Round 24 - GMC Call for Bounty Applications - Deadline is May 7

Grants / Bounties
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This thread is for applications for Rocket Pool’s April 7, 2025 - May 7, 2025 bounties. Please only post bounty applications in this thread. If you would like to discuss and/or ask questions about any applications you see in this thread, we ask that you do so in this separate forum thread (link) which has been established for all community discussions related to this round of applications. Only those bounty applications that are posted in this thread and timestamped by May 7, 2025 at 23:59 (11:59 PM) UTC will be considered. Any bounties posted after that deadline will be carried over to the next award period.

This is the expected schedule for round 24:

  • Application Period (April 7 - May 7)
  • Scoring Deadline (May 20)
  • Final Voting Amendments, Discussion and Finalization (May 21 - May 24)
  • Award Announcement (May 25)
Differences Between Grants and Bounties Grants are intended to be applied for by those who are wishing to carry out the work themselves. Bounties are open-ended goals that could be met by anyone, including those other than the proposing party. In other words, if I believed that Rocket Pool needed a fifty-foot paper mache orange rocket for publicity purposes and I wanted to be the one to built it, I would apply for a grant. If I instead thought Rocket Pool needed a fifty-foot paper mache orange rocket for publicity purposes but I wanted it to be open to whoever built it first to claim the reward (similar to a prize), then I’d apply for a bounty.

To guide you in your application, the GMC has established the following goals and the following scoring rubric:

GMC Goals

Grants, bounties, and retrospective awards should make it easier and/or more attractive to do one or more of the following:

  • become a node operator

  • operate a node, mint rETH

  • hold or use rETH

  • improve the quality of life for the protocol and its community.

Bounties Rubric

When evaluating grant applications, the GMC takes into account the following goals:

  • If the bounty is completed successfully, to what extent does it further the GMC goals?

  • To what extent is it likely that the bounty can be feasibly claimed/completed successfully?

  • If the bounty is successfully completed, how large is the benefit to the protocol relative to the size of the proposed costs?

Bounty Proposal Template

Guidelines

  • The goals of the Bounty Proposal are:
    • to communicate your bounty idea clearly, in general terms, such that the GMC can decide if it’s worth pursuing.
    • to estimate the benefits and costs attached to your proposal.
    • to disclose any relevant conflicts of interest.
  • Answers to the template questions do not need to be highly detailed. Estimates or ranges are acceptable. Brief answers are also fine.

Template

# Bounty Name

## General Information

### What is the nature of the proposed bounty?

### Why are you writing this bounty proposal?


## Benefit

<please enter N/A where appropriate>

| Group | Benefits |
|---|---|
| Potential rETH holders | If the bounty is successfully completed, how does this help people looking to stake ETH for rETH? |
| rETH holders | If the bounty is successfully completed, how does this help rETH holders? |
| Potential NOs |  If the bounty is successfully completed, how does this help people looking to run a Rocket Pool node for the first time? |
| NOs | If the bounty is successfully completed, how does this help people already running a Rocket Pool node? |
| Community |  If the bounty is successfully completed, how does this help the Rocket Pool community? |
| RPL holders |  If the bounty is successfully completed, how does this help RPL holders? |

### Which other non-RPL protocols, DAOs, projects, or individuals would stand to benefit from the bounty being successfully completed?



## Work

### What steps would be entailed in completing the bounty? Do successful examples of such work exist elsewhere? What skillsets or knowledge will be required?

### What advice would you give a bounty hunter working on this bounty?

### Should the output of this bounty be available under an open source license?



## Costs

### How much do you think the completion of this bounty worth to Rocket Pool (in USD)?

### How much work will be needed to verify this bounty has been completed? What skillsets or knowledge will be required?


## Structure

### How would you structure this bounty, and why? 
* A single payout to single team on completion? 
* Divided into milestones? 
* Multiple payouts to multiple teams? 
* Should this be written up as multiple bounty definitions?
* Something else?

### Is this bounty repeatable?

### Are there any reasonable circumstances under which this bounty should be withdrawn? Should it expire?


## Conflicts of Interest

### Does the person or persons proposing the bounty 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 successful completion of the bounty).

