Taking into consideration the feedback received in the comments, I will not be posting any more DAO updates here on the forum. Updates shall henceforth be posted on our new substack at https://effectivedao.substack.com
Anyone still interested in this project may check / subscribe on the substack or follow us on:
If you do end up buying an NFT, please send me a DM here or on Twitter so that I can send you an invite to the DAO’s Private Discord. ]
Summary / TL;DR
In the last three months I’ve been developing the blueprint for a very ambitious and audacious plan (if I do say so myself).
Also in the last couple of months, there’s been increasing calls for various changes and reforms in the Effective Altruism (EA) community.
My plan, I strongly believe, has the capability to solve (or mitigate to a great degree) several (maybe most, if not all) of the concerns raised in the various critical articles and comments on the EA community’s problematic issues.
It will also make it possible (and feasible) to attempt raising at least $1 Billion in donations for EA within 12 months.
The plan is to create a DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization) with a core mission to raise at least $1 Billion USD for (mostly) effective altruism every year (and to give out grants selected by the DAO members through democratic processes).
A DAO is an internet-native, blockchain-enabled organization made up of a group of people with shared interests or goals and a shared treasury coming together to collaborate (usually over the internet) and to work towards achieving their shared goals.
Decisions in a DAO are made democratically with every member having a say in the affairs of the organization usually through the ability to discuss, debate and vote on issues relating to the DAO’s activities, policies and governance. Financial controls are enabled by blockchain technology with transactions and voting results commonly recorded on the blockchain for full transparency.
Learn more about DAOs and how they work here and here.
A DAO is well suited for movements like effective altruism because it provides the tools and structural elements to efficiently manage and govern large communities at scale in a decentralized and democratic fashion.
My planned DAO aims to transform EA into a community-led movement by decentralizing governance and providing a way for the wider EA community to have a say in key decisions, grantmaking and fundraising.
Anyone who wishes to join the DAO would need to buy/obtain a membership NFT (Non-Fungible Token) that will grant them access to the DAO’s platforms and give them voting abilities (plus other member-only capabilities). The sale of these NFTs also serve as one of the means of raising funds for the DAO.
I will post more updates in the coming hours and days to provide more details about my full plan, how it shall be executed and how anyone interested can buy the NFT and join the DAO.
Full article:
Who am I?
Let me start by briefly introducing myself and explaining my main motivations for embarking on this project.
I have an engineering degree with 10+ years experience in technology consulting where I’ve led various teams to develop simple software, mobile/web applications and other ICT solutions.
Over the course of my career, I have worked on more than 30 web and mobile apps and supervised teams of up to 20 people. I have also grown and managed online communities having hundreds of thousands of members and subscribers.
My superpowers include product experience design, building online communities and growth hacking.
I’m also a cryptocurrency and web3 hobbyist and have consulted for up to ten crypto/web3 projects including two fairly successful DAOs.
(Note: I happen to be an extremely and obsessively privacy-oriented person (the type that always uses pseudonyms online) so I’m not really keen on putting my name and private details out here in public just yet—but this is not a burner account, it’s my main and only EA forum account, just bearing a pseudonym. Notwithstanding, I’ve interacted with a handful of people in the EA community and they already know my real identity.
My intention is to fully “dox” myself to people who join the DAO. To them I will reveal my face and all my important personal details and even go through transparent KYC procedures if necessary.
However what I can say here in public is that I am a 40+ male from a country in Sub-Saharan Africa. )
[Edit (added after some feedback in the comments): If knowing my true identity is an important factor for you please feel free to DM me with a request for such. I’m not against revealing who I am, I just don’t feel comfortable doing it here in public]
I first heard about effective altruism in September 2022 after coming across an article that mentioned Sam Bankman-Fried’s $1 Billion donation/pledge/promise to EA. Out of curiosity I sought to learn more about this movement and why it deserved to receive such a massive sum from him.
On learning more about EA, I realized that many of its core values aligned with mine, so I decided to become a part of the community and find ways to contribute in any effective way I could.
I though of various things I could do to create impact (based on my strengths and experience) and eventually settled on founding an organization (christened EffectiveCauses Organization).
