KarmaPoint

KarmaPoint is a personal reputation System to recognise people that contribute to the society, rewarding good deeds with tokens given by others, creating them a reputation level.

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Inspiration

One day we realized that technology has not helped human being to be better. Maybe faster and more productive, but not better. We want to change that and use technology to create a better society and help the human evolution. How? By recognizing and motivating people that are a positive impact to our society, rewarding their good deeds with KarmaPoint tokens.

Tokens received in reward for good deeds will create a reputation level that increase with more tokens received, as well as token's balance. Tokens can be purchase, however it will only increase token balance and not user reputation. Reputation value needs to be earned helping others, volunteering, donating to causes, inspiring, and many other human values such as, leadership, positive attitude, commitment, etc.

People whom are not used to help, will find in KarmaPoint a tool to try, and even if they do it to earn tokens, they will be able to see what to give feels like. To give has been describe as the intrinsic act to become a better person.

What it does

KarmaPoint is an App where users can create an account and receive 30 tokens for free and 0 reputation. Objective is one hand reward good deeds with those tokens. In another hand the user will grow its own reputation helping others in any aspects of his life, in his community, at work, school, etc. As reputation grows user will reach higher levels, from Awaken to Lighting, open more possibilities to be recognized and obtain more tokens.

Users can create and join Campaigns in the app. This campaigns are created to request help in exchange for tokens. Tokens can be use in the Karmastore and exchanged by products or services offered by other users or companies within the App. Also tokens will be exchangeable by other cryptos or tokens in Crypto exchange markets.

For many companies remote work is a challenge to motivate and engage employees. KarmaPoint can be use to improve their work environment, retain hidden talents and motivate employees using campaigns. Companies will be able to subscribe to a Professional version with more features to follow up token exchanges.

As KarmaPoint live in Symbol Blockchain, tokens and reputation will follow the user no matter if he left the company or goes to a new one. Users will be able to attach themselves to a company.

As our purpouse is social, we are going to make KarmaPoint available for free to Non profit organizations so they can attract more and better volunteers.

How we built it

I am not the CIO just the CEO so I cannot talk about so much technical details :). But we had an MVP built with NEM testnet, MongoDB, Node.JS and React in 2020. Our current architecture is build to work with Symbol testnet (and recently we created the mosaic in the Mainnet) MongoDB, Node.JS for Backend, Angular and HTML5. We have developed a WPA application until we finish Beta.

Challenges we ran into

About the idea we have a very good reception, except in the Blockchain world. People seems more sceptical, maybe because there are so many scams around. So we have had comparisons with a Black Mirror episode and the chinese' point system. Therefore we had to explain we are not like that, mostly because we do not use KarmaPoint to punish, just to reward. There is no negative points or reputation.

It bring us to the next challenge: Is It a Reputation idea enough to move people? And the answer is yes. In the MVP we probed reputation is a valuable asset for users. They feel recognized and respected. Also they felt the need of rewarding others with KP tokens, we have recorded testimony on that link to video.

Scams are also a challenge. We will create certain rules and algorithms to avoid such behaviors, limiting the amount of tokens between accounts and the fact that you cannot give more tokens than the value of your own reputation, in this way we make sure high reputation users can give more as a result of their good deeds. Also community itself will rule over scam cases. Once you reach certain level, you will receive scam complains (if you want) then you can decide over that case as your reputation level talks that you are a fit person to do so .

Accomplishments that we're proud of

KarmaPoint has been my case of study in my course "Blockchain Strategy" in the RMIT in Melbourne by end of 2019. Both of my mentors are savvy people in the world of Blockchain and they found the idea amazing. They said they haven't seen something like it. And they gave me a good score for it. At the end of 2020 we participated in Web Summit and we were selected in the 2nd round of the 40Word pitch made by our co-founder Maria Palshina. Here is our KarmaPoint for Business pitch

We are mostly pride of our team. They are in love with the project and work day and night pro bono just for the sake of going live with our Beta. We are a diverse group of people from young 20 yo developers to more experienced ones. We are from different backgrounds and all over the planet: Chile, Argentina, Ecuador, Venezuela and Russia.

What we learned

This experience has enriched me and my team in many ways.

  • First we have learned to work together. Each of us in their own expertise, but with the flexibility to help other members. For instance I am the CEO but I'm also the webmaster, social media editor, blockchain junior tester, and more.
  • Also to be patience. A project like this takes time and has a lot of obstacles. You need to breath in and take them one by one and obtain the gain from them, which is experience to don't fail again.
  • To be like a reed, flexible but strong to change direction of the roadmap or fix a bug that you did not see.
  • We learned to ask questions. We do not know everything and we have found very nice and savvy people willing to help us: Developers, Sociologists, Game theory experts, HR directors, Blockchain mentors, Chaman, Writers, and a long list of people that has helped us in different paths of this journey.

What's next for KarmaPoint

Next for us is

  • [ ] April 21. Finish beta product to present it to selected users and get feedback to improve
  • [ ] Q2-Q4 21. Grown our community. We are reaching 1.5K on IG and continue growing. We are opening a Telegram channel now.
  • [ ] May 21. Launch our Beta with selected Non profits
  • [ ] Q3 21. With Beta product Reach Non profit organizations
  • [ ] Q4 21. First production version live after learning from Non profit
  • [ ] Q4 21. Start conversations with potential customers (Companies)
  • [ ] Q4 21. Launch our token in Crypto exchange market. We put a lot of thought on this aspect. At the end we decided that a good deed can be rewarded with a profit because it is an exchange of energy, It does not only exist the giving but also to receive.
  • [ ] Q2-Q4 21. Search for funding. Part of the team has different jobs, they need to dedicate more time to the project as we grow.
  • [ ] 22. Create the KarmaPoint for Business version.

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