Publishing On-Chain Impact Networks onchain, and promoting at FarCon book fair May 3

[amelie]

Abstract:

I propose to release On-Chain Impact Networks as an onchain book on Alexandria and release it at FarCon NYC next month.

Alexandria builds infrastructure for publishers and authors to release onchain books that readers truly own. You can see examples of other onchain books, including any currently available free editions, in the Alexandria shop here: alexandriabooks.com/shop

Alexandria will be hosting a book fair side event for FarCon (May 1-4) and we would love to promote this digital edition at the event. Event details here: The Forever Library: A FarCon Side Event at Fractal · Luma

(My name is Amelie, I’m the Alexandria founder—hi!)

Motivation and rationale:

At Alexandria, our mission is to ensure global information access and develop new funding and distribution methods for authors and artists by leveraging decentralized technology and simple, beautiful reading and book collecting experiences.

On-Chain Impact Networks is about “tangible ways crypto is being used to create positive sum outcomes and the amazing networks of communities behind them.” The project is also a fantastic distillation of Greenpill’s mission. This is exactly the kind of book that belongs in the onchain Library of Alexandria, where it can be preserved on decentralized rails and collected by readers who want to support Greenpill and its partner organizations.

Key terms:

Alexandria will provide a distribution agreement where designated representatives of the creators of On-Chain Impact Networks will grant Alexandria permission to distribute the book onchain.

Alexandria’s smart contracts are on Base, and we use IPFS and Lit Protocol for ebook storage and decentralized encryption.

Specifications:

We’ll need the On-Chain Impact Network in EPUB form (or in a text manuscript that we can use to typeset an EPUB). We recommend EPUB because readers can enjoy it most accessibly with reflowable text on Kindle or in Alexandria’s web e-reader. That said, if the book’s authors prefer to maintain all the design elements in the PDF, we can consider releasing this edition as a PDF instead.

We’ll also need to determine certain ramifications about the release: web3 things like supply and price, as well as book metadata things, like description and BISAC codes. The Alexandria team will provide a list of what’s needed with examples and make suggestions where it is useful.

Funding from book sales can be split between Greenpill and any other organizations they choose: Gitcoin matching pool, Allo Protocol, Deep Funding, etc. Alexandria takes a 10% commission on sales to fund the platform.

Steps to implement:

Other than signing the IP distribution agreement and agreeing on how it will be presented, there’s not much else needed!

Timeline:

We at Alexandria will need to receive all the materials (either finalized files or text/source files we can use to typeset the ebook) by ~April 23 to make sure we can prepare the edition ahead of the book fair. Then the book fair will be May 1-4. After that, the edition will remain in the Alexandria bookshop forever and we could always continue to promote it at future book fairs!

[afo-wefa]

Would love to discuss this during our next monthly and writers guild calls!

Monthly Call: April 9th 1pm EST

Greenpill Network Community Call · Luma

Writers Guild: April 17th 2:30 EST
https://meet.google.com/opt-nscz-dfh

[amelie]

Wonderful, thank you so much!! I’ll definitely be able to be at the Writers Guild call and will try to come to the monthly call this week!

[MattyCompost]

Thanks Amelie! Think this is a really awesome onchain way to introduce the books to a larger audience. Not sure where I stand on the scale of using this as a mechanism for capital formation and public goods funding vs keeping it free outside of gas fees and just focusing on expanding distribution.

Originally mentioned to Amelie that On-Chain Impact Networks is probably the book that the Writers Guild has the most direct say over but for what it’s worth I’d love to see this happen with any books on greenpill.network.

@owocki do you know what the deal is with IP ownership and what would need to be done in regards to an IP distribution agreement? @lanzdingz thinks the Writers Guild may own the IP for On-Chain Impact Networks but isn’t sure. Also any thoughts about this idea for the Allo books or any other books as well? I see Ethereum Localism has some sort of minting function on manifold already, not sure how that overlaps with this idea.

[amelie]

Amazing, thank you all! So I’m not going to be able to make it to the call today (I’m so sorry) but will be able to discuss at the Writers Guild call! And please let me know if any questions come up in the discussion today that I can help answer in the meantime.

For something like Ethereum Localism, if you’d like to put it in the Alexandria library as well, it can just exist in multiple onchain editions with different purposes.

[owocki]

@MattyCompost

@owocki do you know what the deal is with IP ownership and what would need to be done in regards to an IP distribution agreement? @lanzdingz thinks the Writers Guild may own the IP for On-Chain Impact Networks but isn’t sure.

I could ask my lawyer’s to take a look but that might be expensive. I think err’ing towards a handshake agreement would suffice in the meantime. I’m good with whatever the writers guild is.