✅ Application #30 SandboxDAO × Giveth - Quadratic Funding Round for Supporting Community-Led Public Goods

The Sandbox DAO Grant Program OPEN: Community Engagement
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Q1 Name of your Grant

Enter the name you want your Grant to be known as.

SandboxDAO × Giveth - Quadratic Funding Round for Supporting Community-Led Public Goods

Q2 Total Grant amount in USD ($)

Enter your grant request in USD ($). Anything over 3K USD is allowed and will face higher scrutiny per Project Diversity metric of SIP-25.

Answer:

$26,750 – $53,500 USD

Fee structure:

  • Solo Round - For a $53,500 grant, $13,500 is used for operations; $40,000 powers the matching pool.
  • Main sponsor - For a $26,750 grant, $6,750 covers operations; $20,000 goes directly into the matching pool.

:light_bulb: We are also open to smaller contributions (e.g. $10K–$20K total), with proportional fee and exposure adjustments. These funds would be pooled with other sponsors in a shared round.

Q3 Evaluation Factor – Specific

Include specific outcomes (end result) for this grant.
Lanzer will be answering:

  • Is it obvious what this grant wants to achieve?
  • Is this grant explained in a way that doesn’t require additional context outside of this grant application?

Answer:

We are proposing a Quadratic Funding (QF) round on Giveth that is either co-sponsored or fully sponsored by Sandbox DAO. The QF round will amplify community engagement and charitable giving while highlighting Sandbox DAO’s leadership in decentralized ecosystem empowerment.

Specific Outcomes:
• A matching pool seeded by Sandbox DAO and distributed using QF logic to support high-impact, community-nominated public goods projects.
• Increased visibility and alignment between Sandbox DAO and the public goods ecosystem, with branding and participation throughout the round.
• Strong engagement through co-marketing, donor participation, and measurable ecosystem growth.

The result is a transparent, community-led grant allocation process, with all funds going directly to supported projects.

Q4 Evaluation Factor – Measurable

Include 3 measurable milestones that track progress toward the grant outcomes. with recommended payment %s that total to 100%.
Lanzer will be answering:

  • Does this grant have at LEAST 3 milestones? (There is no penalty for only 3)
  • Do these milestones make sense?
  • Are the grant outcomes distributed evenly across these milestones?
  • Do the recommended payment %s per milestone all total to 100%?

Answer:

Milestone 1: Round Launch Preparation (~25%)

  • Confirm sponsorship level (solo/co-sponsor), and round specs
  • Define matching pool network, eligibility criteria, and timeline.
  • Begin co-marketing coordination
  • Giveth charges of grant upfront for round operations, platform setup, and coordination
  • Note: Giveth receives an operations fee for platform management, dev works, sybil resistance, analytics, marekting, and round coordination.
    • For $53,500 total: $13,500 goes to Giveth (~25%) and $40,000 is used for the matching pool.
    • For co sponsorship (e.g. $26,750): Giveth receives $6,750 (~25%), with $20,000 for the matching pool.

Milestone 2: QF Round Execution (0%)

  • Opening of projects application process, curation, verification, onboarding of projects
  • Launch QF round on Giveth platform (with round page, matching logic, and verified projects)
  • Feature Sandbox DAO in landing page, announcements, threads, blogposts, host Twitter spaces featuring Sandbox DAO members and projects participating in the round
  • Roll out social campaign, and provide live round support.

Milestone 3: Post-Round Wrap-Up (~75%)

  • Conduct sybil analysis (using COCM mechanism, on-chain tools like Arkham, Zapper, etc)
  • Conduct matching calculations and publish round results
  • Publish final donation and matching results, analytics, forum post and Snapshot ratification vote
  • Distribute matching funds
  • Conduct recap blog post and social media announcements
  • Share feedback survey and incorporate insights

Total: 100%

Q5 Evaluation Factor – Accountable

Provide a primary and secondary PUBLIC point of contact for this grant. There is no need for email.
Lanzer will be answering:

  • Was a primary and secondary contact listed?
  • Can one or both of these contacts be reasonably thought of as owning the success or failure of the grant?

Answer:

Primary Contact:

Yegor Golovnia → https://x.com/yegorgolovnia

Role: Program Manager for the QF round, responsible for full execution, including planning, project onboarding, platform coordination, donor comms, post-round reporting, and fund distribution.

Secondary Contact:

Jake → https://x.com/GivJake

Role: Supporter and fundraising steward. Jake will support with fundraising coordination and act as a secondary point of contact for Sandbox DAO and ecosystem partners.

Q6 Evaluation Factor – Realistic

Define the realistic impact of your grant outcomes on the Sandbox ecosystem.
Lanzer will be answering:

  • Do these impacts make sense for the Sandbox ecosystem?
  • Do any of these impacts connect with the people, product, or purpose of the Sandbox (timestamp 29:54 to 31:00) OR does the grant author clearly explain how it reasonably connects to the Sandbox ecosystem in a way not covered by the linked video? (Impacts not covered will receive increased scrutiny during evaluation)

Answer:

The round directly supports community engagement and charitable giving, one of Sandbox DAO’s stated funding priorities. Giveth QF rounds match small individual donations with pooled matching funds to amplify support for grassroots and public goods projects . This is a low-lift, high-impact mechanism for Sandbox DAO to fund projects that align with Web3 culture, decentralization, education, social impact, and regeneration, all while giving visibility to the SAND token and DAO initiatives.

Giveth has proven this model through 12 previous rounds, supporting 4,000+ projects and attracting over 22,000 donors.

Q7 Evaluation Factor – Timely

Describe the timeline for completion of the grant outcomes.
Lanzer will be answering:

  • Do the grant outcomes fully complete before the SGDP program end of August 30th?
  • Is the timeline clearly laid out and easy to connect with the measurable milestones?

