Project Name: Zero Aggression Smart Contract, or, Building the Free World
Background: What problems do you aim to solve? How does it serve our mission of a user-owned internet with more privacy and self-sovereignty?
We propose to encourage more voluntary interactions amongst people, reduce the risk associated with some of those interactions, and increase accountability by people and enterprises interacting in free markets.
Project Overview: What solution are you providing? Who will it serve? Our solution is to put the Zero Aggression Principle into the NEAR protocol as a smart contract with a small fee for collecting the signature and a surety of an amount chosen by the signer to be relinquished to any victim or victims of aggression if the signer commits an act or acts of aggression and a private dispute resolution service finds them liable for the act or acts.
Scope: What are the components or technical specs of the project? What will the final deliverable look like? How will you measure success?
The smart contract is about one page of text which collects a fee from each signer of the equivalent in NEAR tokens of one-tenth ounce of silver (about US$2.75 today) and collects a surety (any amount at least one-tenth ounce of silver or above) to be held against future adjudication if any. The final deliverable is a working smart contract which distributes the signing fees to the software developer(s) for 40%, the marketing enterprise applying for the grant (Houston Space Society, Inc.) for 40%, and the grant agency (Cypherpunk Council) for 20%; and which places the surety funds into a multi-signature account to be managed by an escrow board consisting of one representative from the software team, one from the Houston Space Society, one from the grant agency, and a fifth representative to be selected by the other four.
The final deliverable would scrape the spot price of silver from Kitco com or similar once a weekday (the price wonât change from Friday evening to Sunday evening) and display that to the prospective signer, collect and post the signature block of the signer, collect the fee in NEAR tokens, allow the signer to choose a surety amount and collect that amount in NEAR tokens, distribute the funds as indicated to the various parties involved. The Council of Five to establish procedures for identifying aggression events and connecting victims to dispute resolution services for private adjudication.
We would measure success of this proposed smart contract by its being accepted by 10,000 or more signers within 6 months. Another measure of success would be the establishment of similar smart contracts on other blockchains by other parties seeking to perform the same function, which should not be centralised but, rather, distributed.
Budget and Milestones: What grant amount are you seeking? How long do you estimate that the project will take in hours? If the project is nontrivial, please break down the project into milestones, with a clear output (e.g., low-fi mockup, MVP with two features) and include the estimated work hours for each milestone.
The grant amount we are seeking is US$5,000. We believe the project requires about 30 hours of programming at roughly US$75/hour for $2,250. A budget of $250 is available for NEAR Protocol operational expenses if any to get the smart contract operating. A budget of $2,000 is allocated to marketing activities, including social media presence, building a Zero Aggression smart contract web site, developing essays and blog posts, posting to Telegram channels and other discussions, posting to old-school web forums and email distribution lists for freedom community people, and issuing a press release to select publications (Reason magazine, e.g.). A budget of $500 is allocated to management oversight and for identifying prospective private dispute resolution services.
Approximate schedule for programming: Low-fidelity mockup - 5 hours; Functioning silver price scrape - 1 hour; completed smart contract - 18 hours; testing - 6 hours.
Total Grant Request: US$5,000
Team: Who is building this? What relevant experience do you bring to this project? Please share links to previous work. Are there skill sets you are missing that you are seeking from the community?
Coding to be performed by a NEAR experience code team or coder. Marketing to be performed by Jim Davidson for Houston Space Society. Jim has coded since 1978, posted to USEnet and other social media since 1982, taught cryptography since 1992, has been involved extensively in freedom community projects and liberty-related political activities since 1988, been director of marketing and senior vice president of marketing and business development for various ventures. See EldarCapital com FreedomLandDAO com HoustonSpaceSociety net and BadQuaker com for examples of Jimâs work.
Skill set needed: Jim does not have extensive experience coding for the NEAR protocol and would be seeking a code team or individual coder for that part of the work.
Risks: What dependencies or obstacles do you anticipate? What contingency plans do you have in place?
