Dear friends,
Following our analysis of Season 4, we have written some reflections:
How we started
@seedlatam was supported by members of its community in its early years. However, it also greatly benefited from its early entry into the DeFi ecosystem and receiving airdrops and rewards that were given to pioneers who interacted with protocols before the DeFi Summer. The price increase of multiple tokens held in our wallet allowed us to have runway and sustain a team of 5 people for three years (from 2020 to the present).
SEED Latam in RPGF2
In the rpgf2, we received 55k $OP. We see this as recognition of our long-standing work, which materialized in the vote of the Badgeholders. We are taking an active role in managing these funding. In fact, we recently restructured SEED Latam in response to this input of $OP tokens to maximize the efficiency of our budget and avoid any wasteful spending. You can see the new SEED Latam statute here.
Some observations about the Latin American crypto ecosystem
We believe that the Latin American ecosystem is going through a stage where hundreds of teams are emerging and putting their efforts into spreading crypto adoption. We live in a region where the challenges are significant because we not only need to teach Web3 knowledge in a “friendly” way but also basic concepts of financial education that were not covered in the elementary education of most Latin American countries.
We have noticed a significant increase in educational initiatives in general, and the same is true within the Optimistic collective. In such a large region where Spanish is the official language of 21 countries, coordination and complementarity seem to be the most intelligent approach. We mention Latin American countries because it is the region where we were born and where we work. However, we are not oblivious to countries like Spain, Andorra, Equatorial Guinea and other Spanish-speaking regions worldwide (for example, Miami). This gives us a broader reach in linguistic terms.
Creating educational material in Spanish is important, and we greatly value the work of #translators and #contributors within the Optimistic collective. However, producing original content in Spanish with a critical perspective is more challenging and requires more time and resources. And this is what we need—a critical perspective to adapt the benefits of Optimism to our region.
To provide some perspective, here are some data points:
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In the last Gitcoin round, there were 220 projects in the Education and Community category, of which 54 were from Latin America.
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In the current round of QF by CLR Fund, out of 45 projects, 19 are from Latam. One falls under the tooling category, one under content, and the rest are all Education and Community initiatives.
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In the RPGFs of Optimism, there were 13 initiatives from Latin America, with only 3 in the tooling and research category.
A new approach to incentivize
Educating retail and building communities is important, but it is also crucial to create incentives for research and development of tools and infrastructure. If we fail to do so, the Latin ecosystem will continue to follow trends rather than contribute new discussions and tools.
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To the governance of Optimism: Teams in our region operate under very different conditions than teams in other regions, especially in the Northern Hemisphere.
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To the Latin ecosystem: we can set the task of attracting web2 builders to Optimism on the horizon. We could explore categories such as research, tooling, and infrastructure too.
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To the Optimistic collective: we need to start considering the task of developing classification filters with a capture-resistant approach as one of our priorities.
In this regard, SEED Latam did not submit a proposal for the 
Mission Proposals. We believe that we are an established team. We have never monetized nor will we ever monetize our content or any other actions generated by us (courses, events, hackathons, etc.). Being an initiative that generates Public Goods does not entitle us to indiscriminately ask for funding in every financing round that comes up (both within the Optimism ecosystem and beyond).
Everything mentioned above is based not only on safeguarding the health of Optimism but also the health of the entire ecosystem. For example, the RPGF2 was an experiment that, with its successes and failures, serves as a model for other chains to review. The clearest case of this is this proposal in the Arbitrum forum, where the RPGF2 is mentioned as a parameter for thinking about a superior and definitive model for grant allocation in Arbitrum.
In that regard, we applaud and celebrate the work of Grants Council considering complex and specific rubrics at this time seems to be the wisest approach for evaluating initiatives. This translates into better allocation of resources and, consequently, a greater impact on communities.
To Latin and global teams: Good faith and an Optimistic Vision should be the guiding principles for every action we take. We have seen several submissions in this stage. In a bear market context, it is difficult to maintain contributors, especially in Latin America, and it is natural to seize funding opportunities as soon as they arise. However, we must be careful when applying and evaluating. The lack of quality or differentiation in initiatives diminishes the real impact, and this can discourage the arrival of better proposals or cause them to migrate to other ecosystems. We run the risk of the human oracle approving new proposals of lower quality than in the previous Season simply because “something needs to be approved.”
If we manage to work in a coordinated and complementary manner, we can grow as a region and help the inhabitants of Latin America. We are at a crucial point where Ethereum’s scalability options are emerging, and we can attract more people to Optimism.
Together, we can bring forward proposals that truly benefit the ecosystem with unique ideas, avoiding repetitive attempts to exploit the system.
Let’s not miss the opportunity to use Optimism as a protocol for human coordination.
P.D.: Aquà tienes un link en Español con la traducción de este post, o más bien, con la versión original en Español 