Answer:

The round can be delivered within a ~6 week window post-approval.

Timeline example:

  • Week 1: Confirm sponsorship and finalize scope
  • Week 2–3: Marketing campaigns for the round launch, preparation and application window, curation and projects onboarding
  • Week 4–5: Run the QF round (typically 14 days)
  • Week 6: Reporting, analytics, fund distribution, co-marketing wrap-up

The entire project can be completed before August 30, 2025.

Q8 Evaluation Factor – Disclosure

Fully disclose those who benefit from your grant. Include a link to read about them, how they benefit, and the group/business/entity they are associated with or belong to.
Lanzer will be answering:

  • Are the disclosed persons findable on X, LinkedIn, or other websites where Lanzer can read about them?
  • Is it clear what group/business/entity these disclosed names associate with or belong to?
  • Is it clear how the disclosed persons/groups will benefit (monetarily, DAO voting power, etc)?

Answer:

Beneficiaries

1. Giveth Core Team

2. Yegor Golovnia

  • Role: Program Manager, Giveth QF, https://x.com/yegorgolovnia
  • Responsible for full round coordination, project onboarding, timeline delivery, and reporting.

How They Benefit

  • Giveth receives a designated operations fee to cover platform setup, dev resources, sybil protection, community support, comms.
    • For a $53,500 solo sponsorship, $13,500 (~25%) goes to Giveth, and $40,000 is used for the matching pool.
    • For a $26,750 co-sponsorship, $6,750 (~25%) covers ops, and $20,000 goes to the matching pool.
    • For rounds over $100K, Giveth charges 15% of the matching pool instead of a flat fee.
  • The remaining 75–85% of the grant is distributed directly to community-nominated and donor-selected public goods projects through transparent Quadratic Funding.

Future Beneficiaries (To Be Determined)

  • Project recipients are not yet known. They will be selected, verified and onboarded in the lead-up to the round and selected by round sponsors and Giveth based on the defined eligibility criteria.
  • All projects will be publicly listed and their impact traceable via the Giveth projects explorer and QF round page.
  • Full transparency will be maintained - all transactions, results, and fund distributions are fully onchain.

How did you hear about the Sandbox DAO Grants Program?

Referred by a Giveth team member during research into aligned public goods ecosystems and initiatives.

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Wow.

Color me impressed. This is one well-prepared grant, @yegor . Onto the evaluation!

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Evaluated on 6/23/2025

Q1: Name of your Grant

  • Score: 5 of 5
  • Decision: Meets intent of the question. No additional input required.
  • Rationale: Excellent grant name! Side note: the linked https://www.wtfisqf.com/ was really cool and very well made. It was a little confusing, since this isn’t actually your website and made me think this was a grant about developing quadratic funding (QF) versus charity.
  • From the linked WTFIQF website

Quadratic Funding (QF) is a crowd-funding mechanism that amplifies available resources by inviting community members to make donations (big or small) that act as votes on where to allocate funds. The broader the support, the bigger the match!

Q2: Total Grant amount in USD ($)

  • Score: 3 of 5
  • Decision: Meets intent of the question. Additional input required.
  • Rationale: As of right now $33K is left in this domain and I anticipate a few more grants are about to be accepted within the next week. The upper limit of $53.5K is far outside of Community Engagement’s ability to resource, and the lower limit cuts into existing applications I anticipate will be approved. The most I can support is $10K. Is this workable for Giveth? I’m not understanding the fee structure proposed. Can you please rephrase it in another way?

Q3: Evaluation Factor – Specific

  • Score: 4 of 5
  • Decision: Meets intent of the question. Additional input required.
  • Rationale: From what I’ve been able to understand, Giveth is a charity donation platform, like a crypto charity version of Kickstarter or GoFundMe…yes? I see on Giveth’s website under “Explore projects” page that there are 6039 projects. Are these all active projects that we need to choose from? I’m not fully understanding how the quadratic funding (which has got to be my most favorite website I’ve seen in awhile) distributes our funding. And apologies for piling on here, I’m not understanding how the “Active and Archived Rounds” plays into this although it seems like an important part that I’m not grasping here.
  • From the linked Giveth website

Giveth empowers changemakers to accept crypto donations. Join our community-driven movement to transform the way we fund nonprofits and social causes using innovative crypto fundraising strategies.

Q4: Evaluation Factor – Measurable

  • Score: 4 of 5
  • Decision: Meets intent of the question. Additional input required.
  • Rationale: What does “Define matching pool network, eligibility criteria, and timeline” mean? In the quadratic voting website it refers to a matching as “Pools together small donations from many people and matches them with a larger amount of funding from a central fund.” So if we give $10K, then $10K will be matched from crowdfunding?

Q5: Evaluation Factor – Accountable

  • Score: 4 of 5
  • Decision: Meets intent of the question. No additional input required.
  • Rationale: Both primary and secondary contacts seem like credible individuals who have experience in the charity industry.
  • From Grok: Yegor (@ yegorgolovnia), a web3 trailblazer, leads Quadratic Funding at Giveth, passionately fueling public goods with massive USDC matching pools while vibing with culture-driven memecoins. Yegor’s hyping public goods, steering QF rounds with @ Giveth, and rallying builders for big USDC matching pools. The X community praises @ yegorgolovnia for hosting impactful shill spaces and contributing to public goods projects like @ Giveth and @ DoinGudHQ. Yegor frequently promotes @ Giveth’s Quadratic Funding rounds, emphasizing large USDC matching pools to support public goods. Recent posts highlight their role in managing these rounds and encouraging community participation. Yegor is vocal about the potential of “culture-fueled memecoins,” predicting their dominance in 2025. They engage with meme-driven Web3 projects, blending humor and community vibes.
  • From Grok: @ GivJake, a passionate Web3 fundraiser, champions public goods at Giveth, rallying support for grants and community-driven projects with infectious enthusiasm. GivJake’s hyping web3 projects, shilling tokens, and vibing at Token2049 while rallying support for @ Giveth and public goods. @ GivJake is associated with Giveth, a Web3 platform focused on funding public goods and community-driven projects. They describe themselves as a passionate fundraiser and advocate for decentralized philanthropy. Posts frequently highlight Giveth’s mission to support public goods through blockchain-based donations and grants. Expect content like project updates, calls for donations, or showcasing successful campaigns.

