If there isn’t one already, there should be a DAO for storytellers.
You’d have different people telling stories over live recorded feeds in channels based on language, theme, and format:
- Languages: Pretty self explanatory. What language is the storyteller going to tell their story in?
- Theme: This would classify the stories from a high level, perhaps in categories like fiction/non-fiction, and into further subcategories (i.e. fantasy vs sci-fi). Furthermore, there could be non-narrative categories, where people share stories from their own personal experiences (perhaps this category could be therapy-related? Motivational?).
- Format: Is the storyteller reciting their story? Are they freestyling/making things up as they go along? Or are they reading aloud from a book or written source?
Tokenomics
Tokens would be available for purchase at some low price (maybe $1?), and community members would stake one token to be allowed to listen in on that story. When the storyteller is done (or whenever the listener decides to leave), the listener is given two options before leaving:
- Provide feedback and complete some standardized scoring survey.
- Contribute the token as a payment for the story, no need to fill out the scoring survey.
After the listener selects one of the two options, the listener has an extra option of paying additional tokens to the storyteller.
The storyteller is selected within some timeframe beforehand, by the community, by vote. The storyteller provides a quick headline of what kind of story they want to tell, and is pitted against other storytellers, to be selected for specific timeslots, say, 48 hours in advance (if there is no storyteller selected for a certain slot, then it either remains empty or is allocated to the first storyteller who claims that slot). Timeslots will span one and a half hour (or some other time frame, depending on what data will show as ideal). In order to be considered as a storyteller, the storyteller will need to stake some amount of tokens (perhaps 100 tokens). The storyteller voted to fill that slot will tell their story, and afterwards, will receive some aggregated report on the scoring surveys, as well as any tokens that were paid to that story teller (perhaps minus some small portion, no more than 25% in total, held back for the voting community members, and for administrative expenses — will get to this in a bit).
Community members will stake some amount of tokens (perhaps 10 tokens) to vote. Those staked tokens will stay staked until the storyteller finishes; after which, the portion of tip payments held back for voting community members is distributed prorata to those community members who voted (even if those votes were not for the storyteller who won the slot).
Administrative Expenses and Revenues
The “administrative costs” would come from maintaining the infrastructure (perhaps using Discord or Twitter, or building a proprietary platform), but also in the process of taking top rated stories and posting them on Youtube and Spotify (and any other streaming site). Because these stories are recorded, they should be available for the community to relisten to.
Alternatively, these recordings can be held in an accessible database/repository where community members are able to access at any time. Perhaps access would be at the same 1 token rate. This approach also provides a solution that does not rely on third parties (which may still be stuck in a Web2 world) to rely on monetization, but would also be more costly, as there would be a need for some sort of AWS-like server subscription.
Whether this DAO decides to go for third party platforms or proprietary database, the revenues generated would go towards the DAO’s treasury, and at the end of every month, would be distributed to token holders who stake the token (perhaps on the Storyteller DAO platform itself, or on a third party staking platform).
Potential Pivots and Expansions
The obvious expansion direction is to serials — regardless of how long each story time frame will be, there will definitely be stories that cannot be told within the confines of one story time frame. Serial stories would also potentially engage a captive audience that would return to listen to the next episode.
The other expansion direction is into music — you can essentially take the whole Storyteller DAO concept and make it the Singer/Songwriter DAO, though I personally would find a Storyteller DAO more interesting; however, perhaps a channel within Storyteller DAO could be devoted to musical stories (after all, what are songs, if not stories set to music?).
This sort of DAO could be helpful for everyone from parents with kids in need of bedtime stories, to commuters in need of an alternative to podcasts, to anonymous group therapy sessions. Naturally, there would be a need for some guidelines on content and rules around moderation of the community, but I think a DAO like this would do well.
