[Grant Application] SesameOpen: Bringing Commerce 3.0 to ICON

Grants
1

Title

SesameOpen: A Middle-Layer Protocol for Commerce 3.0 (a community oriented, owned, and operated commerce network) on ICON

Project Category

Development & Community

Project Description

Blockchain and token economics enable the next evolution of commerce – Commerce 3.0 – in which the traditional centralized retail and ecommerce structures are replaced with decentralized networks. Commerce 3.0 is inherently cross-chain, but it requires a critical middle-layer protocol that sits on top of multiple blockchains to incentivize and structure commerce transactions. SesameOpen provides that middle-layer protocol and the token economics that drive Commerce 3.0.

With its strong community and growing development efforts, ICON has the potential to become one of the leading blockchains for Commerce 3.0. For this project, SesameOpen seeks to jumpstart ICON’s ability to support commerce by expanding SesameOpen Protocol to the ICON blockchain. More specifically, we plan to develop a series of reference smart contracts and Dapps to showcase the protocol and its underlying token economics, and to provide the developer specs for the Dapp development community on ICON to leverage the SesameOpen Protocol. Also as part of the project, SesameOpen will educate the ICON community about Commerce 3.0 and work to attract additional advocates of decentralized commerce to the ICON community.

As a result, ICON can leapfrog other blockchains in their support of decentralized commerce. The resulting network growth from buyers, sellers, and communities using ICON and the SesameOpen Protocol will cement ICON’s status as a “commerce-positive” blockchain and propel further usage by commerce Dapp developers.

The SesameOpen team is well-positioned to develop the protocol and reference Dapps on the ICON blockchain and to grow the Commerce 3.0 network. Our lead developer on this project is an expert in token economics – published in VentureBeat, HackerNoon, and CoinMarketCap – and has significant development experience in multiple front-end and back-end languages, including with smart contracts on the Ethereum blockchain. Our lead marketing resource has 20+ years of technology marketing experience, most recently building a Commerce 3.0 community from scratch in Korea. Those experiences are directly applicable to this project and will help ensure success.

Project Duration

We expect a project duration of 6 months from the date of funding. The product development is divided into 3 phases:

  1. Smart contract development on ICON blockchain to showcase the SesameOpen protocol
  2. Reference Dapp development
  3. Developer documentation to support Dapp ecosystem on ICON

Throughout the project, on the community and marketing side, we expect to engage the ICON community and those outside the community to create momentum and excitement for ICON as a leader in Commerce 3.0.

After the duration of the project, the SesameOpen Foundation will continue to support and grow the Commerce 3.0 network on ICON to encourage buyers, sellers, and communities to come together.

Project Milestones

This project has several milestones that will be detailed in monthly progress reports. In particular, we will keep the ICON community informed and solicit feedback about Protocol Design, Protocol Development on ICON, Dapp UX/UI, Dapp Implementation, and Developer Documentation Completion. Further, once the protocol is released and reference Dapps are created, SesameOpen will regularly report on the network growth and usage of Commerce 3.0 on ICON.

Funding Amount Requested

SesameOpen is requesting funding solely to cover the team’s salaries and expenses for the duration of the project. We will have 2 full-time project members plus freelancers that will be engaged during different phases of the project. Below find the summary of team members required:

  1. Fullstack/Blockchain developer: Responsible for building the core protocol on ICON and developing the reference Dapps and smart contracts (expected full-time on project for 6 months @ $8,000/mo)
  2. Communication/Marketing manager: Responsible for engaging the ICON community, outside developers, and commerce participants to nurture and grow the Commerce 3.0 network (expected full-time on project for 6 months @ $4,000/mo)
  3. UI/UX Designer: Responsible for designing reference Dapps to maximize onboarding and usage, which are critical for network growth (expected full-time for 4 months @ $3,500/mo)
  4. Technical Writer: Responsible for creating Developer Documentation to enable easy usage and onboarding of Dapp developers (expected full-time for 1 month @ $2,000/mo)

To generate adoption, we would also propose to work with ICON to fund the initial growth of the Commerce 3.0 Network on ICON. We have had success jumpstarting the network on Ethereum through a community-focused staking reward mechanism, and we propose to use ICX to similarly jumpstart the network of buyers and community leaders on ICON. The additional amount of reward can be mutually decided on at a later date.

