# PSE is the USS Enterprise

When reflecting what does PSE should be or should do in Ethereum, the first image that comes to my mind is of [Star Trek](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek) and the [USS Enterprise](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Enterprise_(NCC-1701)).
> ...a vision of a future where humanity's greatest strengths come to the forefront. Imagine a world where curiosity and the thirst for knowledge drive us to explore the farthest reaches of the universe.

Similarly, in my opinion, PSE's role is to explore the universe of cryptography, finding new inspirations and constructions that collectively add value to Ethereum and ultimately to humanity:

> "explore strange, new worlds; to seek out new life and civilizations; to bodly go where no mas has gone before."


### Connected fates
All goals and efforts are connected, PSE makes a better world through cryptography and Ethereum.
* Build a better world ->
* Ethereum can build a better world ->
* Cryptography can make Ethereum better ->
* PSE can expand the cryptography in Ethereum in order to build a better world

### How?

We can do this by ***researching, prototyping, building tooling*** and eventually releasing ***production-grade*** projects who either become a team on it's own, or even better, inspire new teams onboard to continue the journey.

<img src="https://hackmd.io/_uploads/BySHrb5EA.png" alt="drawing" width="400"/>

The image above represents the best way to capture this exploration/dissemination thoughts.
- We do research and POCs on the edges, exploring new technology and use cases
- We grow them to a point where they become lighted or crowded, and become clusters on their own.
- At that point we should move on and pursue new things

This however requires discipline and strategic calls on what to prioritize and not prioritize, as the universe is so big.

### Portfolio Management
- If this was a funnel or pipeline, we probably want to have a high percentage of research projects, a medium percentage of POCs and a small percentage of production ready projects.
- For example: at any time in PSE look to have 10 reseach/experiment projects, 5 POCs, 2 production-looking projects.

Outside of PSE mission, this is likely the most contentious point of PSE organization. **In what way should we focus?** (see more thoughts below)

### Ways to explore:
How should we explore new things to build?
- Problem driven: what are key challenges and problems Ethereum has today?
- Technology driven: what are key technolgoy's advancements that unlock new use cases?
- Opportunity driven: by combining new technologies, what kind of new applications are possible?

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More, less thought-out ideas regarding Portfolio Management

I'm more of a "downside piramid" myself

But I can also see the arguments for less research and more application level experimentation

When we say "experimentation" what do we mean?
- I think it's targeting things without the intention to reach high levels of maturity (production grade)
- It should ideally not be "wasted effort", but focus should be on learning and informing bigger investments in resources or new paths

When we talk about project classification, with what visuals can we group them?
I think the two spectrums we need to think and talk projects about are:
- Research <> End Users spectrum
- New <> Mature spectrum

And a third that could group them by "theme", this gets trickier though