This organization is meant to be a kind of lab and think-tank for EA projects and ideas; our primary mission is to think up impactful and neglected EA-related project ideas, raise funds for the ideas and execute or incubate them.
The organization would also act as a kind of anchor point or base from which we could drive EA expansion (and provide extra support for EA communities) in Africa (which has very few or no EA communities in most countries).
Right now I’m actually just trying to get things off the ground with the organization. I’ve been holding meetings with some persons who have shown interest in being a part of the project and we have been brainstorming.
So far we have already come up with a number of ideas.
This DAO idea is one of them.
What Exactly is a DAO? How Does it Work? Will it Work for EA?
DAO is an acronym for Decentralized Autonomous Organization and, according to Wikipedia, ”...is an organization constructed by rules encoded as a computer program that is often transparent, controlled by the organization’s members and not influenced by a central government.”
In general terms, DAOs are member-owned communities without centralized leadership. They are internet-based organizations that are owned and managed collectively by their members.
They usually have a shared treasury on the blockchain that is accessible only with the approval of the members; and in many DAOs, financial transactions, voting results and key governance decisions are also recorded on the blockchain for transparency and accountability.
The decision-making and governance processes in a DAO are inherently decentralized and democratic, usually carried out through proposals that are voted upon by members. Proposals are commonly preceded by a more general discussion or “temperature check” to gauge the opinions of members regarding the proposal and if it should be put to vote at all.
This sort of system ensures that the voice of every member counts and that each member has some influence in the direction the organization takes and in the decisions it makes.
DAOs are emerging as a new organizational paradigm enabled by blockchain technology. They have been used to successfully raise considerable funds in recent times both by for-profit and non-profit entities.
This is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the huge potential of DAOs (note that these results were obtained despite the fact that the concept of DAOs is still relatively new and largely unexplored).
In addition to decentralized governance, a DAO will also provide a way for EA to diversify funding sources and democratize grant making.
Two Pros and a Con
Main Pros of DAOs:
DAO members decide on how the DAO is run, how money is spent, what projects are funded, how governance is done and various other key issues concerning the DAO.
There’s democracy and transparency (which are both enabled by the blockchain).
Main Con of DAOs:
The major con is that DAOs are still largely an experimental concept with no best practices developed yet.
Can this DAO Really Raise at least $1 Billion for EA Every Year? Can it Really Fix EA’s Issues? Can EA Governance and Grantmaking Actually be Decentralized and Democratized this Way?
To all these questions I would answer an emphatic YES with over 90% confidence (but only if the DAO is setup and managed properly).
The effective altruism movement is a prime example of an organization for which a DAO structure would be very effective (no pun intended) especially if done right.
The EA movement has been growing and expanding at an ever increasing rate in recent times. The movement is maturing and can no longer afford to NOT have a formal (or informal) decentralized co-ordination and governance backbone structure of this nature.
Many great movements have evolved such structures in one way or the other at some point in their life time and this helped them to handle the complexities of scale without disintegrating, splintering or imploding.
The effective altruism movement is fast approaching a tipping point where the absence of such a structure (or some other far reaching reform process / mechanism) may lead to the eventual splintering, disintegration or implosion of the movement as we know it today.
While my plan is not perfect, it’s as close to “doing it properly” as I can envision.
During the ideation process, I observed and studied other successful DAOs and infused some of their best features into my framework. This adds to what gives me much confidence.
This DAO is not meant to be a separate / parallel / rival community to the current EA community or organizations, rather it is meant to be an addition to the movement: an instrument to draw the diverse EA communities and groups (scattered all over the world and online) closer.
A symbolic icon that all EAs can rally around and identify with as being as close to a collective representation of the broader movement as possible.
It is meant to be a formalized organizational construct drawing in and embracing EAs of all shades and hues of thought, beliefs, opinions and preferences without sacrificing the epistemic health, effectiveness, cohesion and morality quotient of the movement.
An organization that is collectively owned, controlled and governed by the entirety of the effective altruism community and geared towards growing and improving the entire movement (together with currently existing EA organizations, groups and sub-communities).
A mechanism that can finally help to provide a satisfactory answer to the multi-billion dollar question “Who comprises the “EA Community?”.