### Will the applicant, or any protocol or project in which the applicant has a vested interest (other than Rocket Pool), benefit financially if the bounty is successfully completed?

Bounty Definition Template

Guidelines

  • When a single proposal bounty proposal has parts that must be completed by different groups, it should become multiple definitions.
  • Where reasonably possible, bountiy definitions should limit the number of distinct skillsets required for completion of the bounty.
  • Bounties should be defined in terms of the smallest worthwhile unit of work. IE: $25 to add/update a single relevant FAQ question rather than $5,000 to update the FAQ.
  • Include any information or resources that might reasonably help a bounty hunter complete the bounty.
  • Think carefully about which tasks are required, and which can be optional.
  • Clearly list any dependencies, if the bounty cannot be completed in all circumstances.
  • Only include multiple milestones for large bounties with natural points of division.

Template

# Bounty Name 

## Data
* Repeatable?
* Expiring?
* Skillsets for completion? (See existing bounties and reuse where possible, new skillsets are recommended if sufficiently distinct)
* Relevant tags? (See existing bounties and reuse where possible, new tags are recommended if sufficiently distinct)
* Min reward (USD)?
* Max reward (USD)?
* Any linked definitions? (e.g. if a single bounty proposal becomes multiple definitions.)
* Any dependencies? 

## Summary 
Short 1-3 sentences describing the bounty.

## Dependencies
Is there anything that must happen (outside of a bounty hunter's control) before it is possible to complete this bounty? This may be other bounties that must be completed first, an upcoming event or change or a regular occurance that triggers a valid bounty. This section is optional. May be later removed from the definition if the dependency becomes permanently met. 

## Required Milestones
What _must_ be completed for a bounty hunter to claim some amount of bounty. Described per milestone.

### Milestone A - <Name of Milestone>
**Payout: ** <payout amount>
Clear bulleted list or subheadings covering the items that must be completed and/or adhered to for this milestone to be valid.

### Milestone B - <Name of Milestone>
**Payout: ** <payout amount>
Clear bulleted list or subheadings covering the items that must be completed and/or adhered to for this milestone to be valid.

### Milestone C - <Name of Milestone>...

## Optional Milestones
What tasks _may_ be completed for a bounty hunter to earn extra bounty rewards. Described per milestone. This section is optional.

Optional milestones may be less strictly defined than required milestones. You may aggregate multiple minor considerations that would contribute to a payout. 

### Milestone D - <Name of Milestone>
**Maximum Payout: ** <maximum payout amount>
Clear bulleted list of the items that would contribute to payout for this milestone.

### Milestone E - <Name of Milestone>...


## Further Notes
Anything you think that would be beneficial for a bounty hunter to know when working on this bounty. Maybe be divided into subsections as needed.

## Resources
Links to repositories, web pages, forum discussions, etc. Anything that the bounty hunter may be able to use to do a better job on the bounty work. 

## Contacts
Individuals that have agreed to act as contacts for this bounty. Include usernames + contact details for any platform on which the contact is willing to respond to requests. Any contacts are expected to fully understand the bounty definition. This section is optional. 

Contacts:
* MAY be eligible for incentives.
* SHOULD NOT assist the bounty hunter directly with the bounty work.
* SHOULD assist bounty hunters via feedback, direction and oversight upon request.

## Verification
Who is expected to verify that the work delivered meets the relevant milestones? This person or group must have agreed to do this in advance of this definition being published. This person or group should have any relevant skillsets needed to properly verify the bounty work.

Please Note - Treasury Situation:
During this time of treasury distress, the GMC would like to reiterate its strong preference for grants over retroactive awards—especially for development work. Pre-approval is important and appropriate for development features. Grant applications should be scoped in advance to ensure alignment and accountability.

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## Name of Grant
Message Maxxing for Rocket Pool - Video Content

### What is the work being proposed?
The work proposed is a full suite of videos to help with Rocket Pool’s messaging. The goal of the project will be to upgrade RP’s presence on the website and across social media channels like X. The goal being to increase the brand recognition through video and bring in new users to Rocket Pool.

The grant will include animated explainer videos to be used on the website, animations applied to the current website images, and a full content plan of shorter videos and graphcs to be used across X and Youtube.

