# The Human Blockchain: Join the Kappa Sigma Mu Society on Kusama Network

*Due to gorwing interest in the Kappa Sigma Mu Society in the last weeks, I have made a detailed overview on what the Society is about, what the rationale behind it is and what to expect from Kappa Sigma Mu.*

### What's All This Fuss About?

In technical terms, Kappa Sigma Mu is a collective created using the [society pallet](https://github.com/paritytech/substrate/tree/master/frame/society) on Substrate, which in principle, is defined as an economic game incentivizing users to participate and maintain membership through rewards paid by the collective treasury. But in actuality, the Society is more than just that: It aims to make the Kusama network and its functionalities known to non-technical users, raise awareness of new forms of organization and identify the link between the onchain and offchain worlds.

The Kappa Sigma Mu Society has specific conditions for users to join as members: An [onchain convention of membership approval](https://polkascan.io/kusama/transaction/0x948d3a4378914341dc7af9220a4c73acb2b3f72a70f14ee8089799da16d94c17) exists for candidates to follow. In order to become part of the Society, the candidate must show "Proof-of-Ink" (PoI) to existing members: in other words, to become a member you must get a tattoo meeting the specific requirements.

The Society was founded by an anonymous single member who automatically became the original Head. The members support this anonymity as the Head shows commitment to the society by voting on new candidates (and many feel that it makes this game more interesting).

### How to Become a Member in a Few Simple Steps

Currently, participants in the Society can be a:

**Bidder:** A user who has submitted an intention of joining the society.
**Candidate:** A user who will be voted on to join the society.
**Suspended Candidate:** A user who failed to win a vote.
**Member:** A user who is a member of the society.
**Defender:** A member whose membership is under question and voted on again.
**Suspended Member:** A member of the society who has accumulated too many strikes or failed their membership challenge.

Once a user submits their candidacy to become a member the bid phase begins. This phase extends for the length of the ongoing rotation period - up to three days and eight hours. During this time, other users can also submit their candidacy.

Bidders currently need to make a deposit of 1.66 KSM to sign the transaction when bidding. When signing the transaction, the bidder then stipulates how much they think it is worth to become part of the collective. The bidder can request however much is in the pot at the time of their bid. If voted in, the candidate will receive their bid reward as a future payout, after a [lock-up time](https://wiki.polkadot.network/docs/en/maintain-guides-society-kusama#lock-up-time). Up to ten bidders can pass to the candidacy phase at a single time, as long as the total sum of all their bids equals or is smaller than the total KSM in the Society pot (See **Where is the fun** for more information). Once bidders pass the bid phase and are approved as candidates, they should execute POI.

**Where is the fun?** Bidders can "outbid" each other, meaning that if one bidder decides to try to bid for the total amount of the pot, others can submit smaller bids and eventually push the first bidder out of the game after the rotation period is over. All candidates get a portion of the pot after they are elected as members: this amount equals their bid.

*E.g. There is 100 KSM in the pot. Person A bids 100, but then person B bids 40 and person C bids 55. Since both person B and C's bids add up to less than the pot, both their bids would be accepted and person A's wouldn't.*

**Who funds the Society pot?** At present, the pot is being funded by a 0.2% burn of Kusama Treasury each spend period (current spend period is 6 days). Additionally, in the near future, a new funding mechanism will be set in place following a recent treasury proposal (see below for more details).

Once the next rotation period begins, the bidders who made it to the next phase become candidates. Both periods last for three days and eight hours. In practice, this means candidates have roughly three days to submit Proof-of-Ink, following the convention of membership approval.

**Where do I submit my PoI?** Members expect candidates to submit POI on the [Society's Element channel](https://matrix.to/#/!BUmiAAnAYSRGarqwOt:matrix.parity.io?via=matrix.parity.io&via=matrix.org&via=web3.foundation). The proof should contain compelling evidence that the tattoo exists on the body, it is larger than 2.54cm, and is permanent. In order to validate each of these requirements, we recommend high-quality well-lit photographs, a video of it being done where the equipment is visible, or have a current Society member present as a witness. If you wish to have a Society member present as a witness, please provide the Society members prior with the date, time, location of the in the Kappa Sigma Mu Element channel. The identity of the candidate or the specific part of the body on which it is placed does not need to be disclosed.

