This article will take a look at where the Bobu IP governance experiment began, what’s happened, and a look towards what could be next.

The goal is to review how the experiment has progressed, as well as inspire conversation about the future of Bobu’s IP governance experiment.

If you think you know everything there is to know about Bobu, skip to the “opinion” section of the article with header “Reflecting on the Past Year”.

The State of the Bobu

The Basics

Bobu (token #40) is one of 200 Azuki tokens minted in the genesis collection by the Azuki team. While there’s nothing particularly remarkable about the token itself in terms of rare or sought after attributes (outside of the fireflies special), what makes it unique is the experiment.

https://opensea.io/assets/ethereum/0xed5af388653567af2f388e6224dc7c4b3241c544/40

On March 6th, 2022, Bobu was fractionalized into 50,000 separate ERC-1155 tokens. Also on this date, 20,000 of these tokens were minted at a price of .01 ETH ($26.64) using fractional.art’s decentralized protocol. The remaining 30,000 were held by the Azuki core team, but we’ll dig into that later.

The purpose of this mint? To kick off the first ever experiment in fractionalized IP governance of a character, and not just any character, a character that was defined by the Azuki team as “core character” of the Azuki universe.

By holding a token, you get to participate in the Bobu IP governance experiment, what does that mean? A couple of things:

• You DON’T actually own a piece of Bobu, neither do you own any of his IP rights

• You DO own the right to participate in the decentralized governance of Bobu’s IP rights, or in the team’s words “…a way to participate in votes about the use of Bobu in merchandise and media.

Token Distribution

Treasury

Revenues - Estimated

• Mint - 20,000 units @ .01 ETH on March 6th | 200 ETH

• Royalties - 4,475 ETH Opensea Volume @ 5% royalties | 223 ETH

Costs - Estimated

• Bucket Hat | 7 ETH

• Space Mission | 8 ETH - Donation, 2 ETH - Marketing

• ??? - Core team started with 30,000 tokens. 393 have “left” the team wallet, 19.65 ETH at “relatively consistent” aftermarket price of .05 eth / token. What has this been spent on? Payment for Bobu art, and/or general marketing? We do know for a fact they have done a number of Bobu token giveaways on twitter.

Proposals

It has been nearly 11 months since the beginning of this experiment, and in that time there have been just 4 proposals brought to vote. Three from the team, and one from the community. You can see all proposals here or summaries below.

Proposal #1: Bobu Bucket Hat vs. Plushie Merchandise -- Result: Bucket Hat Win

Result: Bucket Hat Win | Status: Incomplete | Proposal Source: Team

Proposal #2: Bobu to Space, Donating ETH to Student Org -- Result: 8 ETH Donation

Result: 8 ETH Donation | Status: Complete | Proposal Source: Team

Proposal #3: Bobu Twitter Banner Competition -- Result: Winner Picked

Result: Winner Chosen | Status: Complete | Proposal Source: Team

Proposal #4: Create Collectible Digital Bobu Cards -- Result: Pass

Result: Vote passed. Cards created. | Status: Complete | Proposal Source: 0xNader

Holder Participation

Note-able Events

Collaboration with World Wide Web3

Almost immediately after mint a quest event was hosted on Worldwide Web3 for a chance at some NFT prizes. To this day you can play on their platform with a Bean avatar (if you own an Azuki), and a Bobu avatar if you hold a Bobu.

https://twitter.com/azukiofficial/status/1501749080329834496?s=46&t=qYygvMaNNF9dVEf-9GYp5w

Bobu Space Animation

The most note-able development from Bobu’s journey to space has been the fun animation linked below that suggests he was imprisoned on what looks like the ISS.

It’s also the biggest media/story development for Bobu since the WorldWide Web3 quest.

https://twitter.com/bobubeanfarmer/status/1570107351167795206?s=46&t=qYygvMaNNF9dVEf-9GYp5w

The Shit Posting Epoch

Shortly after the space animation release, Bobu went full shit poster mode. Certainly an experiment in drawing eyes and attention to Bobu as an online persona. There was…. mixed feelings about this. It worked, but at what cost. It ended in a full fledged surrender to the formidable @wabdoteth and the @SappySealsNFT community. Since then he’s calmed down, but so has the attention.

https://twitter.com/BobuBeanFarmer/status/1574939738104270848

Reflecting on the Past Year

The story of the past year can be told by just one metric, the decrease in voting participation.

The Azuki community, and Bobu holders at large were excited about this new experiment in IP governance, and an early holder participation rate of nearly 20% proves that. Since then we’ve seen that participation rate decline by 95% to a dismal 0.6% holder participation rate. (Scroll up to revisit Holder Participation chart.)

To get an idea of what that means, let’s take a quick look at the participation rate of two other popular DAOs.

