[INTRODUCTION] MetaTherapy - A metaverse based mental wellbeing DAO

[Cryptonaut]

MetaTherapy - A metaverse based mental wellbeing DAO

Mission - To develop metaverse spaces conducive for various modalities of therapy to be held.

The reason to create this DAO is to

1. Build an ecosystem of therapists of various modalities
2. Test those modalities in metaverse space
3. Research and report findings about individual & group therapies and their progress & areas of improvement
4. Eventually provide decentralised web3 structure for future of therapy

Phase - 1 goals of DAO

1. to start testing individual and group therapies in NearHub spaces with 5 therapists
2. to enable therapies in metaverse using nearhub
3. to research the cross section of metaverse and various therapies and their pros and cons and to provide a monthly report on individual and group therapies

Phase - 2 goals of DAO (Tentative) Web3 based website

1. to build a robust eco-system of therapists of multiple modalities to engage with each other and share best practices
2. To eventually become a self sustainable DAO and provide trustless model based therapies through metaverse.
3. To provide free therapies to subjects of the current war and to caregivers to war subjects.
4. To onboard new members (therapists and clients) to NEAR via social media outreach

We want to begin by creating a therapy space in metaverse where we conduct individual and group therapies for the NEAR community for 3 months where we gather their response and how they feel.

This will be a beta testing space and we will be working very closely with clients and therapists trying to understand how they feel in this virtual space and whether or not this space is conducive for such intimate and sensitive work for healing traumas.

All the learnings, developments and areas of improvement will be shared to see in the reports on a monthly basis for community members and new therapists who might join later and will get up to speed with the DAO trajectory.

We would also like some support from the NEAR community as we are relatively new in this space and would need some form of mentoring to bring this idea to fruition with higher chances of long term growth and sustainability done with the utmost care and awareness.

It would be great if NearHub creates a space for us to do individual and group therapy sessions.

If the project seems like it will work, the MetaTherapy Dao would then invest in land or virtual spaces to conduct these sessions and will keep developing more space for clients to have these therapies in.

In future we will also add a tab for clients to have custom spaces designed for them using NearHub, where they could feel comfortable as per their requirements.

Initially this could be just using the computer screen but eventually we’d like a fully immersive virtual world experience which could help be a client’s safe space. We’d like a vertical dedicated to sending VR glasses to the clients if they start finding value in this therapy model.

Benefits

1. The stigma around mental health is taken care and helps for a more open therapy session for (benefit for mental health space)

2. Clients, as they can be completely open and transparent about their issues as they are represented by their avatar and don’t have to use real identities

3. Therapists, as they will now get completely honest information with reduced inhibitions from clients and they can be objective about their feedback as they won’t have any subliminal judgements against the clients popping up

4. Research space for how metaverse will help in future of therapy

5. NEAR - Pioneering in therapy related metaverse spaces with unlimited possibilities.

6. Group therapy sessions will allow for participants to generate self-empathy as they will help each other with various coping mechanisms and also have the understanding of not being alone while struggling with their respective issues.

7. NEAR will be able to onboard a lot of users looking for therapy in a trustless manner all around the world as mental health is one of the most pressing issues of our time and it will be really good for NEAR’s brand value

8. Promotion of Near protocol

9. Promotion of Nearhub

10. Onboarding new clients from outside near ecosystem

11. One of the pioneers in the world in therapy related metaverse spaces

12. Therapists and clients will develop an understanding of NEAR platforms and dapps as needed for

Councils

@sanaya

@Cryptonaut

@jefedeoro

Team - 5 Therapist ( We have shortlisted a few, but waiting for your questions and approvals to confirm them)

Roadmap

May 1st to July 31st

Phase 1 - 3 months - May 1st to July 31st

1. Informing NEAR communities about MetaTherapy as a service and Requesting their participation and feedback about their experience
2. Get therapists of multiple modalities together and test metaverse spaces with Nearians.

• Art based therapy
• Cognitive behavioural therapy
• REBT - Rational emotive behavioural therapy
• Exposure therapy
• Dialectical Behavioural Therapy
• Psychoanalysis and psychodynamic therapies
• Behaviour therapy
• Cognitive therapy
• Humanistic therapy
• Integrative or holistic therapy
• Psychodramatic therapy
• Guided meditations audio which can be converted into NFTs
• etc

3. Built a parcel/build a nearhub space where 1 group therapy and 2-3 individual sessions can be held
4. Conduct 10 individual sessions and 1 group therapy sessions per therapist per month for 3 months
5. Figure out unseen issues that might come up with the sessions and try to find work around for it.
6. Mint Art from art based therapies post the sessions on mintbase and collect them on 3xr galleries.
7. Ask people to record their experiences post the therapy and mint NFT of it. This gives them an opportunity to share the experiences with others on social media, helps near’s propagation and also allows them to turn their experience into art.
8. Building reward based models for

• Therapists - providing them with an NFT based badges for conducting 10/20/30 therapies which gives therapist them seniority and clients can trust them more
• Clients - providing them with NFT based badges for getting 10/20/30 sessions done.

