Humberto Besso

$349.66 crowdfunded from 77 people

$476.93 received from matching pools

75%
average score over 1 application evaluations
Humberto focuses on aiding communities through web3 tools, with significant work in activism, education, and urban development, leading to his involvement in Gitcoin and creation of "Urbánika". His future work includes an educational roadtrip and workshops on Gitcoin's potential for local governance, aiming to integrate web3 into participatory budgeting and community management.

This is a submission of MIXED work: You'll first find information about Work Done (retroactive), and then about the Planned Work (Proposed).

Let's start with who's this Gitcoin Citizen

Humberto's story has intrinsic value to be considered while choosing who to fund. In short:

As a university student, in 2009 he funded "HUV ANI" the first and still ongoing student group of International Business' from the Universidad Veracruzana. The goal was to provide students with the IRL connections and experiences that the academic field of the university was missing.

His political, professional, social, and academic activism led him to be chosen by the Botin Foundation as one of the 40 most outstanding young latinamericans in 2011.

In 2015, he ran participatory budgeting exercises within a neighborhood cataloged as one of the most dangerous one within Xalapa, Veracruz, Mx. From it, 60+ green common areas were recovered and maintained, a bus stop was build, and a cultural house was installed. Criminal rates lowered and wellbeing increased.

That experience was the seed for what now is called "Urbánika".

In 2018, the second iteration was called "FARO Chetumal". Its goal was to cooperativize public services. A coop was constituted and two projects were co-created with 23 city changemakers coming from the local Gov, Universities, Activist, Neighbors, and Business owners.

Finally, in 2021, Humberto graduated with a double master degree in eGovernance and Public Sector Innovation from KU Leuven and Tallin's TalTech, which led him to the Crypto Commons Hub, where he deepened his understandings about postCapitalism, with which he combined with his past experiences to create Urbánika.

Why all the above is important for you to make your vote? Simple. You gotta have some context to understand if the Gitcoin Citizens candidates are up to the match with the proposals they make.

WORK DONE

-Two years ago, he created a 10-min long video on how to create a Trust Bonus (primitive of the Gitcoin Passport) with Proof of Humanity. The video talks about using the $UBI token to fund projects, it promotes the funding of other projects, and donating to the Gitcoin Grants Official Matching Pool Fund. Impact: 509 views and positive commentaries.

-One year ago, he created a 15 min-long video to teach how to get started within Gitcoin. The video took people from creating an eMail, opening a Github account, opening a wallet, funding it, swapping tokens, valdiating stamps within the Trust Bonus, searching for projects, donating to projects, and sharing with others so more people join the movement. Impact: 422 views, positive commentaries, and funding for several projects.

-Humberto talked about Public Goods vs Commons at Ethereum Guatemala. Impact: 100 views and more than 60 people physically present at the moment of the talk.

-He gave two onboarding session for the coordination group of several Sinaloan Indigineous communities that are fighting for protecting their commons from privatization. Note: first session was recorded without audio but you can watch that QF and Gitcoin are explained. Second session was given on Sept 25th and the video is not yet available. Impact: Setting up the field to onboard hundreds of native people that need uncensorable means of treasury and fundraising management.

-He has stewarded the Gitcoin Radio 24/7 since its inception within the SolarPunk Guild (~120 hours), and he also co-hosted 13 hours of sessions with Claudio CiFuentes, from La Dream Machine. At these sessions, they interviewed projects working on the field of social and environmental impact, and promoted donations toward participating projects. Impact: Hundreds of people tuned in, continuous positioning of the Gitcoin movement.

-He promoted Gitcoin donations and argued in favor of QF at MetaFest 2023. Impact: Awareness.

-He promoted Gitcoin and QF at a workshop previous to Nauta Talk 6 at 0:45 Erik mentions it. Impact: Raised awareness and solved questions to around 10 folks from a non-web3 background interested in how crypto fundraising and identity management work.

-Humberto has been part of other initiatives such as:

  1. Aprendamos ReFi (Let's learn ReFi). This is a WhatsApp group where Humberto and Cotabe shared their experiences on the path of web3 fundraising. Impact: 46 people participating at these sessions. Dozens of hours invested in leveling up the web3 fundraising game of traditional on-field activists. Credit to Cotabe for starting this group and for inviting these activists.

  2. SolarPunk Guild. Impact: Hundreds of hours invested in supporting other founders improve their fundraising and impact making game through Telegram and Discord chats, as well as through four Gitcoin Spaces marathons: First one was at Alpha round, it lasted 12 hours. At this one, 296 people tuned in and 2,177 DAI were raised for different projects. Second one was previous the Beta round, it lasted 3 hours and it was about how to prepare for it. Third one was at the Beta round, the first edition of Gitcoin Radio 24/7. Fourth one was at the GG18 round, the second edition of Gitcoin Radio 24/7.