ApeCoin DAO - Proposals range around 0.8% holder participation. (850-1000 of 106,000 wallets)

Nouns DAO - Proposals range from 13-14.4% holder participation. (45-50 voters of 345 wallets)

I’ll let you do your own thinking on what you can takeaway from those comparisons. Don’t want to spend too much of your precious attention on that in this write up.

Why the decrease in voting participation?

It’s easy to connect the dots and assume that the main reason for the massive decrease in participation would be the near total absence of any proposals. For context, ApeCoin was launched shortly after Bobu, and in that time 60+ proposals have been brought to a vote, compared to just 4 Bobu proposals. In the same time period (plus about 8 months), Nouns have brought 200+ proposals to vote.

It’s not entirely fair to compare. Bobu isn’t a DAO, Bobu is an IP governance experiment, and IP famously takes much… much more time to evolve and grow. Still, I can’t help but feel disappointed in the fact that the last year didn’t feel much like an experiment.

Why weren’t there more proposals?

Of course, the team would be the best resource on this topic, but I believe we can account this to a couple of things:

• Azuki & Beanz were, and still are the focus.

Chiru Labs is an early stage start up with a small team of talented individuals. They continue to execute at the highest level with unrivaled creative energy. They have given the community and the web3 space at large a masterclass on storytelling in the age of web3.

But to accomplish so much in such little time, (with so few people) means you have to make sacrifices. Bobu was certainly one of them. Little has progressed in terms of the vision of the experiment, or clarification of the role the community will play in the years to come.

• Azuki = Bobu, or does it?

Creating a brand with its own unique identity is difficult. Being as that it’s so early, and Azuki is still forging its path, it would be multiplying that difficulty by further muddying Azuki’s brands image with Bobu’s. Given time, and a more secure branding position of Azuki as a whole, this could change.

Not only that, this space is all about perception. That puts a lot of execution risk on the team here if they were to push for developments too quickly on the Bobu side of things. Move too quickly there any you might hurt the ecosystem as a whole. This will be the case until there is a clear division between the two entities.

• The Bucket Hats

It’s been 10 months since holders voted for bucket hats to be produced. To my knowledge there have been three updates from the team on this project.

1. “Almost done!” | 5/29, Two months post-vote

2. “Coming Dec. 2022!” 10/29, Seven months post-vote

3. “Pushed back to Early Jan. 2023” 12/20, Nine months post-vote

This is disappointing in itself, likely an underestimation by the team on how long it would take to develop this product and do it right. (Or perhaps just not enough focus / manpower? See #1) To complicate this issue, see point #2. As mentioned prior, whatever the team does for Bobu will reflect on themselves and Azuki as a whole, so they have a lot of pressure to get this right.

I think it’s likely that the team would not want to make any grand new proposals without finishing what they already started.

• No Clear Route for Community Proposals

To this day, there has been no official communication on how holders can submit community proposals. In the team’s defense, @DemAzuki is extremely communicative, and in my experience happy to chat 1 on 1 with any Bobu interested in submitting something to the team. It’s likely this obscurity remains until the team has formed a solid precedent set by completed proposals of their own.

What do I wish we would have seen?

If you visit Bobu’s website you won’t find a roadmap, but you will find some bits and pieces of what their vision is for the experiment moving forward. Here’s an important quote:

“At the start of the experiment, most of the decision making will come from the Azuki team (except the voting!). We intend to gradually open up that governance to Bobu Token holders. Once a few Proposals have been executed, the Committee will open up Elections for 4 additional community-elected members to the Committee. The Governance of the Bobu Token experiment will evolve as we all become more familiar with the structure.”

It’s extremely important to note that the team has done exactly what they said they would do, and haven’t made any false promises. As stated at the beginning of the experiment, they would like to see a few proposals executed before extending governance to the community.

What’s challenging here is that the team wants total control of bringing proposals to the table, but (from the outside looking in) doesn’t have the time to kickstart the fire needed for the governance of the DAO like structure.

So what do I wish we would have seen? More experiments! More disagreements! More discussions! And you might argue; “Well this is web3!!! The community should be driving that initiative!!!” I would have to call bullshit on that. To quote @swombat on the topic of decentralized orgs (he and I are both fans):

https://twitter.com/swombat/status/1616043297373290496?s=20&t=ESY3HgBjKWlzs7s1usKfWg

Sushiswap would be nothing without the core founding team, Nouns wouldn’t have been brought into existence if it wasn’t for a handful of Nounders who birthed and nurtured the vision.

This experiment in IP Governance is like building the first ever steam powered ship. The concept is a marvelous thing, but without the inter-infrastructure it won’t take you anywhere. We need to come together to talk about the boiler room, the cargo holds, the observation decks, the navigation room, and all the people who staff them! That admittedly is both on us the community, and the team. But it is my honest belief that kickstarting this energy and discussion is magnitudes more difficult without core team initiatives and leadership. (And to be honest that’s so much work, too much to do it for free.)

Moving Forward: What Questions Should We Be Asking?

