As someone who most closely aligns with the "nouns funds software" thesis, I don't think it's worth another ~70K into Nerman.

I'd be much more into any sort of prop that aims to bring nouncil onchain

Voting Result: No

Based on the analysis of the proposal and adherence to the fixed voting principles, the final decision is to vote against the proposal with a probability of 70%. The reasons include concerns about financial sustainability, lack of clear ROI, insufficient transparency in fund usage, and inadequate on-chain evidence to support the proposal's claims.

I really appreciate everything Joel and Nerman have contributed over the years and how valuable that’s been for Nouncil, but I’m voting against this proposal in its current form for two main reasons:

• I didn’t think the deliverables from Prop 514 were as strong as I’d hoped (see my VwR);

• Since the proposal frames Nerman as an onboarding tool, I expected at least a basic marketing plan showing how it’d connect with other communities.

I’d actually be down to support a more expensive proposal if the strategy felt more solid. Also, the rebranding wasn’t super clear to me.

As a Nerman user at the time of the Nouncil vote, I felt that the proposed budget was irrational, especially since Nerman had already received funding in proposal 514.

Votes from the Nouniverse ⌐◨-◨

Every $NOGS holder now has a voice in deciding how the NOGS pool of Nouns votes on each Nouns proposal.
Cast your vote on your Noggles Dashboard, earn more $NOGS!

FOR: 15.07M $NOGS
AGAINST: 417.55M $NOGS

147120 $NOGS have been shared among the voters.

FOR 36 VOTES

otterfodder.eth | "Using discord to introduce people to governance then crypto is s valid strategy while also providing the oppprtunity to directly talk to longstanding members"

AGAINST 126 VOTES

nekofar.eth | "Doesn’t really feel Nounish to vote for someone else’s Web2 project and slap a “public good” sticker on it."

ABSTAIN 0 VOTES

I appreciate the vision and the service Nerman has provided.

was already leaning against due to the seemingly incomplete nature of Prop 514 and find other member's VWRs persuasive regarding the ability to justify the cost:value ratio at this moment

Sounds like bullshit

While cost concerns are valid ($67K isn't trivial), funding experiments in decentralized governance aligns with Nounish values—especially when it lowers barriers to participation via Discord’s massive user base (200M monthly active users). The bot already drives higher engagement than Snapshot (2-10x per nocguild), automates critical processes like aligning voting windows with proposal edits (Nouncil depends on this), and shifts toward open collaboration by decentralizing development (Dot/Benbodhi/James Young joining). Even imperfectly executed projects can spark broader cultural adoption—like how Farcaster started niche before scaling up over time ✨

+1. while current nerman functionality is great, $9k/year is already a high price to justify.

Would support a prop without the new features to keep it alive if that also included open sourcing.

Also curious if you've considered the lift to deploy nerman as a farcaster mini app, which would provide another avenue for access and notifications that's not dependent on Discord.

Nerman gets more use than any other piece of tech nouns has made besides .camp, no?

We used this in Lils for a long time, and as pipe says; it brought out more voters than snapshot, for example. Joel spent a lot of time helping us set this up, and maintaining it.

IMO, would be great to have this more plug-and-play so more communities and sub-cultures can use it.

Also, Nerman can alert you of new props, or new VWRs because Discord has notification settings ... none of this is available elsewhere.

For - Wins

FOR - 26 VOTES

floofys | *"As a Nouncillor, I dislike the anonymity with which the voting takes place. So I will always provide a reason for my votes.

Nerman proliferation! It's Nerman all the way down. On a more serious note I think Nerman's been great for automating our own governance and would be a big W for assisting other groups in automating governance.

I'm Floofys and I approve this message"*

davinoyesigye | "Nerman for President 🫡"

0xmonografia | "Let's keep Nerman alive. Happy to see a decentralized, nounish team being formed. Happy to collaborate on UX/UI design work."

AGAINST - 5 VOTES

nekofar | *"Over the past year, I’ve offered several times to contribute to this as an open-source project, no compensation needed, just to fix issues and maybe make life easier for Nouncilors. Never got a response. The data and control over this bot have always stayed within a small group; it’s never really been open to the broader community.

I’ll skip all my assumptions about why it’s been kept so closed off. But honestly, it doesn’t feel like a Nouns project. It feels like a private project owned by a few. I’m not convinced we should still be funding closed projects in 2025, especially ones built on non-web3-native platforms like Discord. We should be building toward more transparency, openness, and contribution-friendly tools."*

ABSTAINS - 6 VOTES

Ive enjoyed using nerman when I did, but ... at this pointl Nerman should be open sourced and let loose. In the world of !vibe coding . I dont see what prevents this from being recreated by the willing. and as an opensource tool. maybe it will find its true final form and PMF .