Phase 2 (tentative)

1. Buy and design 2-3 metaverse spaces with different environments which will be used for hosting therapies
2. Create a team of 2-3 people for onboarding new users from Social media campaigns who will be able to get on calls with people over whatsapp, telegram, zoom and google meet which will help onboard new users interested in decentralized therapies
3. Start social media accounts on Insta, Twitter and FB
4. Create a social media campaign designed to onboard new users who want therapy and new therapists who want to be a member of the MetaTherapy DAO
5. Provide VR glasses for an immersive experience in future
6. Call researchers from universities to propose and conduct research they want.
7. Produce blogs for therapies and the need for it in today’s world, talk about metaverse based therapy and create an inbound marketing mechanism to onboard new clients

FUTURE COUNCIL MEMBERS -

Phase 1
Support Council Members -

Their primary responsibility will be to

1. provide support, assistance and technical expertise to the therapists, researchers and nearians.
2. Make monthly reports about progress & areas of improvement.
3. Communicate with internal DAOs and teams for development to better the process and MetaTherapy DAO.
4. Minting NFTs of feedbacks recorded after sessions and art based therapies
5. Minting NFT based badges for therapists and clients

(Phase2)

Supervisor Council Member - understands what the organization needs and what our clients are going through. He’s one point of contact for all therapists who hit a dead end with clients and need to discuss how to proceed.

Therapists - will be onboarded post verification of documents. Therapists will be only onboarded when they have appropriate certification in their field and 3+ years of experience.

Researchers - will try to find areas of development, what is working and not working for the therapists and clients. Also individual research which can help them produce new instruments of therapies or enhancing existing modalities in the metaverse

Funding details per month - Phase 1

5 therapists

$50 per session per hour per therapist x 50 Session - $2500

Support Council Members - $300 per council - $900 total (Responsibilities mentioned above)

Total - 3400

Creatives Dao Proposal
One time cost NearHub Building - $2700
Bounty for NFT based badges - $300

Total for Creatives DAO - $3000

@jlwaugh @David_NEAR @FritzWorm @creativesdao-council @IgbozeIsrael

We would really appreciate any suggestions for the right category and tags

[IgbozeIsrael]

Do you have a group where people can join? Like telegram or Discord.

Also, how about separating the funds proposal from the Inteoduction of your DAO. Let the community understand what you are up to before you request for funds.

[Cryptonaut]

Thanks @IgbozeIsrael for the suggestion.

I’ll take the funding bit off. Can you please help with the category we should route the funding to?

[IgbozeIsrael]

What i mean is that you can write your funding proposal after your DAO has been discussed.

You can still let it let it be though

[Mohaa]

What a sensational move, let’s keep up bringing better health solution to the Near ecosystem
The [INTRODUCTION] NEAR Health Guild would be happy to be involved.

[Cryptonaut]

Thanks for showing support @Mohaa.
I’m really glad you liked the idea.

We would love Near health Guild and your support!

Would love to know any ideas that you might think will help the DAO to be a more robust and effective system that can thrive for a long period!

Also please keep tagging more relevant DAOs and guilds you think might be of assistance

[David_NEAR]

Hey!

Great introduction, is this doubling up as a funding request? Who are you looking to make the funding request to?

[johanga]

@David_NEAR this is a question - what is the proper category to request funding from?
Thank you for the feedback

[Purpledots]

Great and sensational initiative. I believe mental health is a big take on societal reality as much as it’s been overlooked, it’s also very necessary in building ideas to bridge the gap in humans from different aura.

I hope to see this come alive

[LulucaL]

This is so important. Nice done

[Cryptonaut]

Hey @David_NEAR
Could you please guide us as to who do we need to approach this for funding?

Thanks
Sahil

[semwal]

Amazing initiative! Would love to support in whatever way I can

[damboy22]

Love the whole idea, my recommendations

1. This is an introductory post, make a Funding proposal different from that of an introductory post
2. You can reach out to the community Dao, The NEAR HEALTH TEAM and NEAR MEDICAL TEAM for collaborations and Futher fine tuning of your Funding proposal

[Cryptonaut]

Thanks @damboy22

I’ll get to it at the earliest!

