Multi-Account System (MAS)

Funders (FUNs): These will work much like user accounts for other systems in that these are the accounts people will use to search content, manage their subscriptions, post comments, and participate in our Reputation (REP) system (see the REP feature). In addition to all of that, these accounts will also allow users to send and receive funds to/from any other FUN (and Open FAs, more on that later) and are eligible to receive funds in our Faire Money System (FMS, see the FMS feature). There are no transaction fees for sending funds from one FUN to another. Additionally, there are no charges* for any deposits to a FUN from any other source.** The only time FundFaire (FF) charges for a transaction is when users make withdrawals from our network.

A FUN must have a verified payment account associated with them in order to be considered a valid FA. Those that are still pending or don’t have any such accounts can still use the system, but will be restricted to a NORMal (NORMs) status. NORMs cannot participate in the majority of the FMS, count for less when determining REP, and cannot view any content that is marked with anything other than “All Ages” tag in our REP system.

FAires (FAs): FAs can send and receive funds the exact same way that FUNs can. They can also participate in FMS. The main difference between a FA and a FUN is that FAs cannot be linked to a payment method and FUNs cannot upload content or have a store front. Additionally, FAs can Close themselves off from receiving funds. FAs that are Open to receiving funds cannot withdraw those funds as they will have no way of specifying a location outside of the FF network. To withdraw the funds in their FAs, these users will need to create a FUN account, send the funds from their FA to their FUN and then withdraw from that FUN.

We know that may sound silly and pointless to separate these two account types in that manner, but that separation and distinction is vital to the integrity of the network. Without this separation it would be easy for an administrator to lock a FA account and block a user from receiving funding from the people who want to pay them for their content or merchandise (Like we have seen on so many other social media sites). With this separation, a FA account can have all of their funding/payments going to a FUN that is independent of their FA account. And while FAs can be disabled due to illegal activity, FUNs cannot***.

FAs will be able to do a whole host of things down the road. However, as FF is primarily a payment system, our initial offering might limit these accounts to having a page that merely links to their other content (meaning their other social media accounts). The amount and type of content we will be able to host at launch will be dependent on how much interest and investment we can get to develop this site.

Our vision for what FF will become, is a smorgasbord for any and every type of market you can imagine and even those you could never imagine being possible. For instance, people who currently earn a living off of creating content for sites like YouTube, Patreon, Vimeo, Facebook, Gab.ai, and/or Minds could instead store all their videos, music, art, photos, writing, and other digital content in front of and/or behind a paywall on FundFaire.

In addition, if they had any merchandise like T-shirts, mugs, or branded gear, they could have the storefront for that hosted on FF too! And we don’t mean a “Click the link in the description below” that takes you to a different site way. We mean while you are watching a video from a content creator you want to support, they could have their merch store to the side or under the video itself where you can purchase something while the video continues to play. If you make and sell furniture, we could host a page for that as well even if you aren’t using FF to take payments for your wares. Do you have a charity for which you are raising funds? There is no reason you can’t host that on FF either to take advantage of our (hopefully) large user base and low fees. For those looking to raise funds for a project, good, or service, FF will do that too!

Not only will FF be able to host all of these different types of markets, but it will also provide each of them a way to reach out to previous and current customers/subscribers/fans when you have new merchandise or content via our built-in notification system. On top of that if you want to add onto or transition your current market to something new you can do that at will via our FUN list (FUNL) system. That way you don’t have to direct your current network of users to a new place or different site. Users in your FUNL will get notified of that change just as easily as they would be notified of you posting a new message/video/like/etc to them.

Advertisers (ADs): These accounts are intended for advertisers only and require a valid EIN. Once verified these accounts can upload videos, images, banners, etc. and pay to have them display site wide or on specific types of content. Funds can only be sent from these accounts and never to them. They cannot participate in the FMS, but will have a greater impact on the REP system than most other account types. This type of account will likely not be a part of the initial launch.

Employees (EMPs): EMPs are limited accounts available to those who work for FundFaire directly. They cannot send or receive funds no participate in the FMS. These accounts can participate in activities that impact the REP system. They actually have the greatest impact concerning REP. The purpose of these accounts is to promote new or overlooked content, while managing and reviewing content that is restricted or banned for illegal activity.

