Radicle Org Proposal 2024

Author(s):	cloudhead
Type:	Org
Created:	2023-11-03
Status:	active

Purpose

The Radicle Org aims to develop a fully-sovereign code collaboration stack called "Radicle".

Radicle is designed to be a secure, decentralized and powerful alternative to code forges such as GitHub and GitLab while preserving user sovereignty and freedom.

Specifically, Radicle attempts to address the following problems:

• Platform risk
  • GitHub and others have been known to censor projects as well as shutdown developer accounts (eg. youtube-dl)
  • GitHub is closed source and its ToS allows them to change and remove functionality at will.
  • GitHub and others create lock-in via their non-git features, eg. issues, pull requests etc.
  • GitHub trains Copilot on user data without consent.
  • GitHub and others can choose to monetize any feature at any time, requiring users to pay for something they weren't paying for before.
  • GitHub and others are built as monolithic platforms that are not adaptable and changeable by users.
• Open access
  • GitHub and others are not available in all countries due to trade embargos and require an account for interacting with the platform.
• Privacy
  • GitHub and others have access to all private user repositories.
• Data ownership
  • GitHub and others own their user's data and this data is not part of the git repository, hence it cannot be migrated.
• Security
  • By not using cryptography, GitHub's security model allows hackers and/or employees to forge user data without evidence to the user.
• Availability
  • When GitHub or GitLab are down, there is no possible access to the service. Only the source code remains accessible.

By providing the following solutions:

• Users are able to run their own nodes without reliance on any third parties. They cannot be de-platformed.
• All social artifacts (eg. comments, issues etc.) are stored in git, and thus easy to migrate, backup and access both online and offline. Users own their data.
• Radicle is always available, since it is local-first. Users don't need internet access to carry out a majority of tasks.
• Radicle uses public-key cryptography throughout the product and protocol, removing the need for trust in third-parties. Every social artifact or piece of code can be verified by anyone.
• Radicle plans to add end-to-end encryption to git repositories, protecting all user data from third-parties.
• Radicle is open source and permissibly licensed.
• Radicle is censorship resistant: any node on the network can choose to host a radicle repository and make it available to others.
• Radicle is an open protocol that can change and adapt to user needs and a changing world.

Annual Strategy & Quarterly Objectives

Objectives

• Improve and stabilize the Radicle stack
  • Improve and extend Radicle Patches
    • More advanced code review workflows
  • Improve and extend Radicle Issues
    • Improved issue management options
  • Build out Radicle CI/CD
    • Implement Radicle “native” CI
    • Support the integration of third party CI platforms
• Stabilize and improve the Radicle network protocol
  • Implement hole-punching
  • Optimize performance
  • Improve new Git fetch protocol
• Improve the Radicle CLI
  • Improve user experience: auto-complete, documentation, errors, help etc.
• Improve the Radicle web interface
  • Feature parity with the CLI
• Implement Radicle notification system (stretch goal)
• Implement Radicle user identities (stretch goal)
• Create a great onboarding experience for users
  • Launch docs website
  • Launch Radicle guide
  • Revamp website
• Onboard users, communities and teams to the Radicle stack
• Gain a better understanding of what features are missing to onboard more users
• Gain a better understanding of what users or companies might want to pay for
• If we succeed at these previous goals, convert some of these users to paying customers

Roadmap

• Q1: Launch Radicle 1.0
• Q2: Start onboarding users
• Q3: Continue stabilizing and improve the Radicle stack
• Q4: Start experimenting with paid offering, given product-market fit

Organizational Structure

Legal structure

Corporate entity (Sárl) based in Switzerland, with @cloudhead as managing director.

Core Contributors

• @cloudhead -- project lead -- full-time
• @zlatan -- project & community management -- part-time
• @rudolfs -- software engineering on web -- full-time
• @sebastinez -- software engineering on web -- full-time
• @erikli -- software engineering on heartwood -- part-time
• @fintohaps -- software engineering on heartwood -- full-time
• @lars -- software engineer on heartwood -- full-time
• @daniel -- product designer on web -- part-time
• @arastoo -- software engineer on heartwood -- part-time
• @sllyllyd-- operations -- part-time

Support from

• @geigerzaehler -- software engineering on heartwood and radicle-interface
• @stellarmagnet -- content and strategy

Communication

• Core team development & support: https://radicle.zulipchat.com
• Core team repositories: https://app.radicle.xyz/nodes/seed.radicle.xyz
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/radicle
• Mastodon: https://mastodon.radicle.xyz
• Quarterly Radworks community calls

Reporting & Success Criteria

The 2023 critertia still applies:

• Number of repositories published on the network
• Number of nodes online
• Commit activity on published repositories
• Social activity (patches, discussions, issues, etc.)
• "Key" projects using Radicle
• Number of members on Zulip
• Number of contributors to core stack

For 2024, we also add:

• Stability of the network, reduce breaking changes
• Number of onboarded open source projects
• Team member hours paid by project income, if any

Through Q2 2024, the Foundation Org will provide monthly financial reporting to Radworks on behalf of the Radicle Org. Starting in Q3 2024, the Radicle Org will publish monthly financial reports on Radworks-granted funds spent by the org.

Timeline & Budget

The total budget requested for 2024 is $1,370,482.

Total costs for 2024

Description	Budget
Development	$1,975,448
Marketing	$116,500
Offsites	$52,032
Operations	$26,501
Total	$2,170,482

• Development: contributor pay for a team of ~13, R&D costs
• Marketing: sponsorships, events and some contributor pay
• Offsites: we plan on having two offsites this year
• Operations: accountants, Skyline digital fees, online subscriptions, legal costs & gas fees

This includes room to hire one more engineer.

Budget carried over from last year

There will be an estimate of $800,000 left over at the end of 2023.

Requested budget

$2,170,482 - $800,000 = $1,370,482

Fund management

• DAO funds will be received on a 3:2 multisig (Safe)
  • @cloudhead as signer (two keys)
  • @sllyllyd as signer
• Funds to be paid in fiat will be paid out by Skyline Digital.
• Payouts will be done by operations on a monthly basis.

The Radicle Org - also the "Grant Recipient" of Radworks, if this proposal is passed - hereby agrees to use the amount granted by Radworks in support of fulfilling the purpose outlined in the "Purpose" section above. The Grant Recipient understands and acknowledges that the awarded amount may be used only for this Purpose. Furthermore, any part of the grant that goes unused in the calendar year outlined in this proposal (for 2024) will either be returned to the Radworks Treasury (by March 2025) or rolled over into and applied towards the Org's 2025 proposal and future grant from Radworks.

MoU with Radworks: https://community.radworks.org/t/mou-radworks-radicle-org/3408

Technical implementation

The following transaction has to be executed, which transfers the amount in the USDC token to the Radicle Org multi-sig.

0xA0b86991c6218b36c1d19D4a2e9Eb0cE3606eB48 0 "transfer(address,uint256)" 0x4016Ce2f73100138831CAf716f30EEC3ef1dFa1D 1370482000000