Proposed by:
Requested amount:
0 DOT

#1405 · Live-Streamer Retroactive Proposal

Live-Streamer Retroactive Proposal

Information:
Proposer: Brad
Wallet address: 12uYULCstsq2Nd5hmjPidnSQGDcy4WJhLFw9qJJFEz6tEbiQ
Requested allocation: 25,000 USD

Campaign Start Date: July 10, 2024
Campaign End Date: January 27, 2025

Email: [email protected]

NOTE: Future requests will be done through the Phragmen Funding, as they currently (to my knowledge) do not support retroactive requests. In addition, I attempted to do this through the marketing bounty with Crane’s help and I was redirected to someone who advised me to do future requests through the Phragmen Funding.

Summary of the proposal: This proposal seeks payment ($25,000) for a popular video-game streamer promoting Polkadot by displaying a large neon logo and discussing Polkadot during live-streams with a vast younger audience. This has resulted in ~20,000,000 total video and stream views from July 10, 2024, to January 27, 2025, respectively.

Context of the proposal: This proposal requests compensation for a campaign of ~7 months by an accomplished video-game streamer who has endorsed Polkadot daily for nearly a year across various platforms including TikTok, Twitch, Youtube, Instagram, and Discord. The campaign contains constant visible branding, direct engagement, and integrating Polkadot directly into the content, largely boosting Polkadot's visibility among a younger demographic.

View Proposal (Google Docs)

The compensation amount: In my first proposal with Mister Cole's help, I decided to request a lower amount because it was my first interaction with the broader Polkadot community. After this passed, I started earning roughly $2,000 per million views between April and July 2024 from a treasury-funded social media company (since then, they have seemingly dissolved, with my previous manager quitting, and the new manager giving vague responses for several months). Following this, I have received ~19.7 million views through the duration of this 7-month campaign. Seemingly being the only major content creator largely on TikTok promoting Polkadot, further incorporating Polkadot into my content than before, and this being my second interaction with OpenGov, I believe it is fair to request roughly the same rate I did during my very first proposal.

Audience:
Platform + User Reach:
TikTok Followers: 188,500 (TikTok Account (link))
Discord Members: 15,200 (Discord Server (link))
Twitch Subscribers: 7,000 (Twitch Account (link))
Youtube Subscribers: 5,000 (Youtube Account (link))

— Demographics: 87% of viewers are under 35 years old, with 66% under 25 years old.
— TikTok “Gaming Live Pro” badge, exclusive to only 75 out of over 2 billion active users, recognizing the streamer’s prolonged success and dedication on the platform.

Streaming Metrics: (July 10, 2024 - January 27, 2025)
— Total Hours Streamed: 607 hours (TikTok + Twitch)
— Total Views: 19,700,000
        Video Views: 11,800,000
        Stream Views: 7,400,000
        Other Views: ~500,000 (Twitch + Youtube + Instagram)
— Average Viewership: Approximately 1,000 concurrent average viewers per stream

Description:

The full-time streamer is actively conducting a targeted promotion towards mainly millennial and Gen Z viewers about the Polkadot network during his daily streaming sessions. Multiple avenues of promotion are being taken: Speaking about what Polkadot is in a learner-friendly manner, occasionally streaming games powered by Polkadot such as “NFL Rivals”, including the proper links to Polkadot on all platforms, and showcasing a large neon sign of the logo in the background. This sign is strategically positioned to catch the viewer’s attention, encouraging them to engage with the streamer about Polkadot.

Details:

The streamer had a proposal in April with Mister Cole’s help which passed at 99% Aye: Previous Proposal (link). The streamer was also paid by a treasury-funded media company for roughly 3 months following the aforementioned proposal. I am actively introducing new people into the Polkadot ecosystem through my work and have been engaged with prominent members of the community for over a year.

Additional Information:

— Part of the funds, if passed, will go directly towards expanding my reach to more people and get further eyes on Polkadot. I plan to get a house with some other prominent content creators like myself to collaborate with and exponentially grow my audience.

— Proof of work: Imgur (link)

— An example clip (different variations (for example, recent Polkadot news), several times daily): Stream Clip (link)

Read more
StatusExecuted
59%Aye
Aye (153)
27.88M DOT
Nay (119)
18.80M DOT
Decision21 / 28d
Confirmation2 / 2d
0.0%0.70%
0.31%Support Threshold
0Support Threshold
Support(0.56%)
8.64M DOT
Issuance
1.53B DOT
Vote
jj2013:09

Hey fellow members of the Polkadot community, let me give you an insight on Brad's streams.

