A Complete Overview of the DAOs Ecosystem
Crypto Basics

A Complete Overview of the DAOs Ecosystem

36 Minuten
2 years ago

Everything you need to know about DAOs and the different purpose they serve.

A Complete Overview of the DAOs Ecosystem

Inhaltsverzeichnis

What Is a DAO?

Decentralized autonomous organizations, or DAOs, are groups or bodies with a hierarchical structure. They are internet-based organizations, collectively owned and organized by their members.
DAOs give us a way of collaborating with other people all over the world without ever meeting them. Members can establish their own rules and vote on key decisions using blockchain, and without bureaucracy or hierarchy.

As DAOs are built onto public blockchains, they are open source. Anyone can inspect their treasuries as all financial transactions are stored on the blockchain.

In a 2014 blog post, Vitalik Buterin described DAOs as follows:

“Instead of a hierarchical structure managed by a set of humans interacting in person and controlling property via the legal system, a decentralized organization involves a set of humans interacting with each other according to a protocol specified in code, and enforced on the blockchain.”

By giving every community member a say in how they function, DAOs democratize organizational decision making in a way that publicly traded companies like Amazon or Google simply can’t.

Many people consider the Bitcoin network to be the earliest example of a DAO, but by modern standards, Dash was the first “real” DAO, as it allowed stakeholders to vote through its governance mechanism.

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How Do DAOs Work?

As the name suggests, DAOs run autonomously by using smart contracts to execute its rules as defined by its creators. Although the creators of every DAO write its initial code, once it launches it’s up to the community to decide on how the organization operates.

Conversely, centralized organizations like Amazon host board meetings where shareholders vote on crucial decisions and the direction of the company. The CEO then ensures the decisions are carried out.

But in a DAO, there are no CEOs, nor is there a rigid hierarchy.

Every DAO token holder can submit changes, hold votes and influence the DAOs direction merely by holding tokens. The more tokens you hold — the more votes, and therefore influence — you have over the DAO.

When a change to the code or a new feature is approved through a vote, the DAO changes immediately. This allows code to carry out routine operations like hiring and firing for which centralised organisations need people.

Why Do DAOs Deserve our Attention?

DAOs offer entrepreneurs and innovators numerous long and short-term benefits that a traditional corporate structure cannot.

By carrying out business operations autonomously through smart contracts, DAOs are trustless. They don’t require you to put your faith in an individual or a boardroom of directors. Should an important developer or manager leave, the DAO will keep going.

DAOs are also censorship-resistant. They cannot be forcibly shut down by anyone, including government or regulatory bodies. Even the DAO’s creators cannot shut it down without the community of governance token holders approving the shutdown through a vote. Nobody can impose their will onto a DAO regardless of their position or authority.

DAOs offer many long-term benefits, too. They allow anyone holding a governance token to partake in the success of the project by contributing to the DAOs mission in a wide range of ways. These could include developing new code or features, fixing bugs, or contributing capital to an investment pool, among many others.

Should DAO creators establish and maintain a strong community culture, rather than focus on creating profits at all costs, they could encourage social incentives and increase participation and contributions from their communities.

Now that you're all caught up in DAOs, we will explore the different verticals of DAOs in the current ecosystem, starting with DAOs in the DeFi space.

DeFi DAOs

Forbes described DeFi’s 2020 explosion in popularity as a “revolution” in finance.

There are already hundreds of DeFi protocols built on Ethereum, many of which function as DAOs.

Given the widespread media coverage of the DeFi revolution, it was only a matter of time before DAOs started to garner widespread media attention as well.

Although DAOs are springing up in practically every business vertical, DeFi currently has the highest concentration of DAOs.

This section looks at four of the most popular DeFi DAOs: MakerDAO, Uniswap, AAVE and Compound.

MakerDAO

MakerDAO is, as the name suggests, a DAO built to facilitate the borrowing and lending of cryptocurrencies without an intermediary. The protocol is built on the Ethereum network and uses smart contracts to manage the loans on its platform.

What Makes MakerDAO Important?

The Maker protocol allows you to put up cryptocurrency like ETH as collateral in exchange for a loan paid out in DAI.
DAI is a stablecoin pegged to USD and regulated by the Maker platform and its community. DAI is already used by more than four hundred apps and services across the DeFi space, and has a market cap of over $9.3B, making it the fifth most valuable stablecoin.

To take out a loan through MakerDAO, you first open a Maker collateral vault and deposit some crypto as collateral, for which you’ll receive a corresponding amount of DAI. Your vault is a smart contract on the Ethereum blockchain that holds your money collateral in escrow until you return the DAI.

To take out a loan on Maker, you must overcollateralize. This means you must put up more collateral than the value of DAI you want to receive. This might appear strange or even pointless, but the benefit here is that you can exchange a risky asset for a stable asset to protect your downside.

If your collateral’s value drops enough that it no longer covers the amount of DAI on loan, your collateral is automatically liquidated through an auction.

Should the auction fail to generate enough DAI to pay your debt, it becomes “protocol debt”, which is covered by a buffer pool containing the fees generated by the platform. If there isn’t enough Dai in the buffer, the protocol automatically mints new MKR tokens and sells them for DAI to repay the debt.

How Does MakerDAO’s Governance System Work?

The MakerDAO protocol is governed by a community of MKR token holders. MKR holders assign varying risk parameters to each collateral asset that you can stake in exchange for Dai.

Anyone with an Ethereum address can submit a proposal to change the protocol, but only MKR governance token holders can vote on new proposals. Holders can vote on a variety of platform changes, such as:

  • Adding new assets for users to put up as collateral
  • Changing the risk parameters of existing collateral loans
  • Choosing emergency oracles.