We know that sounds ripe for abuse, but the impact these accounts have on the REP system will be public knowledge and broadcast over the entire distributed ledger. There will not and cannot be any shadow-banning or hidden algorithms controlling content. However, we did need a way to reward users who are behaving admirably if not very successfully and of tracking everything that is being done concerning content that has to be reported as illegal. Remember, these EMP accounts are bound to the REP system as well so, if the community recognizes an EMP abusing their authority, the community can lower the REP of that EMP and reduce that EMP’s impact on the REP system.

Lastly, users can have multiples of each type of account in addition to having multiple account types. The exception to that is EMPs, but we don’t expect anyone to complain about that being limited. The number of valid FUN accounts a user can have is limited by their valid payment options and ADs are limited by the number of EINs they own. A single person or group of people can have multiples of each type of account. We aren’t sure if there are any incentives for advertisers to have multiple accounts, but having multiple FUNs increases a single users chances of earning in the FMS.

*While deposits are not subject to any charges from FundFaire, they may be subject to transaction fees on part of the payment processor based on the type of account used to make that deposit. For example, American Express charges about 3% per transaction whereas Fidelity Bank charges $0 for outgoing domestic wire transfers.

**This is a reversal of our original plan. We originally charged users for deposits, but not withdrawals. However, after a lot of discussion on the issue it was determined that we would do the reverse and simply display to the user the amount of money in their account should they continue to keep it in the FundFaire network and a secondary total informing them of how much they would receive if they withdrew it all.

***At least for now, we may be forced to change this in the future due to legal concerns.

Centralized Marketplaces

The goal behind FF is to be a one stop place for everything like a digital bazaar where people can set up their booth(s), aka webpage(s), then sell whatever, present whatever, just flat out ask people to give you funds. As such, people can come and go as they please, change their shop as they please, set up multiple sites. After all, FF is not limited on space as an actual bazaar would be. They can create their site to just link to all the other sites on which they post.

Eventually FF will have tools built in to link to all of the popular social media sites so that our users only need to post on FF and that post will be likewise sent out via those other platforms when/if possible. This will save our users time and energy for things like posting a video on YouTube, then Minds, and then Bitchute, then… and similar scenarios. Additionally, we want this system to work in reverse so that if you post something on Twitter, it will post on FF as well. This will mean that your customers, fans, and/or subscribers can follow all of your social media activity from one FF account rather than having to follow a single creator on every different apps. Of course, those users will be able to customize which notifications they want to receive from you.

FlexPay (FP)

Because of the nature of our platform, there isn’t a one size fits all way of paying people. FAs and FUNs will be able to set up a variety of different payment options for their customers, fans, subscribers, or whatever else. If for instance they are hosting a podcast on FF and want to set up a monthly fee for access to that podcast they can do that. They can also charge per cast. Or they could charge a one-time fee for access to everything on their channel. They can even have casts that are free to watch with an option to donate. They can actually do all 4 of those simultaneously for their entire channel allowing users to pick the payment method that works best for them. They could also set different charges for individual casts if they want. The nice thing about our system is that users are not bound by any one payment model and can change their setup whenever they need to keep their business going in the right direction. Our system is extremely customizable, because it is built with all of these different options in mind.

We know that subscription management could be a nightmare considering that a user may have their FA set to not receive any funds while their FUN that is receiving funds is independent of their content. Our easy solution for this is system generated time stamped tokens. We’ll spare you the technical details, but for those users, this process is as easy as clicking a button in their FA, copying a series of characters from that FA, using drop downs and buttons to create rules, and then pasting that series of characters with those rules into the appropriate section of their FUN. It might take a bit of time to set up at first, but once it is done the user doesn’t need to manually do anything else unless they want to change the time frame requirements for those subscriptions. Those changes will only impact those paying for the subscriptions after the change is confirmed.