-He also participated at Wingu's Festival of Innovation in Financial Sustainability. He pitched QF in under 3 mins to an audience of non-profits. Later that day, he presented Gitcoin and Giveth to an association gathering 15,000 non-profits from all LATAM. Impact: Face-to-face awareness at a non-web3 audience.

  1. Regen Latam calls. Where LATAM Gitcoin projects where invited to provide peer-feedback to one another so to constantly improve, also, other Gitcoin-related discussions were handled such as participating more in the gov forum, requesting for Spanish and Portuguese translations, and so on. Impact: 5-10 founders participating actively every Friday for about 6 sessions.

  2. Urbánika at "Ciudad Gitcoin" Gitcoin City. Impact: All credit goes to Kairos Research, Humberto was just a participant sharing his experience about fundraising through several rounds. They got from that tweet 1,690 views and achieved that 63 people tuned in to the Ciudad Gitcoin Space.

Finally, Humberto has participated in the gov forum with the following Metrics: 37 days visited, 3 hrs read time, 31 topics reviewed, 287 posts read, 33 ♥ given, 38 ♥ received, 1 topic created, 8 posts created. It ain't much, but it's honest work.

WORK TO BE DONE

This section talks about the Educational and Promotional efforts that Humberto will realize through Urbánika. These efforts are completely aligned with Gitcoin's most important things as well as with the Essential Intents of Gitcoin, most specifically within the Grants Program Success branch.

Educational content:

The Smart, Regenerative, and Self-Management Communities course on Urbánika's website includes a module on Gitcoin and Gitcoin Passport.

The module's purpose is to help the apprentices onboard both as a Grantee and as a Donor.

As context, the ongoing work of Urbánika -as widely described here Grant 1, Grant2, Mega Thread is about facilitating the transformation of neighborhoods into Smart, Regenerative, & Self-Managed communities using DAO-related tech stack

Around February, Humberto will start a 20-country-wide roadtrip evangelizing on the use of Web3 in local governance. Why is that aligned with Gitcoin's most important things and its essential intents?

Well, within this roadtrip Humberto will offer workshops and presentations about web3 tools to Universities, Chambers of Commerce, and Civil Society Organizations related to social and environment impact where Gitcoin and Giveth are the main topics. These workshops and presentations are tailored to the type of public accordingly:

Universities: Discover through Gitcoin impact orgs where you can contribute.

Chambers of Commerce: Discover and support open-source and open-knowledge initiatives that benefit your professional/commercial actitivity.

Civil Society Organizations: Use QF to reach your funding goals while also funding and connecting with other complementary initiatives.

Promotional:

Humberto contributes to the key goals for Gitcoin as addressed in the "Most important thing" post, specifically, within the Product marketing part of the Allo protocol and the Program.

Additionally, it is part of Urbánika's vision to use the Allo protocol to fund the postCapitalist transition ahead. Let's imagine it together:

The Allo protocol enables the City as a Commons grant program to emerge. This program has different categories or rounds within, such as:

Climate, Open source, Education.

Climate. Initiatives regarding turning human activities from polluting by design to regenerating by design. Ex: building and installing biodigestors that turn organic waste into gas and fertilzer, both sold to keep funding other initiatives.

Open Source. Initiatives that develop the operating system and dapps for smart, regenerative, and self-managed neighborhoods and cities. Ex: putting together into a single-page dashboard, similar to the MetaOS, the existing dapps that would improve the citizen coordination UX.

Education. Initiatives that help propagate the cultural, political, and economical shifts for a postCapitalist and regenerative way of urban living. Ex: paying for street art as memes for teaching about the commons, the magic of QF, and other topics that need awareness to be raised (privatizing the formation of clouds and rain water, DNA enclosures, etc)

All cool, but will this bring extra pressure to the core rounds with the same amount of money? The idea is that the neighborhoods help get sponsors and donors. Opening the City as a Commons series of featured rounds will open new possibilities for changemakers from all around the world to design, develop, and deliver solutions for accelerating the transition ahead.

Humberto thinks that the best way to promote the Allo protocol is by using it and engaging others in its usage.

That's why reaching Universities, Social activism groups, Municipalities, and Chambers of Commerce with hands-on workshops will provide awareness of the great value that the Allo protocol has when employed as a v2 of Participatory Budgeting.

Imagine the following:

Universities: Using the Allo protocol to fund R&D+i engaging their students, staff, and patreons into voting/funding them.

Chambers of commerce: Using the Allo protocol to fund tools, infrastructure, and events that benefit their members ahead of those not affiliated.

Municipalities: Participatory budgetting meets Quadratic Voting.

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Well, that's it. Please consider supporting other Global South activists. In that part of the world is where web3 tech makes the most impact.

Thanks to all the people that thought and materialized this awesome program to reward retroactive and future work related to Gitcoin.

Thanks to all the donors that take the time to read and support people doing good. May the donation you make return to you with large gains in wellbeing for you, your dear ones, and the environment where you live.

Humberto Besso History

  • accepted into Gitcoin Citizens Round #2 1 year ago. 77 people contributed $350 to the project, and $477 of match funding was provided.

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