### Is there any related work this builds off of?
Most of the work will be created custom but we’ll take the images on the website (i.e. the ones for Liquid Staking and Node Staking) and animate them.

Beyond that, everything will be custom made specifically for this grant.

### Will the results of this project be entirely open source ([MIT] If not, which parts will not be, why, and under what license will they be published?

As we do more work, the assets will be loaded into the RP Figma file, building a full toolkit of graphics that can be used.

## Benefit

| Group | Benefits |

|—|—|

| Potential rETH holders | If the grant is successfully completed, how does this help people looking to stake ETH for rETH? |

The main purpose of the grant is to help bring new users into the Rocket Pool fold. With this, our messaging will appeal to potential rETH holders who can learn more about the protocol, be impressed with the messaging, and become rETH holders. Videos can also help educate people on how to use the platform.

| rETH holders | If the grant is successfully completed, how does this help rETH holders? |
This grant will boost the messaging of Rocket Pool, bringing more users into the RPL community, and increasing the value of rETH for holders. They will also have go-to videos to share with friends and family for why they love Rocket Pool.

| Potential NOs | If the grant is successfully completed, how does this help people looking to run a Rocket Pool node for the first time? |
Although a secondary benefit, we could aim to create videos offering run-through’s of how to run a Rocket Pool node. These videos will be educational in nature, while helping to increase our main purpose of the grant, which is to bring in new users to Rocket Pool. These videos, when shared on X, will help to show viewers the mechanisms for running a Rocket Pool node and contribute to the overall protocol messaging.

| NOs | If the grant is successfully completed, how does this help people already running a Rocket Pool node? |

| Community | If the grant is successfully completed, how does this help the Rocket Pool community? |
The videos will be encapsulating different aspects of the Rocket Pool protocol. The videos will offer an easy way to become educated on the in’s and out’s of Rocket Pool, meaning new members of the community will be better educated coming in, and established community members will have resources to share with anyone who may be confused.

| RPL holders | If the grant is successfully completed, how does this help RPL holders? |
This grant will boost the messaging of Rocket Pool, bringing more users into the RPL community, and increasing the value of RPL for holders. They will also have go-to videos to share with friends and family for why they love Rocket Pool.

Which other non-RPL protocols, DAOs, projects, or individuals, would stand to benefit from this grant?

None.

Work

Who is doing the work?

Work on the project “Message Maxxing for Rocket Pool” will be completed by Between The Lines Media, a marketing agency specializing in video marketing.

What is the background of the person(s) doing the work? What experience do they have with such projects in the past?

Between The Lines Media has done marketing for protocols like Liquity, Defi Saver, Neptune Finance, and many others, and is a trusted source of video creation within the DeFi community.

Example videos can be found here:
Defi Saver: [https://youtu.be/8n3ln0xxsHw]
Liquity: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1XYLTtfPpo-HC6Jb9M4o2r3D9ddJoPup2/view

What is the breakdown of the proposed work, in terms of milestones and/or deadlines?

The breakdown of the project is as follows:

Flagship video: General explainer video to be placed on the front page of the Rocket Pool website - Delivered for June 2025.
Converting website images into animations - Delivered in late June 2025
X marketing - 24 graphics and 10/12 short videos per month to be used as content - Beginning in July 2025

How is the work being tested? Is testing included in the schedule?

During the content marketing phase, we’ll be able to measure the engagement of our content to make sure we’re hitting key KPIs in terms of adoption. Adjustments can be made based on success or failures engagement-wise.

How will the work be maintained after delivery?

Upon approval of videos, they will not need maintenance. If there are any branding changes for Rocket Pool as a whole, the Rocket Pool videos can be updated, but there may be additional costs involved in this.

With the ongoing content, any updates to branding can be incorporated into future videos.

Costs

What is the acceptance criteria?

What is the proposed payment schedule for the grant? How much USD $ and over what period of time is the applicant requesting?

For the initial explainer video to start off the project, payment will be delivered on the assumption of two minutes.

First payment: $4400 USD or it’s equivalent in other currencies
Second Tier: 4-6 animations based on already existing illustrations. $500/image.
Social Media Tier: $4000-$8000 USD / month for three months (pricing dependant on if we handle just media creation or the full social media strategy and posting).

