I voted Aye cause I know Daniel has been trying his best to be as transparent as possible since the last referendum and has made another appearance on the AAG livestream. He also modified his proposal with more detail regarding the team.

Just one note to Daniel, please modify the permissions for the proposal to read only cause it looks like everyone has edit permissions right now when they access the Google Doc form.

Good luck and hopefully it will pass this time. I know how stressful it can be to go through this. Mucha suerte !

VirtoTeam has put in considerable effort reworking their proposal, providing additional information. They have appeared on AAG 3 times and ran a twitch stream. If you voted Nay last time, it is worth the effort to reconsider their proposal.

Hi Daniel,

Your last "proposal" was particularly frustrating to review, it is refreshing to see that you've put forward an effort with the revision and community engagement. I don't have a settled position with the proposal, something does not feel right about it. I hope that with some reassuring answers I can get to a position where I can deliver a comfortable Aye.

1. Is there any reason that you have not revised the EMA7 rate in your proposal and thus the overall asking amount? The parameters are the same as they were in the previous proposal.

2. Where can I read more about the detail quoted below?

Given our previous work helping 350k+ families in Venezuela to keep their money value using crypto, we have a deep understanding of the ecosystem and, most importantly, first-hand experience building and deploying real use case solutions using web3 technology.

3. The Virto team received funding for four proposals. Were the objectives of all of these achieved and delivered?

• libwallet: 28,800 USD https://polkadot.polkassembly.io/post/825
• Fido PoC: 69,750 USD https://polkadot.polkassembly.io/motion/246
• Sube + Scales: 20,000 EUR https://kusama.polkassembly.io/post/616
• orml-payments: 36,000 kUSD https://github.com/w3f/Grants-Program/blob/master/applications/lip_payments.md

4. In light of projects funded above, why didn't you engage the Polkadot Treasury & W3F for further funding? Why Kusama and why an asking amount that well exceeds the sum of all payments received thus far?

5. Taking a look at the slides it appears that a portion of this funding will go towards Krievo. There was some discussion on Krievo earlier; I tend to take caution based on the concerns that Raul raised. I am also especially cautious when funding a non-common good Parachain project and the precedent it may set.

Hi @olanod! Thank you for reformatting your proposal for review by the community of voters.

Here are some points for consideration:

1. The vision:

I appreciate that you took the time to re-think Virto's initiative from a big picture perspective. Becoming "the Latin American Parity" does indeed reflect the go-getter attitude of your team regarding new concepts and technologies. It has been helpful to read through your profiles to better understand your backgrounds and technical experiences.

Still, it is hard to measure the impact of the solutions that Virto has built so far, which raises the question of "how will the Kusama community benefit from your team's experiments, in practice?"

2. The projects:

Being ambitious and driven towards self-defined goals is a hallmark of innovators, something that the Kusama community is geared to value. And to continue to get the support of the community, this drive needs to be translated into results by teams, rather than routinely depend on an individual's social standing.

I haven't been able to find a repo for 3 out of 4 of the projects that you labelled as delivered. So, apart from your W3F grant submission, there is no Treasury report nor communications on Polkassembly to verify to what *extent your other ventures have achieved their stated goals.

3. The proposal:

The document specifies that Virto is working on solving the issue of adoption by making the technologies more accessible to new entrants. It also states that Virto is building tools for developers that they can use to solve real-world problems.

I couldn't source evidence of Virto marketing its solutions to real-world users and/or developers. The budget you created mostly accounts for devs' salaries for working on the technologies, meanwhile these tech developments will need to be concretely shared with the Latin American audience to support your overall vision.

I look forward to your input on these points. Thank you for your time! 🤓

Hey Daniel, sorry I forgot to mention this on AAG. But why is a team with such proof of work looking to snap up 4.6% of the Kusama treasury?

Ongoing funding of an established team could be more appropriately funded on our Polkadot treasury, leaving KSM for teams and individuals just getting started.

Nothing at all against the work, and more funding seems in the best interest of the network to me!

Reposting this as a Polkadot proposal with the positive feedback you've seen here will get you the same funding, only a few weeks delayed, while preserving Kusama Treasury funds for other teams to follow in your footsteps!

Anyway, lots of respect for growing so much through governance and showing face on AAG!