Q6: Evaluation Factor – Realistic

  • Score: 3 of 5
  • Decision: Meets intent of the question. No additional input required.
  • Rationale: Per what I asked above in Q3 and Q4, I need to better understand how the quadratic funding, active/archive rounds, and the 6039 projects all work together on Giveth. I’m not understanding how the money will flow from Sandbox DAO’s wallet to the charity recipients (even after reading WTFIQF and Giveth documents). Apologies for that.

Q7: Evaluation Factor – Timely

  • Score: 4 of 5
  • Decision: Meets intent of the question. No additional input required.
  • Rationale: Effort needs 6 weeks to fully show impact and meets intent of this Domain’s timeline needs of August 30th.

Q8: Evaluation Factor – Disclosure

  • Score: 5 of 5
  • Decision: Meets intent of the question. No additional input required.
  • Rationale: Excellent disclosure. Thank you. I think it’s very clear who benefits and the personalities behind the project.
  • From Grok: @ karmaticacid, a passionate Giveth Mission Specialist, champions decentralized anarchy and quadratic funding, building AI-driven DAOs to empower public goods with $GIV-backed tokens. karmaticacid’s hyping $POL-backed @ theqacc tokens and sharing heartfelt partner moments, all while diving into crypto’s wild ride. The X community praises @ karmaticacid as an inspiring leader in #Web3, with @ drkellypage lauding her impactful DAO talk at @ EthereumDenver. @ karmaticacid’s posts center around: Decentralized Anarchy and Web3 Advocacy, Quadratic Funding and $GIV, $POL and @ theqacc Tokens, Crypto Culture and Community Engagement
  • From Grok: @ thegrifft, a web3 visionary, co-founds projects like Giveth to empower decentralized charity DAOs with AI, passionately advocating for cypherpunk values and innovative governance. thegrifft’s rallying for Refi growth at EthCC, probing Optimism’s decentralization, and pondering Iran’s internet access. The X community celebrates @ thegrifft’s leadership in @ Giveth and @ theqacc, with @ heypaulroots praising their team’s relentless drive. @ thegrifft is a co-founder of Giveth and @ theqacc, focusing on web3, ReFi (Regenerative Finance), and Charity DAOs powered by AI. They advocate for decentralized governance and cypherpunk principles like permissionlessness and transparency. Key Themes: ReFi and Web3 Advocacy, Decentralized Governance, Global Internet Access, Cypherpunk Values, Humor and Engagement
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Hey @Lanzer - thank you so much for the thoughtful review and encouraging feedback. I really appreciate the time and care you put into each section. Let me walk through all the clarifications point by point.

Q1: Name of your Grant

Thanks! Really glad the name resonated. Noted your point about wtfisqf.com being a bit misleading. It’s not a Giveth property, but we often use it because it explains QF better than anything. And I thought it would be great to give the explanation what is QF right from start :slightly_smiling_face:

Q2: Total Grant Amount in USD ($)

Totally understand the current constraints in the Community Engagement budget. thanks for the transparency.

To clarify our model:

To run a minimum viable QF round, we aim for a $40,000 matching pool. On top of that, Giveth charges a fixed $13,500 operations fee, which covers:

  • Round setup & platform infra + branding and any customizations
  • Projects onboarding & eligibility review (applicable for newly registered projects)
  • Sybil resistance analisys
  • Comms (tweets, blog post, threads, spaces)
  • Post-round analytics, reporting & fund distribution

This brings the total minimum round budget to $53,500. Since this round will be co-sponsored, each contributor pays a proportional share of the ops fee.

In the case of this upcoming round, we’ll be actively lining up aligned co-sponsors. If the matching pool exceeds $40K, Sandbox DAO’s ops fee will be diluted proportionally, and a larger percentage of your $10K will go directly to supporting projects.

Here’s the estimated breakdown based on a $10,000 contribution:

Category Amount
Giveth Ops Fee ~ $2,523
Matching Pool Funds ~ $7,477

You’ll still receive:

  • Brand visibility in all round marketing
  • Project nominations slots (projects you want to be let into the round)
  • Co-marketing (X posts, invitation to Twitter spaces, etc.)
  • Impact report + analytics post-round

To clarify the difference between a co-sponsorship and a solo round:

  • A $10K co-sponsorship still gives SandboxDAO co-marketing exposure (dedicated tweets, inclusion in recap blog, nomination rights), but the round is coordinated by Giveth and the direction is shaped with multiple sponsors.
  • With a $53.5K solo sponsorship , SandboxDAO would fully define the round’s theme, timeline, project eligibility, and branding . You’d be the sole funder and featured partner across all touchpoints.

We’ve also summarized this visually in our co-marketing deck that can give you more insights on different sponsorship levels.

Q3: Evaluation Factor – Specific

That’s a great comparison- Giveth is like a Web3-native, onchain donation platform, closer to GoFundMe or Kickstarter, but focused on public goods and nonprofits.