His numbers are completely inflated and misleading. He streams games that push his content on the tiktok for you page. Content such as wordle, contexto, geometry dash levels. He claims to average 1000+ viewers but this is only when he plays these games. Brad on a regular video game would receive a measly 100-200 viewers and on top of that does not promote Polkadot at all. His fanbase are 15-16 year olds that don't even care/know about the Polkadot community. 

The clip of him promoting Polkadot is also false, Mr. Brad almost NEVER promotes Polkadot on stream. Just having the sign up and playing content that abuses the algorithm does NOT benefit Polkadot at all.

if you take a look at his tiktok videos/lives, yes he has the sign up but he DOES NOT ever promote Polkadot. Please vote NAY on this, he is simply looking for a quick paycheck as his numbers aren't accurate and he is lying about promoting the brand. NAY.

On behalf of the Polkadot Hungary DAO:

We have voted Nay on this proposal as we do not see clear benefits to the Polkadot ecosystem from the work being presented. While we appreciate efforts to promote Polkadot, simply having the logo in the background of an unrelated game does not seem like a meaningful contribution, especially given the relatively low viewership.

We also have concerns that approving such proposals could set a precedent for similar low-effort initiatives—for example, someone requesting funding for a cooking stream while wearing a Polkadot-branded apron.

However, we would have been open to supporting the proposal if it had stronger ties to the ecosystem, such as featuring games built on Polkadot (btw who’s up for a FlappyWud stream?) or incorporating educational content about the network.

You can view how the Polkadot Hungary DAO evaluated this proposal on our public page here.

Lucky Friday have voted AYE. Please consider this a temporary notification after our vote has gone on chain. If you would like additional feedback on our rationale for this vote, please join our OpenGov Public Forum on Telegram here: https://t.me/+559tyPSfmGg0NzUx

Lucky Friday provides feedback once per week (Fridays) if specifically requested in our OpenGov Public Forum, and we respectfully ask that all proponents of referenda interact with us here for the sake of transparency. Please tag our Head of Protocol Partnerships “Phunky” with your referendum number so that he can gather the relevant commentary from our internal deliberations.

Kus DAO have voted (first voting).

✅ Expanding DOT’s reach through gaming streams (20M+ views), engaging younger audiences outside the crypto echo chamber.

❌ Concerns over lack of verifiable content, retroactive funding, and better-suited marketing bounties.

💪 Get involved: 🔗 Discord Invite or Telegram Invite

💬 Join the discussion: 🔗 Discussion Thread

~@_Pieky_

von Flandern voted  NAY  for the following reasons:

No Retroactive Funding Without Prior Approval

• The proposal requests $25,000 USDT for live-streaming activities retroactively.

• This contradicts the principle that public funds should be requested, reviewed, and approved in advance.

• Retroactive funding could set a precedent where more unauthorized projects request funds without prior budget review.

Lack of Transparency and Oversight

• There is no clear documentation of what content was streamed and how it specifically benefited the Polkadot ecosystem.

• Such a request should be evaluated beforehand to ensure funds are used efficiently.

Risk of Uncontrolled Fund Allocation

• Approving this referendum could set a precedent for unregulated retroactive proposals.

• This could strain Treasury resources and lead to inefficient fund allocation.

Sends the Wrong Signal to Future Applicants

• The Polkadot Treasury should follow clear guidelines, ensuring that projects apply for funding in advance.

• Rejecting this referendum signals that retroactive funding requests are not supported, maintaining a structured budget allocation process.

https://vonflandern.org/Polkadot/Polkadot_Ref1405.pdf

Feb 3

Hi everyone! I would like to address some feedback I have received regarding something I did not make clear in the proposal, more specifically about additional data/metrics beyond views. When I advertise Polkadot in my TikTok streams, the main thing I point my younger audience to after talking about it is the link in my profile, and the Polkadot link gets around ~100 clicks daily. Right now that is the only number I have that is actual data. I understand that for everyone to be assured that the impact I'm making is worthwhile I need to have quantifiable data in other ways.