Referencing the white paper: https://virto.network/docs/whitepaper

Virto team aim to build a taxation system to compete with existing authorities, called the Local Incentives Program (LIP). To administer the collected taxes, Virto team expect that local and commercial communities will spontaneously form, then each of them will form their own governance structure and achieve autonomy with a democratic and self-sufficient political economic system. Until these self-governing structures spontaneously form, the "LIP is governed mainly by the founding team which aims to function as a benevolent dictatorship to set up the initial system and maximize overall welfare and efficiency."

Humility is one of the seven capital virtues that stand in opposition to the seven capital vices (or deadly sins). Repeatedly boasting of virtue and benevolence displays the vice of pride, the contrary of the virtue of humility. Your words are thus incongruent with your actions.

The stated goals are not realistic. Most people will not embrace this scheme because most people want less tax, not more tax. Vendors will hesitate to accept currency that is not legal tender and that has value only in a small local region. Existing authorities will not allow you to collect taxes from their tax slaves citizens. Existing authorities will become very aggressive on this point. Self-governing structures will not likely spontaneously form to administer small pots of local funds, and where they do form, they will attract the same personality types attracted to traditional power structures and therefore be effectively no different.

Why do you need so much money from Kusama treasury to do this (20,000 KSM X 33 USD = $660,000 USD)? Could you not cover the costs by approaching the people you plan to tax in the LIP and secure the funding from them? After all, if there are actually real people that do actually want to participate in yet another taxation scheme, they will surely welcome your virtuous, benevolent dictatorship.

Hello friend scrolling in the comments :) failing proposals with a lot of negative support are probably bad and should be voted nay straight away because it is the Will of the community right? Paradoxically it's not always the case, sometimes it just takes, say one or two people perhaps to control the public opinion, but I hope you are the kind of voter that takes the time to read over the proposal and form your own informed opinion. We are there for you in case there are any questions, please check our extra content and maybe join us in our weekly VirtoLIVE in case you have more questions.

Hey Kekose,

I think Kusama is an amazing ecosystem for people to experiment how technology could change the world. People build tools to achieve their dreams, which may sound idealistic, but I don't think unrealistic is the right term to decide the fate of a project.

Just like encointer was born in Kusama with the goal to provide every human with a digital proof of personhood and a basic income in a local cryptocurrency, this project team also has an ambitious goal to redistribute wealth through tax embedded in a de-commerce system.

Regarding tax, I have different opinion with you. If I understood correctly from the whitepaper, I would try to make a different example here. I'm from a developing country and used to do field research in Africa, I saw so many humble farmers having great products but can't make a good living. So imagine, I have a neighbour who produces wine in small quantity, not for big selling purpose and he can't make a business easily out of it. By using the system that Virto team presents, I think I will be able to find this in the chat in a local community. Then I could easily buy a bottle from him using my crypto by clicking a few buttons every now and then and pay a fee(or tax) plus the price. All this business happens in a decentralized way. The small tax could be be reserved for local initiative, say offset CO2 emission, as local community decides. That will be the picture I imagine.

Then you may ask, how about the government, what about taxing from government? But if I just buy a second hand book from my cousin which he gonna throw anyway, do I always pay a tax to the government? Before tax existed, do people make a living legally? Tax has been existing for long in many countries, is it justified in every single case? Is it always well spent? Do we trust the spending more on a local level or national level, say on a war? Is the situation in EU and US the same with in China, Latin America and Africa? If a corrupted government has tax policy only favors the rich people, if inflation is huge everywhere, do I still need to stay hungry but pay the tax to the government? Many of this actually exists in countries like Venezuela. Tax is quite a beautiful word in developed countries, but people in rural areas and in developing countries are still struggling to find a possible selling point for their product to make a living. Blockchain has the great advantage to bring financial inclusion for the people who may need it the most, isn't it nice?

For the reasons above, I'm hopeful and supportive for this project. I knew Virto team didn't choose an easy path, instead, they want to change things through technology and innovation. I'm impressed by their bravery to challenge the rules that many people never doubt since they existed for long in the world. I think they make me realize why I embrace blockchain at the very beginning.

Hi guys, although I support your idea. I do have to ask, why did you leave the KSM amount the same in your new proposal which is now worth $700k instead of $500k ? This will dramatically affect the Kusama treasury pot and when it's empty, who will no longer get funding ? Jay raised a good point about you going to Polkadot for such a large amount of capital even if this may seem like experimental.

