# Research Outline: "When Money Flows, Builders Thrive" This research outline serves as a knowledge gateway for The Human Layer podcast Episode 3 [[Episode 3 - When Money Flows, Builders Thrive]], to further explore how continuous funding mechanisms could transform Web3 from extractive, attention-grabbing chaos into sustainable relational infrastructure. In this Episode, [Graven](https://x.com/GravenPrest) from [FlowState](https://x.com/flowstatecoop) and [SuperFluid](https://x.com/Superfluid_HQ) joined us to explore how streaming money mechanisms could transform open source funding, creator support, and community resilience. The conversation weaves together insights about streaming value, fractal community design, and the infinite game perspective, offering critical frameworks for building resilient systems capable of withstanding collapse while nurturing human creativity and connection. DYOR is designed to give you a foundation of the history and vocabulary used in [[Episode 3 - When Money Flows, Builders Thrive]] and for you to copy/paste into your own LLM models and dive deep into the many layers of emergent technology. ## I. Technical Infrastructure Concepts ### A. Streaming Money and Continuous Funding - **Definition**: Financial infrastructure that enables continuous, real-time value transfers rather than discrete, one-time transactions. As Graven explains: "Streaming is a continuous source of funding...trying to keep builders in a flow state." - **Evolution**: Emerged from early Web3 experiments with programmable money, evolving from basic token transfers to sophisticated streaming protocols - **Historical Context**: Represents a shift from traditional grant-based funding toward sustaining relationships between supporters and builders - **Real-World Applications**: - FlowState co-op's implementation for open source funding - Supersedes earlier approaches like Gitcoin grants that force creators into "battle royale for attention" - Attempts to solve the "grant cadence" problem identified by Crystal where builders must constantly shift between sourcing mechanisms #### Further Exploration - Early implementations: Sablier Protocol, Superfluid - Theoretical foundations: "Radical Markets" by Posner & Weyl; "Common Knowledge" by George Por - Critical perspectives: "The Commons in the Age of Capital" by Massimo De Angelis ### B. Flow State as Infrastructure Design Principle - **Definition**: Design principle for economic systems that prioritizes creating conditions for sustained creative focus and deep work - **Evolution**: Represents an application of psychological flow principles (Csikszentmihalyi) to economic infrastructure design - **Connections**: Links to "continuous vs. discrete value" as identified by Crystal; connects psychological states to economic models - **Significance**: Challenges discrete, attention-maximizing designs that dominate current digital economies #### Further Exploration - Psychological research: "Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience" by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi - Economic applications: "Time-Money Space" by Bernard Lietaer - Community implementations: Flow State; SuperFluid ### C. Software as a Service (SaaS) as Funding Model Precedent - **Definition**: Subscription-based software licensing model referenced by Graven as a precedent for continuous funding - **Conceptual Importance**: Demonstrates how continuous funding models can align incentives between creators and users - **Historical Context**: Represents a shift from packaged software to relationship-based service models - **Relevance**: Shows how "even the most capitalistic people on earth" recognized continuous revenue creates more aligned incentives - **Contrasting Perspectives**: Tension between subscription fatigue in consumer markets versus benefits of predictable revenue for creators #### Further Exploration - Business model evolution: "Subscribed" by Tien Tzuo - Critical perspectives: "Platform Capitalism" by Nick Srnicek - Sociotechnical analysis: "Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace" by Lawrence Lessig ## II. Community and Governance Frameworks ### A. Fractal Community Design - **Definition**: A multi-scale organizational approach where communities organize in nested layers, as Crystal describes: "we decided to do pods... then you plug into a mothership... you're ephemeral in these larger communities, but you have a presence when you go in with your pod" - **Evolution**: Response to failure of both purely centralized structures and completely flat hierarchies - **Historical Precedents**: Indigenous confederations; guild systems; Mondragon cooperative federation - **Connection**: Addresses Taylor's observation about human coordination limitations: "humans have only ever operated in...the Dunbar number style 100 people or so" - **Real-World Applications**: JournoDAO's pod structure; bioregional organizing; federated cooperatives #### Further Exploration - Organizational theory: "Reinventing Organizations" by Frederic Laloux - Indigenous governance: "Sacred Instructions" by Sherri Mitchell - Complex systems: "Scale" by Geoffrey West ### B. Community Composting as Conflict Transformation - **Definition**: Crystal's metaphor for communities metabolizing conflict into growth: "For a community and an individual to have resiliency, they have to be able to compost that negative aspect" - **Conceptual Framework**: Conflict as potential nutrient rather than purely destructive force - **Historical Context**: Builds on restorative justice traditions; contrasts with conflict avoidance common in tech spaces - **Significance**: Offers mechanism for community resilience without requiring perfect harmony - **Challenges**: As Taylor notes, "the composting mechanism? I don't. That's not clear yet" #### Further Exploration - Restorative