What is our mission?

Why does this IP governance experiment exist? What is our goal as a collective? What experience are we trying to offer for both holders and non-holders? Some example missions below:

• Spread Bobu’s IP as far as possible.

• Create an entertaining experience for holders to vote on the character, and story development of Bobu.

• Build a decentralized IP Governance Organization that develops business opportunities and makes all IP related decisions.

Which value are we trying to maximize?

Stability? Speed? Involvement? Experimental?

It’s for each to decide, but without a guiding value to help steer the ship, it’s far too easy to get lost. I’d argue that currently the value we’re maximizing is stability, when it should be experimental.

What role will holders play?

This is a crucial question. The better we understand what role holders will play, the better we can tailor the experience of being a Bobu holder to that end. Who are the ideal holders of Bobu?

Is there more of an emphasis on building? Or more on the consumption of various forms of entertainment and media, with elements of voting and participation mixed in?

Of course, consider that entertainment means different things to different people. Some want to make business decisions, some want to vote if Bobu takes another drink of his sake. Here are some example “proposals” that would indicate different directions for the experiment.

Prop #1: Should we pursue an IP licensing agreement with a breakfast food product? (Business Management)

Prop #2: Should we make a Bobu manga or a 10 minute Bobu Anime. (Creative Direction)

**Assume team develops a Bobu manga unrelated to Prop. #2 on their own.

Prop #3: What adventure does Bobu choose next? (Entertainment Participation)

A similar question: What levels of decisions do we want holders to make?

You don’t necessarily want to write the Bobu comic, you might just want to commission it, with bits of creative direction sprinkled in along the way. Ownership & agency while maintaining crucial elements of end user entertainment.

Back to the steam ship example. Perhaps what we actually want is akin to being the captain of the cruise ship, making decisions that alter the course of the journey on the macro level, but not worrying about all the little details that get us there. Holders help steer the ship while at the same time filling the role of a passenger. Its interior remains an exciting mystery, yet to be explored.

What will we spend money on, and why?

Year to date the Bobu treasury has spent less than 5% of its reserves on various initiatives, a little over 415 ETH (and 29,600 bobu tokens) remain. Of course, spending money isn’t really all that challenging, it’s spending money in places that matter that’s difficult. I’ll touch on some ideas later.

Do we need to wait for further Azuki IP dev for further Bobu IP dev?

Yes and no. In some ways it is difficult to build out the IP of a character in a world that we’re yet to fully be exposed to. At the same time, there are many things we can play and experiment with. Not only that, we should be having the discussions today about what the structure of this experiment will be tomorrow.

We’ve got an Idea(s)

The power of the collective mind should not be underestimated. This experiment could change how the world sees IP and entertainment. It’s going to take effort and ideas from all of us to realize that. To encourage collective conversation, I have included just a couple of my own below. (P.S. These ideas aren’t meant to be great, they’re meant to inspire discussion and creativity.)

Build Bobu’s Character

We need to get the holder base excited again! Could be quite fun to create an experience around building Bobu’s character out. Can be as little as holders writing up his back story (and then being voted on), or as detailed as building out an entire “Bobu personality test” that then spits out a “You’re this Kind of Bobu!”, which will then tabulate total results of who Bobu “is” based on majority input. A million ways to skin this cat, point is… could be fun!

Bobu’s Bean Shop

Create a merchandise shop that stocks items exclusively brought to vote by community proposals. The details and level of involvement are whatever you could want them to be. Community could vote on who is responsible for building the website among holders, and holders who make proposals could be in charge of the entirety of product development (with Quality Checks). Treasury would pay for COGs and man hours.

Bobu’s Art Gallery

It’s well known the Azuki community pumps out commissions like it’s a full time job. Why not create a fund that commissions art specifically for Bobu. Each month voters choose an artist to commission, could even create an open mint edition of the final product.

Governance

There’s A LOT to be sorted when it comes to how we want to govern this experiment moving forward. I could write an entire article about this but I’ll leave it at two things, let’s kick start proposals, and consider quadratic voting and/or some sort of quadratic financing within the treasury. Main reason being that holders will be encouraged to vote on the things that truly matter to them. If you don’t know what either of those mean here’s a decent youtube video.

As I said, these are just a couple ideas. Perhaps I’ll write an entire piece on Bobu ideas later on ;) If you want to contribute to the conversation, use the comment section below!!

In Summary

I truly believe this experiment in IP governance could do some ground breaking stuff, but we need to get to it!

Perhaps I’m all wrong here. Perhaps the energy I put into thinking about Bobu’s potential, and the energy I put into writing this piece is wasted. Perhaps we (and I) need to sit and wait for the team to continue to drive the bus. Perhaps I’m impatient. Perhaps all we’re meant to do is tell Bobu to take another drink of Sake. Perhaps.

But maybe… I’m not wrong. What do you think?

P.S. follow me

https://twitter.com/the__eeb

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