I think Kusama's treasury should be used for smaller requests, maybe up to $100k, but I think $700k is impacting it. I wouldn't like to see any of the media teams & the validator programmes who are here to help the ecosystem no longer get any funding because a project drained the treasury.

Remember, when it's drained...it will take a long time before a bigger pot stacks up for people to be able to use and a lot of media requests seem to be coming in.

I really think you should either consider the Polkadot one or reduce the asking amount. I'm sorry but after reviewing it again and seeing other people's points, it's scary for me to think of the impact this could have and we want people to be happy about the treasury supporting the ecosystem, but not support it with such large amounts of capital at once.

I'm sorry but I'll have to switch my vote to Nay for this one for the reasons mentioned above and should you decide to change the funding request for a shorter period of time which would mean less capital drain on the Kusama treasury in 1 go, I'd be happy to support you with an Aye.

I hope you understand that I'm doing this because I want a lot of people to be able to spread the word about Dotsama.

Qsita, reading comments like yours helps me believe that change is possible. It gives me the determination to keep going, even when the road is full of challenges like today It also brings me hope.

I wanted to share with you that I grew up in Colombia, the second most biodiverse country in the world, a country known for its green mountains, lush jungles, and blue seas, yet it is also one of the most corrupt and unjust; 50 years of an internal war which have displaced millions from their homes in a fight against mafias that is a never-ending, I didn't decide to be born into this complex scenario and changing long-standing rules can seem daunting, but we must not let our perceived smallness stop us from utilizing the immense capacity of our beliefs and actions to bring about change. To do so would be to waste the powerful gift of being alive.

As well as you, Virto makes me believe that it is possible to create a protocol where people can choose to pay 1% of their income to the place where they live or even to other geographies miles away if they choose to help, today, we've lost control of how we shape the world, but bringing web3 to people's hands reintegrates that authority, the same way it made me move forward and work towards a better future for my family, my communities, and my region.

Thanks for your support!

"The first step towards achieving great things is believing they are possible, and that first step is often the hardest."

Dear Kekose ofPheeb, I hope this comment shines a light to your concerns.

Things have changed quite a bit since the publishing of the Virto whitepaper, but there is a persistent intention to integrate LIP as much as possible in the ecosystem to contribute to and strengthen the KSM/DOT economy.

The initial idea was to have a token-less parachain to not have yet another currency that extracts value from the global economy(KSM/DOT) or from the real-world use cases that build on this system, this chain would get a slot by rewarding users in a crowdloan with a mix of tokens(on Statemine) of the projects launching during that lease(e.g. for the first round we had 2-3 projects lined up), an alternative being a common good slot granted by the community they see fit. Fast forwarding to present time, I joined the Fellowship as a humble member with the intention of contributing to Polkadot's core technologies but also with the intention of making Virto team technology find its way to that core. For LIP we would break it down in to separate pieces, for example the local communities governance would become "The Federation" collective in the collectives parachain and our payment infrastructure integrated in Statemine/t, whatever functionality left that can not make it to existing common good chains or the relay chain, we would propose as a new common good/system parachain(e.g. a tax policy maker parachain?) with the fallback of making Kreivo/Virto a simple token-less, governance-less parathread. TL;DR: there won't be a benevolent dictatorship ;) we don't have to follow the steps of every other parachain that uses the sudo module or a fake/weak democracy. In Polkadot community we trust.

The stated goals are not realistic. Most people will not embrace this scheme because most people want less tax, not more tax.

People do want to pay less tax, or better put pay less for things, and the way to do that is by cutting out unnecessary costs. We start simple by making products and services cheaper in the commercial communities of Virto by optimizing away costs of intermediation in things like payment gateways, card processors, or e-commerce platforms. This way we can make things more affordable without scaring away users or upsetting the biggest intermediaries(a.k.a governments).

