ParaTrooper Nomination - Xrivijayan

DAO Contributors
1

Name : Xrivijayan / @xrivijayan

My Journey to ParaSwap

I have been active in startups since 2017, when I left my corporate job to join a non-crypto startup working with the founder/CEO. My introduction to crypto was in 2018 - I was lucky enough to angel invest in a local crypto exchange. I knew the founder from school, and advised him to push ahead with his idea, introduced his major early investors, and came along for the ride. However I wasn’t really involved in crypto itself outside that, until the pandemic where I had enough time on my hands to fall down the rabbit hole and discovered smart contracts, DeFi, etc.

Since then I’ve been spending a lot of time outside my day job in crypto. I don’t actively trade or speculate, but try to invest for the long-term and adjust the portfolio more slowly. I’ve learned from bitter experience getting blown up/rugged on several projects (LUNA/UST, SPELL, SBR/SUNNY are my lowlights). After going through the euphoria and hype cycle of 2021 and the collapses of 2022, I started looking to deconstruct crypto projects as their underlying businesses, mostly through conceptual and financial analysis. I do this as much to learn for myself as to share with others. I try not to get drawn in by hype and narrative anymore, and understand if a real business with solid product-market fit is being built. I have occasionally shared this analysis on Twitter (see samples below):

I believe the possibilities of crypto tokens for capital formation, and smart contracts for operating efficiency (see Uniswap vs. Coinbase revenue per employee) mean that it’s possible for crypto startups to direct a significant amount of their earnings back to tokenholders. That’s how ParaSwap came to my attention when the PSP 2.0 proposal popped up on my Twitter feed. I was very impressed by the thoughtfulness of the framework and the subsequent active DAO discussion on how to improve it, and bought my first bag of ParaSwap to experiment with P2P 2.0 when it launched, while also starting to direct all of my trades through it.

ParaSwap DAO Involvement

I got involved in ParaSwap DAO by chance - I saw some of those trades not get accounted for in my ParaBoost dashboard, so I pinged on Discord. Soon I was talking to @Bach about filling up a Github request. Shortly after that, I started collaborating with @Bach and @0xytocin for the first Express Proposal to add tokens submitted by myself and the rest of the community to the ParaBoost whitelist.

After the Express Proposal passed, I DMed @0xytocin since I wanted to do a similar thread for ParaSwap as my GMX analysis above. I mentioned that it was my first time actively participating in a DAO after lurking and enjoyed collaborating with him and Bach. 0xy encouraged me to take a look at the ParaTroopers proposal. Now I’ve decided to throw my hat in the ring!

ParaTroopers in the Vanguard

I experienced the first epoch of PSP 2.0 and quickly realized that this is the promise of DAOs, Web3, etc. made real. We, the users of ParaSwap and its owners via staking PSP, benefit directly from using the product and its continued growth. We are rewarded for being loyal ParaSwappers and are incentivized to bring our business to ParaSwap. When we refer others to ParaSwap, we get a direct benefit linked to the amount of business they bring. This is all thanks to the elegant design of PSP 2.0, which I believe has set a new benchmark for aligning tokenholders as customers and users to the collective benefit of themselves and the protocol. The benefits of being a ParaSwap DAO member by owning PSP, publicly available to anyone, contrasts with being an early adopter of Web2 products. In Uber or Wise, we got a nice referral fee or a couple of free rides, but we never got a chance to own a piece of the business.

The disconnect between the demonstrated value I see being created with PSP 2.0 and the amount of attention ParaSwap has gotten outside of the DAO to me is a wasted opportunity. Our innovative tokenomics and our great product deserve to come to the attention of all the DeFi traders who should get rewarded for bringing their flows and liquidity to our protocol. I want to be at the vanguard of the battle to bring ParaSwap to the attention of the crypto masses, and to do that I would focus on 3 things:

  1. Content Marketing - I haven’t seen a truly viral thread about PSP 2.0 since the first epoch on Twitter, or a great interview with a major crypto content producer. We should actively focus on raising our profile if we believe (like I do) that we have a great product and superior tokenomics that benefits the average user.

  2. Product Feedback - I’d like to focus on some low-hanging fruit here that will make it easier for the average non-technical user to access ParaSwap effectively, and surface key elements of the PSP 2.0 value proposition like the gas refund and referral bonus. See this suggestion on improving our referral links system as an example.

  3. Protocol Metrics - I think ParaSwap’s operations and performance needs to be better understood by everyone in the DAO. The visibility of the Metabase dashboards is a great first step - more can be done to surface useful information. For example, showing the implied yield for sePSP1 vs. sePSP2 as the epochs progress.

These are just a few thoughts I have to make ParaSwap a vibrant, fundamental building block of the decentralized finance landscape for every onchain user who trades, and for DAO members who want to more actively contribute to its success by referring other users.

ParaSwap Code of Conduct

Nothing to add here, I think this is a great expression of principles. I will flag that I continue to have a day job, albeit one which has a lot of flexibility in terms of time. I currently allocate a significant portion of my time, including certain weekends, to crypto. I manage a small amount of friends & family money which I invest in crypto alongside my own (including PSP). As part of my investing, I was already thinking of doing my own analysis and posting more about ParaSwap publicly, which is in line with my thoughts on how to contribute as a ParaTrooper above.