To clarify a few things:

  • While there are 6,000+ projects listed on Giveth, not all of them would fall under the criteria for specific round, and only a curated, eligible set will be included in each QF round.
  • Projects must apply for each round and meet the specific eligibility criteria we define (everified status, thematic relevance, eg we decide that this round should be focused on funding projects focused on web3 education, infrastructure etc).
  • This allows us to run a clean, focused round- typically with 80–100 projects.
  • “Active” and “Archived” rounds reflect our history of rounds run to date- it’s a transparent record of what was funded, who donated, how matching was calculated and who sponsored past QF rounds.

On how your funding gets distributed:

  • Sandbox DAO’s contribution forms part of the matching pool.
  • Community members donate to the projects they want to support.
  • The more unique donors a project receives, the more diverse donors contributions are, the larger its share of the matching pool, that’s the core idea behind Quadratic Funding and also COCM that we will be using to calculate the final matching.
  • So for example, a project with 100 small donors could get more matched funds than one with a few large donors- it rewards broad community support, not just deep pockets.

This mechanism ensures Sandbox DAO’s funds go to projects with demonstrated grassroots resonance, and it’s all visible and traceable onchain.

Also, are there any specific themes or causes the Community Engagement domain is especially interested in right now? We can factor that into the project selection criteria.

Q4: Evaluation Factor – Measurable

Great question again. The “matching pool” is the central fund provided by sponsors (like Sandbox DAO), and does not get matched again.

So if Sandbox DAO contributes $10K, that amount is the match and it will be split among the participating projects based on the QF Formula.

Also, to clarify “Define matching pool network, eligibility criteria, and timeline”:

  • Matching pool network = blockchain where the matching pool funds will be distributed (e.g. Optimism, Polygon, Base, Solana etc)
  • Eligibility criteria = whether projects need to be verified, fit a round theme, be from specific ecosystem
  • Timeline = round announcements, application period (10-14 days), onboarding period, round dates (on average we run rounds for 2 weeks), and post-round wrap-up.

Q6: Evaluation Factor – Realistic

Totally valid that it wasn’t fully clear how these layers (QF logic, matching pool, platform) tie together.

Here’s a step-by-step of how Sandbox DAO funds would flow:

  1. Projects apply to participate in the round by submitting application form, we curate them, to make sure they all fit under the theme and that there are no bad actors.
  2. Donors contribute directly to the projects they care about and signal who deserves more funding
  3. The matching pool (seeded by Sandbox DAO and others) is distributed based on how many unique donors each project receives, amounts contributed, etc.
  4. After the round, we run the data analysis and send out the funds + a produce a final report on the round results.

All this is transparent and onchain, and we’ll keep you updated at every phase.

Would it be useful if I create a quick walk-through of how matching logic works in a past rounds, and how the matching funds have been distributed?

Q7: Evaluation Factor – Timely

This is the one area where I need to request some flexibility. Because this round will be co-sponsored and we’re still finalizing additional funding partners, I can’t yet commit to completing the round before August 30.

That said, we’re actively working to finalize sponsorships (and always actively scouting for the once interested in supporting public goods projects), and we’ll deliver a strong and timely execution once that’s locked. If SandboxDAO is open to supporting this with flexible timing, we’d be thrilled to collaborate. We are targeting another QF round for August and very likely to start it by August 30, but might require a bit more time depending on the exact start date

Let me know if you’d like to chat on a call or dive deeper into any part of this. Really appreciate your time and engagement on this - it means a lot!

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And I thought it would be great to give the explanation what is QF right from start :slightly_smiling_face:

That certainly did help, yes

This brings the total minimum round budget to $53,500 . Since this round will be co-sponsored, each contributor pays a proportional share of the ops fee .

I’m not sure my domain is a good fit. I don’t have $53K in my budget. I might suggest Web3 Integration domain where @yuelwolf can take a look, he has a much larger budget that meets your minimum requirements.

Here’s the estimated breakdown based on a $10,000 contribution:

I’m confused…earlier you mentioned needing a minimum of $53K. What does this section about a $10K contribution mean?

only a curated, eligible set will be included in each QF round.

How does the curation take place?

On how your funding gets distributed:

This section went over my head. Apologies, I’m just not understanding the process flow here. I don’t get what “the larger its share of the match pool” or “a project with 100 small donors could get more matched funds” means.

edit: I see later in your response to Q6 you go through the process. I posed a couple questions down there which might address my confusion here.

Also, are there any specific themes or causes the Community Engagement domain is especially interested in right now?

Good question! I think an education theme would work well.

So if Sandbox DAO contributes $10K, that amount is the match

It is a match to whom? Who or what are we matching?

  1. Donors contribute directly to the projects they care about and signal who deserves more funding

Are we one of those donors donating and signaling who deserves the funding? If not, who are the unique donors?

  1. The matching pool (seeded by Sandbox DAO and others) is distributed based on how many unique donors each project receives, amounts contributed, etc.

Okay okay, so Sandbox gives $10K. It gets lumped together with other donors until it meets your minimum of $53K. You curate a thematic funding round of 80-100 projects, and then open it up for unique donors to donate. At the conclusion of the funding round, some number of projects receive a donation. The final number of projects chosen and their donation amount is calculated somehow using quadratic funding and COCM…

Am I close? :slight_smile:

All this is transparent and onchain

Can you post a transaction list of this happening onchain, please and thank you?

If SandboxDAO is open to supporting this with flexible timing, we’d be thrilled to collaborate.

I think this can be accommodated. After Aug 30th, Domain Allocator support is significantly reduced due to the program’s expiration, however some minimal support (like payment) may be available with a little pre-planning.

Really appreciate your time and engagement on this - it means a lot!

