A contributor highway is a structure that facilitates the transportation of an idea across a network and allows anyone to join the ride.

The power of many minds often beats the genius of one. This is where contributor highways shine. They act as vibrant arteries, channeling ideas and fostering growth while welcoming many perspectives and skillsets. By creating effective onramps for open contributors, these highways speedrun innovation and can keep a vision alive.

Examples of these highways range from Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) projects, where global contributors have come together to ship software, to Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs), which allow for community-driven enhancements to the Ethereum network. Crowdsourcing platforms like Kickstarter and open hackathons also play their part, providing a stage for ideas to flourish and realities to be molded.

Why are contributor highways important?

Everything starts through some form of a contributor highway. The P2P foundation’s open forum (where Satoshi made their first post) was arguably a simple yet powerful highway that allowed for discussion, contributions, and the eventual dissemination of a collective goal.

Crypto redefines digital contributor highways: Rewarding contributions is simpler and less obfuscated by geo-fencing. AKA: one can fund anyone anywhere in the world for their contributions to a project (KYC laws may apply but are not nearly as restrictive as W2s).

Contributor rewards are important too. Bitcoin’s reward for contributors in the early days was simple: just mine BTC. Some other protocols have other ways to incentivize contributors. E.G Optimism’s retroactive public goods funding approach.

Rewards, however, do not strictly need to be financial; there can be certain rewards like hitting personal milestones, gaining social status and more, these can be effective too.

TLDR: incentives are important. But not all incentives are strictly financial.

How do you nurture these powerful Contributor Highways?

Step 1: Initiate a shared goal that people have an incentive to fulfill

Step 2: Create a platform or process where contributions can be made

Step 3: Promote and manage this platform to ensure the growth and success of both the platform itself and its contributors (people need to feel appreciated and be seen for their work!)

When done successfully, this can lead to the emergence of a dynamic, productive, and self-reinforcing community.

For instance, forming a writing collective where members hold each other accountable can be a starting point. The shared personal goal of writing more becomes the magnetic north, drawing contributors to join, engage, and eventually, construct a self-sustaining highway of collective efforts leading to the completion of individual objectives.

This highway is essentially an accountability engine, aiming to help individuals meet their personal goals. Not directing content, just encouraging commitment.

In a nutshell, Contributor Highways are a testament to the fact that when we embark on a journey together, the destination becomes not just a shared achievement, but a shared journey of growth, learning, and success. Nurturing effective and open contributor highways can lead to a collective impact that far outweighs that of any one individual

**Interested in sparking up a contributor highway? Join the CryptoWriters GG group. **

• You can join this group if you just want to write more and be held accountable or if you want to act as a reviewer for others’ writings before they publish!

• If you want to help bring more stuff onchain:

  • Issue Attestations via EAS or others with a multiplier effect for those who complete writing streaks (mirror already gets every post onchain so there is a headstart!)

  • Help create twitter bots to retweet writers’ publications

  • Help gamify the thing, how can this be made to be more fun?

  • Issue NFTs for all guild members -- wen pfp?

  • Create a website!

• Help work with DAOs so writers can write on behalf of projects and get retroactively funded -- education is a public good. Imagine joining this group to fullfill a personal goal, and then having the opportunity to be compensated for it :O

• Make memes.

What I am personally excited about here is how this can bring new people onchain, 0xreflexivity put it perfectly:

“The role of crypto for this group is accountability as on-chain attestations- long term we see this as potentially a gateway for liberal arts to seamlessly integrate with crypto”

There are numerous ideas on how one can contribute to this highway; the best part is that the lanes are completely open (:

gg.