Optimism Fractal Respect Game Events: Impact on Optimism Governance

Overview and Context

This page provides an overview of the impact and metrics for Optimism Fractal Respect Game Events, a key initiative in the Optimism ecosystem's governance experimentation and community building efforts. These events, hosted weekly since October 2023, serve as a unique platform for builders, delegates, and community members to collaborate, share ideas, and contribute to the evolution of Optimism's governance processes.

The purpose of this page is to showcase the realized impact of these events on Optimism Governance, particularly in the context of our application for Retroactive Funding Round 6. This impact page and the associated application have been created by Dan Singjoy, founder of the Optimystics team, who organize and facilitate these events. For more details on our application, please visit our Optimism Fractal Respect Game Events application.

Important funding clarification

The 30,000 OP listed on this application represents the total funding received by the Optimystics team for multiple projects in RetroPGF Round 3, not solely for Optimism Fractal events. Due to the application structure, there was no dedicated field to explain how previous funding was distributed across projects. To ensure transparency and avoid disqualification, we felt it necessary to note the full amount in each related application.

It's worth noting that at the time of the previous funding round, only one Optimism Fractal Respect Game event had been hosted. Therefore, the funding specifically allocated to Optimism Fractal events is far less than the total 30,000 OP grant. For a deeper understanding of our work across different projects and the broader funding context, please refer to the Optimystics Projects and Funding overview.

Table of Contents

• Overview and Context
• Important funding clarification
• Event Participation and Engagement
• Software Development Fostered
• Content Creation and Distribution
• Governance Innovation and Engagement
• Positive Feedback
• Qualitative Impact
• Related Projects and Further Context
• Conclusion

Event Participation and Engagement

Our weekly events have fostered a vibrant, engaged community of Optimism ecosystem participants. Each event consists of a 45-minute Respect Game, fostering deep engagement with Optimism governance topics.

The Respect Game, at the heart of Optimism Fractal events, is an innovative onchain social game where participants share their contributions to Optimism, collaboratively rank each other's impact, and earn non-transferable Respect tokens by forming consensus. Breakout rooms allow for intimate, focused discussions and consensus-building among small groups. To learn more about the game mechanics and its significance, you can see our welcome guide, protocol specifications, or watch our videos.

Key metrics include:

• Total Events Hosted: 43 weekly events since October 2023

• Unique Participants: Over 50 diverse contributors to the Optimism ecosystem

• Average Attendance: 8-10 participants per event

• Total Respect Game Breakout Rooms: Over 60

• Respect Game Presentations: Over 300 presentations where players shared what they did to help Optimism

• New Governance Participants: 3-5 new participants onboarded to Optimism governance per month

These numbers represent a wide range of participants, including builders, governance experts, business leaders, members of various Optimism councils and commissions, recipients of missions and RetroPGF grants, and leaders from Superchain networks like OP Mainnet, Base, Mode, and Lisk. You can gain a better understanding of the outstanding quality of governance leaders and builders who’ve used our software on our draft contributors page, which we’re working to improve to provide a better understanding of the quality of participants at these events.

The engagement is further evidenced by onchain activity by ~350 real-time gameplay transactions, each logging onchain attestations of contributions and consensus decisions for all players in the breakout group. You can view these transactions on the Optimism Fractal account and OPF Respect token distribution on block explorers. You can find links to watch the videos of the events and verify this participation below.

Participant retention and engagement levels have been exceptionally high, inspiring countless hours of volunteer work towards developing related software and educational content. The recurring engagement of many participants is evident in the token distribution visible on block explorers. We are currently working with analytics tools to demonstrate retention more clearly with onchain data.

Software Development Fostered

The Optimism Fractal events have been a catalyst for significant software development within the Optimism ecosystem. These events have inspired the creation of innovative tools and applications that enhance governance processes and community engagement on the Optimism network.

Key highlights of software development include:

• Major Applications: Full-stack development and release of significant open-source applications for playing the Respect Game and enhancing governance with Respect, such as the Respect Games app, Fractalgram, and ORDAO

• Developer Attraction: Multiple teams of developers have been drawn to build tools inspired by these events, now actively developing open-source repositories with ongoing code additions and commits

• Tool Development: Events inspired and fostered the creation of most tools featured on Optimystics.io/tools over the past year, including other important governance tools such as Respect Trees and the Optimism Fractal Hats Tree

• Comprehensive Builder Resources: Discussions catalyzed the Optimism Fractal Development Hub and thousands of resources on the Optimism Fractal notion site, creating a robust knowledge base for community understanding and streamlined onboarding

These tools represent significant advancements in onchain governance protocols and engagement, providing the Optimism ecosystem with powerful mechanisms for decentralized decision-making.

