Karma Finance September 2020 Update

4 min readSep 30, 2020

This month saw the birth of Karma Finance and the launch of one of the very few giving-based efforts in crypto. We’d like to thank everyone for helping to get this community-funded project off of the ground.

Here are some highlights, as well as where we are now.

Roadmap

We have illustrated the four stages of the Karma Finance project here. Now in Phase 0, we are focused on developing our brand message, personality, and introducing ourselves to the public.

Phase 0: Awareness
Phase 1: Understanding
Phase 2: Wisdom
Phase 3: Enlightenment

Note that timeframes for each phase are on the way!

Marketing

A big part of Phase 0 is marketing. The more people that know about what we’re doing the more we can help others help themselves.

We began experimenting with one of two different approaches to marketing. As our first experiment, we tested out three resources to promote our project via social media. This is the typical crypto route and, while oftentimes an effective roller coaster ride, we felt it was a bit premature. Although only two resources were actually able to perform work, we quickly discovered that this approach did not suit the needs of the project at this time.

Before that, we need a solid message with some icing on the cake.

The second approach may be best at drawing attention to our unique story and value proposition. By retaining an expert public relations resource to work more effectively across less man-hours, we may have a chance to leapfrog to major media outlets, bypassing the low-hanging fruit of the usual crypto marketing.

What does it mean? A PR campaign (lite) that highlights something good happening in crypto when there’s so much in the world of crypto to be desired. That’s us.

We will continue to evolve our growth marketing strategy. Although we’re still looking for a social media manager and others to increase the immediate reach of the Karma Finance message, particularly on Twitter, we will give more focus to positioning ourselves to a much broader audience.

Some Icing on the Cake

When thinking about the journey one will take when using the upcoming Karma DeFi protocol, we mustn’t forget our core message: Help Others Who Help Themselves.

Basically, a recipient of a Karma ‘donation’ isn’t getting something for nothing. (There is too much ‘nothingness’ in the universe for that to be feasible.) A recipient should show themselves to be a productive member of society rather than a burden to society.

So let’s give them a way to show it from their smartphones. (And yes, hundreds of millions of poor folks around the world have smartphones.)

The first idea is an app like Instagram that would allow users to showcase their life and what they’re doing with it. Why do they actually need help and how will it make them a better person? Those who want to give can browse the app and check out their personal stories, uploaded media, etc., and give them as many KARBS as they’d like. The app could also have an integrated wallet.

The second idea is a bit more complicated, but a lot more interesting. It would allow a user to join a guild over an app. Each guild has one task: train an AI to create the most entertaining and compelling social media content. How? With an easy swipe left or right. Essentially, this would be an app with short-form videos, image montages, and text where 100% of the content is created by any number of AI bots. The bots would be simple, as they would not need to be very accurate nor used in business environments. Behind each AI ‘personality’ is a group of people working together to make their AI better or more popular than others. The guilds would do the work of filtering out content less likely to be popular, in an engaging and fun way. Other users would then donate KARBS to individual content or their favourite AI, to be distributed within a guild based on each member’s activity score.

Emerging markets need emerging technologies. The poor making a quantum leap to blockchain? That’s good, but how about allowing them to easily use AI and blockchain over an app in ways that even the general public does not yet?

Let us know which option you think would propel Karma Finance to the front page of the Wall Street Journal. Community feedback is always appreciated!

Token Supply

A rundown of KFI total supply:

Community Reserve — 155,000 tokens
-85% locked for one year (131,750 tokens)
Team Reserve — 155,000 tokens
-100% locked for one year (155,000 tokens)
Development Reserve — 155,000 tokens
-85% locked for one year (131,750 tokens)
Angel Liquidity Providers — 42,521 tokens
-final distribution at the end of October, 2020
Miscellaneous — 5,478 tokens
-intended as an emergency reserve, for miscellaneous expenses, etc.

Total of 513,000 tokens

The ALPs

All 41.48 ETH that our Angel Liquidity Providers had loaned to the project at its inception has already been returned from KFI’s Uniswap liquidity coffers (about 6 weeks early).

Approximately 19,000 KFI has already been distributed to ALPs in consideration, some of whom were kind enough to provide additional liquidity once tokens were in their possession. The remaining 23,000 KFI will be distributed to ALPs during the final round of distribution the month of October.

The Purpose of the KFI Token

Please note that the KFI token is a utility token, not an investment or security. KFI tokens are intended to be used for governance and access to features of the Karma Finance protocol.

Official Links

Securities disclaimer