This year is significant for us, and we’re kicking it off with a bang by launching our first Take Off scholarship program of 2024, this time fully sponsored by Talent Protocol. We will return to a familiar place, where we were very happy last year: ETHDenver.

Take Off, our flagship scholarship initiative, continues to serve as the golden ticket for web3 builders worldwide, opening doors to their inaugural IRL hackathon experience.

The Take Off scholarship includes:

• ✈️ A flight refund of up to $750 (paid in USDT)

• 🏠 Shared accommodation for the duration of the program

• 🧑🏻‍🎓 Exclusive access to the Take Off alumni community

It’s more than attending an event; it’s about immersing yourself in an ecosystem, connecting with other brilliant minds, and accelerating professional growth. With 100+ individuals benefiting from our previous editions, we're more excited than ever for what's next.

Our next stop? The mile-high city of Denver. Participants will be part of the highly anticipated ETHDenver, where they can experience one of the biggest hackathons of the year, submit a project, and attend numerous talks by experts in the ecosystem.

Ready to be part of this transformative journey? Applications are officially open until January 16th. For a detailed step-by-step guide on the application process, head over to our “How to Apply Guide”:

Don’t delay — submit your application today. The earlier, the better.

We're once again empowering our community to vote for their favorite Take Off candidates.

1. Voting as a cost: a small financial cost can help prevent bots and fake votes, ensuring an engaged and motivated voter base.

2. Dynamic pricing: not all votes cost the same; voting on popular candidates, who are more likely to win, should cost more than voting on hidden gems.

3. Voting cost increases linearly: the first vote costs 1 $TAL, the second 2 $TAL, the third 3 $TAL, and so on.

We're on a mission to make the process more democratic and engaging, and to explore new utilities for the $TAL token.

Voting will open on January 9th and close on the 18th at 11:59. Check how to vote in our full guide: Take Off — How To Vote Guide

Voting isn't just a process; it's an experience. Voting shouldn't only be fair, but also fun and rewarding (both financially and emotionally).

The cost of a vote is very little, but it can mean the world to the person you’re helping. This should be your main motivation to vote...but there's more. If you've got a knack for spotting winners, there's a $TAL bonus waiting for you.

All $TAL spent on votes goes into a prize pool. After a 10% protocol fee deduction, this pool will be redistributed among those who voted for the winners (proportionally to their winning votes), ensuring everyone has a stake in the game.

The more the total votes, the bigger the prize pool. And the more winning votes you have, the bigger the share of it you’ll get. It’s a win-win outcome for all.

We learnt from past votings, so for this edition we came up with a few improvements:

• Track your stats: Now you have a stats page inside the voting page, where you can track all the $TAL you spend, amount of votes and also how much are you earning.

• Notifications in-app and mail: Not being aware of what is going on was a problem for some users. Now, you will get in-app and email notifications on the updates of your candidates. (you can turn them off in settings)

• Leaderboard change: See in real time how candidates fight for the top spots.

• Fair usage tax: To reduce the impact of $TAL whales, we implemented a fair usage tax system that increases gradually the more votes a user cast on each candidate.

  • How it works: TAX will be implemented based on the total amount of $TAL a user spent on an individual candidate. This means the TAX is for each individual and will not affect other votes.

  • Tax per Total amount of $TAL spent on each candidate.

    • 0 to 150 $TAL → 0% fee

    • 100 to 500 $TAL → 2,5% fee

    • 500 to 1k $TAL → 5%

    • 1k to 5k $TAL → 10% fee

    • 5k to 10k $TAL → 20% fee

    • > 10k $TAL → 25% fee

Join us and vote for Take Off Denver.

For all things related to Take Off and more, keep an eye on our Twitter for real-time updates. And before you dive in, make sure to glance through our Terms & Conditions.

Stay curious, stay connected, and let's take off together in Denver! 💜