How Blockchain-Based Bounties Can Reinvent Our Social Impact Systems and Incentivize Action

As the social impact space starts to decentralize, Bounties will help charities and individuals collaborate at a new pace and scale.

Bounties have been around for a long time, and have proven their merit as a tool to motivate and incentivize people. A bounty is essentially a simple social contract that, on top of a blockchain, could help us dramatically improve our current social impact systems, which often suffer from friction, slowdown, and lack of transparency while coordinating multiple parties. Reengineering social and environmental impact projects on a bounties foundation can become the simple, yet very effective, key to galvanizing global awareness and involvement.

Decentralized Impact

Some of the key issues with social impact projects so far have been a lack of widespread adoption, unfair/diverted distribution of funds, high costs, and lack of long-term commitment. What if we decentralized all the mechanics of running a social impact project?

People across the world could be rewarded for various levels of involvement. A charity could create a bounty, crowdsource contributions, and each contributor would know exactly where their funds are going, instead of blindly trusting that the charity won’t use most of it for marketing purposes, administrative costs, or paying its execs.

A person or organization issuing a bounty can also decide the value of the reward to be paid out for a certain verifiable deliverable — regardless of geographical location or local currency. Think crowdfunding global beach cleanups, direct community involvement, incentivized volunteering in crisis situations, and more.

Long-term projects could easily be tracked: bounties can be set up for one day, three weeks, five months, and anything in between. The more time you have and the more committed you are, the higher the reward. People all over the world can put their time and skills in the service of worthy causes without affecting their livelihood. They can also directly fund the improvement of their community and local environment. First-hand involvement means each person taking part has full control of the resources they put in. Blind trust is no longer a concept. Proof of action is.