Maker’s emergency oracles are hand-picked by MKR holders. They can trigger emergency shutdowns to protect the protocol from attacks.

Uniswap DAO

Uniswap is an Ethereum-based decentralised exchange (DEX), running on an automated market maker (AMM) model and offering peer-to-peer trading of various token pairs. The protocol was established in 2018 by a former engineer from Siemens, Hayden Adams.

What Makes Uniswap Important?

Uniswap’s governance token, UNI, launched in September 2020 and boasts the largest market cap of any DAO token — currently valued at over $12.5B. Like MakerDAO, trades on the Uniswap protocol rely on smart contracts, making it a transparent and trustless platform.
Uniswap relies on liquidity pools to ensure trades go through without delay. To ensure its liquidity pools remain, well, liquid, the protocol rewards users who choose to lend their crypto with a share of the gas fees from that pool.

There’s no registration required and no third party watching over the markets and individual transactions. As soon as you link your wallet to the platform, you’re ready to trade.

How Does Uniswap DAO's Governance System Work?

By holding UNI tokens, you can vote on proposed changes to the protocol. Token holders who don’t wish to submit proposals or vote on proposals submitted by others can delegate their tokens to other users.

To propose governance actions, you must hold at least ten million UNI. Keep in mind that you don’t necessarily need to own this much UNI — other users can delegate their UNI to you.

Once a change is proposed, the community deliberates and vote on it for 3 days. If at least four million votes are cast, and a majority votes in favour of the change, the proposal is placed in a time lock for two days before being executed.

Some upgrades, like changes to the risk system, are subject to a longer 30-day delay as a failsafe feature.

AAVE

AAVE is a DeFi protocol designed for the lending and borrowing of cryptocurrencies and stablecoins without an intermediary. AAVE was built on Ethereum and incorporates a complex system of smart contracts to manage the assets and loans on its platform.

What Makes Aave Important?

Like MakerDAO and Uniswap, AAVE requires you to put up collateral before you can borrow money, and you can only borrow up to the value of your collateral. This functionality gives you a way to gain exposure to certain assets without owning them.

You can also earn interest on your assets by committing them to a liquidity pool. When you deposit your assets, the AAVE protocol gives you a corresponding amount of aTokens which are pegged to the value of your assets.

Your aTokens will continuously earn interest for the time you hold onto them. You will also earn some of the fees generated from AAVE’s flash loans feature.

Different assets will earn your different interest rates depending on the asset’s risk and stability. For example, if you put up LINK, you’ll create and receive aLINK tokens, which might earn you more interest than if you had deposited ETH and created aETH tokens.

How Does Aave DAO's Governance System Work?

For the first few years after AAVE launched, only developers could propose changes to the protocol. But in September 2020, AAVE protocol transferred ownership rights from developers to AAVE token holders.

If you buy and hold AAVE tokens, you can propose alterations and new features to the platform as well as vote on other users’ proposed changes. Each AAVE holder receives “governance powers proportionally to the sum of their balance.”

In other words, the more tokens you hold, the more sway you hold over the platform’s direction by either submitting new proposals or voting on proposals submitted by other users.

Unlike other protocols, you can delegate your proposal and voting powers separately to other AAVE holders — you don’t need to transfer both to a single user.

Compound

Compound is a DeFi lending protocol that gives you an easy way to earn interest on your crypto by pooling it with other users. Compound sits on the Ethereum network and supports eighteen tokens including Tether, ETH, UNI and LINK.

What Makes Compound DAO Important?

When you deposit crypto into one of Compound’s pools, you receive cTokens with a value corresponding to the amount of crypto you deposited. CTokens are the Compound protocol’s native token which acts as a contract between you (the lender) and someone wanting to borrow crypto from the protocol.

Each asset has its own cToken. For example, if you deposit ETH, you will receive cETH. You can redeem your deposited assets and any accrued interest by returning your cTokens.

Compound pays out interest to lenders in a slightly different way than other DeFi lending platforms. Instead of paying out interest to your wallet, the exchange rate of your cTokens to the crypto you deposited increases over time, allowing you to withdraw more crypto from the pool than you deposited.

Should you decide to borrow from Compound, you needn’t give over personal documents to secure the loan. Instead, you must overcollateralize, which, as explained above, means you need to put up assets worth more than the amount you want to borrow.

Should your collateral drop below a minimum amount, the protocol will automatically liquidate your assets to repay the loan. As soon as the loan and fees are repaid, you can withdraw your assets.

How Does Compound DAO's Governance System Work?

The COMP token is the governance token for the Compound protocol. By holding at least 100 COMP tokens, you can create a proposal outlining changes to the protocol such as interest rates or the addition of a new market.
But for the community to vote on your proposal, your address must have at least 65,000 COMP delegated to it. There’s then a 3-day voting process, which requires at least 400,000 yes votes to pass, after which your proposal enters the time lock for two days. The reason for the two-day delay is to allow people who disagree with any changes to withdraw their assets from the platform before the changes go live.

COMP tokens work similarly to the other DAO tokens described above, in that one token is equal to one vote, and you can delegate your votes to any other user.

DAO Operating Systems

DAOs are often tricky to use, and joining a DAO usually requires a working knowledge of the latest crypto lingo.

Building your own DAO and growing a loyal community is even harder, especially given that building a working tech stack requires significant experience, as well as plenty of trial and error.

Fortunately for budding DAO builders, there are DAOs that exist to serve that purpose — creating a DAO!

Upstream DAO

Upstream has developed tools which make building DAOs significantly easier.