Users that are sending funds can similarly send funds the way they wish. For instance, if they are paid every other Friday and want to set their FUN to deposit a portion of every paycheck and then send it to someone else, they can do that. What if their brother has a family emergency and needs them to send money as soon as possible, but they don’t have enough in their current account? Well, they can pledge a payment to their brother’s account and have our system send those as soon as they are available. Or what if the brother doesn’t need a specific amount of money, but needs whatever the sender can afford by next Thursday? Well, they can simply tell our system to send all the money they have, a specific amount, or up to a cap to their brother’s account on a specified time and date. This is a major advantage over other systems, because most limit their users to either a one-time payment or payments on a monthly basis.

FUN Lists (FUNLs)

This feature can be enabled on both the sender’s and receiver’s end, but when enabled on both, it provides a valuable connection tool. The receiver will get not only the funds*, but also the senders contact information (This is usually their email, but they can specify how they would like to be contacted. This is in addition to their FUN ID). This will allow a receiver to keep a contact list for everyone who has ever sent them money so that they can keep them informed when new products are available for sale, when new content is posted, updates on the progress of their fundraising efforts, etc.

Additionally, this list can be used to cross promote yourself across multiple markets. For instance, if you are a social media celebrity on Twitter, but you are starting an Instagram and you want your Twitter followers to follow you there. Currently what people do is just keep reminding people to follow their new venture and hope their fans get the message. With FF you can send out a notification to your entire FUNL and in that notification, it will have a link for them to follow you on your new platform. Of course, ideally you would just link both your Twitter and Instagram with FundFaire and then they could follow both by just being on your FUNL.

* Users can send a 0.00 fund amount in order to be added to these lists as well so you won’t actually have to pay to use this feature. This might change in the future to be completely separated from the payment system entirely as well.

Low Fees

FF only charges our users when funds are withdrawn* from their FUN to a source outside of FF. That’s right! No transaction fees for funds sent from one account to another regardless of who owns it. (I am estimating no more than a 4% fee on launch, and expect that to go down as the platform grows)

This means that you can deposit $1,000 into your FUN account from your Visa account. FF will charge nothing on top of the charges your Visa will add, plus taxes (if/when applicable), plus any additional fees (that depends on how the payment is processed). After that, you will see the full $1,000 in your account. Then you can send that entire amount to another FA and they will get then entire $1,000 amount. They can take that $1,000 and split it into 2 different payments of $500 to 2 FUNs and each one of those FUNs will get exactly $500 in their account.

Now, as we charge only on withdrawals, users will see 2 displayed amounts in their FUN interface. The main one will show the total they have in their account. Under that will be another amount with the label “withdrawl” displaying the amount they will receive if they withdraw all of their funds. If a user has to pay their $500 rent, and they have $500 in their FUN, that amount will be less than their rent when they go to withdraw. This gives those users an incentive to have their landlord join FundFaire so they can pay their rent without any additional out of pocket expense.

Even if they must make the withdrawal and pay our current fees on that, at least they will know before hand the amount that they can expect to see before making that withdrawal. There are other payment systems and social media platforms that don’t disclose this information up front leaving users to think they have more money than they actually do. Also, other payment systems charge per transaction. With our system the more you keep in our network and the more services that accept our payments, the less fees you will incur.

*Previously this occurred during deposits.

Ultra-Secure

While FF doesn’t technically use Blockchain (the technology behind Bitcoin), it does use a similar technology. FF uses a system that offers a similar kind of distributed security to that which has led to the success of Bitcoin. However, with Bitcoin anyone can download the software to create a wallet and join the network semi-anonymously.

While that works great for what Bitcoin is, it doesn’t work for our purposes at FF. Users will have to go through us to create their accounts so there is some level of accountability. After a FUN is created through FF, the transactions between those accounts will function in a similar manner to those on the Bitcoin network (Actually, closer to the lesser known Ethereum). This means that transactions on FF will be fast, secure, and most importantly transparent to eliminate the potential of manipulation from any single user or centralized authority. Transparency of all transactions on the network keeps the power of the network in the hands of the users, not its creators, advertisers, credit card companies, the government, or anyone other than the users themselves.

Even though transactions between accounts will be fully visible to everyone on the network only part of the information is actually public. This system does not air your dirty laundry to the community. For example, the information of a transaction that is public might be “$10 was sent from FUN1 to FUN2 at 1630 on Oct 9, 2018”, the rest of the information, such as who owns either of those accounts will be private. This could simply be you transferring funds from yourself to yourself. And user’s banking information will never be spread on the network. Lastly, any contact information shared in the transaction will be encrypted so that only the two people participating in the transaction will be able to view that information.