Likewise, thank you for taking the time to explain! :slight_smile:

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Hey @Lanzer, thank you again for your thoughtful follow-up, it really helps me see where to slow down and make things clearer, I can see how QF can feel abstract, especially if you’re encountering it for the first time. Let me break it down step by step, and link to concrete examples.

Thank you for that. I’d be happy to talk with @yuelwolf for sure. That said, we’re still really aligned with the Community Engagement theme, especially since you mentioned education would be a strong fit and we can absolutely shape project eligibility and onboarding toward that.

To clarify: the $53.5K is the total cost to run the full round, composed of:

  • $40,000 → used directly as the matching pool (this goes to projects)
  • $13,500 → flat operations fee for platform setup, sybil resistance, analytics, project onboarding, and comms (goes to Giveth)

We’re actively lining up multiple co-sponsors to reach that goal. If Sandbox DAO contributes $10,000, you’d represent ~18.7% of the total. Your proportional fee would be:

  • $2,523 → Giveth (ops fee)
  • $7,477 → Matching Pool

And to illustrate how this scales:

If the matching pool ends up being larger - say $80,000 - with the ops fee remains $13.5K, then Sandbox DAO’s share of the fee would drop to ~$1,450, and the rest (~$8,550) would go to projects. So the more co-sponsors, the more impact for the same contribution.

There are two main curation models we use depending on the goals of the round (and what sponsors prefer):

1. Open Application & Internal Curation

This is what we did in the ENS × Octant round — projects filled out an application form and were reviewed based on predefined eligibility (e.g. verification, relevance to the theme, etc). We then curated the final list of participants. That round included 103 verified projects.

2. Sponsor / Community Nominations

In the Loving on Public Goods Round (our biggest Public Goods QF round to date, with a $100K matching pool), we used a more community-driven approach:

  • Each sponsor could directly nominate projects they wanted to include
  • We also invited community nominations via a public form, where anyone holding a Giver NFT could nominate 1 project per NFT / max 5 nominations per wallet.

This dual-approach let us blend structured onboarding with grassroots input and always open for innovation and finding new wyas to curate projects.

Let me explain in simple terms:

There are 4 key components in a QF round:

  1. Sponsors (like Sandbox DAO) → contribute to the matching pool (e.g., Sandbox gives $10K toward a $40K+ pool)
  2. Matching Pool → this pool of funds is distributed after the round ends, based on donor participation. It doesn’t go to every project equally- it goes to the ones that receive the most community support based on the matching calculation.
  3. Projects → apply to the round and are selected based on eligibility. They compete for public support to earn a larger share of the matching pool.
  4. Donors (the public) → make small donations (often $1–$50) to the projects they care about. These donations act as signals of support.

So to clarify:

  • Sandbox DAO is not a donor - you’re seeding the matching pool.
  • The matching pool is distributed to projects based on how many unique donors support them.
  • A project with 100 people giving $1 each could receive more matching than one with 1 person donating $100 - that’s the power of the quadratic funding formula: it favors breadth of support over donation size.

You’re very close! Just to clarify one key part- Sandbox DAO would be a co-sponsor, not a donor.

So:

  • SandboxDAO contributes $10K toward the matching pool
  • We raise additional funds from other co-sponsors (not donors) to reach the $53.5K total
  • Once funded, the round launches
  • Individual donors (the community) give directly to projects they support
  • The matching pool is distributed based on the calculation from the matching algo = how many unique donors each project receives.

Also to clarify:

  • Quadratic Funding (QF) distributes matching funds based on how many unique donors support each project. That’s the base logic - favoring broad community support over large individual donations.
  • COCM (Connection-Oriented Cluster Matching) is an additional algorithm we layer on top to make the system more resilient to sybil attacks. It evaluates how connected a group of donors is, which helps prevent abuse by ensuring that real, independent donors carry more weight than coordinated donors or bots, etc.

This makes the matching distribution fairer and harder to exploit.

Gladly! Here’s the full matching payout from our most recent ENS x Octant Round:

You can see each project’s wallet receiving their share directly from.

To give more context, here’s the summary of our recent ENS x Octant Round:

Some round stats (more in the forum post above):

  • 103 eligible projects
  • $80K matching pool
  • 744 unique donors
  • $28,890 in additional community donations

Really appreciate this. Here’s what we can do to make it work with Sandbox DAO’s grant cycle:

We’re actively securing co-sponsors now, and although the round itself likely to be launch before August 30, we might need a few more weeks to wrap it up fully and in any case SandboxDAO’s contribution can be sent beforehand. We can coordinate the transfer to the donation.eth wallet (Giveth Matching Pool multisig) before the deadline.

That way:

  • The payment is complete before the program wrap-up
  • We maintain full transparency and traceability onchain
  • The round can still be launched with Sandbox DAO’s support fully locked in

Let me know if there if I can clarify any piece in more details. Thanks again for sticking with this!

Best,
Yegor

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That said, we’re still really aligned with the Community Engagement theme

Yes, I think we’re aligned as well.

To clarify: the $53.5K is the total cost to run the full round , composed of:

We’re actively lining up multiple co-sponsors to reach that goal. If Sandbox DAO contributes $10,000 , you’d represent ~18.7% of the total. Your proportional fee would be:

If the matching pool ends up being larger - say $80,000 - with the ops fee remains $13.5K, then Sandbox DAO’s share of the fee would drop to ~$1,450 , and the rest (~$8,550) would go to projects. So the more co-sponsors, the more impact for the same contribution.

Ah. Interesting. Okay I think I understand that much better now. Thank you.

There are 4 key components in a QF round:

  • Sandbox DAO is not a donor - you’re seeding the matching pool.
  • The matching pool is distributed to projects based on how many unique donors support them.

Ah…yeah okay, I get it now. The terminology breakdown and then these clarifying points made it clear. Thank you.