Upstream is a “next-generation networking platform,” which facilitates both live and virtual events where members can meet one another and collaborate.

The platform has numerous communities for a number of different professional and vocational interests, including healthcare, podcasts and female-founded firms.

Upstream’s collection of DAO building tools are part of “Upstream Collectives”, the platforms newest venture. Collectives is still in Beta mode, but you can join the NFT community now.

Upstream’s collectives are similar to the DAOs you’re no doubt already familiar with, only they’re a bit easier to use and set up. The reason for the name change is to try to encourage crypto-wide move away from technical lingo, which can deter newer crypto users from signing up.

Each Upstream collective is an independent community sharing a single Ethereum wallet. Members of each Collective contribute funds to the shared community wallet, and each member can vote on or propose original changes to the DAO, as well as suggest projects for its community.

Upstream aims to give founders and creators a much easier time building their own DAOs by integrating the entire DAO tech stack into one place, rather than spreading all of the community’s resources out over multiple apps, DApps and platforms.

Unlike most other DAOs you’ve either heard of or even joined, Upstream doesn’t use on-chain voting.

Instead, Upstream’s Collectives designate representatives called signatories who execute proposals on the blockchain once a proposal has garnered enough votes to pass.

This novelty does mean that Collectives aren’t quite as decentralized as other DAOs — a trade-off which allows Upstream help non-tech folks build DAOs without as much hassle but might ruffle the feathers of a few crypto-natives.

To find out more about Upstream’s Collectives, check out the official webpage here, or the team’s announcement post here.

Syndicate DAO

Syndicate’s founders are Will Papper and Ian Lee, both of whom worked at IDEO prior to launching Syndicate.

Syndicate’s overarching vision is to help us to move away from outdated, traditional economic frameworks, and into a future where the majority of economic coordination and investing happens through DAOs.

What Makes Syndicate DAO Important?

To achieve this lofty goal, Syndicate is building the tools to make building DAOs, as well as finding and connecting into new DAOs, much easier for everyone. In time, Syndicate’s founders hope this will position Syndicate as a leading DAO social network for Web 3.0, as well as the go-to place for building DAOs.

In an interview with CoinDesk, Syndicate’s co-founder Ian Lee said:

“We have a strong hypothesis that the next frontier of decentralized finance and crypto is social networks… The only thing that can't be forked is the community, and we take that to the next level with the only thing that can't be forked," which is "the social network.”

The Syndicate team has attracted significant interest and funding from a mixture of community and venture capital, including $800,000 in June from a pool of 100 Syndicate community investors, $1 million in a seed round led by IDEO CoLab Ventures in March, and $20 million from a Series A funding round including notable investors like a16z, Ohanian and Snoop Dogg in August this year.

How Does Syndicate DAO's Governance System Work?

Syndicate allows for the creation of decentralized investment vehicles that run as DAOs, with the intention of democratizing how capital is raised and allocated. Users can register for beta access currently, and governance mechanism specifics are expected to firm up as the platform launches.

For teams looking to merge their digital plans with real-world use cases, Syndicate has made it easier to link your on-chain Syndicate DAO with a real-world company, like an LLC.

Syndicate’s existing DAO creation tools have enabled the development of DAOs such as:

  • Audacity, which is a VC fund investing in black and African founders, as well as emerging and overlooked markets.
  • Delphi InfiNFT, which plans to push the NFT ecosystem forward through shared investing.

If you’re looking for more information or updates from Syndicate, check out the official webpage here.

DAOstack

DAOstack is another platform looking to drive growth in the DAO space and contribute to reducing our collective reliance on centralized organizational structures.

What Makes DAOstack Important?

The platform’s founders have developed a new kind of problem-solving toolkit, one which new or existing organizations can adopt to create a scalable DAO structure, which will (hopefully) accelerate our collective capacity to solve the world's most pressing problems.
DAOstack’s toolkit is a modular, open-source software stack, which includes a vast library of governance protocols which users can choose from when building a DAO, as well as a user-friendly UI for both creating and managing DAOs.

The toolkit also includes peer-to-peer decision making modules, enabling fully decentralized decision-making capabilities and more fluid governance.

Gigi Levy-Weiss, the famed Israeli entrepreneur and one of DAOstack’s investors, describes the platform as:

“The complete decentralized end-to-end tech layer for governance of large organizations. It can be a decentralized Wikipedia; it can also be a decentralized investment fund or decentralized insurance network.”

How Does DAOstack's Governance System Work?

DAOstack’s toolkit was designed for maximum scalability, which enables newly created DAOs to link in with existing DAOs. And as the network of DAOs grows, all its member organizations will benefit from an innovative and collaborative network.

It would be inaccurate to classify DAOstack as merely a framework for building DAOs. It’s actually closer to the foundation or bedrock on which an entirely new and scalable DAO ecosystem can grow and thrive.

For more information on DAOstack, check out the whitepaper here, or the official Medium post here.

Investment DAOs

As internet-native communities flourish in the crypto space, it is no surprise that DAOs are created to pool together capital and expertise, and invest in up-and-coming crypto projects in this innovative space. These DAOs are fashioned in a similar way to venture capital funds, working directly with founders and projects to ensure their success.

BitDAO

BitDAO’s principal aim is to support open, decentralized finance. It position its community at the heart of the crypto space through investing in promising DeFi projects.
The BitDAO community collaborates with DeFi projects through token swaps and joint development initiatives which, over time, grows the DAO’s treasury size.

What Makes BitDAO Important?

Today, the BitDAO treasury’s value is approaching the $3 billion mark, and is mostly made up of ETH, Tether, USDC and BIT tokens.

