The Tunable Quadratic Funding (TQF) project is an innovative initiative by the Token Engineering Commons (TEC), designed to enhance the traditional quadratic funding model by incorporating token signals to adjust donation weights. This approach allows for a more nuanced allocation of funds by considering donor attributes such as token holdings and subject matter expertise, which are used to boost the influence of contributions. The TQF tool is particularly focused on increasing sybil resistance and enabling communities to align resource allocation with their values through a transparent and informed process.

The TQF project has been applied in several funding rounds, including the Token Engineering Grants Rounds (TEGR), where it introduced the concept of subject matter expertise signal boosting (SMESB). This feature boosts donation weights based on expertise indicators, such as credentials from the Token Engineering Academy and $TEC token holdings. The purpose of TQF is to provide a research environment for grant operators and a tool for community round operators to employ tunable quadratic funding techniques, ultimately aiming to attract funding to token engineering public goods and the broader Web3 ecosystem.

The scope of the TQF project includes delivering a paper or extensive forum post with findings and recommendations, developing a TQF template for Round Operators and community members to easily apply to their QF rounds, and creating training materials for grant operators. The framework accommodates various methods for determining donor coefficients, such as historical contribution analysis and community voting mechanisms, allowing for customization and optimization of funding mechanisms. This flexibility empowers communities to experiment with funding approaches, leading to more equitable and effective public goods funding.