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Lightning Stacking Pool
APPLICANT
Type: Direct Application
Email: [email protected]
Discord: peters.btc#6485
Twitter:
Stacks Forum:
GRANT BASICS
Grant Name: Lightning Stacking Pool
Total Budget: 20,500
Total Duration: 250
Grant Type: Stacks Chapter Grant
Grant Track: Bitcoin Utility via Stacks
Grant Goal: Integrate Between Technologies
Grant Audience: End Users (Consumer)
Specific Audience: STX holders and lightning users/routers
Grant Team: Michael-report, pogi01
Previous Grants: Completed Grant 466
Ecosystem Programs: After we clarified legal issues with an Austrian Law firm focused on Blockchain projects (Grant 1), we are now ready to proceed with the setup of a regulatory-compliant Stacking Pool in the EU with 0% fee Lightning payouts.
GRANT MISSION, IMPACT, RISKS & REFERENCE
Grant Mission: metastackdata.com proudly presents the first legally compliant Stacking pool with Lightning payounts
For the first time, Stackers will be able to stack STX and earn BTC at zero-commission with the lowest possible BTC tx fees.
Furthermore, we will set up a member area on lnstacking.com. An individual user dashboard for transparency throughout the Stacking process. Blog posts and animated video clips will ensure that anybody will be able to maintain a Lightning node and stack STX via. lnstacking.com
Users will earn Sats via the Lightning Network by Stacking STX. Transferred directly into their mobile wallet - Stacks will enable Lightning payments in our everyday lives and Lightning payments will make Stacking more cost-effective. Integrating Stacks with Lightning represents an example of a useful combination of Blockchain-Technologies for a better user experience.
No matter how congested the mempool is - Lightning will enable close to 0% fee payouts. Furthermore, the community will get in touch with Lightning nodes and possibly maintain a routing node. What strengthens BTC will help Stacks as well.
Grant Impact: Functional website, onpage KYC process and user area (on lnstacking.com) with a transparent individual dashboard throughout the Stacking process. Efficient ln payouts to connected users.
Grant Risks:
- ln routing errors => onchain payouts
- efficient pool size
We kindly ask the foundation to delegate a stake for the first 6-12 months in order push the pool size in the beginning.
Metastack Data will have its Skin in the Game anyway with 100k STX - no matter how big the delegated stake is.
Support Link: Please have a look at our pitch deck and the community feedback (link above). Furthermore you can find more details on the old Grant-dashboard: https://grantsdashboard.stacks.org/dashboard/grants/589
GRANT ROADMAP & DELIVERABLES
MILESTONE 1:
Deliverable: lnstacking.com: Web dev. / KYC process/ Pool setup / User dashboard / Marketing
FINAL DELIVERABLE
Deliverable: A legally compliant Stacking pool with Lightning payounts in the EU.
👋 @Ston3cutt3r Thanks for your application! We will do a pre-review and let you know if we have any immediate questions. In the mean time please refer to our review schedule here for a detailed timeline and response dates. Best, Will
Hi @Ston3cutt3r thanks for the application! Glad to see you building upon your last grant. Curious, if you meant to mark your application with the Grant Type: Stacks Chapter Grant? Or was that by mistake? Thanks.
To be honest we haven´t been sure about the label with the new application process (chapter and developer grant - even though not 100% open source, would be appropriate?). We just want to build a great product which shall benefit the Stacks ecosystem.
@Ston3cutt3r can you please let us know if there is any portion of the work you will be completing via grant funds (i.e. scope included in your grant application) that will not be open source? (something you mentioned above).
If so, can you please remove that scope and adjust the budget ASAP?
Lastly, as of now, we have funding for 40-50% of the applications received. If you would still like to be considered in this round, we recommend rescoping your proposal to a lower amount that closer reflects the industry standard of $75/hr.
Thanks Will
Hi @will-at-stacks !
initially we thought publishing the usermanagement tools would not be optimal due to security considerations. After we revaluated the project again internally, we came to the following solution:
- The project will be 100% open sourced.
- In our total budget of $24500 there are external costs of $3000
-
- The remaining $20.500 got calculated from an internal hourly rate of $86
We would like to offer a reduction of the hourly rate to $70 wich brings us to a total budget of $20.500 (edited in the application).
We hope that this revision corresponds to the common interests and we are lookling forward to a good cooperation.
Hey there @Ston3cutt3r I had a question about community reception for this product I'm personally interested in the idea, however I want to see people who are interested in this in light of KYC requirements, and also want to ask you about the limits and requirements for users, like do they need to be an EU resident, is the routing node optional and so on Thank you
Hi @hozzjss, thanks for your interest and feedback!
Regarding KYC requirements this may be object to change but we plan to proceed along the guidelines given in the legal memorandum we received from an EU law firm (Grant 1) in order to be compliant with DAC 8/MICA regulations, namely:
- limit users to jurisdictions where we can operate within a manageble legal framework for our company (located in Austria). This would certainly mean EU and beyond but likely exclude US.
- in case a CASP licence will be required in the future, we would be committed to obtain it.
The routing node is optional, users don't have to run a lightning node but it would allow for zero fee payouts. Please have a look at our pitch deck for further details.
@Ston3cutt3r we have a couple of final questions for you:
- If this grant is approved on 9/39/22 are you able to complete the work and have it operational by 3/31/23?
- Before the Foundation could commit to stacking in your pool, would you be willing to prove there is market demand for this product? Perhaps hit 10k STX stacked or 100 wallets contributing to the pool first?
Thoughts?
Thanks Will
(cc: @jennymith )
Hi @will-at-stacks,
I assume you meant approval by 9/30/22, if so – yes, that’s conform to our timeline.
We are a bit confused regarding your second question, wasn´t it an item on the grant whishlist as well? Please have a look at the community feedback samples, especially the message from Jasper regarding the Grant 1 approval: Link
However, we will commit STX to the pool ourselves, thereby the 10k would not be a problem. The whole idea behind the delegation from the foundation was to get the product live as soon as it is ready in order to get a proof of concept - which subsequently should attract more users. We cannot pledge that there will be XY users on a given date – we are willing to run the pool as long as it is economically reasonable for our company. Besides market conditions, this may also depend on what happens in the Stacks ecosystem in the coming months (e.g. Stacks 2.1). Furthermore, we cannot predict how big the min. stack for a slot will be at the time we will go live. That said, it´s pretty sure that a constructive start of the pool won´t be possible without a delegation from the foundation.
Hi @Ston3cutt3r -
Congrats! Your grant application has been approved. We just sent you an invite (to the email the application was submitted with) to an onboarding call on Monday. We will use this call to provide an overview of next steps and expectations for proceeding with the grant.
If you are not able to make the call, don't worry, it will be recorded.
Best, Will Stacks Foundation Grants Program Manager.
Thanks for the approval @will-at-stacks! In any case one member of our team will join the meeting on Monday.
I think you have an interesting project. If you haven't already gone through the Stacks Web3 Startup Lab, I would like to invite you to apply.
Here's a 5-minute read on how we can help you turn your startup idea into an investment-ready startup: www.web3startuplab.io
If you are interested, you can apply through the "Apply Now" button.
Feel free to ping me on email: [email protected]