So far, BitDAO has received support and funding from a number of leading investors, one of which is Peter Thiel, who famously co-founded PayPal and was the first outside investor in Facebook.

BitDAO also has a grants program, which go to teams researching or developing new products which could be of great public use for the crypto industry. Like the DAO’s investment proposals, new grants are proposed by and voted on by the BitDAO community.

How Does BitDAO’s Governance System Work?

BIT tokens are the DAO’s governance token. BIT holders can propose new functions or features for the DAO, as well as vote on proposals by other members of the DAO, which might include new protocols for the DAO to either invest in or from a partnership with.

BIT holders can also request funding from other community members in exchange for building new features for the DAO itself.

The BitDAO treasury keeps hold of 30% of all BitDAO tokens in circulation, which the DAO’s members can use to swap for the tokens of any new promising protocols they want to invest in.

For more information about BitDAO, check out the Litepaper here.

Flamingo

Flamingo was launched in October 2020 by LAO DAO, a for-profit community-based DAO which supports crypto and blockchain projects.
While most other investment platforms and DAOs in the crypto space focus on trading tokens, Flamingo’s strategy chiefly focuses on buying and holding non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
NFTs have enjoyed a surge in popularity in the past year, the acronym “NFT” was even named Collins Dictionary’s word of the year, much to the dismay of the “Bitcoin’s a bubble” brigade.

What Makes Flamingo DAO Important?

The LAO community has been deeply entrenched in the NFT world since the early days, so building a new DAO focusing on NFTs was a logical next step.

NFT proponents have high hopes for this novel form of digital ownership.

Some members of Flamingo believe that NFTs could eventually move the internet to an entirely new kind of ownership model. One in which creators are adequately paid for their work and collaborate without pesky intermediaries.

As such, the Flamingo DAO community wants to position itself right at the heart of the new, decentralized creative economy.

How Does Flamingo DAO's Governance System Work?

In typical DAO fashion, the Flamingo community decides which NFTs to buy and add to the DAO’s collection by popular vote.
The Flamingo community’s long-term aims include:
  • Commissioning digital artworks from prominent NFT artists
  • Investing in up-and-coming NFT artists
  • Collecting and archiving important pieces of NFT history.
  • Building a digital gallery to showcase all of Flamingo’s collected works
  • Eventually supporting and investing in additional community NFT infrastructure
  • Fractionalising the DAO’s NFTs to use them with DeFi platforms, among other uses
In a somewhat unusual move, Flamingo recently organized as an LLC in Delaware, USA, with some help from Open Law. This affords Flamingo DAO members some additional legal protections under US law, including shielding from Flamingo’s financial liabilities.
While the added protection is certainly a bonus, operating as an LLC does raise the barrier of entry for new members, as you have to be an accredited investor to sign up.
For more information about Flamingo, see the FAQ section here, or the official announcement Medium post here.
To see the Flamingo NFT gallery, see here.

Komorebi

Komorebi was founded by an all women team with experience across the blockchain space, many of whom were also members of she256 and Women in Blockchain.

The community’s name, “Komorebi,” is a Japanese expression used to describe the illumination of a forest’s mossy undergrowth as sunlight filters through the trees and leaves — a reference to the team’s focus on supporting unseen yet important creatives in the crypto startup space.

Komorebi was built with help from Syndicate, another DAO features in the “Operating Systems” section of this list.

What Makes Komorebi DAO Important?

Kinjal Shah, describes the Komorebi’s members decision to adopt a DAO structure as follows, “DAOs level the hierarchy of a venture fund by ensuring everyone is going to have a seat at the table.”
In 2019, Harvard Business Review reported that only 2.8% of funding went to women-led startups, which marked a depressingly low record high.

This severe lack of diversity in the crypto and blockchain space is precisely what Komorebi aims to address. The community’s plan is to invest in crypto founders and entrepreneurs from demographics who are often snubbed or overlooked, namely women and people identifying as non-binary.

How Does Komorebi DAO's Governance System Work?

When the DAO’s members invest in a new project, they also provide them with the tools, resources and advice they need to grow and succeed. Each new investment is proposed and voted on by the members of the DAO.

So far, Komorebi has been backed by Kleiner Perkins, Mechanism Capital, and Dragonfly Capital.
To learn more about Komorebi, check out the team’s Twitter profile here, and the Medium page here.

Grants DAOs

Crypto grants are used to entice promising new projects to the crypto ecosystem and support the development of existing incumbents. This year, numerous layer 1 protocols, competing directly with Ethereum, have launched grants in the form of developent funds. The largest is arguably Near protocol, with $800M offered in grant. Other notable blockchains include Fantom ($314M), Harmony ($300M), Avalanche ($180M) and Celo ($100M). DAOs are also getting into the action.

Moloch DAO

Moloch was birthed into the world on Valentine’s Day, 2019.

The DAO’s name “Moloch” comes from the Canaanite god of child sacrifice, which is a joking reference to humanity’s futile efforts and abysmal track record of coordinating to solve large-scale problems.

The DAO’s stated goal is to solve the “problems associated with collective action, where individual incentives are misaligned with globally optimal outcomes.”

What Makes Moloch DAO Important?

In other words, Moloch wants to coordinate funding for open-source infrastructure on the Ethereum blockchain which, without a DAO structure in place designed to address this problem, probably wouldn’t happen.

Moloch’s community is dead set on focusing on making the world a better place, rather than of profits. Point 3 of the DAO’s Manifesto even states “We can take a punch to the face and still remain optimistic that we can manifest this world to be better, much better.”

