Name of Grant
Token Motion Design Subscription
What is the work being proposed?
Dedicated professional graphic design, branding and animation service for the Rocket Pool team (potentially), the GMC and the Rocket Pool community. The duration is 6 months guaranteed availability. See tokenmotion.io for full list of potential deliverables.
How this grant would work
- Rocket Pool (Team/GMC/Community) requests designs for x, y, z.
- Token Motion takes the requests, creates designs from them and delivers media files.
- Rocket Pool (Team/GMC/Community) publishes delivered designs.
Implementation
Regarding the implementation of a design service, I propose two options for the GMC to consider.
1. Community sourced requests
Rocket Fuel has a submissions channel where collective suggestions are placed (asynchronously) and @waqwaqattack processes and delivers them in a polished format. Similar to this, Token Motion could have a channel called ‘RP design requests’, where anyone in the community can request media and provide info they feel could add to the outreach and promotion of rocket pool products/community initiatives.
As part of the grant:
- the RP community can request any designs they need.
- the RP GMC can request any designs they need.
- the RP team can request any designs they need.
If there are no requests queued at a particular time, Sleety would use his discretion (or poll #trading) to create materials that would be of general informational/educational value to Rocket Pool. Sleety has a history of these kinds of solutions, both voluntary (as a community member) and paid (tweet threads, RP team, related organizations).
2. Private Task Board
An alternative private task board (e.g. Trello) for the GMC/RP Team to curate. The benefits of this type of board is more targeted control on the creative output. While similar results could be achieved with the public Discord channel, there may be more noise in that approach vs. more signal/direction with control from the GMC/RP Team directly.
I don’t have a preferred method from a workflow perspective. The GMC should evaluate which approach would be most valuable. Happy to consider other options too!
One more thing…
With multiple requests, how do we prioritise them? Say the GMC requests an ad design, the community requests an explainer video and the team wants an announcement slide. What do?
A proposed solution:
If a queue forms, or I anticipate that future requests will require some input on prioritization, I can, in order:
- work on the most time-sensitive request first
- liaise with request creators to determine the highest priority artwork
- create a 24-hour poll in Discord to let people decide which option gets prioritized
Disclaimer
It is important to communicate to the GMC that Token Motion is not a marketing agency or a copywriting service. We produce visual representations of written content. We do not have the capacity to research, strategize, produce bespoke written content for RP in the way a marketing/copy agency would. Our designs will of course contain written content (ad copy, explainer scripts, tweet threads, social media announcements etc) but we do not write the content, it needs to be provided to us. The Rocket Pool community is unique in that there is an opportunity for anyone to collaborate with us to create an amazing stream of media. Lots of great information is shared everyday in the RP Discord, we want Token Motion to be the conduit that takes this out of Discord and into the world in the same way that Rocket Fuel does, but for visuals.
We do not require micromanagement and will take initiative on less consequential decisions, but we design the visual side of things, the illustrations, the animations, the typography choices, the spacing, the color palette, the attractiveness and delightfulness of things - not the written content. We specialize in arranging pre-existing information, providing creative direction on information provided to us and delivering high quality visuals - graphics, branding, animations, webpage designs, marketing materials, ads, educational GIFs and video walkthroughs.
Is there any related work this builds off of?
Not exactly related but we have done some paid work for the RP team (website illustrations, conference media), received a prior grant from the GMC for tweet thread and have consistently contributed media to the RP community (for free).
Will the results of this project be entirely open source (MIT, GPL, Apache, CC BY license or similar)? If not, which parts will not be, why, and under what license will they be published?
By default, designs will be CC BY, unless a design requires something different (e.g. logo or using another org’s logo for co-marketing)
Benefit
I’ve added a few potential design deliverables to each group - but ultimately the direction and focus of what gets produced would be GMC/Team/community led.
