- Grant Program Launch: February 2021
- Contribution Areas: Developer and User Tools, Analytics, Token Infrastructure, Educational Content
Powered by the Helium Blockchain, The People’s Network is a global, peer-to-peer wireless network that provides a secure and cost-effective way for devices to interact with the internet. To date, the network provides long-range wireless coverage for LoRaWAN-enabled low-power IoT devices. In the future, the Helium Blockchain and The People’s Network could similarly run on other wireless networks.
The network is made up of Miners around the world who operate hotspots that produce and are compensated in $HNT, the native cryptocurrency of the Helium blockchain. This open source and public blockchain incentivizes the creation and maintenance of physical, decentralized wireless networks. Anyone with access to an ISP connection can purchase a community approved hotspot to become a miner. Read more about Helium hotspots and mining.
The Helium Ecosystem has already seen its fair share of use cases as hundreds of companies and thousands of developers are already building on The People’s Network. The scalability and affordability, plus compatibility with thousands of existing devices, have made it a very attractive option for wireless connectivity for air sensors, water tracking, and other asset tracking. Read more about using The People's Network.
The Decentralized Wireless Alliance (DeWi) oversees the grant program, which exists to encourage development of infrastructure, tools, applications, and educational content to benefit the Helium ecosystem and The People's Network. We provide individuals and project teams with access to funding, technical support, and community resources.
DeWi invites active contributors of the Helium community along with IoT, crypto, and wireless enthusiasts to reach out. Grant proposals are reviewed and approved by the DeWi team with input from other leaders and stewards of the Helium ecosystem.
Teams and individuals are evaluated on the following criteria:
- Impact
- Urgency
- Novelty
- Design
DeWi is prioritizing projects that drive network growth and adoption. Applicants should strongly consider and share how their project will benefit or encourage developers or network users. At this time grants will not be applied to the acquisition of hotspots or promotion of host networks.
A strong application will have the following:
- A clear deliverable, product, or outcome, as a result of the grant
- Thoughtful explanation and evidence that speaks to how the project supports network growth and/or adoption (akin to product-market fit)
- Connection to an audience that benefits or finds utility in the outcome
Below are some community inspired themes but we encourage applicants to think beyond this list. Submit via the general application or email [email protected] with questions.
| Project | Notes |
|---|---|
| HNT <> ETH trust minimized bridge | Convert HNT into an ERC20 token for use within the DeFi ecosystem |
| Ongoing improvements for DeWi ETL | More dashboards and data analysis tools. Examples: how much data flowing through the network, how frequently, how many hotspots have transmitted data, geographic distribution of data transmission, transaction activity in DC and HNT burnt. |
| Rosetta Implementation | Add support for Helium to Rosetta. This will speed up integrations with exchanges and wallets. Learn More. Coinbase Implementation docs. |
| HNT browser wallet | A user-friendly browser-based wallet. Priority for a Chrome browser extension. Also looking to add support to Ledger hardware wallet. |
| HNT mobile wallets | Add support for HNT on 3rd party mobile wallets, both iOS and Android |
| Manufacturer dashboard | Show units sold, online/deployed, HNT burnt |
| Documentation translation | Make docs.helium.com available in other languages (Mandarin, Spanish, Japanese, Korean) |
| Security and/privacy overview | Create educational content to help hosts understand how a hotspot will interact with their home network. Example |
| Anti-gaming research | In-depth analysis of hotspots and challenge behavior for anomoly detection; build trust scores; more sophisticated data crowdsourcing than current spreadsheet; documentation of current cheating techniques; alerts when suspicious networks pop up. |
| Support Mapping Improvements | Source additional mapping devices, create custom firmware and supporting documentation for easier deployment. |
Want to contribute immediately? The following projects are looking for owners.
| Project | Notes | Value |
|---|---|---|
| HIP 12 implementation | Add remote location assert. See HIP12 | $5,000 of HNT |
| HIP 24 implementation | Add hotspot revenue split. See HIP24 | $5,000 of HNT |
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