Moloch’s simplicity sets it apart from other DAOs, as it functions as a minimum-viable DAO. It’s structure centres around a simple smart contract functionality, which greatly reduces the chances of the platform being hacked.

Moloch’s success hasn’t gone unnoticed — its smart contracts have already been forked more than a hundred times to create new DAOs, including MetaCartel’s grant DAO.

How Does Moloch DAO's Governance System Work?

Every Moloch DAO member can propose grants for projects designed to build some kind of crypto-related public good or infrastructure, which the other members of Moloch’s community vote on.

If any member doesn’t support a proposal which passes by popular vote, they can withdraw their funds in what’s called a rage quit.

In 2020, Moloch v2 was released, which added some much needed additional functionality to the original framework, including multiple token support and “guild kicks” for members removing other members from the DAO.

Soon after Moloch’s launch, Vitalik Buterin and Joseph Lubin both donated 1000 ETH apiece to get things off the ground.

According the Moloch’s handbook, the DAO has so far given out at least $700,000 in grants to infrastructure projects.
For more information about Moloch, check out the original whitepaper here, or the DAO’s Medium blog here. Also, the official MolochDAO handbook makes for an interesting read, as does Scott Alexander’s Meditations on Moloch” essay, which is referenced throughout Moloch’s whitepaper.

Audius

Creative artists being underhandedly ripped off or unfairly rewarded for their work is a long-standing problem, but it’s one which Audius aims to solve.

Audius is a blockchain-based music streaming DAO which is owned and managed entirely by its community of creative artists and avid listeners. It’s essentially a decentralized alternative to Spotify, Soundcloud, or Apple Music.

What Makes Audius DAO Important?

Today, the global music industry generates more than $40 billion per year in revenue, just 12% of which goes to the artists creating the music.

Through decentralization and shared governance, Audius is able to fairly renumerate artists rather than record labels or corporations.

Musicians can create, share and monetize their music on the Audius platform without needing to sign a record deal. What’s more, the platform is entirely free for both artists and end users — there’s no limit to track uploads or listens, and there are no strings attached.

How Does Audius DAO's Governance System Work?

The Audius platform lives on Solana and is governed by a community of AUDIO token holders who can propose and vote on changes to the platform.
In April, the Audius community passed a proposal to create the AUDIO Grants Committee, which will distribute AUDIO tokens to artists in the community.

AUDIO token grants will also be given to users who:

  • Win remix contests
  • Host live streams showcasing Audius music
  • Curate community playlists
  • Hosting Audius music festivals

Although Audius is generating a lot of excitement among musicians, there isn’t yet an arbitration system for artists to resolve copyright infringement claims.

However, the team is working on a solution which will involve a network of third-party arbitrators and community members voting on the outcomes of moderation cases.

Audius has forged partnerships with some big names in the music industry, one of whom is Joel Zimmerman (deadmau5), who had this to say about Audius:

“As an artist, I spend much of my time seeing around the corner to the future of the industry, and Audius is clearly the way forward. I’m thrilled to join this team.”
Besides Deadmau5, Audius has received support from some well-known music industry figures, including Katy Perry, The Chainsmokers, Jason Derulo and Nas.
For more information about Audius, check out the Audius whitepaper.

Sevens Foundation

The Sevens Foundation is a non-profit DAO dedicated to supporting up and coming artists.
The official website states Sevens’s mission is to “spotlight emerging artists and share their creativity with the world,” while also addressing the lack of respect and attention digital art receives from the traditional fine art world.

What Makes Sevens Foundation DAO Important?

The Foundation carries out its aim through a grants program which gives both artists and curators the tools they need to create art as well as exhibitions.

A grant from Seven covers the costs of publishing artworks in a show, which gives fledgling artists an easier way to network with other artists and art curators.

Seven’s exhibitions are designed to closely mimic the experience of viewing physical artworks in a traditional gallery, only digitally.

The first grant program supported 317 artists from 60 countries, many of whom were disadvantaged by circumstances outside of their control.

Tim Kang, an engineer and avid NFT collector, supported the foundation’s first grant program, with a little help from Paris Hilton.

Kang said he was inspired to offer the grants to combat the high gas fees required to mint NFTs, which still remain a financial barrier to entry for disadvantaged young artists.

In August this year, Hilton curated her own exhibition called “Empowered by Paris: Empowered Women Empower Women Exhibition.”

As the NFT space grows and more artists look to blockchain-based platforms and DAOs to monetize their work, Sevens hopes to scale along with it.

How Does Seven Foundation DAO's Governance System Work?

The platform connects both sides of the art world — curators that want to view submissions from emerging and undiscovered talent can provide grants, while up-and-coming artists can access resources to help kickstart their career.

The Foundation uses an OpenSea API, so the process of bidding and listing NFT artworks is the same as on OpenSea.

However, Sevens doesn’t provide price data on each artwork, which the DAO’s members believe creates a bias toward pieces with higher historic prices.

For more information about the Sevens Foundation, check out the official website here.

Collector DAOs

Whale DAO

Whale DAO boasts one of the largest community-owned collections of NFTs, and has tens of thousands of members across the world.

What Makes Whale DAO Important?

Whale was launched by the infamous NFT collector — WhaleShark, who launched Whale DAO to build a community of like-minded people who could invest in NFTs together.

WhaleShark was initially responsible for curating the community’s NFT collection, but the community eventually migrated to a DAO structure to enable faster growth.

How Does Whale DAO's Governance System Work?

Whale is governed by a community of WHALE token holders, who can propose changes to the platform as well as suggest which NFTs the DAO should buy, sell, and rent.
The WHALE token is fairly unique as it derives its value from its 13,000 NFTs, which are stored in the Whale Vault.