6 Likes
2

Well, very interesting and motivating presentation. Well done, for your express proposition. It was necessary.

1 Like
3

Stepping up and making valuable contributions even as a new user/member or a non-technical person are some of the things that excites me about DAO… and you’ve perfectly demonstrated that… well-done and good luck on this endearvour.

1 Like
4

Very thoughtful post, Xrivijayan. Twitter threads that accurately and succinctly breakdown complex topics are a valuable skill to have and the posts you shared are great examples. Well done.
It’s great to see you coming with clear areas of focus to have an immediate impact, I have a couple specific questions for you:

Can you share what steps you would take to make this a reality? Do you have experience in this area?

  1. Product Feedback - I’d like to focus on some low-hanging fruit here that will make it easier for the average non-technical user to access ParaSwap effectively, and surface key elements of the PSP 2.0 value proposition like the gas refund and referral bonus. See this suggestion on improving our referral links system as an example.

What medium/location do you see as the best place to communicate PSP 2.0’s value? Have you seen a strategy which had a strong impact that is worth exploring?

  1. Protocol Metrics - I think ParaSwap’s operations and performance needs to be better understood by everyone in the DAO. The visibility of the Metabase dashboards is a great first step - more can be done to surface useful information. For example, showing the implied yield for sePSP1 vs. sePSP2 as the epochs progress.

Do you have any experience in creating/modifying these dashboards directly or do your skills lie in offering feedback on what additional information would be useful to users and ways to improve visibility?

5

Thanks Burns, appreciate the feedback. On the specific questions:

1. Content Marketing

I would individually start by doing one Twitter thread on how PSP 2.0 has been translated (and why people should care), to test how much engagement and interest there is with ParaSwap now being part of the #RealYield movement. I would then perhaps do a follow-up tracking our 1Q 2023 financial performance in terms of protocol fees and earnings distributed to stakers, benchmarked against traditional financial metrics. Happy to share more on these points.

Separately, I would engage with the core team and ask about our existing relationships in the crypto content world and whether we can leverage our seed investors (e.g. Coingecko has a Youtube channel with 92.5k subscribers). We should try to organize a speaking tour for 1-2 of the core contributors (similar to Coinbase’s blitz on launching their Layer 2 Base) to discuss how PSP 2.0 has gone into effect and why retail traders should be interested in this especially if they trade heavily. ParaSwap as far as I can tell are DeFi OGs and our DAO is a great example of decentralization, so would be perfect for something like Bankless.

All of these podcasts and content producers are constantly looking for something interesting that their audience can engage with; I definitely think PSP 2.0 is interesting for people who are active in DeFi!

2. Product Feedback

Based on what my own community of crypto-interested folks engage with, I would say the top formats are (a) Twitter, (b) YouTube, and (c) podcasts. Other forums like Reddit and Facebook groups (depending on the geographic market, these are still huge in parts of Southeast Asia) should be considered. I will note that I consume English-language crypto content only, so this is the world I am familiar with.

One thing I experienced since I was early in GMX’s bull run last year is how effective having short, customizable referral links were to incentivize crypto influencers on Twitter to talk about GMX, and surfacing the earnings from that to gain attention. I know this sounds a little like multi-level marketing, but it is an efficient way to acquire eyeballs and users (see this example from one of the main GMX influencers/contributors). This was the main thrust of my point here - product design should also take into account how to make ParaSwap more effective in acquiring new traders and more volume.

3. Protocol Metrics

I am only teaching myself SQL now and so I don’t have the confidence to set one up myself. What I’ve done on Dune has been to set up dashboards repurposing queries from others and adapting them in a way that I consider more intuitive for someone with a business lens trying to understand the value of the business (see examples for Liquity and Overtime).

I’m not familiar with Metabase though, so what I meant here was working with the core contributors who are setting these up to suggest improvements or separate dashboards that would be interesting for different audiences e.g. something that an investor would find useful purely to hold PSP vs. a user who trades regularly and wants to get the APR on their PSP staking earnings, etc.

Happy to answer further questions here or flesh out ideas more!

2 Likes
6

A few of these ideas are easily and cost-effectively implemented so could be a good place to start.

Have you had any positions or experience in financial analysis, marketing, community engagement or what transferrable skills have you acquired on your path in another field to support your nomination? Don’t think formal education is the main requirement here, a DYOR mentality combined with passion/curiosity is a powerful strategy.

7

I spent several years in a global management consulting firm doing financial analysis, management dashboards, etc. I’ve created and run complex financial models for market sizing, financial projections, and the like, both in that job and then at the startup I joined.

Have frankly less experience in community engagement, have mostly experimented on threads in Crypto Twitter. Frankly not my strength - I prefer the analytical side - but I believe that analysis without communication is of no use to anyone but myself, so I try and publish my personal work on CT when I feel the urge (had much more time during the pandemic lockdowns to do so). If this is part of my contribution though as a Paratrooper, I’ll devote the appropriate time and attention to it in order to meet agreed-upon milestones.

3 Likes