Moxie Options

Let's analyze the different incentive mechanisms proposed by Moxie. This question is being posed openly by the project to gauge the community's sentiment. Ultimately, these mechanisms need to be well-designed not only from a financial perspective but also from a social one.

As a starting point, let's introduce several concepts that we will use throughout this article

Farscore

We're talking about an indicator that measures your social reputation. Ideally, this indicator should be independent and typically measures the impact of your activity on the network and the quality of your relationships. Farcaster initially introduced the Power Badge, which, although still used for content curation, is no longer displayed. This indicator was critical for gaining visibility on the network, which is why users tried to improve it by following the criteria defined by Farcaster. It's interesting because it effectively becomes a way to signal users to engage in certain activities

LPs

One of the strategies that became established in DeFi and the broader crypto environment to provide liquidity for tokens was the use of liquidity pools. The protocol usually outsourced this need and compensated it with its own tokens. Additionally, it achieved an extra effect by encouraging users to keep their tokens locked, thus reducing selling pressure. This created significant virtuous cycles in token prices, although, in cases where it was the only source of demand, these yields eventually diminished as the token's value declined. This happened because the incentives generated by investors were sold, even though they continued to maintain the liquidity pool.

FTs

We're talking about Fan Tokens, which are tokens that can be purchased in auctions. Currently, these tokens are bought using Bonding Curves, which allow their price to rise or fall algorithmically based on supply and demand. This mechanism has proven to mitigate the risk of sudden drops in these assets. However, it's essential to provide a utility for these tokens that encourages us to hold onto them.

OPTIONS

3️⃣ you get a Farscore boost by owning FTs. Supports the people participating in the protocol; in a way that helps others who are adding value to Farcaster

4️⃣ you get a boost on your everyday earnings if you are a MOXIE LP. Boosts you, but only if you are consistently casting/creating quality content or frames or such on Farcaster.

ANALYSIS

The options lead us to a general question: do we prefer to improve our Farscore or our earnings? It's difficult to answer this question without knowing the details of the improvements, but given that Farscore indirectly allows me to earn more rewards, in addition to enhancing my social reputation, I would lean towards improving my Farscore. Ultimately, rewards at this point are perceived as money, and probably not much unless the price increases, while social reputation seems like a more attractive intangible. Therefore, I believe that in my case, the clear choice would be to gain more Farscore. However, a significant amount of capital could change this decision.

The second question is whether I prefer to provide liquidity or buy Fan Tokens. In this case, I think it makes more sense to buy Fan Tokens because they have much more upside potential, and it's like buying a lottery ticket, which generates more excitement than leaving capital in a kind of deposit. Additionally, it could give me some contact with that influencer or person by purchasing their token. Clearly, my decision would be to buy Fan Tokens.

CONCLUSIONS

I believe the community sentiment would lean towards getting a boost in your Farscore if you acquire Fan Tokens. However, that decision could change if the incentives in the options are significantly unbalanced. A different discussion is what would make more economic sense for the project, but that's a separate question altogether.