Conceptually, backing a token with NFTs is somewhat similar to the gold standard, in which a paper currency like the dollar is backed by a store of physical gold, only with more volatility.

Whale DAO’s vault contains an extensive range of digital artworks from popular digital artists and games, as well as metaverse NFTs like the 1600 land units from the Sandbox game the Whale community recently purchased.
For details on exactly how the Whale DAO works, see the official Whale DAO docs here.

PleasrDAO

PleasrDAO started out as a “quick DAO” with the sole aim of pooling funds to buy a single NFT; a short advert for Uniswap designed by the meme creator and digital artist @pplpleasr1 — who came to fame for designing the cover of Fortune Magazine crypto edition.

What Makes PleasrDAO Important?

The DAO’s website states it’s mission is to “buy and fund culturally significant pieces and then create something fundamentally additive to the soul of the piece before sharing it back with the community.

Although PleasrDAO originally comprised just 23 Ethereum addresses, they successfully collaborated and won the auction for 310 ETH, worth roughly $525,000 at the time, all of which went to charity.

But after the sale, PleasrDAO had $250,000 left over in its treasury. The DAO members decided to continue collecting digital artworks which represent important movements and causes.

How Does PleasrDAO's Governance System Work?

Like other NFT collecting DAOs, Pleasr is experimenting with fractional asset ownership, which will allow it to blend DeFi with community ownership and digital art.

Today, the PleasrDAO community consists of “DeFi leaders, early NFT collectors and digital artists who have built a formidable yet benevolent reputation for acquiring culturally significant pieces with a charitable twist.”
In the nine months since PleasrDAO began, its community has already purchased a number of iconic NFTs, including the original “Doge” Shiba Inu photo. The Pleasr community forked out the princely sum of 1696 ETH for this iconic NFT, which at the time had a value of $5.5 million.
The community’s collections includes several other noteworthy NFTs created by Edward Snowden and the band Pussy Riot, a member of which is also a PleasrDAO member.

PleasrDAO’s headline-grabbing purchase occurred in October this year, when the community nabbed the first copy of Wu-Tang Clan’s new album, Once Upon a Time in Shaolin.

The Pleasr community won’t be able to sell the album commercially, despite paying $4 million for it, but the album’s ownership deed has been minted as an NFT.
Click here to see the full PleasrDAO gallery or read more about the DAO.

Social DAOs

Friends With Benefits DAO

Friends with Benefits is a community dedicated to building a fairer economy for creative professionals.

The FWB community launched as a token-gated Discord server, but it’s now home to thousands of renowned Web 3.0 creative leaders and personalities.

What Makes Friends With Benefits DAO Important?

The founder if the $FWB community, Trevor McFedries, said during an interview that the platform was born from an effort to create a more collectivist, social approach to rewarding content creators and artists.

FWB is a community of “creators, rebels, artists, thinkers, and doers” who, through the FWB platform and eventual implementation of Web 3.0, aim to shape the future.

The FWB community has forged some impressive projects already, including an official FWB gallery, which auctioned off several notable NFT artworks, including a piece titled “DRINK MY BLOOD”, created by the Russian band Pussy Riot.
The FWB community have also thrown a number of IRL parties, including a “token-gated rave” in Paris.

How Does Friends With Benefits DAO Governance System Work?

The platform’s community is tied together through shared ownership of a social token, FWB.

To join FWB, you have to own a minimum quantity of FWB tokens, which gives you an ownership stake in the DAO.

Each new member has to go through an application process, all of which are reviewed and voted on by the community.

The application process to join FWB involves filling out an “About You” questionnaire, which asks about your professional and life experiences, as well as what you’d like to contribute to the community.

There’s a finite supply of 1 million tokens, and each member needs at least 75 to join the community, meaning there’s a member ceiling of around 13,333 members.

Once through the application, you get access to the full FWB ecosystem, including:

  • Learning and Education
  • Lifestyle and Culture
  • NFT and Trading
  • Cities
  • Events
  • Governance
FWB suffered a serious hack in March but managed to bounce back impressively quickly. On April 1, 2021 this year, the community launched $FWB Season Two, in which the community migrated to a DAO model.
For more info about FWB, check out the official website here.

Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC)

BAYC started out as a fairly innocuous NFT collection launch in April this year.

But seemingly overnight, BAYC transformed into a global community with a pretty exclusive (and famous) membership.

What Makes BAYC DAO Important?

The Tonight Show’s Jimmy Fallon has aped in, announcing on Twitter that he’s the proud owner of Bored Ape #599. Similarly, Post Malone spent an eye watering $700k on his two Bored Apes, and DJ Khaled and Steph Curry have also joined the party.
Media coverage for the Bored Apes has been extraordinary so far, and has included a limited edition front cover of Rolling Stone magazine.

During the initial launch, all apes cost 0.08 ETH, but have since risen dramatically in price.

Between the Nov. 10, 2021 to Nov. 17, more than 23,000 ETH in volume was traded in the Bored Ape collection, and the average price per NFT rose by nearly 400% to around $200,000.
Two Bored Ape collections sold through Sotheby’s auction house for a combined $26 million.

How Does BAYC DAO Governance System Work?

To join BAYC, you have to own one of only 10,000 Bored Ape NFTs, each of which is unique and has varying attributes, expressions and attire.