practices: "The Little Book of Restorative Justice" by Howard Zehr - Community conflict: "Turning to One Another" by Margaret Wheatley - Implementation models: Restorative Circles methodology (Dominic Barter) ### C. Co-ops as Organizational Structure - **Definition**: Member-owned, democratically-controlled enterprises as referenced by Graven: "We're structured as a co-op" - **Evolution**: From 19th century mutual aid organizations to contemporary digital cooperatives - **Significance**: Offers formal structure for collective ownership of technological infrastructure - **Connection**: Links to fractional community design and streaming value distribution - **Contrasting Models**: Platform cooperativism vs venture-backed platform capitalism #### Further Exploration - Cooperative history: "Everything for Everyone" by Nathan Schneider - Platform cooperativism: "Ours to Hack and to Own" ed. by Trebor Scholz - Implementation challenges: "Democratic by Design" by Gabriel Metcalf ## III. Political and Economic Theories ### A. Infinite vs. Finite Games - **Definition**: Distinction between play-to-continue (infinite) versus play-to-win (finite) frameworks that Crystal references as "the infinite game" - **Conceptual Origin**: James P. Carse's philosophical framework distinguishing games with fixed endpoints from those played for continuation - **Significance**: Challenges short-term extraction mentality of venture capital and token speculation - **Connection**: Relates to Crystal's critique of systems where "everything is that short-term game like what's going to get us to the token, what's going to get us to that flip" - **Applications**: Design principle for technologies that build intergenerational value rather than optimize for exit events #### Further Exploration - Philosophical foundation: "Finite and Infinite Games" by James P. Carse - Business applications: "The Infinite Game" by Simon Sinek - Systemic perspective: "Doughnut Economics" by Kate Raworth ### B. Transactional vs. Relational Value Exchange - **Definition**: Distinction identified by Crystal: "When you do something once, it's transactional...but continuous and streaming is relational" - **Historical Context**: Builds on indigenous economic systems and gift economies that prioritized relationship maintenance over extraction - **Current Significance**: Challenges dominant models where all value is commodified and relationships are reduced to transactions - **Real-World Applications**: Mutual aid networks; care economies; regenerative business models - **Tensions**: Balance between clear boundaries (transactions) and ongoing obligations (relationships) #### Further Exploration - Anthropological perspective: "The Gift" by Marcel Mauss - Economic alternatives: "Sacred Economics" by Charles Eisenstein - Feminist economics: "Caliban and the Witch" by Silvia Federici ### C. Biomimicry and Natural System Design - **Definition**: Design approach that learns from natural systems, as Graven describes: "Biomimicry and following things that nature...has worked to create whatever this is that we're in" - **Evolution**: From superficial nature-inspired design to deeper ecological systems thinking - **Significance**: Offers tested patterns for resilient, regenerative systems that have survived evolutionary pressures - **Connection**: Links to fractal design, community composting, and continuous value flows - **Applications**: Governance designs based on ecosystem patterns; economy designs based on circular flows #### Further Exploration - Design framework: "Biomimicry" by Janine Benyus - Systems perspective: "Design for the Real World" by Victor Papanek - Practical applications: "Emergent Strategy" by adrienne maree brown ## IV. Resistance and Resilience Strategies ### A. Ethereum Localism - **Definition**: Movement referenced by Crystal that emphasizes hyperlocal Ethereum applications: "When systems do collapse, you're going to go to your community gathering places" - **Evolution**: Response to scaling challenges and recognition of community as foundation for resilient systems - **Connection**: Links technical decentralization to geographic re-localization of economic activity - **Significance**: Challenges purely digital, placeless visions of crypto; re-grounds technical infrastructure in physical communities - **Real-World Applications**: Local currencies on Ethereum; municipal blockchain implementations; community-owned broadband DAOs #### Further Exploration - Theoretical framework: "The Web of Meaning" by Jeremy Lent - Implementation examples: Global Ethereum Localism Forum (GFEL); ETHDenver's community focus - Critical perspective: "Who Owns the Future?" by Jaron Lanier ### B. Trojan Horse Strategy - **Definition**: Taylor's concept for embedding alternative systems within dominant structures: "It's the era of Trojan horses...slide a better narrative into the ecosystem when those centralized entities swoop in" - **Historical Context**: Builds on long tradition of strategic entryism and tactical subversion of dominant systems - **Current Significance**: Strategy for navigating increased centralization and corporate capture in Web3 - **Connection**: Links to Crystal's observation about systemic collapse creating vacuum that alternative systems can fill - **Tensions**: Risks of co-optation versus benefits of strategic positioning #### Further Exploration - Historical examples: Free and open source software movement; Creative Commons licensing - Tactical framework: "Design Justice" by Sasha Costanza-Chock - Strategic thinking: "Rules for Radicals" by Saul Alinsky ### C. Building Through Collapse - **Definition**: Approach to creating systems specifically designed to function during systemic transitions, as Crystal notes: "We're at the point where we all envisioned this tech being used in collapse" - **Context**: Recognition