[johanga]

@jlwaugh @FritzWorm @williamx @Monish016 @sterryo
@Community_Moderator @community-team
we would be greatful for your recommendations and observing, if such an initiative can be funded by Community DAO

[David_NEAR]

Hey guys,

Since the retirement of the Ecosystem Development DAO

[UPDATE] Ecosystem Development DAO Vertical

Hello Community! It’s been a busy past few months as we’ve rolled out the [New Process] Community Payouts (warts and all), and we’ve gotten into a routine. However, until we can make wholesale changes to the entire process - you may recall, we are waiting on some product developments and internal strategic decisions before we can - there are still small yet mighty improvements that can be made. And while some of these changes will be installed behind-the-scenes to address the very ma…

Funding for things like this, that being projects which don’t fit into the Creatives or MarketingDAO funding verticals, would fall under the @community-team

Although I think there’s every good intention in this proposal, I don’t see how it completely relates to NEAR. It more seems like something that NEAR has been squeezed into.

@Cryptonaut

One time cost NearHub Building - $2700

Where did you get this quote from? I spoke to the NH team and they said they weren’t in contact with you?

@Cryptonaut

We’d like a vertical dedicated to sending VR glasses to the clients if they start finding value in this therapy model.

This sounds expensive and unnecessary.

@Cryptonaut

$50 per session per hour per therapist x 50 Session - $2500

Where are you seeing the demand for this?

Therapy and counseling is a bordered environment bound by regulations and patient-doctor confidentiality (at least here in the UK). I don’t think the same levels of checks and balances would be able to be upheld in an environment like this.

I can see you’re verifying their documents but it then boils down to who’s watching the watchmen?

I would be opposed to funding this for the reasons laid out above, but happy to hear the opinions of everyone else and @community-team

[Ace]

i have long pondered on the intersection of web3 and mental health and must commend the efforts put into developing this proposal. i believe the creation of such a DAO keeps humanity at the center of its NEAR purpose and no amount of resource is ever enough to preserve humanity. I look forward to seeing this DAO succeed in its goals and vision as well as expressing the principles and vision of the Protocol. THE FUTURE IS NEAR !!

[Cryptonaut]

Hi @David_NEAR

Thank you for a detailed response and raising questions that we can shed light on.

I’ve tried to answer all the questions you’ve asked. Please let me know if this makes sense or are there any more grey areas that you might want clarity on.

Our council members are trying their best to make this work as our research, experience and belief has shown that this could be an area which could help millions of users in the future which would make NEAR reach more people and would allow NEAR to be seen in the light of good humanitarian work

Your questions are marked in bold and the responses follow after that.

“Although I think there’s every good intention in this proposal, I don’t see how it completely relates to NEAR. It more seems like something that NEAR has been squeezed into.”

The reason for this proposition is to onboard therapists and test therapies in metaverse using NearHub, for a community of online therapists to thrive in the NEAR ecosystem.

This helps NEAR in following ways

• Onboarding therapists and clients on NEAR - This itself can onboard hundreds of online based therapists and users and allow them to interact with NEAR wallets, Mintbase to mint their NFTs and get familiar with the NEAR ecosystem.
• We will provide them custom environments to have therapies in the metaverse (nearhub) instead of a zoom call or a video call. This itself could have a lot of demand as clients now can design the space that is comfortable for them to have therapies in. The spaces would be designed by NearHub, generating revenue for NEAR
• NEAR branded social media and blog for MetaTherapy DAO will provide brand outreach to thousands.
• It will give NEAR protocol an informational and research leverage as we would have tested metaverse space for therapies and we’ll know what are the advantages and issues.
• It will position NEAR as a futuristic and humanitarian brand as it is trying to solve an issue that millions are suffering from

“Where did you get this quote from? I spoke to the NH team and they said they weren’t in contact with you?”

Got the quote for NearHub from the link mentioned below. Haven’t spoken to them yet. If the price is lesser then it will be even better. I don’t mind modifying the proposal to a lesser price.

[Proposal] Monthly CryptoVoxels Parcel Rental and NearHub gallery build

​ Project/Council Members: belzua.near chloe.near geminirising.near jmm.near samhill.near tabear.near Target: ina.sputnik-dao.near Total Requested Funding Amount: $2,700 USD For this month we are requesting funding to build a virtual gallery on NearHub. As well as the monthly rental for the parcel in CryptoVoxels. To start, we are requesting the next parcel rental payment - month 2 from 6 months rental for the parcel we have built on in CryptoVoxels. We have discussed a build with th…

This sounds expensive and unnecessary.

We can’t say if it’s unnecessary or not because we haven’t tested it yet. This is anyway in the 2nd Phase after the DAO starts generating money through online consultations in the metaverse.

This will be one of the last areas to be explored as it could be costly with unknown chances of success.

