[DAO:048fa3d] ShelleyVan x TRU Band Room

Governance
21

Hey Shelley, I love what you and TRU have been doing and I definitely want to continue supporting you all and believe you would put grant funds to good use!

However, I think that asking for grant funds retroactively, and asking for funds for the future should be filed under separate grants.

In general, I believe grant funds for services provided in the past should not become a standard. If retroactive grants were to become a standard, it may open the DAO up to potentially Millions in requested payouts. However, in certain situations I could see why some groups may deserve retroactive compensation, and this is why I believe it should be requestable – but separated.

For this reason, I am voting no based on the current structure.

22

hello! While I do support tru and recognize the great amount of value they bring to dcl I am a torn on voting on this proposal and have questions about the budget. I see that $93k for personal salary and $7k for travel expenses while $0 is dedicated towards onboarding artists or paying performers. Will any of the budget go towards paying performers? Will any of the budget go to improving the show experience ? If it only costs $20k a year to run Tru and additional $100k on top of that for one full time employee seems a bit excessive. I have trouble justifying retroactive pay unless it is to cover expenses paid out of pocket. I would like to see a greater percentage of the budget dedicated towards the show experience and paying artists. Again I am not trying to be adverse and do support Tru as a whole but wanted to give you a chance to answer these questions. I’d also like to hear opinions from the rest of the community who voted yes on retroactive pay. Will be waiting to vote until this question is answered.

3 Likes
23

Yes!!! I became part of the TRU fam last year and was welcomed with open arms, the community is so loving and supportive of music. I feel this has been an excellent opportunity for artists and continues to be so, Shelley communicates clearly and is always super helpful and open to suggestions. It’s become my home.
I know Shelley works super hard and does anything in her power to take care of her artists as much as we will take care of her. My secret (not secret anymore ;P) vision is to bring this to the IRL experience.

2 Likes
24

I Voted yes because this Grant is 100% deserved. TRU Bandroom hosts 30+ events a month and has onboarded many of the active DJs and performers in the space Such as @bufalo @jackfrost @Djtraxnft @PANSDJ Mr.Swe @marcosnaide @phuturemusic @akaHORUS @PinkstarJVB and many more . All these names I just mentioned have all gone on to make amazing web3 careers for themselves

All the event coordinating ,onboarding, graphics, Sound checks, Artist support, Tech Support, community building, as well as Coordinating with the building team at TRU to improve the user experience is handled by @shelleyvan. Although there is no portion in the Breakdown for “Onboarding and Paying performers” that does not mean that performers aren’t being onboarded. Shelley is literally bringing value to these performers not through monetary value but through the backend support of things. The value Shelley brings to Decentraland is immeasurable. While all the other stages during the DCL Music Festival ran their Prerecorded video performances. Shelley Van worked tirelessly on coordinating LIVE SHOWS (not prerecorded), In the course of 4 days Shelley managed to coordinate 31 live shows at the TRU Stage 10 of those performers had never performed on Decentraland before.
Shelley has proven that she can Coordinate events better than the Foundation can. TRU Stage was the most successful Stage in that entire Music Festival.

In regards to the budget breakdown I think there may have been some misinterpretation. In the break down the numbers that are listed all the way to the right all add up to the number in the Actual Cost category not the the Grant request total. From reading the budget breakdown, What I understood is that TRU Bandroom is asking for less than what they have spent.

5 Likes
25

If anyone deserves, it’s TRU

4 Likes
26

Yes.

I feel that we need to see a bit more grants awarded of this nature, opposed to random projects with no track record. TRU has been a beacon for all of Decentraland and never swayed through any storm. I believe it is important to keep these event spaces operating for the betterment of DCL as a whole.

Cryptocurrency seasonality can be unforgiving, no matter your success. Stimulate the “businesses” that have a solid resume that can transcend DCL to higher visibility. TRU has a great team and is capable of that.

I am/we are very excited to see what TRU can do with a grant award.

-WJ

4 Likes
27

Thanks for taking the time response I think these a good points. As I mentioned I do believe TRU brings a great amount of value to DCL that is not what I am questioning. I am aware TRU has brought artists in to DCL who may have never played in DCL but I am questioning retroactive salary payment and travel expenses being paid for by the DAO. As far as I understand Shelley is not asking for less that what they’ve spent but less than what they think the total cost is. We all began building in DCL in a good faith effort to start businesses and I think paying retroactive salaries can open the door for a troublesome precedent in which anyone who has spent anytime building can ask for a grant to pay them for those hours spent. I am also not sure the DAO should pay for things like travel to promote one’s personal brand. I support TRU receiving a grant but would like these budget issues to be addressed. Please let me know your thoughts.

