What is Gitcoin? Here’s everything you need to know

IS Team

2 years ago

What is Gitcoin?

Gitcoin is a blockchain platform where communities come together to improve and fund the open web. It is a distributive platform for software developers where you can solve real software problems for real companies. When you solve more problems, you build skills, develop relationships and collect bounties. Gitcoin disrupts the status quo and how development problems are solved in this day and age. What’s the payoff besides watching your robot self grow up? 1, You get to solve real problems. 2, You get paid for it, and 3, You meet great people along the way. Gitcoin is governed by its token, GTC.

About GTC

GTC is the native token of Gitcoin. It is being utilized by the team to disseminate Gitcoin into a DAO ecosystem (GitcoinDAO). GitcoinDAO intends to be the best place to unite and fund its digital infrastructure. With Gitcoin’s ecosystem allies, the team wants to assist in creating the largest and boldest experiments in the public source and decide on what works. The team works to decentralize donations, handle disputes, and govern the coffers. They have been further advancing with progress so as to achieve the mission of constructing & funding virtual public goods and changing from web2 to web3. They are:

constructing a community that has regard for public goods
formulating & launching experiments
sustaining & scaling them
mutually looking after them

In order to put this into action, the team is working to build GitcoinDAO—the decentralized platform structuring the vessel to the Quadratic Lands: a more acceptable world for public possessions and virtual democracy. GTC has zero economic value, it is merely a governance token. It’s contract address is 0xDe30da39c46104798bB5aA3fe8B9e0e1F348163F. Everyone in the community has a say, and GTC is the primary step on Gitcoin’s trail on the road to developing decentralization of Gitcoin. With the floatation of GTC, aspirations of building a DAO of DAOs are in action.

Bearers of the token will help lead Gitcoin’s course as they move from a semi centralized Web2.5 network to an entirely decentralized protocol. The team’s primary step is turning over control of Gitcoin Grants to community officials, but over time more and more decisions will be left in all respects in the community’s hands.

Now,

What are the “Quadratic Lands”?

The Quadratic Lands is the promised land for digital democracy and public goods funding. You can as a matter of fact, go to Quadratic Lands and you can see the site that talks about GitcoinDAO and how it is enabled by the Gitcoin token. Still focused on the mission of building and funding open-source software, the big idea is that Ethereum can be more than just a decentralized casino where we can build multiplayer games that fund the commons and we can have programmable money. Gitcoin values open-source software and public goods. We can build monetary systems with programmable money that funds public goods. Those are the first principles that the team is assembling to create the goal which is that we can create regenerative finance, we can have better economic systems by constructing multiplayer games.

What is Quadratic funding?

Quadratic Funding, according to the co-founder of Ethereum, Vitalik Buterin, is the mathematically best way to fund public goods like open-source software in a representative method. Public goods are merely things that are non-rejectable and non-rivalrous in contrast to something you would get on Amazon, for example, a chair. You can download open-source software and it does not stop anyone from downloading open-source software because it’s infinite, plus it is accessible for free online. Open source is a public good. Quadratic funding is chiefly that you raise a matching pool. The matching pool on Gitcoin grants is $500,000 per quarter that is employed on Gitcoin grants, and then you employ that matching pool simultaneously. The way that it works is that if project ‘X’ raises $10 from ten contributors and project ‘Y’ raises $10 from one contributor, then the project with the larger base of support, even though it raised the same amount as the project with the narrow base of support, gets way more of the matching funds. The best part about this type of funding is that Gitcoin is funding the projects that have a wider base of support, and so the needy and the numerous ones are getting funded rather than the rich and the few and so, the number of contributors is of more importance than the amount capitalized. This shoves power to the edges, apart from whales and other central power brokers. It fashions more autonomy and public goods funding. About $20M have been funded on Gitcoin so far, and Quadratic Funding is a big part of that.

Now the question arises, what does Gitcoin really have to offer? Let’s have a look.

GITCOIN PRODUCTS:

There is a list of products offered by Gitcoin, and those as such:

GITCOIN

Everything that Gitcoin provides

Each and every product offered by Gitcoin will be discussed in this article/guide.

How to earn through Gitcoin?

When you go to https://gitcoin.co/earn, you will be shown three options, which are:

Three methods to earn on Gitcoin

Earn in bounties

Bounty schemes are incentives provided to an array of contributors for different activities related to an initial coin offering (ICO). Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) are a common fundraising process used especially by startups wishing to provide goods and services, usually associated with the cryptocurrency and blockchain space.

