiment I have for where we are as a community.
If you are a project seeking funding, you can definitely learn from what took place in Epoch Zero. What we noticed during that event was that there was a direct correlation between the results of funds received, and the ability of communities to activate both the Octant community as well as their own. Granted, some communities that participated were much larger than others, and this gave those projects an advantage. But there were other large community-based projects which participated that did not look to activate either theirs or ours, and the results showed.
Community Is The Heartbeat of Octant
Octant’s unique value isn’t just in its platform but, more crucially, in its people. It’s essential to remember a few things in that the Octant community is relatively small from where we aim to be, and this current community isn’t automatically in the loop about all of the new projects joining and their merits. Many of our community members come from the initial Golem Network project from long ago. Some of them are learning about the public goods funding ecosystem for the first time. As impactful as your project may be, their interests may lay elsewhere.
Setting Expectations:
I say all of this simply to set expectations early on. This is our first round, and we are not sure how the community will react. But, very importantly, the community determines the funding outcome of Octant. Many of the projects that participated in Epoch Zero will be doing their best to rally their supporters again for Epoch One. Many of these projects have a very large community to once again tap into. So if there is community support that you are able to draw in, be it through the small but growing Octant community, or a community that supports you that has yet to join, it would definitely benefit your outcome to do so. If there is no outside community to tap into, engaging actively where you can will help. Ideas around this might be teaming up with some of the other projects. Maybe holding a twitter spaces on your own, or designing communications around boosting awareness. Taking initiative here will go a long way.
A feature of Octant that is important know is that there is a minimum funding threshold, which is determined by the number of projects participating in an Epoch. If we have 20 projects this round, each project will need to receive 1/40th of what users donate. If you are unsure overall what decisions users go through in Octant, I highly recommend going through the docs at docs.octant.app.
Together, with a strong communication strategy and your invaluable contributions, we’re optimistic about the funding and support for each project. The initial steps might seem challenging, but the potential rewards — both in terms of funding and community expansion — are profound.
Eager to watch our community thrive with your active participation! Cheers!