2 Likes
28

If there was a need with this grant to pay performers, I would think that would be tacked onto the total amount requested. As is, this is a topic that should be handled outside of the grant request. This grant IMO only pertains to the venue and the manager of the venue. And with that said, 60k/year to to the insane full-time job Shelley has been doing at TRU seems incredibly reasonable at the cost of living expenses where she lives. I know I wouldn’t do that job for any less for sure.

3 Likes
29

Maybe if that’s the case, separate grant proposals for retroactive vs. future should be established and locked in. But I don’t think Shelley and TRU should be made an example of. She isn’t the first to ask for retroactive compensation. From my understanding, the way the DAO started was that 100% of grants were retroactive. If this should be changed as a separate thing, then I think that should be agreed upon by the community and DAO and then put forth. But since this this hasn’t been locked down and this grant is live, Shelley/TRU are grandfathered in the current way that grants have been operating.

2 Likes
30

Regarding the travel expenses. I personally feel Shelley should be a salaried member of the foundation. And since those efforts have fallen on deaf ears, her goals of spreading the DCL word and onboarding musicians, presenting the potential and sharing the DCL knowledge with normies at NFT tradeshows means that she would represent DCL. Those costs should be covered not out of pocket. This isn’t a grant case where you have someone hopeful with ideas that havent been tested. It’s a case of someone who has demonstrated absolute proof of concept and knows more about showcasing live streams in the metaverse than pretty much anyone else including the Foundation. I certainly wouldn’t sweat $7k travel expenses for the tried and true ambassador of DCL that Shelley is, if that means she will be on stage delivering the full potential to a crowd of metaverse hungry people.

4 Likes
31

It is just in the best interest of the Proposer to separate them in my opinion. If this proposal was separated out, I could’ve voted No for retroactive, but Yes for this years grant as an example. Since they are lumped together, it hurts the overall chance of success for the proposal.

Also, when someone has their own brand and own company that they are using grant money to expand and increase the value of, I don’t think it makes sense for them to also use grant money to take a full salary for running their own company. Grants should be used to build / expand companies, things like salaries should be paid by raising funds, selling equity or generating revenue through other means.

If they were organizing all the events on behalf of the DAO vs. TRU then I would totally support a full salary for that.

I know you mentioned that she should be on the Foundation but they haven’t listened; why not make it an official DAO Committee Position that is funded?

I would totally vote yes if it was:
-Last year costs incurred (no salary)
-This year, projected costs to run / expand TRU (no salary. maybe some travel if I knew the events.)
-Create a salaried position on the DAO for Shelley

2 Likes
33

Definitely something to explore if this grant proposal falls short. I didn’t know you could set up DAO funded positions. There is a lot I am unaware of when it comes to possibilities with the dao.

post above deleted because it didnt appear to go as a reply to you DCLCurations.

1 Like
34

This is a resounding yes from me. We are so blessed to have the TRU Band Room and Shelley in DCL. I have first hand experience with Shelley and the whole team. They bring so much value and sense of community to the space. Projects like this are going to be key to the overall success of our beloved Decentraland moving forward. I personally would rather see grant money go towards people/projects that have a track record and existing presence in the space already.

5 Likes
35

thank you for the response. This makes sense but still would like to hear from the team. As far as being grandfathered in I think we can all acknowledge there are problems with how grants have been given out in the past. I do not think we should continue to do things just because that is how it has been in the past.

1 Like
36

First, thank you for the questions, @dogman, and thank you @SinfulMeatStick and @Roustan for your responses.

  1. Regarding paying artists:

The amount of non-monetary support is difficult to quantify. The TRU structure provides extensive (and ongoing) onboarding and technical support in/for Decentraland. This is provided by me and I make myself available pretty much 24 hours/day, 7 days/week. I take DMs and calls from all over the globe and operate on extremely flexible hours to accommodate the artists’ schedules. We offer free consultations regarding wearable design, smart contracts, and general web3 strategies for musicians.

As for monetary support, whenever possible, we invest in performing artists’ music NFTs for the TRU Community Wallet. https://opensea.io/TRU-RockingUniquehorns

We also offer 10% of TRU NFT sales to all performing artists as part of the TRU affiliate or “dynamic minting” program. We support all artists seeking external sponsorship and offer ad space during any sponsored shows to allow everyone to seek third-party support (we do not take any of that funding.) TRU has also created custom builds to support large-scale IRL events for artists at no cost to the artist.

This structure supports an “all are welcome” stage. Providing payment for shows would introduce political complexity that would require gatekeeping and a potential “are you good enough to be paid” situation which does not align with our goal of bringing new artists to Decentraland. The point of the TRU Band Room is to give all artists a place to learn and grow.