I have some ideas to help put these concerns at ease. First off, simply to increase the attention on Polkadot would be to make a very well edited/funny clip on Polkadot and just play it on my live-streams every time I have to get a drink, use the bathroom, etc. and I would play it so much it would become iconic in my live-streams and possibly catch on 😭. Another idea to advertise outside of my TikTok to open the gateway of being able to provide actual data on other platforms related to Polkadot is to do an art contest on my Discord and whoever draws the Polkadot logo the best gets a certain amount of money or something similar, as Discord is a big place for art fanatics. A third idea is to make an actual Twitter account (I currently do not have one) and start advertising it to my fans, where I can freely talk about recent Polkadot news, etc. more deeply and get further data based on how many of my fans interact with the posts. These are just some ideas, to name a few.

As I stated at the end of this proposal, I plan on getting a house with several well-known creators to collaborate with them, exponentially grow my audience, and make live-streaming my sole responsibility which would allow me to add all these additional avenues to advertise Polkadot. This collectively would get further eyes on the network. Unfortunately, right now my entire family is extremely against this plan even though I believe I can financially support myself because they don’t consider what I do as a real job, and they insist on me going to a university. I believe that the attention I've garnered from a unique younger audience towards Polkadot is sufficient for the funds I am requesting, and this would also change my family's opinions and give me their blessing or at the very least their approval to move out and follow through with the plans I stated. The reason I have not already added other ways of advertising Polkadot that can give me statistical data like the examples I provided above is because I'm still in my last couple months of high school (right before university) and balancing that with the time I invest in live-streaming already ends up with me hardly getting sleep. Thank you for reading and I hope you all take this into consideration. <3

These proposals seem better suited for the Marketing Bounty as sponsorships of this size seem to be in their range and scope and not in a retroactive manner. Also they can consolidate all these content creation referenda into a single report.

Hi! Yes, future proposals will be done either through the Marketing Bounty or the Phragmen Funding, whichever works better :)

Jan 31

Nice, but thank you. Nope.

Jan 31

These proposals seem better suited for the Marketing Bounty as sponsorships of this size seem to be in their range and scope and not in a retroactive manner. Also they can consolidate all these content creation referenda into a single report.

Jan 30

If anyone has any questions please let me know and I will get back to you as soon as I can! <3

Hello, can you give us targeted KPIs for each stream, video, post you've made? You talk about daily live but I see: Last live broadcast: 11 days ago on Twitch and youtube 7 months. Have you also made promotional videos for Polkadot? If so, do you have any links?

Without these details I'd be NAY.

Hi, thank you for asking! In terms of quantifiable data, I get around ~100 clicks daily on the Polkadot website through the link in my profiles. However, there are people who ask my moderators about info on Polkadot, those who search it up themselves, etc. so I can't give you an exact number.

About the live broadcasts, ~99% of my live-streams are through TikTok Live, and I provided some screenshots in the Imgur link.

On your third point, I did attempt to make short-form content on Tiktok entirely about Polkadot but the algorithm did not push it out to people and my followers who did see it didn't have the enthusiastic reaction I was looking for. When it comes to trying to appeal to a younger audience and especially those who don't have much knowledge in the crypto space, there needs to be a sweet spot where you include Polkadot enough but not too much where you start losing people watching/viewing videos and streams. Over the past months, I have fine-tuned how I encorporate Polkadot so I can maximize my viewership while also delivering Polkadot-related talk/content through my live-streams in unique ways so my audience is actually willing to consume the information.

Jan 30

Hello, can you give us targeted KPIs for each stream, video, post you've made? You talk about daily live but I see: Last live broadcast: 11 days ago on Twitch and youtube 7 months. Have you also made promotional videos for Polkadot? If so, do you have any links?

Without these details I'd be NAY.

Jan 21, 1970

Dear Proposer,

Thank you for your proposal. Our first vote on this proposal is NAY.

The Small Spender track requires 50% participation and simple majority of all voters according to our voting policy. This proposal has received zero aye and four nay votes from ten members, with four members abstaining. Below is a summary of our members' comments:

> The voters expressed skepticism about the proposed marketing actions, with several seeking more data on effectiveness and metrics to measure success. Many believed that the requested funding was excessive given the unclear return on investment and insufficient engagement strategies. A common suggestion was to involve marketing experts for guidance and to develop a more comprehensive approach that included better preparation and clearer communication of sponsorships. Overall, the lack of confidence in the proposal led to multiple abstentions and negative votes.

The full discussion can be found in our internal voting.

Kind regards,
Permanence DAO

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