This provides a level of relative anonymity as far as who is making transactions, while still allowing these transactions to occur securely on a public network. This system is to guarantee that no one can cheat and pledge funds to one user, get the rewards of that pledge, and then send those funds to a different user. It also prevents you from copying your reward token and mass distributing them so that others can view the subscribed content for free.

Reputation (REP) System

REP is our system for scoring and ranking each Account and each piece of individual content. This will be broken down into 5 tiers of Reputation value. The five tiers are Employees (EMPs), Advertizers (ADs), FAs, FUNs, and NORMs. Those tiers are in order of priority for searches or level of trust of the Account or content with that/those REPutations. When searching in FF, the first results would be the account or piece of content containing that word that has the highest REP score. In the case of a tie between REP scores, they will be ordered according to those 5 tiers, then in reverse chronological order (oldest first) by default.

The four tiers also impact their contribution to the REP score of other accounts and content. We are still working out the exact ratios of impact between these account types and that is likely to be adjusted quite a bit in the first few weeks or months of launch. The impact of NORMs will be extremely low to deter botters and randos. The impact of each individual account will also be based on that accounts own reputation. For example, if a “Like” from an EMP is normally equal to 100 dislikes from FUNs, but a specific EMP has a 60.00% REP score* then their “Like” might only negate 60 dislikes from FUNs. However, those 60 dislikes better be from FUNs with 100% REP scores themselves or else their dislikes won’t add up to that full 60.

This system is intended to prevent the possibility of shadow-banning, secret algorithms, and trend manipulation. Keep your REPutation up and you will likely grow your audience on FF. Keep annoying or enraging other users and you will find yourself ostracized by the community at large. However, if your REP score becomes unsalvageable, just create a new account of the same type and don’t be as much of a dick this time. Who knows maybe you’ll find yourself acting different in real life once you get used to the idea of being responsible for your own actions.

*For now this is being represented by a percentage, but we may change this if this results in too many entries having the same REP score.

Tagging (TAG) System

This will be much easier to show than to tell, but we shall try our best here. In conjunction with our REP system is our TAG system. TAGs can be added to any piece of content or FA. TAGs include things like “Not Safe for Work”, “Explicit Language”, “Violent Imagery”, “Not Suitable for Children”, “Nudity”, “Adults Only”, “All Ages”, and other such categories. These TAGs will contribute to the TAGged content or user’s REP score.

The purpose of this system is to allow users and advertisers to limit their searches, payments, or endorsements based on their individual preferences. It is inspired by the way Rotten Tomatoes has a score for films split between the professional critic and the audience and then an overall rating. The FF REP system will function similarly, only with 5 groups instead of 2 and TAGs in addition to the overall REP score. TAGs functions similar to the MPAA ratings for films and TV only rather than some board of industry snobs; it will be based on feedback from the entire FF community.

Personalize (PER) System

The PER system utilizes the REP and TAG system to their fullest potential. Like the REP system, the TAG system is broken down into 5 tiers as well. With the PER system, users can specify which tiers they would like to include in their preferences. A user can chose to ignore certain TAG and/or REP tiers, as well as by the TAGs themselves, and/or the overall REP scores. Those preferences set in each individual’s preferences with the PER system will impact the overall scores of the content that a specific user sees as well as which content they are exposed to in the first place.

For example, say a FA posts content then an EMP tags it as “Adults Only”, ADs collectively give it a category of “Violent Imagery”, the FAs declares their content, “All Ages”, but collectively FUNs deem it, “Not suitable for Children”.* All of those categories would be applied to that FA’s content and then be aggregated into an overall score (exact method to be determined), which will be very low. Searching with the default PER settings will likely result in that content never being found by the user as it will be buried under content with a higher REP scores. However, what if that user is looking for Adult content? They could go into their PER settings, customize them to their preferences and that content might be on the first page or top of the list in that user’s searches.