that current systems are increasingly brittle and prone to cascading failures - **Connection**: Links to continuous funding as stability mechanism during disruption - **Significance**: Shifts focus from optimizing for growth to designing for resilience - **Applications**: Infrastructure designed to maintain essential functions during system failures #### Further Exploration - Collapse perspectives: "How Everything Can Collapse" by Pablo Servigne & Raphaël Stevens - Design principles: "Designing Regenerative Cultures" by Daniel Christian Wahl - Historical examples: "A Paradise Built in Hell" by Rebecca Solnit ### D. Creating Alternative Gardens - **Definition**: Graven's metaphor for building parallel systems: "We're creating an alternative garden, because we believe the existing garden can have all the money in the world, but the humans are getting tired" - **Historical Context**: Connects to autonomous zone creation and prefigurative politics traditions - **Significance**: Strategy for avoiding direct confrontation while building functional alternatives - **Connection**: Links to Hirschman's "exit" strategy as alternative to "voice" or "loyalty" - **Applications**: Alternative educational systems; parallel economic structures; food sovereignty movements #### Further Exploration - Political theory: "Exit, Voice, and Loyalty" by Albert O. Hirschman - Practical implementation: "Building the Commune" by George Ciccariello-Maher - Historical examples: "Emergent Strategy" by adrienne maree brown ## V. Complex Challenges and Evolving Questions ### A. Scale and Human Coordination Limitations - **Definition**: The tension identified by Taylor between human cognitive capacities and global coordination needs: "humans have only ever operated in...the Dunbar number style 100 people or so" - **Context**: Evolutionary limitations meeting planetary-scale challenges and digital networks - **Significance**: Core design challenge for creating systems that respect human-scale interaction while enabling broader coordination - **Current Explorations**: AI mediation; fractal governance; nested sovereignty models - **Unresolved Questions**: As Taylor notes: "How do you do that alongside building the connective tissue that creates cohesion...between what would feel like completely disparate communities?" #### Further Exploration - Cognitive science: "Thinking, Fast and Slow" by Daniel Kahneman - Governance research: "Governing the Commons" by Elinor Ostrom - Technology perspective: "Team Human" by Douglas Rushkoff ### B. AI as Infrastructure Mediator - **Definition**: Emerging role of AI in synthesizing knowledge and mediating between scales, as Crystal describes: "Bringing in ancient wisdom...through an AI model and asking it to apply it to this specific context" - **Evolution**: From narrow AI applications to potential coordination infrastructure - **Significance**: Potential solution to scale limitations identified by Taylor: "We're starting to find AI being this really interesting, terrifying, but like perfect solution in some ways to actually be the mediator" - **Tensions**: Enhanced coordination capabilities versus risks of algorithmic control and opacity - **Unresolved Questions**: Balance between human agency and AI mediation; governance of AI systems themselves #### Further Exploration - Critical perspective: "Weapons of Math Destruction" by Cathy O'Neil - Technical approaches: "Human Compatible" by Stuart Russell - Indigenous AI: "Making Kin with the Machines" by Jason Edward Lewis et al. ### C. Central Bank Digital Currencies and Systemic Transition - **Definition**: Government-issued digital currencies referenced indirectly in discussion of "central banking system" disruption - **Context**: Represents potential acceleration of surveillance capitalism and financial control - **Connection**: Links to Crystal's point about tech "bringing down the central banking system" creating a "fucking shit show" - **Significance**: Creates urgency for building alternative systems before centralized digital currencies consolidate control - **Contrasting Visions**: Sovereign digital currency systems versus state-controlled digital currencies #### Further Exploration - Technical analysis: "Digital Cash" by Finn Brunton - Privacy perspective: "Privacy is Power" by Carissa Véliz - Historical context: "The Age of Surveillance Capitalism" by Shoshana Zuboff ### D. Knowledge Gardens and Wisdom Integration - **Definition**: Crystal's concept for integrating diverse knowledge sources: "Knowledge gardens...bringing in ancient wisdom...bringing it in through an AI model" - **Evolution**: From discrete knowledge repositories to interconnected wisdom ecosystems - **Significance**: Creates framework for making ancestral knowledge accessible within contemporary contexts - **Connection**: Links to continuous value flow concept by incorporating ongoing knowledge streams - **Tensions**: Appropriation concerns versus benefits of cross-cultural knowledge exchange #### Further Exploration - Indigenous knowledge: "Braiding Sweetgrass" by Robin Wall Kimmerer - Knowledge commons: "Common Knowledge?" by Henry Farrell & Melissa Schwartzberg - AI ethics: "Technology and the Virtues" by Shannon Vallor --- This research outline provides contextual frameworks for understanding the complex concepts discussed in "When Money Flows, Builders Thrive," connecting them to broader historical precedents, theoretical foundations, and practical applications while maintaining the podcast's critical perspective on technological systems and power dynamics. --- ## Begin exploring the full scope of the episode here: - #### [Listen to Episode 3 here.](https://www.buzzsprout.com/2460445/episodes/17059458) - #### [[When Money Flows, Builders Thrive]] - #### DYOR Resources located here: [[EP3--DYOR]] - #### [[Episode 3a - Dialectical Insights]]