In summary, we are asking for $88,000 (~500,000 ICX at Jan 26 close price), distributed as follows:

  • Month 1: $12,000 (Developer, Marketer)
  • Month 2: $15,500 (Developer, Marketer, UI/UX)
  • Month 3: $15,500 (Developer, Marketer, UI/UX)
  • Month 4: $15,500 (Developer, Marketer, UI/UX)
  • Month 5: $15,500 (Developer, Marketer, UI/UX)
  • Month 6: $14,000 (Developer, Marketer, Tech Writer)

Official Team Name

SesameOpen

Team Contact Information

The SesameOpen team is reachable via email at info@sesameopen.network or via our Telegram group: https://t.me/SesameOpen_EN

Public Address

hx33395e70034e1b515a13e5ba23576148e5165ee0

3 Likes
2

Hi there, thanks for the application.
We know SesameOpen is a great team and have great team members. but I personally think asking for entire salary is too much. SeasameOpen has its own token and had ICO to fund your project. we are willing to support it but not to pay entirely. Please convince me and our community that having SesameOpen in ICON network is worth more than $88,000. Thanks

1 Like
3

Thanks for the question, Ben. Sorry for the response delay, as we were launching our beta product - Raindrop - over the weekend and wanted to make sure it went off successfully (which it did!)

Because SesameOpen’s development, design, and marketing team is based in Silicon Valley where the cost is 2-3x the cost in Korea, the compensation asked for in the grant proposal is actually much less than a full-time salary for those roles. The difference will be funded by SesameOpen. To avoid submitting a proposal with a total cost that could be considered out of range by the ICON community, we compared the two approved projects, which requested 250,000 ICX for only a 3-month period, and submitted the proposal for 500,000 ICX over the 6-month period that we feel is needed to successfully complete the development, reference apps, and marketing outlined in the proposal.

Any blockchain similar to ICON, which is designed as a developer platform, needs to power a massive decentralized economy to succeed in the long-term. The reason is very simple: the bigger the economy is, the more transactions the blockchain will have, and the higher the demand of the blockchain’s native token will grow. We believe that Commerce 3.0 is a $100 trillion economy in commerce transaction volume. And we are the best team to execute the Commerce 3.0 vision.

By powering part of Commerce 3.0, ICON will gain a leadership position in the Commerce 3.0 movement, generate new native demand for its native token ICX, create a new powerful narrative for ICON blockchain, and energize ICON community to build a better world for themselves. For that value and the market opportunity it opens, $88,000 is a drop in the bucket.

We hope that you will approve this grant, as we are excited to get started building Commerce 3.0 with ICON.

4

Hey Ben Lee, as an early ICON contributor I hope my voice can be heard. I personally do not think that e-commerce applications are good for an early stage technology like Blockchain technology is. I would like to hear what are ICONs thoughts on this.
What kind of projects would you like to see build on ICON protocol? What are the tools and layers that Icon would like to see built first?
Thanks
Dusan Ristic

1 Like
5

Hi Dusan,

I’d be interested in your thoughts for why ecommerce isn’t a great fit for blockchain. It’s likely we agree. Traditional ecommerce isn’t a great fit, especially if it’s trying to force the usage of crypto as payment. However, a different business model for commerce, driven by what makes blockchain (and especially token economics) great, is likely to be a huge industry for blockchain. Just like the internet ushered in the era of ecommerce, blockchain and token economics ushers in an era of decentralized commerce – community-driven, community-owned, and community-operated.

That’s our belief, but we’re always interested in how others in crypto view the potential of blockchain and business models it powers.

6

Review Result Comments

Review Result

Rejected

Review Comments

Even though idea is great and your team is great it is not just right time to fund something like this yet. After your product is developed, we would love to fund the integration process to the ICON. Thanks for the applications

7

Hey Dushan,

I bet you had NOT read the SesameOpen whitepaper yet. I am sure you are an open-minded person and once you learn our vision, our rationales, and our go-to-market strategy, I am confident you will change your mind like many others. You can access the whitepaper here: https://sesameopen.network/whitepaper.

If you don’t want to spend more time to read the longer white paper, I hope you at least read this short article: Crypto & Blockchain Education | CoinMarketCap. People should have their own opinions and I appreciate you voiced your opinion. But we are thrilled that CoinMarketCap agreed with our vision and supported it by publishing it on its blog.

1 Like
8

Thanks for sharing that in response to them. Appreciate you taking the time!

9

@NorskKiwi Thanks for your note. More importantly, thank you for your time and effort to study it to make informed comment. The ICON community definitely needs more engaged members like you.

To keep you updated, we have successfully launched our Raindrop product, a beta-product of SesameOpen to bootstrap the community-based Commerce 3.0 network and we are impressed by the results: SesameOpen Ushers in Commerce 3.0 with Successful Launch of Raindrop Program | by SesameOpen | SesameOpen Network | Medium

Feel free to reach out to us if any ICON community member is interested in helping us to expand Raindrop to ICON and its community.