Proposal: Research to inform a builder support strategy

Thank you, Daniel, for drafting this proposal. While DAO-funded user research initiatives are relatively uncommon, we believe the ethos of this proposal aligns well with the values and priorities expressed by the Foundation during the co-creation cycle.

We have a few comments and questions regarding the proposed research:

  1. Clarification of Goals:

Could you clarify the overarching goal of the user research? Is it to pilot a DAO-funded grant program, create a builder support program, or address a different objective?

  1. Deliverables:

The proposed deliverables are described at a high level. Could you share examples of prior user research conducted by RnDAO? This will help the DAO set its expectations accordingly.

  1. Budget Concerns:

The hourly rate budgeted appears high. According to Glassdoor, the highest annual compensation for a User Researcher in the United States is $169,000, which equates to $81/hour. However, your proposal budgets $150/hour. Could you provide justification for this rate?

The budget also includes a 20% overhead for routine business expenses like accounting, insurance, and legal. Since these costs are unrelated to the proposal, we recommend removing them.

  1. Focus Ecosystems:

Should this proposal move forward, we recommend focusing on ecosystems most relevant to Scroll and the goals of the program . Specifically:

Ethereum Mainnet: As a baseline for comparison.

Comparable EVM L2 Ecosystems: ZKsync, Arbitrum, or a leading Superchain ecosystem, as measured by TVL (e.g, Optimism, Base). All of these chains have established developer grant programs and builder support mechanisms that Scroll can learn from.

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