The Scope of the Ergo Foundation#

The Ergo Foundation is a non-profit organization dedicated to advancing the adoption and development of the Ergo Platform. Its primary focus is to support the Ergo Platform in providing an efficient and secure way to implement financial contracts, the most widely used application of blockchain technology.

Mission and Principles#

The Ergo Foundation is committed to the following principles:

Organic and Non-Breaking Development: The Foundation ensures that protocol changes are approved not only by miners - who express their will directly on the blockchain - but also by users and projects building on top of Ergo. This approach promotes a gradual and non-disruptive evolution of the Ergo Platform, fostering stability and continuity for the ecosystem.
Open-Source and Permissive Licensing: The Foundation is committed to maximizing the number of valuable ecosystem developments accomplished in open-source with the least permissive license possible. This philosophy encourages collaboration, transparency, and community-driven innovation, while minimizing barriers to entry and fostering a vibrant and inclusive ecosystem.
Privacy and Trustless Environments: The Foundation is dedicated to helping build trustless environments, smart contracts, and payment frameworks for the public with privacy in mind. Ergo's strong focus on privacy and decentralization aligns with the Foundation's mission to empower individuals and promote financial sovereignty.
Community-Driven: The Foundation believes that the Treasury should be distributed mainly to the community, including freelancers, hackers, experts, and enthusiasts. This approach recognizes the vital role of the community in driving innovation and growth, and aims to cultivate a thriving and self-sustaining ecosystem.

The Ergo Foundation's Future

Please see this page for more information on the long-term goals of The Foundation.

Key Areas of Focus#

The Ergo Foundation's efforts are focused on several key areas that are essential for the growth and success of the Ergo Platform.

Infrastructure#

Support for protocol research, development of the reference client, alternative clients (if needed), libraries, and developer tooling. The Foundation recognizes the importance of a robust and well-maintained infrastructure to support the Ergo ecosystem.
Improving market access by getting Ergo listed on centralized exchanges, hardware wallets, bridges, or other means. Increasing the accessibility and liquidity of Ergo is crucial for its widespread adoption and integration into the broader cryptocurrency ecosystem.

Education#

Creating materials to educate developers and users directly or funding their creation through third parties from within the community. The Foundation understands the importance of knowledge-sharing and capacity-building to foster a thriving and knowledgeable community of developers and users.

Promotion and Outreach#

The Foundation aims to promote the adoption of Ergo through various outreach and promotional efforts. While its operations in this area are conservative, it does fund a select few roles for areas not currently met by the community, such as:

Angie Har, Editorial & Events Manager (salaried)
Andy Lowe, YouTube Manager (hourly)
Sean Rice, Editor (hourly)
Eva Qing, Chinese Outreach Manager (hourly)
Marcelo Roncatti, Branding Advisor (hourly)
Writers (via paid bounties)

Their efforts ensure ample information is available about ongoing developments on Ergo via blog posts and social media, as well as the promotion and operation of various events, such as Ergo Summit and ErgoHack. These initiatives aim to raise awareness, foster community engagement, and attract new users and developers to the Ergo ecosystem.

Wen 'Marketing?'

The Ergo Foundation takes a principled approach to marketing and promotion, focusing on empowering community-driven initiatives and fostering organic growth. For ethical and legal reasons, the Foundation does not directly control outward marketing efforts. Instead, it aims to support and enable community-driven innovation through initiatives like the Ecosystem Grant Framework and donations to community-led projects like the Sigmanauts.

Network effects have been a significant driver of value creation in the tech industry, accounting for approximately 70% of value creation over the past 23 years. For a grassroots, third-generation blockchain like Ergo, this figure is likely even higher. While the Ergo Foundation strives to lay the foundations and help ignite community outreach and compounding growth, the ultimate promotion and adoption of Ergo rests principally on the shoulders of the community. The Foundation's role is to empower and support the community's efforts, fostering a self-sustaining and vibrant ecosystem. (Get Involved!)

The EF does not commonly pay for influencers or ad campaigns and does its best to restrict frivolous spending, which is deemed not cost-effective (i.e., airdrops, giveaways). This approach reflects the Foundation's commitment to responsible and sustainable growth, focusing on building a strong foundation and fostering a vibrant community rather than relying on short-term marketing tactics.

The outreach department highlights projects building in the ecosystem. However, these initiatives do not constitute an endorsement from the Ergo Foundation. The Foundation will always use best practices to vet projects and ensure that there is no risk for potential users. Still, in the early stages of development, it is often unknowable if anything of substance will ultimately be produced. This cautious approach aims to protect users and maintain the integrity of the Ergo ecosystem.

Development#

The Ergo Foundation's relationship with development is primarily focused on areas where there is a demand not met by the community. This role is expected to diminish over time as the community grows and takes on more development responsibilities. The Foundation recognizes the importance of fostering a self-sustaining and community-driven ecosystem, where the community plays an increasingly prominent role in driving development efforts.

Some Ergo Foundation members also hold developer positions, although their development activities are separate from their foundation involvement. For transparency, these roles are listed below:

Morphic manages JVM-related developers (Wallet devs, Scala devs, etc.) and the sigmastate-interpreter. (salaried)
Mark Glasgow manages this documentation and various other developer-adjacent tasks. (salaried)
Mohammad Hasan Samadani (mhs_sam) manages a team of graduates and PhD students who have produced Ergo Raffle, ErgoWell, Minotaur-wallet, and Rosen Bridge. (rewarded until April 2024 - now working on a volunteer basis)
Fleet-sdk is managed by Alison Robson (anon_br). (salaried)

Additionally, outwith the EF members, we fund a few roles in development.