According to our therapist onboard, who has worked on exposure therapy, she thinks it could really help people get over fears of spiders, heights, insects etc. However, we do not know if it will be successful or not. If it works NEAR could be one of the first to do this.

“Where are you seeing the demand for this?”

This came in just yesterday and is literally what MetaTherapy is aiming at.

MENTAL METAVERSE - TAGO LEADS THE WORLD IN APPLYING BLOCKCHAIN IN MENTAL HEALTH CARE

The market expects to reach US$ 493.8 Billion by 2027

Mental Health Market Size, Growth, Analysis Report 2022-2027

You can find information projected about the future of mental health industry in the market research done below

https://www.alliedmarketresearch.com/mental-health-market-A11770

I’ve additionally attached a few screenshots of a few top online therapy websites as seen in a website analysis tool called Ahrefs. It’s one of the best paid tools to analyse monthly websites stats and is regularly updated.

Please look at Organic Traffic on top right of the screenshot. You will see that the traffic is between 100k to 1Million users per month for different websites offering online therapy and online meditations.

[Note - The traffic on these sites are also conservative as these tools ( like Ahrefs) can’t index all the pages on the internet and according to them, the organic traffic is generally 3-4 times higher than what is shown in the organic search bar]

Don’t judge the number of tabs opened

“Therapy and counselling is a bordered environment bound by regulations and patient-doctor confidentiality (at least here in the UK). I don’t think the same levels of checks and balances would be able to be upheld in an environment like this.”

These are valid questions and this is where we are stuck

1. How to get HIPAA compliance for the DAO
2. How to secure the sessions and patient doctor confidentiality from a technical standpoint in the metaverse
3. Can we create personal spaces for each therapist and is it possible for recordings to be absolutely private? Can they be encrypted when stored on our servers?
4. Will developers have access to the recordings and can this not be the case?
5. What are other areas that we are not able to see yet which could be a fatal error for this project

I’d be more than happy to discuss this if we have any legal team which is onboard, so we can figure out grey areas. This is where we would need help.

I can see you’re verifying their documents but it then boils down to who’s watching the watchmen?

1. All of the therapists will have a Masters Degree or a Doctorate Degree in their field. They will have to be qualified and certified by their state’s professional board after successfully completing the necessary education, exams, training and practice. While their experience, expertise, and background vary, they all must possess at least 3 years and 1,000 hours of hands-on experience.
2. Art based therapists need a certificate from an organisation they learned from.
3. Life coaches and meditation teachers may or may not possess documentation.

This is the criteria on various websites who are leading online therapy today and we’d like to adhere to the same.

These are our first draft guidelines which are subject to change if new information comes to light.

I hope I have answered your questions. Let me know if you have any other query.

If everything is answered, I’d request you to guide us with

Legal team, so we can understand what areas we need to work on.
Other DAOs who you think can help us fund this
Anyone who could potentially mentor us to realise this goal

Thanks
Sahil

[mr_free]

Hello Sahil,

Probably it’s a nice idea.
I don’t understand how the therapist will onboard users. Will he speak about Near Ecosystem during the therapy session?!
I see the risks.
How we could measure success in therapy? What will happen if therapy will not work as expected? How will check the therapist’s licenses (or it’s available only for some selected therapists)? Will it be group meetings or p2p?

Sorry, It doesn’t resonate with me.
You can ask for support from community-dao

[Cryptonaut]

Hello,

Appreciate your questions and doubts.

Allow me to answer your queries.

Therapist will not onboard clients. We will onboard clients and therapists post three months of testing the space with NEAR community members who would want to be participate as users and 5 therapists of different modalities.

As already mentioned in the main post, in Phase 2 we will try to onboard therapists and clients via ads created on social media and a website where they will be routed to.

A backend team of 2-3 members will be created or a chat bot will be created to help them onboard. We will have to look at this at a later stage with more clarity.

There will be individual therapies which will only be amongst therapist and the client and group therapies which will be with one therapist and multiple users.

Council members will collect feedback from therapists and clients post their session about technical issues, how to hey felt in the virtual space, what were pros and cons.

We won’t be measuring the quality of the therapist’s quality but the quality of the experience. If a therapist isn’t good enough a client can always leave and get a new therapist.

Our aim is to provide infrastructure conducive for metaverse based therapies. Which is what we’ll be trying to find via constant question and answer.

We will ask the therapists to share their certificates or license which can be uploaded in the metaverse room and can also be uploaded as an NFT for anyone to view.

I hope I answered your questions.

Please let me know exactly what does not resonate with you and I’ll be happy to reply.

We need your support and constructive critisism so we are able to realise this project with all due diligence done.