It would the producer of the public good (e.g. for my project I put up the collateral).
Oh, got it! Thanks!
Possibly? I’m not sure why you’d do that?
I thought you’d be fundraising to offer refund compensation to others to make their fundraisers more likely to succeed. But if the project developer themself put up the compensation, it’s probably also an important signal or selection effect in the game theoretic setup.
I disagree that a Refund Bonus is a security.
Yeah, courts decide that in the end. Howey Test: money: yes; common enterprise: yes; expectation of profit: sometimes; effort of others: I don’t know, not really? The size of the payout is not security-like, but I don’t know if that matters. All very unclear.
Profit: I imagine people will collect statistics on how close to funded campaigns can still be a day before they close so that they still fail in (say) 90% of the cases. Then they blindly invest $x into all campaigns that are still $x away from that threshold on their last day.
I imagine the courts may find that if someone goes to such efforts to exploit the system, they were probably not tricked into doing so. Plus there is the question of what effort of others we could possibly be referring to.
But even if the courts in the end decide that you’re right and it’s not a security, the legal battle with the SEC alone will be very expensive… They keep expanding their own heuristic for what they think is a security (not up to them to decide). They’ve even started to ignore the “expectation of profit” entirely (with stablecoins).
But perhaps you can find a way to keep the people who run the fundraisers in the clear and keep your company in South Africa (where I know the laws even less though). If the fundraisers are on a mainstream blockchain, the transactions are public, so you (outside of the US) could manage the refund compensation on behalf of the project developers and then pay refunds according to the public records on the blockchain. That way, no one could prove that a particular project developer is a member in your system… except maybe if they make “honeypot” contributions I suppose. Perhaps you can have a separate fund from which you reward contributors to projects you like regardless of whether they’re members. If a honeypot contributor gets a refund, they won’t know whether it’s because the project developer is a member of your org or because you selected their project without them knowing about it.
This is actually a cool idea. I don’t know how I’d manage to get people’s details for giving refund without co-operating with the fundraising platform, and my impression is that most platforms are hesitant to do things like this. If you know of a platform that would be keen on trying this, please tell me!
Yes… You could talk with Giveth about it. They’re using blockchains, so perhaps you can build on top of them without them having to do anything. But what I’ve done in the past is that people sign up with my platform, get a code, and put the code in their pubic comment that they can attach to a contribution on the third-party platform. Then if they want to claim any rights attached to the contribution from me, I check that the code is the right one, and if it is, believe them that they’re either the person who made the contribution or that the person who made the contribution wanted to gift it to them.
I don’t quite understand this point. You could work on AI Safety and donate to animal charities if you don’t want to free-ride.
Well, let’s say I barely have the money to pay for my own cost of living or that I consider a number of AI safety orgs to also be the even-more-cost-effective uses of my money.
But what I’ve done in the past is that people sign up with my platform, get a code, and put the code in their pubic comment that they can attach to a contribution on the third-party platform. Then if they want to claim any rights attached to the contribution from me, I check that the code is the right one, and if it is, believe them that they’re either the person who made the contribution or that the person who made the contribution wanted to gift it to them.
Oh cool, that’s a good idea. Then you can piggy back off existing crowdfunding platforms instead of making your own one.
people sign up with my platform,
Do you have a link? It sounds cool. I want to check it out.
Well, let’s say I barely have the money to pay for my own cost of living or that I consider a number of AI safety orgs to also be the even-more-cost-effective uses of my money.
I think I see your point. I agree that DACs don’t solve this type of free-riding.
Oh, got it! Thanks!
I thought you’d be fundraising to offer refund compensation to others to make their fundraisers more likely to succeed. But if the project developer themself put up the compensation, it’s probably also an important signal or selection effect in the game theoretic setup.
Yeah, courts decide that in the end. Howey Test: money: yes; common enterprise: yes; expectation of profit: sometimes; effort of others: I don’t know, not really? The size of the payout is not security-like, but I don’t know if that matters. All very unclear.
Profit: I imagine people will collect statistics on how close to funded campaigns can still be a day before they close so that they still fail in (say) 90% of the cases. Then they blindly invest $x into all campaigns that are still $x away from that threshold on their last day.
I imagine the courts may find that if someone goes to such efforts to exploit the system, they were probably not tricked into doing so. Plus there is the question of what effort of others we could possibly be referring to.
But even if the courts in the end decide that you’re right and it’s not a security, the legal battle with the SEC alone will be very expensive… They keep expanding their own heuristic for what they think is a security (not up to them to decide). They’ve even started to ignore the “expectation of profit” entirely (with stablecoins).
But perhaps you can find a way to keep the people who run the fundraisers in the clear and keep your company in South Africa (where I know the laws even less though). If the fundraisers are on a mainstream blockchain, the transactions are public, so you (outside of the US) could manage the refund compensation on behalf of the project developers and then pay refunds according to the public records on the blockchain. That way, no one could prove that a particular project developer is a member in your system… except maybe if they make “honeypot” contributions I suppose. Perhaps you can have a separate fund from which you reward contributors to projects you like regardless of whether they’re members. If a honeypot contributor gets a refund, they won’t know whether it’s because the project developer is a member of your org or because you selected their project without them knowing about it.
Yes… You could talk with Giveth about it. They’re using blockchains, so perhaps you can build on top of them without them having to do anything. But what I’ve done in the past is that people sign up with my platform, get a code, and put the code in their pubic comment that they can attach to a contribution on the third-party platform. Then if they want to claim any rights attached to the contribution from me, I check that the code is the right one, and if it is, believe them that they’re either the person who made the contribution or that the person who made the contribution wanted to gift it to them.
Well, let’s say I barely have the money to pay for my own cost of living or that I consider a number of AI safety orgs to also be the even-more-cost-effective uses of my money.
Oh cool, that’s a good idea. Then you can piggy back off existing crowdfunding platforms instead of making your own one.
Do you have a link? It sounds cool. I want to check it out.
I think I see your point. I agree that DACs don’t solve this type of free-riding.