We already ran what I'd consider a successful pilot, hundreds of stores in Colombia already pre-registered and tried out Bloque, a platform that allows merchants to create simple to use stores in minutes and earn in dollars(stablecoin) to protect themselves from inflation. Besides its simplicity users highlighted its competitive pricing as one of the main advantages because they are not faced with the sometimes prohibitively expensive fees of Shopify-like platforms that are not cost effective in places like Latin America. As the system matures and more commercial communities that share the same infrastructure are formed, costs for the end users will just keep getting lower and the burden of a LIP fee/tax/contribution will become negligible. Take for example the readily available and cheap infrastructure in Kusama with its overflowing wasted block space, it will give our decentralized organizations a competitive advantage to run perhaps orders of magnitude more efficiently. In the future as we go down the supply chain and more economic activities and trade moves on-chain I expect even more economic optimization taking place, it will be a time when LIP might become a competitor to existing tax authorities but it won't happen soon nor everywhere all at once, governments will have time to join the system and for those in countries with failed economies that won't wait for their governments to change, they will find good use for this kind of unstoppable technology the ecosystem provides regardless of the opinion of their local leaders. TL;DR: Our goals are not unrealistic as we go one step at a time testing our hypothesis solving real problems of real users in the process. What is unrealistic and unfair is to think the project should be killed before it even starts just because of it might look too ambitious.

LIP might fail to incentivize formation of local communities, worst case it just becomes a fancier way to burn the KSM/DOT, but if it has the chance of changing one community, get a road paved, build a school or do anything at all in the real world, I think it's an idea worth exploring. Kusama is built for this kind of things no?

About funds, yeah we would make good use of resources requested as implementing LIP is not the only thing we work on. Also copying my reply to Claudio.

About the price, it's actually quite unfortunate that it has been so crazy the past few weeks as it affects the opinion of the voters, it increased 60% since the beginning of the month but in the same way it can(and probably will) flip to the other side, we've been through similar situations before(e.g. 20% increase during voting and -30% by the time we actually have the funds). $500 or $700 might seem like a large amount but to fund a 12+ people team of mostly Rust developers for about a year which is what we are after it's actually a tight budget. Since the previous proposal we had in our budget spreadsheet a comparison with the team being payed more competitive salaries according to generic online sources(would be around 1M) without even considering that reality might be even more crude and $700K could well vanish among 3 senior Rust developers(like myself) ... But that's not what we are here for right? we are here to have fun, build for a greater cause while making sure people have the basics covered and piece of mind so they can unleash all their potential. So yeah, we resubmitted the same proposal(same preimage) for 20,000KSM giving continuity to the previous one, focusing on addressing previous feedback, making it clearer and hoping the community would focus more on our the ideas at hand and not on price discussion.

There are many more reasons I can think of why it's good to support us but if none of this changes your mind it's fine. What I would recommend for the future is to not weight in so strongly, i.e. vote proportionately to the current support, with OpenGov current support levels your vote alone becomes the sole deciding factor to approve or reject a proposal, I bet you don't want to become the great whale of Kusama governance that everybody fears as you can greatly manipulate the outcome and opinion of the electorate.

Let's make governance more interesting for everyone, it became a very frustrating experience to know that no matter if the majority of the community likes what we are doing and what we can offer we would still have to fear that two people alone will decide if a team is worthy or not.

Hi team.

In a previous incarnation of governance, I've always been a supporter. On this proposal I'll be a "nay". Overall I believe it is more of a "trying all angles" than a specific pin-point approach. However, I would still like to team to have funding since they have been valuable, so I would suggest this approach:

1. libwallet & sube - get the maintenance proposal for these up. We really need to have options for developer integrations. At this point I'm not sure about the userbase here, however it certainly fills an own niche, so it is important to keep alive and ongoing and ensure it is 100% rock-solid.

2. The hardware wallet - in my view this is speculative at this point, but once again we options in the environment is absolutely great. So on a proposal for this would really like to see focus on where the funds are going to specifically and importantly what makes this different. (With my cowboy hat on this is certainly something that I'll most-probably back in the interest of experimentation)

3. The network - for anything common-good we really need to separate it out and ensure it really is fitting the bill. Generally I'm in the camp to not fund paras (there are certainly different views on this), however always happy to see common-good using KSM as the native token. However there is a higher bar to pass to add more common-good chains, so it needs to be treated as such.

Really hoping to vote "aye" on the next ones from the team - there is great work overall.

PS: I loved the streams, it was great virtually meeting the guys behind it all.

I'm following the opinion that probably Kusama treasury is not the better place for the amount requested. Nothing against the work itself too.