A project with 100 people giving $1 each could receive more matching than one with 1 person donating $100

I think my only question left is how the matching pool plays into this exact sentence. If 100 people give $1 to Project A, 1 person donates $100 to Project B, and 2 people donate $50 to Project C…how do these signals of support tell the Matching Pool to distribute the $10K? Again, please keep it really simple, as you have been. I understand that there is probably a lot of nuance, I only need to understand the principle at play here :slight_smile:

You’re very close! Just to clarify one key part- Sandbox DAO would be a co-sponsor, not a donor.
So:
Also to clarify:

Yup, makes sense now! :slight_smile: That helped big time. So does this mean that each project receives both a QF+COCM calculated share of the matching pool and the amount individual donors donated to them?

Gladly! Here’s the full matching payout from our most recent ENS x Octant Round:

Excellent. So I assume in addition to a multi-sig you have some assortment of smart contracts governing part of the process here? No need to delve too deep into your security architecture, just need to get an idea for the robustness of your backend.

We’re actively securing co-sponsors now, and although the round itself likely to be launch before August 30, we might need a few more weeks

I think this can be arranged. When you say a few more weeks…Let’s say we give you 10K USDC next week. What is the absolute worst-case scenario if every single thing goes wrong :slight_smile: and does that absolute worst-case scenario change in any way if we gave 20K instead of 10K USDC?

What % of the way through securing co-sponsors are you toward the $53K?

We can coordinate the transfer to the donation.eth wallet (Giveth Matching Pool multisig) before the deadline.

Understood. So as I look back on the milestones you proposed, we’d release 25% (2.5K USDC) to you at the beginning, and then release the remaining 75% toward the end. Where does the deadline fall within the milestone structure?

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Hey @Lanzer!

Thank you for your follow up questions

Here’s a simple example using $10K matching pool as an example:

  • Project A : 100 × $1 = $100 total, 100 unique donors
  • Project B: 1 × $100 = $100 total, 1 unique donor
  • Project C: 2 × $50 = $100 total, 2 unique donors

Quadratic Funding formula roughly gives normalized across all projects and limited by the pool size.

Matching = (Sum of square roots of individual donations)² – Total donations

So A gets ~100 units, B ~1, C ~2.

Normalized, A gets ~96% of the match, B ~1%, C ~2%.

Meaning of the $10K pool:

  • A gets ~$9,600 matched
  • B gets ~$100
  • C gets ~$200

This demonstrates how broad engagement yields much more matching than large single donations.

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Exactly. Each project receives:

  1. All individual donations made during the round (e.g. $100 total)
  2. Their share of the matching pool, calculated using QF and COCM

Thus, projects walk away with both direct donation revenue plus amplified matched funds.

Yes - definitely. Most of Giveth’s infrastructure is open-source and available on our GitHub: Giveth · GitHub

If you’d like, I can also ask one of our devs to contribute in the next reply and walk you through the backend architecture more closely.

Also worth noting: Giveth never touches or holds donor funds. All donations are made directly from the donor to the project’s wallet .

We now have a few QF rounds lined up - one kicking off soon (announcements coming likely next week!). While I can’t share full details yet, I can say that one of them isn’t focused on the Ethereum ecosystem, so it wouldn’t overlap with what we’d do here.

We’re also in active conversations with a couple of major L2s and have a commitment from the Ethereum Foundation to boost the next round’s matching pool by 25% once its all set.

Worst-case timeline?

If you send $10K or $20K next week:

  • The funds are received and recorded in the Giveth multisig before August 30 (fits SGDP timing) - Giveth Matching Pool |<!-- --> Giveth
  • The round itself might launch late August or September
  • The latest we’d execute fund distribution and reporting would be mid-late September

So if everything gets delayed, we’re talking ~4 weeks max beyond the Aug 30 milestone, and we’d keep you posted the entire way.

The timeline risk itself stays about the same, but a $20K contribution would bring us much closer to hitting the $53.5K threshold faster, meaning we could lock in a launch window sooner.

It also gives us stronger leverage when finalizing co-sponsorships - the more committed funds we have early on, the easier it is to close the remaining gap.

So while worst-case timing doesn’t shift drastically, your $20K could very well be the tipping point that secures the round and accelerates execution.

Based on your earlier note - that some minimal support (like payment) may still be possible after August 30 - we’re designing our timeline with flexibility, but here’s how it could work best:

  • Ideally, the Milestone 1 payment (25%) would be sent before August 30 to keep things fully within the SGDP program window, and have a commitment from the DAO about participating in the round.
  • That payment goes to the donation.eth multisig and secures Sandbox DAO’s co-sponsorship.
  • The remaining 75% (Milestones 2 & 3) - covering execution and reporting - can take place once the round is finished (when we have the QF round timeline set) and would not require further DAO involvement unless preferred.

Either way, we’ll ensure:

  • Funds are traceable onchain
  • Sandbox DAO’s support is fully acknowledged in the round
  • Milestone-based deliverables are executed and reported transparently

Let me know if there are any other questions or clarifications and which flow makes the most sense on your end, and I’ll adapt accordingly!

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Normalized, A gets ~96% of the match, B ~1%, C ~2%.
Meaning of the $10K pool:
A gets ~$9,600 matched
B gets ~$100
C gets ~$200

Yup! Okay I get it. thanks :slight_smile:

Thus, projects walk away with both direct donation revenue plus amplified matched funds.

Roger that. Makes sense. When you publish the recap and donation results, are any of the direct donation revenue attributed to the sponsors in any way?

Yes - definitely. Most of Giveth’s infrastructure is open-source and available on our GitHub: Giveth · GitHub

Ah. Excellent. Thanks. No need to ask one of your devs. I wouldn’t be surprised if one of our fellow SandFam community members saw this and looks through it. :slight_smile:

Giveth never touches or holds donor funds. All donations are made directly from the donor to the project’s wallet .