Unlike most other NFTs, Bored Ape NFT holders own the intellectual property for their NFT, so they can use the image however they want. One BAYC member even managed to cover their Porsche with a decal of their Mutant Ape.
Your Bored Ape acts as both your Yacht Club membership card, and gives you access to various members-only benefits, including access to a “collaborative graffiti board” called “THE BATHROOM”.
The Bathroom is a shared digital canvas on which BAYC members can “drawl, scrawl, or write expletives.”

Loads of exciting events and new features are planned for BAYC members, including collaborations with big brands, a festival in NYC, and a BAYC-themed blockchain game.

Membership to the BAYC also gives you access to the official private Discord, as well as the possibility of receiving some free additional NFTs from the Bored Ape Kennel Club or Mutant Ape Yacht Club NFTs.
BAYCs biggest real-life event so far was Ape Fest 2021, which featured a real yacht party and a show featuring Christ Rock, Aziz Ansari and the Strokes.

Right now, the community’s focus seems to be on promoting the Yacht Club through merchandise like Bored Ape skateboards, basketballs and t-shirts.

If you happen to have a spare 40ETH, you can pick up your own Bored Ape NFT on OpenSea here.
To check out BAYC’s plans for its governance token, see this thread.

Bright Moments DAO

Bright Moments is a DAO specialising in “live NFT minting experience,” which usually takes place in art galleries or other public spaces.

What Makes Bright Moments DAO Important?

Bright Moments revolves around its Crypto Citizens NFTs, all of which are unique and created by the DAO’s community.

Bright Moments started out as a popup NFT gallery where local artists could show their work in Venice Beach, California. You can check out some of the Crypto Venetians for sale on OpenSea here.

The DAO has released three distinct NFT collections so far:

  • Crypto Galacticans
  • Crypto Venetians
  • Crypto NewYorkers

How Does the Bright Moments DAO Governance System Work?

By owning a Crypto Citizen, you gain membership to the Bright Moments DAO, which lets you take part in the platform’s governance and take part in live minting events.

Every Crypto Citizen NFT is minted at a live event, and like CryptoPunks and Bored Apes, each NFT has unique attributes and clothing making some rarer and more valuable.

To get hold of a crypto citizen, you’ll either need to buy one on the secondary market on OpenSea, or purchase a “Golden Token,” which guarantees you a minting reservation in New York up until the end of 2021.

The next NFT collection on the roadmap is Crypto Berliners, which will include 1000 new Berlin-themed NFTs, bringing to DAOs total up to 4000 Crypto Citizens.

Golden Tokens for the Berlin event were available from November 19th this year, and the live minting events are planned for Spring 2022.

Service DAO

Neptune DAO

Neptune DAO is a project devoted to supplying DeFi and blockchain projects with sustainable, long-term liquidity.
The project was announced in March this year by the LAO — Limited Liability Autonomous Organization — as its DeFi support extension, and publicly launched on April 2, 2021.

Another of LAO’s secondary DAOs — Flamingo — is described in the “Investment DAOs” section of this guide.

During its incubation period, Neptune raised $20 million in initial funding, and describes itself as the “first liquidity DAO.”

What Makes Neptune DAO Important?

Neptune members pool their capital and vote on which DeFi protocols to supply liquidity to. The community is full of members who have been involved with Ethereum and DeFi since the early days.

This liquidity is provided by the DAO as a both a service to the DeFi space and an investment for the DAOs members.

Without Neptune’s liquidity, some of the DeFi protocols would otherwise have to rely on venture capitalists for initial funding and liquidity. So far, Neptune has contributed 10,200 ETH to DeFi liquidity pools, worth around $43 million at the time of writing.

How Does the Neptune DAO Governance System Work?

All proposals are debated on and discussed through the Neptune DApp, and any member can propose a new liquidity pool or investment strategy to the community.

In classic DAO fashion, there are no managers or directors of Neptune — members have fully democratized control of the DAOs direction and operations via its voting mechanism.

The DAO’s community benefits from membership through shared gas costs and a wider knowledge pool of emerging DeFi opportunities.

So far, only 70 members can join, but a further 29 members will be able to join eventually. Each member must deposit a minimum of 60 ETH, and the maximum contribution is 540 ETH. Every DAO member has the rights to any profits proportional to their share of the DAO’s total pool.

While the community is a tight-knit for now, there are plans for “additional liquidity-focused DAOs, independently operated but adjacent to Neptune,” which will enable people without the required 60 ETH to get involved with Neptune.
For more information about Neptune DAO, see the official docs here.

YAP DAO

YAP DAO is the latest brainchild from YAP Global Ltd, a leading DeFi, crypto, and Web 3.0 PR agency.

The DAO describes its principal service as “translating crypto and DeFi for the world.”

What Makes YAP DAO Important?

The platform was built to address the shortage of communications experts, savvy marketers and killer content creators in DeFi, blockchain and crypto.

The DAO’s members have so far focused on offering PR and communications services to protocols in the DeFi space, but their seven core services include:

  • Media Relations
  • Strategic Communications
  • Brand Positioning
  • Investor Relations
  • Crisis Communications
  • Media Training
  • Events Management
The platform also functions as a marketplace for people with non-technical skills — particularly those with creative, marketing, or communications experience — to work in the highly technical crypto and blockchain fields.
Currently, YAP is working with DAOhaus, a widely revered DAO explorer which allows you to join DAOs or create your own DAO, and which also features in this guide.

How Does the YAP DAO Governance System Work?

To join YAP DAO, you’ll need to pledge 500 DAI (which represents your ownership share of the DAO), and you’ll need experience in public relations or communications. Also, having a working knowledge of DAOs and crypto will certainly help your application.

YAP doesn’t currently have a token, but Samantha Yap, the DAO’s founder, hinted in a Medium blog post that there could be one in the future, and that early participation will be rewarded.

