Curating on The Graph

The role of Curator on The Graph serves a vital function in vetting the quality and supporting the success of a subgraph.

A wide variety of skills are helpful, but none are necessary. You can signal on a subgraph with as little as 100 GRT — even less if you’re not first to curate on that subgraph — and the GUI designed by the team is intuitive. In this article, I will talk a little about my own experience becoming a Curator. I hope to encourage you to reflect on your own life experience and interests and see where you might have something to offer the network yourself.

Where I come from

As a teacher of math to 7th and 8th graders, I often find myself having conversations with students about current events and the internet. Many of my students don’t think twice about their digital lives and the information and content they are consuming and creating on a daily basis. Yet all of my students dream of their TikToks going viral and getting a slice of the ad revenue they imagine makes it all worth it.

Intro to crypto

In my own education at university, I was exposed to crypto during the 2017 bull run. I had a Coinbase account, but I struggled to get verified. I ended up not purchasing any coins or tokens and then forgot all about it as the prices tanked. During the rest of my time at university I developed an interest in programming, web development, investing, and all kinds of other things that I would use when I encountered The Graph. My exposure to high-level mathematics at university has been incredibly valuable as I try to understand and navigate the different economics involved with The Graph.

Meeting The Graph

In December 2020, I had a renewed interest in crypto and investing. I purchased a cold wallet and bought some GRT to use on The Graph Network on Coinbase after receiving a few tokens through their earn program. I knew about delegating, indexing, and curation, but I was intimidated by the incredibly large fees to transact on the blockchain. As someone who had never even used a web3 compatible wallet, there was a lot I wanted to understand before I made a leap to participating. The Discord channel in particular was a great help. Eventually I would become a member of the Graphtronauts Telegram group — they were and still are one of the best resources available to all network participants.

Delegation experience

Finally, in December 2021 I made my first two delegations. I had done a lot of research and even tried to have conversations with different Indexers. The vetting that a Delegator does for Indexers is not so different from the vetting that a Curator does for subgraphs. I learned that a high yield is often unsustainable and at the very least you must investigate the source of the high yield. Even if your goal is maximum profits, there is good reason to go with dedicated and fair community members over those who might offer a great deal or promotional rate. I am still an active Delegator. I think that even if you are more interested in curation, delegating is a good idea because it will incentivize you to get to know the Indexers. This is relevant because attracting Indexers to the subgraph is the main purpose of curation.

My curation journey

I minted my first curation shares in October 2022. My strategy is young and will definitely change and evolve over time, but I know that I plan to take a long-term view rather than a short-term view. Bots will always be better than a human at being the first to signal on a subgraph. The types of projects that are attractive to me as a Curator are projects that I have heard of or use myself. In addition, I look for projects that have a decent amount of traffic already and have growth possibilities. On The Graph the main incentive is to curate to subgraphs which will generate fees, not necessarily the project that will “win.” Projects which show an interest in decentralization are preferable to projects that just have a lot of users. One of the best ways to know if a project’s subgraph is going to be worth curating on is to directly ask the team how often they intend to query the subgraph themselves.

The role of Curator has significantly more risk involved than delegating, and this creates an interesting test of the quality of the incentive structure. This is a role that really demands an active mindset. While the value of your shares is unpredictable, the value generated by the subgraph and associated projects is something that can be researched and understood from fundamentals. Everyone belongs to a unique circle of people and has a different background. Consider what skills and connections you have. Being someone who is willing to go after the information, connect people, and make decisions is much rarer and more valuable than many realize.

The promise of web3 is to enable all of us to capture the value of our contributions, rather than losing much of it to a central entity. There are real risks but the rewards, both financial and otherwise, have been well worth it in my experience.