The impact of these tools extends beyond Optimism Fractal. They have attracted interest from many large communities and organizations who are now implementing or planning to implement them. For example, the ZAO Fractal has adopted our processes and hosted over 20 weekly events based around the Respect Game, empowering musicians in their community.

Throughout our events, we've showcased numerous governance-related tools and innovations presented by developers. These demonstrations are accessible via timestamps in the show notes of each episode, providing a valuable resource for the community to learn about and engage with new governance tools.

For more information on these tools and others, visit our Optimystics Tools page and the GitHub repositories for Optimism Fractal software.

Content Creation and Distribution

Our events have not only fostered engagement and software development but also produced a substantial body of educational and historical content:

• Event Recordings: 43 full event recordings, each with comprehensive show notes including timestamps for easy navigation

• Total Video Content: Over 50 hours of Respect Games and related planning or office hour sessions

• Breakout Room Recordings: Available for most events, providing in-depth insights into group discussions

• Viewership and Reach: About 2,500 views across event recordings and 40,000+ impressions on social media posts promoting events and sharing highlights

• Content Creation: Events sparked dozens of articles, thousands of notion site resources, and lots of collaborative community-generated content (such as these videos)

This body of work serves multiple purposes: it documents the progress and contributions of builders on Optimism, provides a valuable historical record of ecosystem development, and serves as an educational resource for newcomers and researchers. By creating and distributing this content, we're not only preserving the history of Optimism's governance evolution but also fostering a more informed and engaged community. Our reach demonstrates the growing interest and engagement with our content within the Optimism ecosystem and beyond.

For a comprehensive overview of our video content, including breakout room recordings and detailed show notes, visit our Optimism Fractal videos page and YouTube playlist. You can see Farcaster channel and X account for some examples of the many channels where I content is distributed. For detailed metrics on our content's reach and impact, please see our impact metrics dashboard.

Governance Innovation and Engagement

The Optimism Fractal Respect Game Events have been a hotbed of governance experimentation and innovation. Through these events, we've explored novel approaches to decentralized decision-making, community representation, and ecosystem engagement. Here's an overview of our impact in this area:

• Governance Proposals Generated: 27 community-driven proposals developed with over 220 votes from participants (as you can on the snapshot space and leaderboard)

• Council Formation Cycles: 31 weekly council selection processes, demonstrating a novel approach to representative governance

• Respect Token Distribution: Enabled a decentralized soulbound token distribution amongst over 50 accounts of leading builders and governance enthusiasts. This democratic allocation, based on peer-judged contributions to Optimism over one year, has formed an independent body capable of contributing to the decentralization of Optimism governance (empowered with onchain decision-making via ORDAO).

Our consensus process, based on the revolutionary concept of fractal democracy, was launched in Season 2 and has been in continuous operation since then. This process is a key innovation in decentralized governance, allowing for efficient decision-making while maintaining community representation. You can learn more about the Optimism Fractal council on the council page and explore our core intents, protocol specifications, and history of changes on the details page. You can verify the participation in our consensus process by viewing the leaderboard in the Optimism Fractal snapshot space.

As stated in the section above, we've onboarded 3-5 new participants to Optimism governance per month through these events (and more via video viewership), steadily growing the pool of engaged governance participants. Our events attract a diverse range of ecosystem representatives, including core developers, dApp builders, and governance contributors, fostering a rich environment for cross-pollination of ideas. Several participants who joined Optimism Fractal events have went on to become Optimism delegates and active participants in other governance related events, such as Grants Council Office Hours and Token/Joint House calls.

Notably, we've attracted several deeply experienced governance leaders from the Upscale Fractal, which operates on a competing L1 ecosystem. These leaders, who have practiced fractal democracy for years, have been inspired to shift their focus towards developing and marketing Respect Game applications on Optimism. This migration of talent and expertise represents a significant win for the Optimism ecosystem and demonstrates the compelling nature of our governance experiments.

Through the combination of our Respect token system, innovative consensus processes, and regular community engagement, we've created a meritocratic and engaged community of governance participants. This system provides a model for decentralized reputation and decision-making power distribution, offering valuable insights for the broader Optimism ecosystem's governance evolution.