In a world of abundance everything is worth 0. sorry. (except finite compute resources... like eth and usdc)

PizzaDAO Governance Crew ABSTAINS:
"Governance is one of Nouns DAO's greatest products, so investing in it makes sense. Could the community collectively identify the most important features and vote on a resubmission? - Enzo Pepperoni
"⌐◨-◨" - Peas
"I like Nerman, but I think much more could be done here." - Don Scrimmy John

This proposal is underselling the potential of Nerman as a tool to increase variety in Nouns DAO governance.

It’s undeniable that Nerman drives much higher participation than Snapshot (in Lil Nouns, we consistently saw anywhere from 2–10x higher turnout with Nerman on identical proposals running in Snapshot). Discord feels like an untapped channel for expanding governance into new communities—especially those that aren’t crypto-native. This is a governance experiment, and governance is Nounish.

There are shortfalls in Nouncil’s current setup, with the community frequently voting for fixes—e.g. aligning voting times with proposal edit periods, resolving anon/public vote tensions, adding/removing members based on community polls and voting %, etc. That list will keep growing, and we should automate what we can to improve efficiency - especially if we aim to expand this to new communities who will likely want similar things.

So the questions are: a) Is Nouncil a valuable service to the DAO?
b) Should we enhance the infra to allow more automation and reduce dependence on Joel (who’s likely spent many hours manually patching things)?
c) Can we onboard more likeminded communities into Nouns governance via Nerman in their own discords—thus increasing voter variety and our capacity to handle proposal variety?

This effort lowers the barrier to entry for outsiders (e.g. no wallet needed, another + over Snapshot), which can help grow both Nouns and Noun O’Clock through broader participation. More voices, more votes, more variety. Joel is a supporter of noc and an ambassador of nounish culture, so this feels like it could be a big win — bringing in new communities, increasing engagement, and helping more people fall down the rabbit hole, & hopefully they end up at the Crystal Ball.

Thanks Joel, viva la noc

• noc enjoyer

I'll echo what Krel shared: "Appreciative of Nerman, Joel and team but i think its hard to justify spending more resources here."

Was gonna vote yes, but there's some compelling reasons on here it should be no. So just like. I dunno. Abstain.

appreciate the comfort Nerman has brought to communities like Nouncil and Joel's contributions throughout the years. However it seems like for most governance actions, snapshot is a more cost efficient option.

Nerman FTW! As a Nouncillor for the past two months, I’ve really appreciated the reminders to vote on proposals—they keep me engaged and informed. That said, I fully support aligning the voting window with Nouns DAO’s standard timeframe. Giving proposers more time to showcase, tweak, and iterate on their ideas leads to stronger proposals and better outcomes for everyone.
Let’s make it happen! 🚀

With automated polls for adding members, etc, this kind of sounds like reinventing the concept of a dao, but centralized and on discord.

I like daos because they are decentralized and not on discord.

Agreed, too big of an ask for such a restricted scope of use.

I also found the outcome of the last prop pretty underwhelming for the cost and reported dev time. And, even with the poke, it's still missing a final release and propdate.

Appreciative of Nerman, Joel and team but i think its hard to justify spending more resources here.

Nerman has been the best bot, notification and vote tooling we’ve had in discord, and I basically live in discord. Big supporter.

The proposal lacks a clear financial return mechanism and specific impact metrics. While the bot has been operational and used by various communities, the proposal does not provide a detailed budget breakdown or measurable financial KPIs. The requested funding of $67,000 USDC is substantial, and without a clear return on investment or a detailed plan on how this will enhance Nouns DAO's financial position or brand value, it is not justifiable. Additionally, the proposal's innovation and long-term sustainability are not convincingly demonstrated, as the features listed are mostly incremental improvements rather than groundbreaking innovations.

I think it's a pretty poor use of funds. Right now, the main thing Nerman does is help with Nouncil, and let's face it, that could be handled by one person setting up votes when proposals come in. Plus, submitting votes on-chain is still something a person has to do.

Do we believe they can market this to other communities and grow its usage?

Even if it took off, what's in it for our DAO? Sure, branding it as a nounish governance tool could make it more appealing, but does that help drive auctions, add value for current holders, or bring any return on investment? At best, it seems like a public good meant to make the world better. If that's the aim, perhaps $67k could be spent more effectively elsewhere.