| Group |
Benefits |
| Potential rETH holders |
If the grant is successfully completed, how does this help people looking to stake ETH for rETH? Engaging visuals to help attract potential rETH holders. Maybe a series of walkthroughs on minting via RP website/buying rETH on selected secondary markets. Maybe an animated explainer on the Deposit pool mechanism. Maybe infographics on the decentralization of rETH compared to other LSTs. |
| rETH holders |
If the grant is successfully completed, how does this help rETH holders? Infographics on rETH supply stats, commission explainers, maybe a ui for yield calculation. |
| Potential NOs |
Lots of NO’s required, could benefit from onboarding explainers, visual aids in the official documentation, community enticement through sharing user experience videos. |
| NOs |
If the grant is successfully completed, how does this help people already running a Rocket Pool node? Could make ui design improvements, explain upgrades via visuals, demonstrate features, help series. |
| Community |
If the grant is successfully completed, how does this help the Rocket Pool community? Community gets a voice in the creation of media. Can crowd source effective visuals from other protocols and replicate for RP, offer an opportunity for big brains to have their writing enhanced with professional tier graphics. Could raise the collective presentation of community research. Could help brand important GMC funded projects. |
| RPL holders |
If the grant is successfully completed, how does this help RPL holders? RPL holders may benefit from educational content on Defi integrations, TAX explainers, tweet threads on RPL utility post-Saturn, constant stream of visual media to retain confidence in token, etc. |
Which other non-RPL protocols, DAOs, projects, or individuals, would stand to benefit from this grant?
I believe that in an effort to explain the value proposition of Rocket Pool, we educate the wider crypto community on the mechanisms of Ethereum staking, the value of decentralization and the importance of a home staker community (like Rocket Pool).
Work
Who is doing the work?
Token Motion / @sleety . Token Motion is a two-person design studio based in the UK. I (Sleety) will complete the majority of the digital design work.
What is the background of the person(s) doing the work? What experience do they have with such projects in the past?
@sleety - Graphic Designer / Animator for 12+ years and I been an active member of Rocket Pool community since April 2021. Proficient in Adobe Suite, Cinema4D and Figma. Main skillsets are graphic design, illustration, typography, animation, video, branding, web design. Also memery.
What is the breakdown of the proposed work, in terms of milestones and/or deadlines?
In terms of Milestones, I am happy to review performance at the end/beginning of each GMC period, with the deliverable being a quick PDF containing all media produced in the month for Rocket Pool - for GMC appraisal and accountability.
The ideal scenario is a continuous stream of design requests from all RP stakeholders for the duration of the grant. If quiet periods were to arise, Sleety would use his discretion to create materials that would be of general informational/educational value to Rocket Pool. Or Token Motion’s service would be fully available to the RP Team for internal, B2B, branding, co-marketing etc.
How will the work be maintained after delivery?
The deliverables will be media files (.png, .svg, .gif, .mp4, etc). Token Motion will deliver them as zip files. The files should to be published by person(s) with login credentials/authority to various social media outlets (discord, youtube, twitter, website, website docs).
Costs
What is the acceptance criteria?
A regular stream of high quality visual media produced by Token Motion.
What is the proposed payment schedule for the grant? How much USD $ and over what period of time is the applicant requesting?
Requesting $29,970 LUSD which secures a 6 months subscription to Token Motion’s dedicated design services. This translates to 12.5 hours per week (see below) dedicated to providing solutions to design problems in areas such as marketing/advertising, education, awareness and engagement.
While we don’t price explicitly on an hourly rate, it may be helpful to give an approximated example of value.
Rate for short term clients: $120/hr
12.5 hrs/wk * $120/hr = $1,500/wk * 4 (weeks in month)
= $6000/mo
Rate for long term clients: $100/hr
12.5 hrs/wk * $100/hr = $1,250/wk * 4 (weeks in month)
= $5000/mo
This calculation takes into account 4 weeks (20 workdays) + 8 UK public holidays of the year for holiday/breaks. Our calendar can be found here.
Is the applicant requesting RPL or LUSD?
LUSD
How will the GMC verify that the work delivered matches the proposed cadence?
The output of all design work (except for sensitive work, new releases, co-marketing announcements etc.) will be documented in the design channel and in the monthly round-up PDF.
What alternatives or options have been considered in order to save costs for the proposed project?
Working for the RP Team/GMC/community individually is feasible, but less cost effective. This approach allows all RP stakeholders to be involved. In addition, a long term commitment to Token Motion services saves the GMC a total of $6,000 ($29,970 vs. $35,970)
Conflict of Interest
Does the person or persons proposing the grant have any conflicts of interest to disclose? (Please disclose here if you are a member of the GMC or if any member of the GMC would benefit directly financially from the grant).
No
Will the recipient of the grant, or any protocol or project in which the recipient has a vested interest (other than Rocket Pool), benefit financially if the grant is successful?
No