Merge !248

Monero Observer news website

See merge request monero-project/ccs-proposals!248

escapethe3ra-monero-observer-website.md

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+---
+layout: fr
+title: Monero Observer news website
+author: escapethe3RA
+date: August 23, 2021
+amount: 15.99
+milestones:
+  - name: September
+    funds: 5.33
+    done:
+    status: unfinished
+  - name: October
+    funds: 5.33
+    done:
+    status: unfinished
+  - name: November
+    funds: 5.33
+    done:
+    status: unfinished
+payouts:
+  - date:
+    amount:
+  - date:
+    amount:
+---
+
+# WHAT
+
+I will maintain **Monero Observer**[^1] for the next 3 months (autumn 2021): September, October and November.
+
+Essentially:
+
+- DAILY: search, curate, structure and post new content (CHANGELOG available: https://www.monero.observer/changelog/)
+- AS NEEDED: housekeeping (revise stories to make sure links and content is still relevant)
+- AS NEEDED: outreach (engage with the community mainly via email to encourage participation and get new stories/tips faster)
+- AS NEEDED: make sure the website is live and working as expected (no 404's, domain is paid, etc)
+- WEEKLY: publish Monero XMR TA Report, a weekly XMR technical analysis report (reference: https://www.monero.observer/tag/analysis/)
+- MONTHLY: publish Monero Observer Blitz, a monthly report that includes everything that happened the previous month (reference: https://www.monero.observer/tag/blitz/)
+- (BONUS, OPTIONAL) AS NEEDED: publish Monero & privacy/opsec-related guides (reference: https://www.monero.observer/tag/guides/)
+
+# WHO
+
+Myself: escapethe3RA, a Monero enthusiast, a private citizen.
+
+# WHY
+
+I strongly believe that the Monero community would benefit from the existence of the Monero Observer, both right now and in the long run.
+
+While there are a few other places where people can get news and stories from around the Monero community, I am proposing a slightly different and more efficient approach.
+
+Here are some of my thoughts:
+
+- we need a dedicated Monero-only news website that is being run by someone in our community, privately
+- the general writing style should resemble a journalistic approach, based on facts and as little opinion as possible
+- clean, minimalist interface, no bloat, few images
+- references/sources should never be absent from each post; furthermore the author should seek to prioritize privacy-respecting platforms and thus share the links to those if possible (ie. invidio.us instead of youtube.com, nitter.net instead of twitter.com)
+- readers must be allowed unrestricted access to the stories, privately via tor (zero Javascript, no cookies, no tracking or any kind of analytics service, no pop-ups, no newsletters, no CDN, no captchas, no ads whatsoever)
+- smaller stories should also be covered whenever possible, in order to support and encourage community participation in a decentralized way, the Monero way (individual bloggers, small time alt platform video and guide makers, tiny merchants)
+- search engine juice should be allowed to flow to every site in the community and disabled (rel=nofollow) for big tech sites (in the references/src links)
+- advertising should be approached very conservatively and human-to-human contact should be prioritized whenever possible (think: email still works, word of mouth will never die, if you build something they will come so have a strong foundation ready;)
+- stay away from mainstream centralized social media if possible; RSS should be encouraged, it's still the best (IMHO); potentially add decentralized social accounts (ie. federation) in the future 
+
+There's more, but I believe these notes should suffice for now.
+
+I have already taken the liberty to dedicate my past couple of weeks to this project: find a voice and well defined structure for the content, design the website, research and write the posts, add reference links and deploy.
+
+You can visit the website and get a glimpse of my work so far. Before I continue with the project in this direction I need the community's feedback and approval. If you think this would be useful, comment and support my proposal. Thoughts, constructive criticism and discussions are encouraged.
+
+If you wish to contact me you can do so by sending me an email (address on the website's about page, PGP key available for sensitive content).
+
+# MILESTONES
+
+The work hours that I have already put in this month will **not** be counted towards this proposal. First of all I wanted to know approximately how many hours I'd need to put in beforehand and secondly I wanted to show up with a PoC.
+
+I am proposing to maintain Monero Observer for the next three months of autumn: September, October and November at a rate of $15/hour, 80 hours a month. The total is 15.99 XMR at the rate 1 XMR == $225 (~10% buffer from current Kraken price).
+
+Thus, there will be three milestones, 5.33 XMR each, paid on the last day of each month: 30 September, 31 October, 30 November.
+
+If all goes well and the community finds the project useful we can discuss 2022 plans.
+
+Thanks for reading!
+
+Ta-ta,
+**escapethe3RA**
+
+[^1]: https://monero.observer