As Q1 wraps up, let’s dive into this week’s update. Spotlights this week include launching global community hubs starting in LATAM and Japan, upcoming new member area on our website (including announcing membership tiers). Plus, the release of new in-depth infographics courtesy of Intersect members Mike Hornan and Summon Platform. Lastly, Intersect featured in March’s Essential Cardano360, and as usual, we get the latest updates from SanchoNet and Govtool.

Intersect community franchise hubs

Cardano is global, and everyone involved should have an equal opportunity to participate and contribute. As such, we're excited to announce a pioneering step forward by introducing Intersect community franchise hubs.

Intersect community hubs will act as a geographical central point for members to collaborate, meet, and participate. They will enable members to join local events and working groups where all can express their opinions with a regional twist. This is crucial when considering the consensus mechanism that is the foundation of Cardano’s governance system.

The first regional hub starts in the LATAM region with Intersect member, and committee member, Alex Pestchanker, acting as the LATAM community hub franchise manager. Japan will follow later this spring!

What to expect from community hubs?

• Monthly Town Halls tailored to local Intersect communities
• Dedicated regional Discord channels
• Translation and localized content to drive inclusion and participation
• Local meet-ups and regional events
• And much more!

To learn more about the process and to enquire about starting your own regional community read more on our knowledge base.

New members area coming soon!

We have started to develop Intersect’s members area. The members area will make it easy and straightforward for new and existing members to access their membership and improve onboarding and routes to participation. The members area will also introduce tiers and reasons to join Intersect. All membership levels offer unique benefits, allowing members to fully immerse themselves in the Intersect community and supercharge your Cardano experience as an Intersect member.

Our members stand at well over 1,000 and with the introduction of tiers and subscription levels, there’ll be a home for all at Intersect. One of the key benefits that full members will enjoy are voting rights at Intersect’s Annual Members Meeting, including voting on Cardano’s budget for 2025 and more.

We will soon open up the members area in beta, starting the feedback loop with the Membership and Community Committee. Following early feedback, we’ll then expand to all interested members for further testing. We’re aiming to release a final version in Q2 2024, and from there, it will continue to iterate and evolve to provide more value to members.

Much more on this to come, with demo’s and sneak peeks to be shared throughout April.

Governance tooling update

Development continues with new features for Govtool. This week, Intersect member Byron Networks finished creating the governance action submission feature, which covers information and treasury actions. This development includes the introduction of context (or metadata) for governance actions. In addition, we've completed an update to the governance action page, which now displays this context, making it easier for users to cast informed votes.

Also this week, the Intersect product team gathered in London to outline the development roadmap for Govtool in Q2 in collaboration with some of the community builders involved in its development. We plan to wrap up the development of the new DRep directory and the delegation and DRep registration processes next week. We’ll share more on these developments and our plans for Q2 shortly, so remember to keep checking our updates here and in our knowledge base.

Govtool & SanchoNet

Govtool has seen a spike in activity, with over 40% growth in users testing the latest governance features coming to Cardano through SanchoNet! Check out the stats for the week:

Community and membership

Intersect members Mike Hornan and Summon Platform have collaborated on exploring governance parameters and scenarios visually, with a series of in-depth infographics. Check it out!

Intersect's February town hall

In our March town hall, we discussed community events, community tooling funding opportunities and developments, working groups, and other important topics. You can find a copy of the town hall deck here, and don’t worry if you missed it; you can find a recording here.

Register here if you’d like to participate in April’s town hall on 30th April at 16:00 UTC.

Intersect on Essential Cardano360

In other news, Intersect was featured on March’s Essential Cardano360. Funding opportunities & the DRep Pioneer Program were the key highlights, with the Chair of the Open Source Committee, Nicholas Clark of Tweag, sharing the latest. Watch it here.

This week's reminders

In this new reminder section, we’ll point out important points that we’ve perhaps shared before but are still relevant or active. There are often items that persist over time that we want everyone to notice!

• Our knowledge base continues to expand, and you can now find out more on all the current and proposed working groups supporting the various Intersect committees.
  
• We’re recruiting - a new role to support the consultation on Cardano’s constitution has become available - learn more about the role here
  
• The DRep Pioneer Program grant - just one week left to register your interest and apply to become a DRep workshop leader to co-design and deliver the DRep Pioneer course to the Cardano community. Up to ₳25,000 grants available. Express your interest
  
• Intersect returns to Tokyo in April for the Teamz Blockchain event. Jack Briggs, Intersect’s director of marketing and communications, will deliver a keynote speech on the main stage at 14:00 JST on April 13. If you are in the area or heading to Japan, Intersect members can access a special discount to attend - visit https://en.web3.teamz.co.jp and use the code INTERSECT2024 at checkout

We’re always interested in hearing more from you about subjects important to you, such as Cardano’s governance. If you have any questions, ideas, or suggestions, please get in touch via email, X, or LinkedIn.