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09 - The Respect Game: Process

How a single weekly Respect Game session actually runs, end to end. ZAO Fractal’s flow is documented here; Eden Fractal and Optimism Fractal run the same shape on Fractalgram (Telegram) instead of Discord.

Preconditions

Before a member can participate in their first fractal:

  1. They have posted in the #introductions channel (one-time requirement).
  2. They have run the /register command to add their Optimism wallet to the bot’s registry.

After that, they can join any session.

Phase 1 - Gathering (async)

Members gather in the “Fractal Waiting Room” Discord voice channel.

  • Official session: Mondays 6pm EST.
  • Also runs anytime with 4+ unplayed members (a member is “unplayed” if they have not participated in the last 7 days).

Phase 2 - Randomization

A facilitator runs /randomize in the #fractals channel. The bot:

  1. Fetches everyone currently in the Fractal Waiting Room.
  2. Splits them into groups (max 6, min 2).
  3. Auto-moves members into voice channels (“Fractal Group 1”, “Fractal Group 2”, etc.).
  4. Posts a confirmation embed with group assignments.

Phase 3 - Presentations (4 minutes per speaker)

In each group’s voice channel, the facilitator runs /timer. The bot:

  1. Detects everyone currently in that voice channel.
  2. Posts a “Meet Your Group” embed with the speaker queue.
  3. Starts a 4-minute countdown per speaker.
  4. Displays interactive buttons: Done, Skip, Come Back Later, +1 Min, Raise Hand.
  5. Pause/Resume controls.

Each member describes their contributions over the past week. The 4-minute limit forces concision. Audio supports both Stream.io (default) and 100ms (with built-in transcription).

Phase 4 - Sequential elimination voting

The facilitator runs /zaofractal [fractal_number] [group_number] to start voting.

The voting flow goes Level 6 -> Level 1 (highest rank first):

  1. Bot posts 6 colored voting buttons (one per candidate).
  2. Bot joins voice channel and plays an ascending-pitch audio signal to indicate a new round.
  3. Each member clicks the button for whoever they think contributed the most.
  4. Votes are public - the bot announces each vote in the thread.
  5. Members can change their vote at any time during the round (button click updates the vote rather than adding to it).

Winner detection

A simple majority wins: threshold = ceil(group_size / 2). Example: a 4-person group needs at least 2 votes to lock in a winner.

Elimination loop

  1. The Level 6 winner receives 110 Respect (ZAO 2x curve) or 55 Respect (standard Fibonacci).
  2. The winner is removed from the next round.
  3. Remaining members vote on Level 5.
  4. Continue through Levels 5 -> 4 -> 3 -> 2 -> 1.
  5. The last remaining person (no vote needed) gets Level 1 (10 or 5 Respect).

Phase 5 - On-chain submission

The bot generates a pre-filled URL:

https://zao.frapps.xyz/submitBreakout?groupnumber=N
  &vote1=WALLET_OF_RANK_6
  &vote2=WALLET_OF_RANK_5
  &vote3=WALLET_OF_RANK_4
  &vote4=WALLET_OF_RANK_3
  &vote5=WALLET_OF_RANK_2
  &vote6=WALLET_OF_RANK_1

The wallets come from the bot’s /register registry. A facilitator opens the link, which launches a Vite SPA at zao.frapps.xyz. The SPA builds a transaction to the OREC contract on Optimism.

OREC stores the consensus on-chain. Later (after the OREC voting + veto windows close), the ZOR ERC-1155 Respect tokens are minted to the top performers’ wallets.

What “2/3 consensus” means in practice

The original Fractally protocol requires a 2/3 supermajority for the group’s final ranking. ZAO Fractal’s bot operationalizes this through per-rank simple majority votes in sequential elimination - over 6 sequential rounds with public, changeable votes, a strong supermajority effectively emerges. Members are expected to change votes when a clearer consensus appears.

Visibility bias - the honest limitation

Ranking rewards visible work. Loud social contributions (events, casts, conversation) tend to out-rank quiet infrastructure work (code, contracts, internal tools). Every fractal community knows this and mitigates it differently. ZAOstock’s sprint-fractal adaptation (Doc 498 in ZAO’s research library) prescribes:

  • Explicit infra-contribution framing during pre-session briefing
  • Facilitator pre-briefing on the week’s invisible-but-load-bearing work
  • Periodic infra-themed rounds where ranking criteria are intentionally tilted toward maintenance work

ZAO Fractal does not yet have a formal infra-bias mitigation in production, but it is a known design space.

Sources

  • ZAO internal research: Doc 188 (the bot process), Doc 109 (90+ weeks history), Doc 114 (live infrastructure), Doc 498 (ZAOstock sprint variant + bias mitigation)
  • github.com/bettercallzaal/fractalbotmarch2026 - the live bot codebase (private repo)
View source on GitHub →