How will the GMC verify that the work delivered matches the proposed cadence?

Every stage and work flow will be agreed upon before beginning, with multiple stages that will require approval at each stage. We can speak with Grant, the ecosystem lead, or we can build with the CMO.

What alternatives or options have been considered in order to save costs for the proposed project?

There are a few potential alternatives that could be considered to save costs:

  • Lower quality animation: It’s possible to use lower quality animation but the effect is generally that it gives the wrong vibe that we are trying to convey. With a lower quality animation, the movement and illustrations, while not terrible, feel ‘off’. It subconsciously conveys that there’s an unwillingness to invest in high quality for the project. A higher-quality animation, however, will offset the inconsistencies and difficulties found in using lower cost options.
  • B-roll: B-roll and edits can look good and would come in at a lower price point, but is not as in line with RP’s branding. Although a possibility, animation is the better strategy.

Have you already been compensated by the RP protocol in any way for this work?

No

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 potential conflict of interests.

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.

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Rocket Pool Support Payments #4 (June 2025 - November 2025)

Note: My additions to the original bounty content are marked for clarity, while the original text is retained for context.

General Information

What is the nature of the proposed bounty?

Provide support for questions posed by Rocket Pool community members in the # support discord channel; questions come largely from Node Operators and those hoping to be Node Operators.

Allowing prospective payments allows for both effective budgeting from the DAO, the possibility of increasing payments for critical time periods (for example, bonus payments to encourage more #support contributors around rocketpool v2, LEB rollout, or megapool transition), and quicker feedback to contributors for their efforts.

This is a continuation of the previously approved Support Payments #3 (Round 19 - GMC Call for Bounty Applications - Deadline is December 7 - #3 by epineph) submitted by Epineph.

Why are you writing this bounty proposal?

  1. I think #support has been one of the most important services offered by the RP community and deserves regular reimbursement. This is particularly true as we look towards scaling up and lowering bonds in :checksnotes: the next 8 months with the new NOs we are trying to onboard.

  2. I think prospective reimbursement is both easier to administer and more effective than a retrospective payment structure.

  3. I think the previous bounty period May-November shows that this type of bounty has not resulted in any large-scale negative effects in #support (eg bots or low quality contributions)

  4. (NEW) Support was initially provided by volunteers and not funded by the GMC, during a time when the protocol was thriving. Incentivizing similar levels of service today—while recognizing loyal contributors to the protocol and community—offers meaningful benefits.**

  5. (NEW) I am updating the costs section to account for the state of the treasury and the recent support activity.

Benefit

<please enter N/A where appropriate>

Group Benefits
Potential rETH holders questions answered, although much of this is done in # general/# trading
rETH holders Solving NO issues ultimately benefits rETH holders through less downtime and drag on APR, as well as facilitating the supply side of rETH
Potential NOs Huge benefit, both for answering questions and for the assurance that should problems come up, there is an active support structure
NOs see above
Community The community provides support; this bounty will regularize payments. The payments will all go to community members. The folks who are active in # support are often active in other parts of the protocol that they are not reimbursed for
RPL holders By creating a budget for # support, the payments will be more regular and we will not have as many unclaimed allocations weighing on our balance sheet

Which other non-RPL protocols, DAOs, projects, or individuals would stand to benefit from the bounty being successfully completed?

So it is likely that questions about Rocket Pool adjacent protocols (as examples, NodeSet or Dappnode) sometimes pop up in support, but almost always in the context of Rocket Pool nodes.

Work

What steps would be entailed in completing the bounty? Do successful examples of such work exist elsewhere? What skillsets or knowledge will be required?

Provide user support in the # support channel of discord, under the following terms:

  1. Provide at least 1 hour of work providing #support discord channel in EACH of the three months June - August 2025 or September - November 2025, as measured by RocketScrape; alternatively provide 15 hours TOTAL over each 3 month block.