I must have previously misunderstood. When you posted the link to the matching payout transaction …these didn’t come from a Giveth-held wallet?

$418K raised from 3549 contributors (which I assume means donors)…nice.

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The timeline risk itself stays about the same, but a $20K contribution would bring us much closer to hitting the $53.5K threshold faster,

Ah, yeah, okay. I get it. Which is why when you offered us sending the full $53.5K, we could start immediately, yes? @Money and @yuelwolf , do yall have any interest in pitching in with me to reach $53.5K? If we reach $53K, then they’re sure to finish before Aug 30th and we can share in the impact to the ecosystem.

Let me know if there are any other questions or clarifications and which flow makes the most sense on your end, and I’ll adapt accordingly!

I think I’ve seen enough to say that I’m going to approve this grant. There’s some loose ends up above I need to secure with you + the other grant approvers, and a third loose end is the exactly amount we’ll go with. I’d say a safe number is at least $10K. Let’s keep going back and forth here to settle the details. While that’s happening, some other pending grant applications are resolving within Community Engagement, which will give me a final number that we’ll donate.

I should have my final evaluation on this grant published by end of day on Monday. That’ll be the official commitment from us to you. Thoughts?

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Love hearing that - really glad it’s all making sense!

Great question! Sponsors receive full credit for contributing the matching pool, but we do not handle or redirect individual donor funds- those go directly to projects.
That said, we do enroll all of the sponsors contributions into a GIVbacks raffle - a rewards program where all contributors to the matching pool (aka sponsors) are entered to win up to 500,000 GIV tokens. It’s our way of giving back to contributors and shining additional light on their support. Check out the full details here: GIVbacks

When I say “Giveth never touches or holds donor funds,” I’m referring to direct donations :

When Donor A donates to Project Y, the transaction is initiated on the Giveth frontend, but the funds are sent directly from the donor to the project’s wallet - they never pass through any Giveth-controlled wallet or intermediary. We’re just connecting donors and projects in this case.

The matching funds (like the Sandbox DAO contribution) are a separate flow. These are pooled into our donation.eth multisig, which is a Gnosis Safe owned and managed by the Giveth core team. After the round ends and all matching calculations are done (using QF + COCM), we execute the matching payouts from that multisig, as seen in this onchain tx you referred to

Totally! That stat comes directly from the Giveth Matching Pool project page, which represents the donation.eth multisig as a donation target on the frontend.

Those 3,500+ contributors include:

  • :white_check_mark: Public donors who donated funds to the Matching Pool instead of (or in addition to) specific projects
    [every time you donate to any project you have the option to give % to Matching Pool]

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  • :white_check_mark: Co-sponsors who contributed matching pool funds directly through the Giveth frontend

  • :cross_mark: Not sponsors who sent funds directly to the multisig via manual transfer - those aren’t reflected in this counter, though they’re still tracked onchain (Arkham - you can see here the balances history of all the funds that were received into donation.eth and after distributed to projects in QF rounds.)

For total donation tracking across all projects and rounds, I recommend checking https://stats.giveth.io/
(Screenshot below shows over $4.6M donated to date!)

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Let me know if you’d like to explore any of these in more detail!

Yes, exactly. With $53.5K confirmed, we’d begin coordination immediately, since that covers both the ops fee and minimum matching pool. It’d give us everything needed to lock the round timeline, open nominations/applications, and start building comms asap!

@Money & @yuelwolf let me know what you think! happy to answer any questions. It would be sick to make Sandbox focused QF round with a full branding and impact focus on Sandbox eco!

That sounds fantastic - really appreciate the thoughtful engagement throughout this process.

I’m thrilled to hear you’re moving toward approval and totally understand the need to lock in the amount and coordinate with other grant approvers. Whether it ends up being $10K or more, we’ll make sure Sandbox DAO’s contribution is clearly recognized as a co-sponsor: featured on the round landing page, highlighted in comms, and included in the post-round blog, analytics report, and invited X Space (btw, on this one, would you be the person representing SandboxDAO in X Spaces, or I will need to coordinate with the comms team?).

I’m here and ready to adapt to whatever flow works best for you.

Looking forward to your final update today🔥

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grant-accepted for 10K USDC with 3 milestones and 3 deliverables.

Yegor, I wasn’t able to settle an amount above 10K, however, I do believe that I’ll be able to commit more in the future. I’ll DM you the next steps to get KYC completed and payment initiated.

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Evaluated on 6/30/2025

Q1: Name of your Grant

  • Score: Remains at 5 of 5

Q2: Total Grant amount in USD ($)