Once you have submitted your PoI, at the end of the rotation period, all current memebers will vote to accept or reject your candidacy. The system will then randomly select yes or no based on the votes by existing members. A random set of existing members are also chosen as skeptics: they are expected to vote on the current candidate. If they do not vote, their skeptic status is treated as a rejection vote, the member is deemed "lazy" and is given a strike per missing vote (if they accumulate ten strikes, they are suspended).

After the candidate becomes a member, they are expected to monitor the channels closely, vote on each rotation period and help fellow candidates migrate through the process.

### The Deeper Meaning Behind Collective Identities: Connecting Two Worlds and the Concept of Self-Obliteration

What's behind the economic game? The Society's goal is to identify the link between the onchain and offchain worlds. These two universes often join forces in an eternal alliance between human and machine, and the Society is the tangible representation of this union: we use the machine to create our bodies, and they end up defining part of who we are.

<iframe width="710" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/n6wnhLqJqVE" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>
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**THIS IS AN ALLIANCE BETWEEN HUMANS AND MACHINES.** We are a product of science and technology, we cannot distance ourselves from it. We can forge an alliance to embrace what technology can do for us and what we can do for others.

**WE ARE PART HUMAN AND MACHINE**. We are part of hybrid networks living and reproducing in our bodies. The dichotomy of natural/artificial is no longer relevant in our times. We are here to understand how hybrid networks can help human development. We are [cyborgs](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Cyborg_Manifesto).

**The Kusama Human Blockchain Project aims to forge an eternal alliance between human and machine**, and to make this alliance tangible through the Kusama network. By joining the collective, we live in the machine and the machine lives in us. This is a social movement triggered by the immutable hash-chain as a concept, with the goal of erasing the division between human and machine. By erasing the division between both worlds, [self-obliteration](http://filmslie.com/watch-yayoi-kusama-self-obliteration-dissolve-identity/) is achieved.

The Society aims to gather Kusama aficionados and experiment with new ways of organization while playing with individual and collective identity sets. The use of an identifier representing the parent member on each member's PoI combined with the immutable hash of Kusama creates a human chain in which each member represents a block.


*Donna Haraway as portrayed by Existential Comics. Fragment from "[Dungeons & Dragons & Philosophers VIII, The Sci-Fi debate](https://existentialcomics.com/comic/305)"*

### The Future of The Human Blockchain

The Society is a movement aiming to invest a great part of its resources to onboard new members into the new generation of Web3 tech stack. We aim to become a collective in which members can learn how to make use of the network's assets via proposals and fund projects to enhance their understanding.

Kusama's economic design is the aggregation of all individual behaviors: by selfish specialization we create collective wealth. Our goal is to incentivize the initiative of individual action on the network. Developer engagement is an important part of the Kusama ecosystem, but it is essential we also provide as many straightforward and simple on-ramps to allow non-technical end-users to participate.

With this in mind, the Society submitted a [proposal](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1q6kFyznrDnyctZViK29J2OvBrr4D1LNo/view) to the Kusama council to fund the next phase of its development. This was [approved](https://polkascan.io/kusama/council/motion/186) a few weeks ago. The project focuses its efforts on the development of a communications strategy, brand development, educational resources for new members wishing to understand Kusama and its benefits further, and funds for the pot. The Society plans to extend the roles in the collective by adding a key member in the future: the Maker – responsible for vouching for and executing PoI on new candidates.

In order to develop a structured set of materials for non-technical users the KSM Society will be working closely with some of the W3F employees in the development of challenges using Polkadot Pathways. Pathways allows us to design a learning strategy for Society members that promotes competition, imparts a sense of achievement, engages users in desired behaviors and motivates them to take action. The further gamification of the Society dynamics will assure knowledge retention and learner engagement levels for non-technical users.

This project is in the initial phase of development and new updates will be released soon. Are you ready to join the experiment?