  2. Within the first 3 days after a 3 month block ends a list of all potential awardees will be produced by GMC.

  3. A 10-day period will follow where any community member can publicly or privately notify the GMC that a potential awardee was not providing support (for example, was requesting support) or not providing quality support (for example, multiple ineffective messages/farming). Anyone offering # support can also petition to add their name to the list if they narrowly failed the initial inclusion criteria and can be included on a case-by-case basis.

  4. The GMC will investigate the # support record of any questioned potential awardee and weight contributions either 0%, 50%, or 100% based on posts on # support channel. The 50% level will be for users with approximately 25%-75% effective support messages. Potential awardees receiving 0% or 50% will be considered 0% or 50% for future # support bounties unless they specifically request and are granted re-evaluation.

  5. The “cost” below will be split proportionally amongst all awardees based on time spent as measure by RocketScrape and adjustments based on investigation in (5); payment will be done during the next GMC distribution phase.

Note: No further # support retroactive awards will be considered for this timeframe to # support contributors.

What advice would you give a bounty hunter working on this bounty?

The pot is a fixed amount. If there are people who are not actively helping or should not be providing # support, there should also be self-monitoring to ensure that high quality contributors are not diluted. This can be done on the back-end by GMC oversight, but self-policing is encouraged (if for no other reason than a better experience for support seekers).

  • If farming becomes an issue then some degree of whitelisting (support guild) may be needed in the future.

Should the output of this bounty be available under an open source license?

N/A, although rocketscrape should continue to be open source.

Costs (UPDATED)

How much do you think the completion of this bounty worth to Rocket Pool (in USD)?

Previously, support was funded at $18,000 per 3-month period.

This effectively worked out to around $8.50 per hour for 24/7 coverage.

Hourly Costs Over Time

Period Hourly Cost Total Hours
Bounty 1 $ 100.31 179.45
Bounty 2 $ 88.73 202.86
Bounty 3 $ 122.82 146.55

Source: Support Bounty Breakdown - Google Sheets

I’ve revised this proposal with the following considerations:

  • The GMC is actively pursuing cost-saving measures.

  • $18,000 is no longer a suitable benchmark given the reduced level of support activity.

I recommend a new cap of $15,000 per 3-month period. (This proposal covers two three-month periods)

In the most recent support period, contributors submitted 146 hours.

To create a more activity-aligned model, I propose using the formula:
$1,000 × √(total support hours)

For example:

  • At 144 hours submitted, the payout would be $12,000.

  • At 100 hours, the payout would be $10,000.

This approach helps ensure compensation scales appropriately with actual activity and avoids overpaying during low-volume periods.

How much work will be needed to verify this bounty has been completed? What skillsets or knowledge will be required?

  • RocketScrape
  • GMC investigation by reading support messages of people identified as not offering quality support.
  • Math

Structure

How would you structure this bounty, and why?

Payments portionally split amongst all awardees based on adjusted hours worked per RocketScrape, as listed above.

Is this bounty repeatable?

The goal is to provide reimbursement for ongoing support. There are other ways to pay contributors prospectively, and it may be that other better systems are proposed. I think this systems is very low overhead and ‘good enough’. The specific amount is always open to negotiation from GMC.

Are there any reasonable circumstances under which this bounty should be withdrawn? Should it expire?

Only good for the 6 months in question. It should be withdrawn if there is significant evidence of gaming. It can be withdrawn effective immediately based on GMC request; in this case prorated awards would be calculated up to the withdrawal date.

Conflicts of Interest

Does the person or persons proposing the bounty 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 successful completion of the bounty).

I am the GMC administrator.

Steely, a member of the GMC, has received compensation from previous support bounties.

I consulted haloooloolo, an active member in the support community on the logistics and pricing of this bounty. Epineph proposed an alternative payout calculation here - Discord

Will the applicant, or any protocol or project in which the applicant has a vested interest (other than Rocket Pool), benefit financially if the bounty is successfully completed?

No

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Notice: This message marks the closing of the twenty fourth (24) round of Rocket Pool bounty applications. Any applications submitted after this will not be considered for this round. The GMC will announce the award recipients in a new thread here on the forums around May 25th. The community will then have two weeks to issue any challenges before funds are disbursed. Thank you to all who applied and thank you to everyone who has followed along. Anyone who would like to comment on existing applications is encouraged to do so in this thread.