request updates to the template to avoid AI slop and speed reviews

[hrischuk-da]

I am requesting updates to the grant template based on the several grant proposals I've reviewed:

• All proposals need to explain how they fit into the current ecosystem: tooling, libraries, frameworks, etc. Alternatively, if this is a proposal to replace something that exists, then they need to explain why the proposal cannot fit into the existing ecosystem by extending what exists.
  • This will ensure grant writers know about our ecosystem and explain why they can't extend what exists. Several grant proposals are greenfield, ignoring existing components, which dilutes the effort and provides less value to the ecosystem.
  • The default approach should be to extend what exists but it this is not being followed.
• All proposals need to provide some estimate of the portion of the ecosystem that will benefit (e..g, 50% of dApps use TypeScript and we expect 50% of them will use our TypeScript library). Right now I see a lot of proposals that say "There was a survey that said this wasn't a great experience and we want to add this thing that will solve that" without any analysis of why it will solve it.
  • The "Rationale" section is buffed up to add this.
  • The current approach puts this burden on the reviewer to do this research when it should be provided. If the proposing doesn't know what this requires or how to go about doing it, I am willing to spend 15 minutes discussing it with them.
• In many cases, the technical content of these proposals is too thin to even figure out what is intending to be built.
  • I suspect this is because there is some common AI skill that is being used to generate these proposals and they just send it in to see what is needed.
  • This is not all proposals but a significant number.
• Many proposals have a 3 tier list of deliverables that don't seem to be related except in some tangential way: easy, not so easy, darn hard objectives. These should be split into two proposals: (1) easy, not so easy; (2) darn hard.
  • Then we can focus on (1) and review (2) at a later time.
  • This is another reason why I think an AI skill is at work here.

Development Fund Proposal Submission

Proposal file:
Link to the proposal added in this PR (e.g., /proposals/your-proposal-name.md)

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Summary

Briefly describe the proposal and the value it delivers to the Canton ecosystem (2–3 sentences).

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Checklist

• Proposal file added under /proposals/
• Milestones and funding amounts defined
• Acceptance criteria included
• Alignment with Canton priorities described

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Notes for Reviewers

(Add anything the Tech & Ops Committee should pay attention to.)

[waynecollier-da]

Looks good to me. @hythloda Would you like to add anything here before asking the Voting Group to comment on these proposed changes to the grant template?