DAOhaus

DAOhaus came alive at ETH Berlin 2019, and its community aims to support an entire ecosystem of DAOs. In other words, the aim is to become the “house” of DAOs.
The DAO takes its name from a German art school called Staatliches Bauhaus, a leader in the Avant Garde modern art movement of the early 20th century, renowned for a combination of fine art and modernism and real-world functionality.

What Makes DAOhaus Important?

The platform’s manifesto states that the DAO’s core objective is to “empower anyone adding value to the DAOhaus ecosystem, regardless of their social status or previous accolades.

You can use the DAOhaus platform to discover and join new and interesting DAOs related to your particular interests or career.

How Does the DAOhaus Governance System Work?

Just like in other DAOs, DAOhaus members can submit proposals or initiatives, as well as rage-quit to receive their remaining contribution should DAOhaus move in a direction they don’t like.

Initially, owning the platform’s native token (HAUS) didn’t entitle you to DAO shares, which had to be earned through “continued value-added actions.”
However, that novelty was changed during first community contribution offering (CCO), in which raised an amazing 1.1 million WXDAI in just eighty seconds.
DAOhaus was built using Moloch, another DAO described in the “Grants DAOs” section of this guide. As such, all the DAOs you can access through DAOhaus are all Moloch DAOs.

DAOhaus also enables you to build your own DAO using the Moloch framework.

By launching through DAOhaus, you can market your DAO to existing DAOhaus members, which gives you a faster and easier route to growing your DAO’s community.

Although only Moloch DAOs are available right now, the community is looking to explore DAOstack integrations and a number of different DAO configurations to further expand its ecosystem.

Media DAO

PubDAO

PubDAO aims to become the Associated Press of the crypto and blockchain media space. The new decentralized media platform was launched in October this year by members of Decrypt, the Defiant and ACJR (Association of Cryptocurrency Journalists and Researchers).

What Makes PubDAO Important?

In the words of PubDAO’s creators, the platform is a “metaphorical water cooler of sorts for creators, writers, entrepreneurs, and coders to discuss, create and distribute articles across our publication network.”
PubDAO essentially runs like a traditional news wire, which sends various news items out to different media outlets, only decentralized. News media created by the DAO’s members will be available for purchase by popular crypto news sites.

PubDAO members discuss story and content ideas in the community Discord channel, but this is only the beginning.

The community’s long-term plans involve creating new guilds to support all manner of crypto creatives, including writers, editors, photographers and illustrators.

Additionally, the founders hope that PubDAO will “reduce the cost and friction in publishing,” as well as create “better ways of monetizing” crypto news and eventually “introduce both trust and transparency into the media production process.”

How Does the PubDAO Governance System Work?

So far, PubDAO’s community consists of crypto bloggers, as well as crypto news reporters and editors. The DAO is currently invite-only, but they are accepting suggestions for member invites.

While there isn’t yet a governance token, early content contributors to PubDAO will receive tokens retroactively for their contributions.
For more info on PubDAO, check out the official website here.

BanklessDAO

Bankless launched as an email newsletter which helped to teach new crypto users about the alternative open money systems available through DeFi.

Bankless has since evolved into a global anti-centralized finance movement, supported by an online content studio with thousands of subscribers and a private Discord chat with more than 1,500 members.

What Makes BanklessDAO Important?

The DAO’s name refers to its community’s mission: to make it easier for people to gain financial freedom by ending their reliance on centralized banking systems.

On May 8, 2021, Bankless’ founders Ryan Adams and David Hoffman launched BanklessDAO, which aims to eventually become the crypto space’s “human-centred layer 0.”
Although the Bankless DAO shares its name with the Bankless media company, the founders have reiterated that the community is in full control of the DAO.
Bankless DAO’s principal long-term goal is closely in line with its parent media company, to:
“Drive adoption and awareness of Bankless money systems through the creation and propagation of Bankless media, culture, and education.”
The decision to launch the DAO was explained in an official Medium post, “Only an internet-native organization is capable of growing an internet-scaled revolution, and thus we need a Bankless DAO to take the reins of the Bankless revolution.”

How Does the BanklessDAO Governance System Work?

With the DAO’s launch, the platform’s governance token, BANK, also launched, which acts as the DAO’s native governance token to coordinate activity, which the Bankless community members can earn by contributing to the DAO.

Additionally, Bankless wants to help steer humanity toward a future in which “anyone with an internet connection has access to the financial tools needed to achieve financial independence.”

For the Bankless newsletter, click here, and for the Bankless DAO, see here.

ForefrontDAO

Forefront is a community DAO focused on creating and curating resources for the social token community.

What Makes ForefrontDAO Important?

The DAO wants to solidify its position as the go-to platform for information and insight for content and news related to social tokens.

Forefront’s content consists of essays, articles, YouTube videos, community discussions and more.

The educational wing of the DAO is already up and running and includes loads of helpful resources for learning about how social tokens work, as well as useful social projects and tools.

How Does the ForefrontDAO Governance System Work?

Forefront’s native token is $FF, which you can earn by writing content for the DAO through its writer program. Forefront offers 109 FF tokens for every piece, currently worth around $300.

The content topics Forefront accepts include education and insight pieces related to the social token space, as well as thought leadership pieces.

The Forefront guidance advises that its token doesn’t have inherent value and was launched only for the DAO’s governance. However, the token’s value is fluctuating between $3 and $4 at the time of writing.
Forefront also runs regular community incentives, offering FF tokens in exchange for any creative work on topics related to the social token and creator economy.
For more info on Forefront, check out the DAO’s Wiki here.
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