Something that provides a true sense of identity and a symbol over which all EAs can confidently claim a real and equal sense of belonging and ownership.
A way to concretize what the phrase EA Community really means so that people will stop enclosing it within f*****g quotation marks ffs!
This DAO project is meant to be a community effort and my team and I will not be the only ones doing it all. The success of a DAO depends on passionate, dedicated members and quality / visionary / experienced handlers.
I’m not exactly an egghead and I’m not super-knowledgeable about EA cause areas and methodology. But I have experience with building and managing large online communities and I know how to construct DAOs.
So I need the eggheads and other knowledgeable and passionate EAs to join me in hashing out the basic structures, processes and policies around which this DAO will operate.
Please come join me let’s build the EA of our dreams.
DAO Membership
It is usual for people interested in joining a DAO to purchase some kind of blockchain-based token (fungible or non-fungible). This token grants the holder official membership which comes with voting rights and access to the members-only online groups, channels and collaboration platforms of the DAO.
In my plan, prospective members will need to buy/own a specific non-fungible token (NFT) to join the DAO.
An online auction for the first set of these NFTs will be held in a few days time (more on this in my next update to be posted in a few hours time).
Why am I Doing This? (or My Many Motivations)
I am doing this in order to kill six gigantic birds (and many smaller ones) with one massive boulder (pardon the awful metaphor, I won’t be killing any real birds, I promise).
The six birds are (in no particular order):
SBF/FTX: Doing my bit for EA to make up for the SBF/FTX funding shortfall
Fix EA’s Issues: Doing my bit to tackle the various issues / complaints raised by some people regarding EA governance, grantmaking, epistemics etc
Crowdfund my own funds for my own projects in a decentralized manner
For other EAs: Doing my bit to help others like me who are also finding it difficult to get funding for their EA projects
Creating a new, diversified funding source for EA
Researching on (and experimenting with) organizing people at scale
1. SBF / FTX
So SBF promised EA $1 Billion. Sadly most/all of that is no more. And Now there’s a funding shortfall. A challenge for the EA Community.
Challenge Accepted!
2. Fix EA’s Issues
In recent months there has been an uptick in posts critical of certain aspects of the EA community / movement including parts of its culture, governance, grantmaking process, funding sources etc. (See this, this, this, this, this and this for some examples of these critical posts).
So the main problems have already been identified and many people agree that something needs to be done about them. Some people have also proposed possible solutions that could be tried out.
But there is still no consensus on the best way forward.
Having given the matter some thought myself, it has become clear to me that a well-run DAO would solve (or mitigate to a large extent) many of the issues presented.
A DAO has the ability to transform the effective altruism movement into a community-driven affair with a flatter, more decentralized governance structure instead of the current top-down pyramidal structure where a few individuals at the top of the pyramid wield most of the funding and decision-making powers.
In a DAO, governance is not restricted to a specific group but spread out evenly with every community member having a say in the affairs and governance of the organization (for EA that would also include decisions on the issuance of grants amongst other things).
By using a DAO, it will also be relatively easy to embed checks and balances into the organic functioning of the organization, ensuring that there is a continuously active check on any excesses or deviations from the generally agreed norms, values, mission and vision.
So this DAO is my own solution which I am not only proposing but also going ahead to implement.
Right now my plan is still largely an untested (minimum viable) draft framework crafted based on my experience and knowledge of DAOs and Web3. While this draft is enough to kickstart the organization, a lot of things still need to be figured out and improved upon with time.
These improvements will be largely community-driven and fine-tuned through research, experimentation and continuous iteration.
The long term vision of the project is to eventually spin off (from the main DAO) new independent DAOs focused on specific EA Cause Areas, thus we could have a DAO just dedicated to Biorisks or AI risks or Global health or Animal welfare etc
Each of these new DAOs will be set up using the improved framework as reference. They will operate autonomously and largely independent of the parent DAO but will maintain close ties and alignment with it.
Eventually this framework will be released as an opensource resource which other DAOs could use as a starting template or reference model instead of having to reinvent the wheel.
