Let’s talk about how to gate a web3 community.
Community is web3’s biggest moat. There are many ways to gate your community, each with pros and cons.
Let's jump in.
No gating
Everyone is free to join.
If your objective is to go far and wide, let anyone in. It's inclusive but can also be chaotic. If you're using this approach, finding a core set of contributors before opening up access may be a good option.
Gating via fungible tokens
Access the community if you own enough tokens.
Friends With Benefits is a DAO focussed on culture. To be a part of the community, you need to own 75 $FWB tokens. Use this approach if you want to be selective with your community. However, it will make your community exclusionary. For example, at its current price it costs $3.3K to join FriendsWithBenefits.
Gating via non-fungible tokens
Members need to own an NFT to access the community.
Similar to the above, but more exclusionary. For example, the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) community requires you to own a BAYC NFT. The current floor price for BAYC is ~$260k. In short, if your community takes off, it will become exclusionary (because the price of the NFT has risen).
Gating based on contribution
Members unlock access based on their contribution.
This is the most inclusive model of gating. However, it's difficult to implement today. How do you measure contribution? Even if you could measure contribution, how do you store this on-chain?
Choose your gating mechanism based on your objectives and the stage of your community.