ADs may not care about nudity or violence and actually wish to advertise on that sort of content and thus seek out FAs like the one in this example. A NORM could set their search or notifications to content or FAs with a metascore above a certain level to avoid content that may be too graphic or lewd for their tastes. Other users may trust the opinion of other regular users over those of advertisers and may want to assess the content they view based on the TAGs of the FAs themselves, and EMPs, but not ADs, FUNs, or NORMs.

For younger users, parents can set the PER settings on their children’s accounts and password lock those settings. Or parents can just let their children continue to only use a NORM account which cannot set the PER system to view content other than that tagged with the “All Ages” tag.

If this sounds confusing that is because it is. Once you see the final product, we are sure it will make more sense. But the idea once again is that this is a highly customizable system intended to cater to the tastes of a wide array of both creators and consumers.

Lastly, as this system is primarily user driven, there is no way for a single user to pay their way to success. Every single user will have to earn their own success by appropriately categorizing their own content and satisfying their customers/fans/subscribers with what they are marketing.

* We understand that parents want to be able to keep their children from seeing explicit material. To aid with that, our current plan is to split the content on FundFaire into three separate areas to ensure this. The first area would be a staging area for new content as the community assesses where that content belongs, this will be a limited access area to ensure that illegal content doesn’t reach the full system. After that content will move to the main FundFaire area where any user can reach it however, this could still include material not suitable for children. If content is deemed suitable for General Audiences to include children, that content will be moved to the third area that is suitable for all ages and users. NORM accounts will be limited to that General Audience area as well as accounts password locked with the PER setting with that same restriction.

Laissez-Faire

FF is built with free market principles in mind. Our aim is to be as Laissez Faire as we are legally allowed to be. As such, anything and everything will be allowed on FF as long as it is within the legal limits. Everything that is not explicitly prohibited by law will be fair game on FundFaire.*

Faire Money System (FMS)

The best analogy for this system is that of a raffle, but it’s not really gambling as users can participate without spending any money into it. All FAs and FUNs will be eligible for random giveaways of funds from FF itself. The exact amounts of these giveaways will vary based on the available balance of the account that will be managing this process and the total number of users. Currently, we plan on having 3 separate types of giveaways. There will be one for all FUNs, one for FAs where the odds of winning are determined by their REP and the number of unique FUNs that interact with them, and one for charitable FAs specifically. Depending on a great many factors we might increase or decrease the number of separate giveaways.

Not only this, but our payment system will give every user the option to do the same. This will allow channels to have contests with cash prizes for their FUNLs, or however they see fit, easily. A lot of content creators like to do random cash giveaways and have to have the person contact them via email, but this system streamlines that entire process.

Bitcoin Galaxy

After several emails and phone conversations, FundFaire has entered into a partnership with Bitcoin Galaxy (BTCG) as an exclusive cryptocurrency used on the network. Whenever a FUN or FA account is created they will be automatically given a BTCG wallet. This wallet is independent of funds discussed under other features of FundFaire. That means they can be traded freely to other accounts on the FF network, but there is the additional feature that they can be traded outside of the FF network completely. That means users trading on FF in the BTCG coin (name TBA) will not be subject to any fees from FF at all.*

The terms of this partnership are that the BTCG will be the only cryptocurrency wallet connected with FundFaire. Individual users on FundFaire can still advertise their other cryptocurrency accounts, but FundFaire will not offer any additional support for other cryptocurrencies. FF will have features that let FAs manage subscriptions to their content when paid in BTCG, but that is our only plan for this cryptocurrency  other than including a wallet in the process of creating an account on our system.

In return for this, BTCG has agreed to help us raise the initial capital we are seeking to launch the FundFaire platform. FundFaire’s development has been delayed and stagnated due to funding issues and this contribution will go a long way to helping us reach our goal of an official public beta going live in Jan, 2019.

–UPDATE: As BTCG failed to help us raise any funds at all, this partnership is null and void. Also, that was our last hope of launching this platform. This project is officially dead unless a funding miracle occurs.

*BTCG is not owned by FundFaire and users trading in it will be subject to the rules of the BTCG network. That may include fees for transactions between accounts when BTCG is used as well as deposit and/or withdrawal fees.