There is a risk that the market wonât find the zero aggression principle important to free market parties interacting with one another. There is a risk that the market would be sceptical of any low-surety participants. There is a risk that the signers would be reluctant to place adequate surety in the hands of the council of participants outlined above. There is a risk that the free market wonât provide adequate guidance when a dispute resolution service finds for a victim against a signer, so the council wonât be sure whether or when to distribute surety funds.
Community and Supporting Materials: Do you have previous projects, code commits, or experience that are relevant to this project and proposal? What community feedback or input have you received? How do you plan to share your plan and updates with the community as you proceed?
Jim has been working on freedom communities since December 1993, including the Atlantis Project, Somali Free Port, Texas Constitution 2000, Republic of Texas, and voluntaryists & agorists living in absolute non-aggression today (VALIANT). He is experienced with digital gold currencies, especially e-gold and 1MDC (1998 to 2007), developing a digital gold denominated stock exchange, writing, editing, and reviewing software since 1978, and building teams since 1976.
The idea of a smart contract version of the Zero Aggression Principle has been discussed in various essays and in online forums and has been favourably received.
Open Source: Is your project open source? How do you plan to license it?
Yes. We plan to use whatever licence approach that NEAR Cypherpunk Council suggests. Our goal is to get people involved in zero aggression, and to help those who need dispute resolution with someone who has agreed to zero aggression, and not to be uptight about licence stuff.
Matrix: What is your handle on Matrix and have you joined our community channel #cypherpunkguild:matrix.org?
I do not have a handle and have not joined there, but will soon. Other contact info:
Jim Davidson jim@eldarcapital.com, +1-937-853-6986
Additional info:
Text of Zero Aggression Element from Basic community participation agreement for [Freedom Land DAO](freedomlanddao com)
Lot Users and their friends, family, and guests are expected to understand this agreement and participate in accord with its terms. Our goal is to avoid any form of political governance, and make all involvement in Freedom Land communities based on voluntary participation and cooperation.
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Each individual is the exclusive owner of their existence and the fruits of their labour and inventiveness, owing no obligations except as they voluntarily and specifically agree.
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No one has the freedom to initiate aggressive force against any other person and all members of each community will defend the members of the community where they live from coercion by anyone with such means as each individual judges may be needed.
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Voluntary agreements are important and must be upheld. Involuntary relationships are mistaken and wrong.
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Rights are individual and not collective. Our voluntary agreements are held without regard to race, nationality, gender, gender identity, sexual preference, system of beliefs, or participation in other groups. No entity, association, or individual is permitted to contravene this agreement or the freedom of any participants herein by initiating aggression, by threatening force, nor by delegating force to any other.
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This agreement is binding on all parties to this agreement and stands above and beyond any other agreement, real or imaginary, that may be or be imagined to be binding on the parties to this agreement. This agreement cannot be modified except by the unanimous consent of all signatories. For any amendment to be valid it must in writing and signed by all parties to this agreement before the amendment takes effect.
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Freedom Land DAO and its participants, officers, and associates will work in accord with this agreement at all times and will interface with outside parties only in such ways as will best serve the members of the communities who are party to this agreement. Persons leasing land, renting rooms, or visiting any of our communities are to receive a copy of this agreement and to be given adequate time to comprehend its terms and accept them. Those who agree may stay within the borders of our territories. Those who do not agree will be asked to leave.
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The resources of the DAO that are not otherwise encumbered by direct obligations will be used to support the defence of the communities and the health and well-being of the members through rapid response teams, mutual aid associations, and by facilitating communications amongst those involved. Members will participate in such response teams and aid associations as they are willing and able to do so.
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The signer of this agreement pledges the following amount [user indicates an amount not less than a tenth ounce of silver and with no upper limit) that is surety in the event that a competent dispute resolution service concludes that the signer has violated this agreement and committed an act of aggression. In such instance, the signer of this agreement understands that the surety would be forfeit to the victim or victims of the act or acts of aggression.
[Above text to be modified for Zero Aggression smart contract for NEAR before deployment]