An organization seeking to collect money to generate a new coin,virtual currency service, or an application, launches an ICO as a means to accumulate funds. A bounty scheme distributes tokens or rewards for contributors finishing certain tasks that assist in promoting the ICO. These schemes started in the virtual video gaming world. Different sorts of perks are every so often provided to gamers who assist with game development—particularly those that recognise bugs in the game.

On Gitcoin, you have to deal with bounties for each and every skill level presented by Web3’s most thrilling projects. From open security competitions and new feature makes, to content creation and UX/UI design. You can get paid while building purposeful open source projects.

Once you click on the “Explore Bounties” button, you’ll be presented with various options to choose from, and you can decide which bounty is suitable for you. Note that to engage in these activities, you must have an account on Github.

Earn in Hackathons

A hackathon is an event, generally arranged by a tech organization or company, where programmers gather up for a short period of time to work together on a project. The contestants work rapidly and in many cases, work without sleep to attain their task, as the events usually merely last 24 hours, or occur over a weekend.

Gitcoin offers you to build with the most interesting web3 projects, link with a community of skilled hackers, acquire a knowledge of new tech, build remarkable projects and earn thrilling prizes! Once you click on the “Explore Hackathons” button, you will get options to join a hackathon, or become a sponsor.

Earn in Grants

Gitcoin Grants is like a patreon, but in crypto-style. Raise money from supporters of all kinds, large and small, and earn even more from their matching rounds every quarter!

On Gitcoin, you can either explore grants or create a grant. If you explore grants, you will see a number of projects which you can choose from. You would have an option to choose from various categories, such as

-All Grants

-Idle Grants

-Community

-dApp tech

-Infra tech

-NFTs

You can start your favorite grants, fund them or add them to cart.

What are Gitcoin Quests?

Gitcoin Quests is a fun, gamified way to understand about the web3 ecosystem, challenge your friends, gain rewards, and advance your decentralization-fu! Play games and get the most out of the crypto world. All you need to do is click on “Explore Quests” and you’ll be redirected to a page including many, many games to choose from. After you choose a quest of your choice, you will be shown the quest rules.

You will be provided with some links to prepare for the Quest. If you get one answer wrong at any point of the quest, you lose. If you win, you earn special rewards. You can even create a quest with maximum 15 minute commitment time. You can even earn ETH, as provided by the quest threads. If you make a quest up to the required standards, you’re good to go!

What are Gitcoin Kudos?

Kudos is a way of displaying recognition for another Gitcoin member.

It’s also a way to display special talents that a member might own, such as Design Star or Pythonista. Kudos tokens can be sold and bought on the Kudos Marketplace. You will have hundreds of options to choose from when it comes to sending Kudos to a friend.

What is the Gitcoin Kernel?

A peer-to-peer learning community, the Gitcoin Kernel is committed to the journey concerning a better understanding of truth: in our connections with people, in our work, and in our internal worlds. It is a curated circle of excellence in web3. The Kernel is constructing a lifelong network of the most skilled people, one block at a time in the blockchain space. Each block allows for 250 people and it runs for 8 weeks. It is a noteworthy experience. It includes learning, questioning, playing and discovering.

What are Gitcoin’s results?

$20.7M in results

Funding for open source softwares: $20,735,543

Since Gitcoin set in motion in November 2017, it has helped 23,891 funders in reaching a crowd of 150,032 earners. Gitcoin has opened the door for 339,322 entire transactions to 8,647 unique earners.

Platform wide stats:

161,206 monthly active developers (but only 1% of them create on-chain tx’s)

$20.7M gross marketplace value (339,332 transactions)

$13,465 value created per business hour (assumes 40 business hours per week)

Gitcoin’s bounties stats:

4.5 hours median bounty start time (after funding)

5.6 days median bounty turnaround time (after start work)

$3.9M gross marketplace value (from 7332 bounties + 6646 tips)

$21 – $82 hourly rate distribution (for most bounties; more details here)

66.7% bounty completion rate (after start work)

162,398 hours worked

Gitcoin Grants Stats:

1649 grants

$10.92M gross marketplace value (300241 contributors)

9 number matching rounds (see the growth of these matching rounds here)

$1.28 median contribution ($36.37 average)

64 Virtual Hackathons worth $2,730,907.

Why Gitcoin?

In my opinion, Gitcoin is an amazing platform that creates financial freedom and defines the future of the open web. There are spectacular communities and projects in this space. Gitcoin helps you learn and earn. Quadratic funding consistently helps high leverage outliers to find their place in the ecosystem. The platform even helps you make plenty of friends, build real connections, and connect with people who believe in each other and want to work on projects. Even the mentors and speakers help you know a lot. Whether you are a crypto expert or have no knowledge about the blockchain space, Gitcoin will definitely help you learn way more.