Certificate of impact

casebash (2020) Making impact purchases viable, Effective Altruism Forum, April 17.

Leong, Chris (2020) Making impact purchases viable, Effective Altruism Forum, April 17.

In late July, a group of authors, in collaboration with Vitalik Buterin,Buterin, proposed a model called retroactive public goods funding.^[3] The model consists of a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO), called "the Results Oracle", which funds projects with high social value. The funding is done retrospectively rather than prospectively, by assessing the value of the project after it has been completed. Once the Results Oracle evaluates a project, it can send the reward to the person or group responsible for the project, or, alternatively, it can use the funds to establish a price floor for a token associated with the project. As the authors note, rewarding via a project token effectively creates a prediction market for the amount of funding the Results Oracle will decide to allocate to the project, and allows the same project to be funded multiple times or by other sources besides the Results Oracle.

OnIn this model, altruistic work receives some or all of its funding after completion rather than beforehand. Once an individual or organization completes work with a positive social impact, they can apply for a certificate of impact. They can then sell this certificate to another organization or individual. Following the sale, the new certificate holder can claim credit for the impact of the project,project's impact, and the organization that carried out the project must acknowledge that they have sold its impact.

Recently, a number ofsome related funding models have been proposed.

In early May 2021, the organization Noora Health—which implements educational programs for mothers of newborns in South Asia—launched a non-fungible token (NFT) which may in some respects be regarded as a certificate of impact. The auction opened with a list price of $2.5 million, and computer scientist and tech entrepreneur Paul Graham—a long-time supporter of the organization—placed the winning bid of ETH 1337, at the time worth $5.23 million.^[1][2] A difference between this use of NFTs and certificates of impact as conceived by Christiano is that those bidding in the NFT auction are payingpay for the prospect of future impact, whereasimpact. In contrast, an impact purchase is a transaction involving the transfer of past impact.

In late July, a group of authorsauthors, in collaboration with Vitalik ButerinButerin, proposed a model called retroactive public goods funding.^[3] The model consists of a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO), called "the Results Oracle", thatwhich funds projects considered to havewith high social value. The funding is done retrospectively rather than prospectively, by assessing the value of the project after it has been completed. Once the Results Oracle evaluates a project, it can send the reward to the person or group responsible for the projectproject, or, alternatively, it can use the funds to establish a price floor for a token associated with the project. As the authors note, rewarding via a project token in effecteffectively creates a prediction market for the amount of funding the Results Oracle will decide to allocate to the project, and allows the same project to be funded multiple times,times or by other sources besides the Results Oracle.

In early May 2021, the organization Noora Health—which implements educational programs for mothers of newborns in South Asia—launched a non-fungible token (NFT) which may in some respects be regarded as a certificate of impact. The auction opened with a list price of $2.5 million, and computer scientist and tech entrepreneur Paul Graham—a long-time supporter of the organization—placed the winning bid of ETH 1337, at the time worth $5.23 million (Noora Health 2021; Graham 2021).million.^[1][2] A difference between this use of NFTs and certificates of impact as conceived by Christiano is that those bidding in the NFT auction are paying for the prospect of future impact, whereas an impact purchase is a transaction involving the transfer of past impact.

In late July, a group of authors in collaboration with Vitalik Buterin proposed a model called retroactive public goods funding (Wang et al. 2021).^[3] The model consists of a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO), called "the Results Oracle", that funds projects considered to have high social value. The funding is done retrospectively rather than prospectively, by assessing the value of the project after it has been completed. Once the Results Oracle evaluates a project, it can send the reward to the person or group responsible for the project or, alternatively, it can use the funds to establish a price floor for a token associated with the project. As the authors note, rewarding via a project token in effect creates a prediction market for the amount of funding the Results Oracle will decide to allocate to the project, and allows the same project to be funded multiple times, or by other sources besides the Results Oracle.

BibliographyFurther reading

Graham, Paul (2021) An NFT that saves lives, Paul Graham’s Website, May.

Noora Health (2021) Save thousands of lives, OpenSea.

Related entries

effective altruism funding | markets for altruism | prize

1. ^{^}

   Noora Health (2021) Save thousands of lives, OpenSea.

2. ^{^}

   Graham, Paul (2021) An NFT that saves lives, Paul Graham’s Website, May.

3. ^{^}

   Wang, Jinglan et al. (2021) Retroactive public goods funding, Ethereum Optimism Blog, July 20.

   Related entries

   effective altruism funding | markets for altruism | prize

In late July, a group of authors in collaboration with Vitalik Buterin proposed a model called retroactive public goods funding (Wang et al. 2021). The model consists of a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO), called "the Results Oracle", that funds projects considered to have high social value. The funding is done retrospectively rather than prospectively, by assessing the value of the project after it has been completed. Once the Results Oracle evaluates a project, it can send the reward to the person or group responsible for the project or, alternatively, it can use the funds to establish a price floor for a token associated with the project. As the authors note, rewarding via a project token in effect creates a prediction market for the amount of funding the Results Oracle will decide to allocate to the project, and allows the same project to be funded multiple times, or by other sources other thanbesides the Results Oracle.

In late July, a group of authors in collaboration with Vitalik Buterin proposed a model called retroactive public goods funding (Wang et al. 2021). The model consists of a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO), called "the Results Oracle", that funds projects considered to have high social value. The funding is done retrospectively rather than prospectively, by assessing the value of the project after it has been completed. Once the Results Oracle selectsevaluates a project, it can send the reward to the person or group responsible for the project or, alternatively, it can use the funds to establish a price floor for a token associated with the project. As the authors note, rewarding via a project token in effect creates a prediction market for the amount of funding the Results Oracle will decide to allocate to the project, and allows the same project to be funded multiple times, or by sources other than the Results Oracle.

CertificatesRelated models

Recently, a number of impact and non-fungible tokensrelated funding models have been proposed.

In late July, a group of authors in collaboration with Vitalik Buterin proposed a model called retroactive public goods funding (Wang et al. 2021). The model consists of a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO), called "the Results Oracle", that funds projects considered to have high social value. The funding is done retrospectively rather than prospectively, by assessing the value of the project after it has been completed. Once the Results Oracle selects a project, it can send the reward to the person or group responsible for the project or, alternatively, it can use the funds to establish a price floor for a token associated with the project. As the authors note, rewarding via a project token in effect creates a prediction market for the amount of funding the Results Oracle will decide to allocate to the project, and allows the same project to be funded multiple times, or by sources other than the Results Oracle.

Wang, Jinglan et al. (2021) Retroactive public goods funding, Ethereum Optimism Blog, July 20.

Graham, Paul (2021) An NFT that saves lives, Paul Graham’s Website., May.

A Certificatescertificate of impact (also known as an impact certificatescertificate) areis a kind of altruistic instrument at the center of a funding model proposed by Paul Christiano. Certificates of impact attempt to harness the benefits of the price system in altruistic contexts, where prices are usually unavailable.