Dmitry Usov manages the Ergo website and works on various other projects such as the DexyGold front-end. (salaried)
The rest of the funds spent on development go towards bounties on the repositories given below

The Ergo Foundation also pays for the hosting and bandwidth costs for several pieces of infrastructure such as the website and explorer. This support ensures the availability and reliability of critical resources for the Ergo ecosystem.

Code Repositories Supported by the Ergo Foundation#

This section is a draft and still open for discussion from the community.

The Ergo Foundation DAO LLC provides funding for the development, evolution, and maintenance of various software repositories. There are two levels of funding:

Development Funding: Involves funding for research, development, maintenance, and bug fixing.
Maintenance Funding: Involves only bug fixing and minor issue resolution to support existing applications. Repositories in this category are considered deprecated. While being part of the core ecosystem, they will receive maintenance support for existing applications. Developers are encouraged to migrate and discouraged from relying on these software.

Development Funding#

The repositories in this section are the main focus of funding support by the Ergo Foundation. They are part of the development roadmap for the core ecosystem. Developers are encouraged to rely on these software and join development efforts.

Maintenance Funding#

The repositories in this section are still part of the core ecosystem; however, they are no longer part of the Ergo Foundation's development roadmap. This means the Ergo Foundation will only support maintenance and critical fixes in these repositories. Funding is provided on an issue-by-issue basis, and each attached bounty is subject to approval by the Ergo Foundation (morphic, anon-br).

Hosting#

Grants and Ecosystem Support#

The Ergo Foundation recognizes the importance of fostering a vibrant and diverse ecosystem. To support this goal, the Foundation provides grants to various projects that contribute to the growth and development of the Ergo ecosystem. These grants aim to fund innovative ideas, promote collaboration, and drive progress within the community.

Some notable grant recipients include:

Spectrum Labs: Received $128,200 to support their work on developing ergodex for the Ergo ecosystem between June 2021 and January 2022.
Rosen Bridge: Awarded $272,400 for the period between May 2022 and April 2023 to fund the development of the Rosen Bridge, a cross-chain bridge connecting Ergo with other blockchain networks.

The Ergo Foundation remains committed to supporting promising projects and initiatives that align with its mission of fostering innovation, collaboration, and growth within the Ergo ecosystem. By providing financial assistance through grants, the Foundation aims to empower developers, researchers, and community members to explore new ideas and contribute to the overall advancement of the Ergo platform.

Code Audits#

The Ergo Foundation does not review or endorse any code specifically. While code reviews are sometimes performed by Ergo Foundation members due to their expertise in this area, this does not constitute an endorsement. Users should be aware of their assumptions when interacting with experimental DeFi protocols. (See - Know Your Assumptions)

This approach reflects the Foundation's commitment to transparency and user education, acknowledging the inherent risks associated with experimental technologies and the importance of individual responsibility in the decentralized ecosystem.

Exchange Listings#

For a detailed overview of current efforts, view the public grist.

The Ergo Foundation, as a legal entity, is primarily responsible for liaising with centralized exchanges. Ergo has been listed on several exchanges, including three Tier 1 exchanges (KuCoin, gate.io, Huobi). A Tier 1 exchange is defined as an exchange that appears in the top 10 of exchange ranking sites such as defillama.com/cexs.

Exchange discussions and details are typically confidential due to Non-Disclosure Agreements ('NDA'). However, we can share some general insights:

Listings are usually expensive.
Exchanges generally do not buy liquidity or any of the native tokens or coins on the open market. Instead, a third-party Market Maker ('MM') is used, which has access to an API with a preallocated amount of ERG and USDT to create a liquid market. The MM can only buy/sell and lacks the credentials to withdraw assets.
The Ergo Foundation has approached all major exchanges, and none have been rejected due to high costs.

If you're wondering why certain coins are listed and Ergo is not, it could be due to several reasons:

They are a native asset on an already integrated chain (e.g., ERC20, Cosmos), which requires less effort to add and maintain.
They may have venture-capitalist funding and connections, which can be leveraged for early listings.
They may have a smaller public distribution than ERG and can negotiate with exchanges for a percentage of their total supply.
They may be less complex than Ergo, with no native asset support, no need to worry about UTXO dust, etc.
They may be older than Ergo and were listed during the last bear market.
Even though they are a unique Layer-1, they may only have a wrapped asset (e.g., on BSC) listed.

The Ergo Foundation is committed to expanding Ergo's presence on exchanges. However, certain factors such as low volume or market cap can affect our eligibility for listing on some platforms. This is not due to a lack of effort or resources but rather the nature of the crypto market and the specific requirements of different exchanges.

We are also exploring the possibility of listing as wrapped tokens on exchanges, which could reduce barriers for high-quality tier 2/3 exchanges and help build up our access and volume. We are actively pursuing discussions with a global on-ramp to increase access for US users.

While Ergo's fundamentals are strong, the decision to list a coin often comes down to factors such as profitability and ease of integration for the exchange. However, we believe that as Ergo's DeFi ecosystem matures and volume builds up, more exchanges will recognize its value and list it.

In the meantime, we continue to prioritize development and community engagement over artificially inflating volume or engaging in questionable practices. We believe this approach will lead to sustainable growth and long-term success for Ergo.

The Ergo Foundation's Future

Please see this page for more information on the long-term goals of The Foundation.