  • Score: Increased from 3 to 4 of 5
  • Decision: Meets intent of the question. No additional input required.
  • Rationale: Per discussion with the author, a custom amount can be sent to Giveth. Once an amount is sent to Giveth, Sandbox DAO would be a sponsor of the next Giveth rounding round. If less than 53,500 USDC, then additional co-sponsors will be needed to reach the 53.5K minimum to start the funding round. A marketing deck of sponsor packages was supplied and process + definitions was extensively explored. A smaller amount (25%) will be sent up front, and the larger amount (75%) sent at the conclusion of the funding round to donation.eth.
Key Terms & Process Summary
  • Matching pool network = blockchain where the matching pool funds will be distributed (e.g. Optimism, Polygon, Base, Solana etc)
  • Eligibility criteria = whether projects need to be verified, fit a round theme, be from specific ecosystem
  • Timeline = round announcements, application period (10-14 days), onboarding period, round dates (on average we run rounds for 2 weeks), and post-round wrap-up.
  • The $53.5K is the total cost to run the full round, composed of:
    • $40,000 → used directly as the matching pool (this goes to projects)
    • $13,500 → flat operations fee for platform setup, sybil resistance, analytics, project onboarding, and comms (goes to Giveth)
  • If Sandbox DAO contributes $10,000, it would represent ~18.7% of the total. Proportional fee would be:
    • $2,523 → Giveth (ops fee)
    • $7,477 → Matching Pool
  • There are 4 key components in a QF round:
      1. Sponsors (like Sandbox DAO) → contribute to the matching pool (e.g., Sandbox gives $10K toward a $40K+ pool)
      1. Matching Pool → this pool of funds is distributed after the round ends, based on donor participation. It doesn’t go to every project equally- it goes to the ones that receive the most community support based on the matching calculation.
      1. Projects → apply to the round and are selected based on eligibility. They compete for public support to earn a larger share of the matching pool.
      1. Donors (the public) → make small donations (often $1–$50) to the projects they care about. These donations act as signals of support.
  • So to clarify:
    • Sandbox DAO is not a donor - you’re seeding the matching pool.
    • The matching pool is distributed to projects based on how many unique donors support them.
    • A project with 100 people giving $1 each could receive more matching than one with 1 person donating $100 - that’s the power of the quadratic funding formula: it favors breadth of support over donation size.
    • Quadratic Funding (QF) distributes matching funds based on how many unique donors support each project. That’s the base logic - favoring broad community support over large individual donations.
  • COCM (Connection-Oriented Cluster Matching) is an additional algorithm we layer on top to make the system more resilient to sybil attacks. It evaluates how connected a group of donors is, which helps prevent abuse by ensuring that real, independent donors carry more weight than coordinated donors or bots, etc. This makes the matching distribution fairer and harder to exploit.
  • Each project receives both a QF+COCM calculated share of the sponsor matching pool and the amount individual donors donated to them.
  • Matching = (Sum of square roots of individual donations)² – Total donations
    • Here’s a simple example using $10K matching pool as an example:
      • Project A : 100 × $1 = $100 total, 100 unique donors
      • Project B: 1 × $100 = $100 total, 1 unique donor
      • Project C: 2 × $50 = $100 total, 2 unique donors
      • So A gets ~100 units, B ~1, C ~2… A gets ~96% of the match, B ~1%, C ~2%.
    • Meaning of the $10K pool:
      • A gets ~$9,600 matched
      • B gets ~$100
      • C gets ~$200

Q3: Evaluation Factor – Specific

Q4: Evaluation Factor – Measurable

  • Score: Increased from 4 to 5 of 5
  • Decision: Meets intent of the question. No additional input required.
  • Rationale: Milestones are specific, can be validated via https://stats.giveth.io/ and analysis on Arkham for donation.eth. An example wrap-up summary was supplied.

Q5: Evaluation Factor – Accountable

  • Score: Remains at 4 of 5

Q6: Evaluation Factor – Realistic

  • Score: Increased from 3 to 4 of 5
  • Decision: Meets intent of the question. No additional input required.
  • Rationale: Per discussion with grant author, clarity was obtained on how these mechanisms played into Giveth’s funding rounds: quadratic funding, active/archive rounds, COCM* , and chosen projects

Q7: Evaluation Factor – Timely

  • Score: Remains at 4 of 5
  • Decision: Meets intent of the question. No additional input required.
  • Rationale: Per discussions with grant author, timeline may exceed Aug 30th by up to 4 weeks (late September 2025).

Q8: Evaluation Factor – Disclosure

  • Score: Remains at 5 of 5
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Thanks so much, @Lanzer- truly appreciate the detailed evaluation and thoughtful engagement throughout. :folded_hands:

We’ll complete KYC and prep for milestone 1 delivery as discussed. Looking forward to kicking off this round and creating some real impact together with Sandbox DAO!

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Sounds good! Standing by :slight_smile:

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Hey @Lanzer!

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We’ve passed thought the KYC and it shall be already approved as I can see :palms_up_together:

Lets walk thought the Milestone 1:

  • We confirm Sandbox DAO as a co-sponsor
  • Can you please provide me with the links to the branding guidelines/ brandbook containing Sandbox DAO brand assets?
  • Who would be the contact for coordinating scheduling of Twitter Spaces that we would have during the round? It would be great if someone from the DAO could join the stage, and optionally if Sandbox account can also participate. Would this contact also be the one we can coordinate cross-marketing - sharing tweets/threads any other content posted apart from X - for reposting/engaging etc

Thank you,
Yegor

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Hello @Lanzer @yegor

I’ve reviewed the proposal, and the project doesn’t quite fit entirely within my domain. I’m also focused on projects that attract thousands of users through technology, platforms, and similar means. If the budget exceeds $15k USD, I request user reach milestones, so I don’t think this will work for the current proposal.

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  • Thank you
  • The Sandbox Press page
  • A combination of myself and the DAO Communications Manager, @theKuntaMC . Kunta can attend on behalf of the DAO Admin Team. Request reposts from x.com/TSBCreators and x.com/theSandboxGame. While there is a connection to the Sandbox Game Company, Sandbox DAO and the Game Company are separate teams and entities. May need a proactive stance from you to ensure that cross-marketing can take place. @theKuntaMC may be able to help if you ask reaaaaaaaaaaaaal nicely. As a backup we can always reach out to their head of marketing or request assistance from some of the Ambassadors like @KamiSawZe to make an introduction.
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Thanks for the tag on this, @Lanzer

Shoot me a DM to try and align schedules, @yegor. Give me details + anticipated dates/times.

Time is very limited for me for the next few weeks,. but we can look at logistics together and I’ll, of course, support your efforts how I can, through promotions, at least.

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