Positive Feedback

The value of Optimism Fractal Respect Game Events is reflected not just in metrics, but in the enthusiastic feedback from participants. Here's an overview of the positive responses we've received:

• All participants asked report finding the events valuable for understanding Optimism governance
• Participants (outside of the Optimystics team) have created dozens of posts promoting Optimism Fractal and created multiple videos about Optimism Fractal
• Many participants have been inspired to integrate our governance processes into their communities or organizations
• Developers frequently mention the events as a source of inspiration for their governance-related projects

We’ve curated over 50 pieces of positive feedback from Optimism Fractal participants to provide you with an idea of the outstanding response for these events. For examples and videos showing positive feedback from participants, see OptimismFractal.com/feedback.

Qualitative Impact

Beyond the quantitative metrics, the Optimism Fractal Respect Game Events have had a profound qualitative impact on the Optimism ecosystem:

Fostering a Governance-Focused Community:

These events have created a consistent, welcoming space for governance enthusiasts to connect, learn, and contribute. This has led to a more engaged and informed community, capable of participating meaningfully in Optimism's governance processes. Over the past year, we've seen participants go from newcomers to active contributors in wider Optimism governance discussions.

Practical Governance Education:

Through hands-on participation in the Respect Game, attendees have gained practical experience with decentralized decision-making processes. This experiential learning has proven invaluable in preparing community members for more active roles in Optimism governance. We've witnessed participants apply concepts learned in our events to thoughtful contributions on the governance forum and in other Optimism initiatives.

Incubating Governance Innovations:

By providing a regular testing ground for new ideas, these events have accelerated the development and refinement of governance tools and processes. Concepts explored in these events, such as using soulbound tokens for governance weight, have sparked discussions in broader Optimism governance circles. The rapid prototyping environment of our events has allowed governance ideas to be tested and iterated quickly.

Bridging Different Stakeholder Groups:

The events have served as a unique meeting point for various stakeholders in the Optimism ecosystem, including developers, users, delegates, and core team members. This cross-pollination of ideas has led to more holistic and inclusive governance approaches. We've seen collaborations form between participants that have gone on to create value elsewhere in the ecosystem.

Foundation for Scalable Governance:

The consistent experimentation and refinement of governance processes through these events have built a robust foundation for Optimism's evolving governance structures. The fractal nature of our approach has demonstrated how large-scale governance decisions can be made efficiently in a decentralized manner, providing valuable insights as Optimism's governance scales.

Cross-Ecosystem Influence: The governance models and community engagement strategies pioneered in these events have started to attract attention from other blockchain communities. While the full impact of this cross-pollination is still emerging, it suggests potential for broader influence beyond Optimism itself.

Catalyst for Innovation: Many ideas first discussed or tested in these events are now being developed into governance tools and proposals by participants. For example, the concept of using Respect tokens for weighted voting in community polls emerged from our events and is now being explored for wider application.

By consistently hosting these events and refining our processes, we've created a vibrant laboratory for governance experimentation within Optimism. While the full potential of these innovations is still unfolding, the foundation we've built over the past year has positioned Optimism Fractal Respect Game Events as a key driver of governance evolution in the Optimism ecosystem.

Related Projects and Further Context

It's important to clarify that the 30,000 OP funding mentioned in our application represents the total funding received by the Optimystics team for multiple projects in RetroPGF Round 3. At the time of that grant, only one Optimism Fractal event had been hosted.

The large majority of the impact described in this document has been the result of countless hours of multiple team members volunteering on a full-time basis since then. For a comprehensive understanding of the Optimystics team's work and its impact across different initiatives, please explore our Projects and Funding Overview.

We are committed to continuously improving our impact measurement. We are currently developing a comprehensive dashboard to track and visualize key metrics related to our events and their impact on the Optimism ecosystem. You can view our draft dashboard here.

Conclusion

Thank you for your consideration and support of public goods in the Optimism ecosystem!

We invite you to join our weekly events to experience the Respect Game and Optimism Fractal community firsthand. You can find event details and RSVP on our events page. To learn more about our work and see our resources, please explore the Optimism Fractal Optimism Fractal website.

If you have any questions or would like more information, please don't hesitate to reach out to Dan Singjoy. We appreciate your time in reviewing our impact and look forward to your feedback.