  1. Travel costs

To be frank, I advocate for Decentraland everywhere I go. The TRU Band Room is more “for DCL” than it is “for the TRU NFTs.” My efforts to onboard musicians and new users is more of a benefit to DCL than it is for the NFT project–or, at least it has been so far, when it comes to NFT sales. That has already been addressed in this proposal: “if for whatever reason the minting pace picks up (wen bull? ) and we happen to mint out the collection, we’re more than happy to pay it forward or repay this grant.”

However, in the spirit of transparency, whenever the travel budget is used, we will provide a detailed plan of how we will engage on-site for the benefit of DCL.

  1. Retroactive costs

I apologize if the budget breakdown wasn’t clear.
Since Oct 2021, TRU has already invested at least $118,000 USD in this operation. (@UniKorn provided conservative numbers when listing the expenses for the build, code, server fees, etc.) We are requesting just a portion of this for retroactive costs. The $93,000 you mentioned is for 27 months and that number would only apply if we were asking for the grand total of $187,600.

To address any other questions, concerns, or feedback, we’ll be available for an AMA during the Community Building Decentraland (CBD) Twitter Space hosted by @SinfulMeatStick and @Canessa this Wednesday. Of course, you can always reach us here or via DM as well.

Link to CBD Space this week: https://twitter.com/i/spaces/1YqxoAkEalXGv

7 Likes
37

TRU Band Room feels like home. I’ve spent umpteen hours here with my best friends transcending irl space & time through music. Truly a remarkable metaverse community. Shelley is one of the most inspiring people in this space, and i hope to learn more from her in my metaverse journey <3
All the love, support & gratitude <3

4 Likes
38

That’s a easy yes for me. I love the event and they bring lots of value to the DCL community. I need to come hang out with you guys soon.

3 Likes
39

Thank you for the thoughtful response. I feel as though my questions have been answered and will be voting yes after reading your answers. Good luck with the grant

5 Likes
40

Shelley has been absolutely pivotal to driving consistent growth and engagement in Decentraland. Countless thousands of people have come to the Metaverse for the very first time just to see a Metaverse concert at the TRU Band Room. Every time we do a concert, someone comes to me after the show to tell me that it was literally their first Metaverse experience. Shelley is the driving force behind the traffic that comes through the TRU Band Room. We need Shelley in the Metaverse. This is an easy YES for me, and for all of the Aliens as well. Bless you Shelley, Godspeed. :alien:

3 Likes
41

YES YES YES!!! As an artist and performer who has had the privilege of playing at some of the most prestigious venues in the world, toured in US, Australia, India and has worked with a global and versatile team of people, I can say without hesitation that I have never met someone as dedicated, passionate, innovative, supportive as Shelley! Shelley’s contributions to the arts community in TRU band room, web 3 metaverse, dcl and beyond are truly invaluable.

Shelley has been a tireless pillar of support for artists, providing assistance with onboarding, support, and beyond. Her dedication to the community is unwavering, as she works day and night to ensure that artists have access to the resources and support they need to create and perform at their best with maximum exposure. Shelley has been instrumental in fostering an environment of inclusivity and support, which has allowed artists in TRU Bandroom to thrive and grow.

Post pandemic, Shelley’s contributions were particularly important. As artists faced unprecedented challenges, she worked tirelessly to ensure that they could continue to express their art and share their talents with the world. She went above and beyond, ensuring that artists had a safe space with engaged audiences to keep creating and performing, even in the most challenging circumstances. I Can say during some of these times when I thought my world changed forever, Shelley’s light and the vibrant community in TRU BAndroom provided a space for me to thrive faaaar beyond ANYTHING that could be expressed as monetary value. Shelley and TRU band room helped me re-find my life calling and helped me keep walking in the direction of my true north as an artist-which then inspired me to affirm some amazing opportunies like singing the National Anthem for the Lakers!

Shelley’s dedication to the arts community has been truly remarkable, and I can confidently speak on behalf of myself and other thriving artists in the game that will agree that the TRU BAndroom and DCL would not be the same without her. Her contributions to the front and back end of shows in DCL and TRU bandroom have been nothing short of essential, and her support has helped countless artists achieve their dreams.
As someone who has had the pleasure of working with Shelley, I can say with confidence that her passion for supporting artists and fostering community is genuine and inspiring. Shelley loves to see people win, and I wholeheartedly believe that she deserves to win.
In light of her exceptional contributions to the arts community in TRU band room and DCL, I strongly urge the DAO committee to consider Shelley Van for this grant. YES YES YES!!!

3 Likes