In my next update, I will elaborate more on this framework and how it tackles the contentious issues in EA including that of uneven concentration and distribution of governance and grantmaking power as is currently the case.
3. Raise My own Funds
(or “Test a New way for EAs to Raise funds / Democratize Fundraising” or “Take the (Funding) Bull by the Horns”)
I mentioned earlier that I am currently in the process of setting up an organization whose core mission is to generate ideas for impactful but neglected EA projects and raise the funds to execute them.
We had actually generated some ideas but try as we might, we weren’t able to secure any funding for any of them.
We applied to various funders and donors, even got some positive feedback for some of the proposals, but unfortunately none has been funded till date.
After more than two months of futile attempts at getting funding, it felt kind of frustrating and draining. I also got to learn that there are others in the community who have complained about facing similar challenges with securing funding.
That was when I decided to try a different strategy to raise funds for my organization’s projects and at the same time see what I could do to make it easier for EAs in my shoes to raise funds for their own projects.
I decided to take the bull by the horn and crowdfund my own projects by myself, while at the same time crowdfunding for the wider EA community, especially those who have had a similar experience to mine in the course of trying to raise funds.
I’m therefore using this opportunity to test out the viability of a crowdfunding-inspired decentralized strategy for fundraising (as a possible alternative to the conventional way that most EAs are used to seeking funding, which is to apply for grants from the major funders and donor organizations).
In this strategy, the idea is for many people (i.e. the DAO members) to pool their fundraising efforts by individually going after many smaller donations from several donors (within and around their own networks) instead of chasing after one large lump sum from a big donor or funding organization.
4. For other EAs Trying to Raise Funds
One of the oft-repeated complaints by EAs who have project ideas is the challenge faced when seeking funding from some of the major EA funders, which is apparently made worse in some cases by an alleged lack of transparency in the selection process and opaque rejection notices that often seem to be missing specific details as to why a project was rejected.
As stated in the previous point (#3), one of my motivations is to create a new funding source for these other EAs and also test out a decentralized crowdfunding strategy with which they can successfully raise their own funds by themselves for their Projects instead of putting all their hopes on the big funders (who, to be fair, are most likely regularly swamped by an unending deluge of proposals and funding requests).
5. Create a New, Diversified Funding Source for EA
$1 Billion for EA every year is substantial enough to be a major new source of funding for the movement independent of the current major funders.
This will improve the financial resilience of the movement and offer some cushioning against unexpected events (like the SBF debacle) so that in the future, such events will not affect the movement’s funding the way that the SBF thing did.
The availability of such new funds will also create further diversity in the movement’s funding and reduce over-dependence on the big funding organizations. It will give the “EA community” its own funds (especially since it has already been made clear that the “EA community” does not own its donors’ money).
Furthermore, the fact that these funds will be raised from a variety of sources and controlled by the broader community of the DAO’s members means that their sourcing, management and use will not be in the hands of a small group of people or organizations but will be under the control of the wider EA community.
6. Research and Experimentation
One thing that many of EA’s critics agree on is the need to explore and experiment with various methods and approaches to solving or mitigating the issues identified.
Managing the DAO will afford an opportunity for EA to carry out governance and co-ordination research and experiments within a live organization.
The endgame of such experimentation for me is to develop a highly scalable opensource framework for decentralized fundraising/grantmaking that can be used by new (non-profit and for-profit) organizations to quickly get up and running.
Here’s My Plan in a Nutshell:
Start by auctioning 172 NFTs in an online Dutch Auction to raise at least $75,000 “pre-seed” funds.
Onboard the 172 NFT buyers as the first cohort of DAO members (the “O.G”s as they are called in the crypto world)
Work with these OGs (for about 2 or 3 months) to set up, flesh out and test the basic structures, processes and policies of the DAO in preparation for full kick-off; and to prepare to onboard the second cohort of members.
Sell 5,555 NFTs to raise $20 Million for the DAO
Onboard these 5,555 NFT buyers as the second cohort of DAO members
DAO begins to issue first series of grants from the funds raised from the 5,555 NFT sales. Grants are debated and voted upon by the DAO members to decide which ones to fund
Begin various decentralized (and centralized) fundraising activities
Auction 10,000 more NFTs to raise at least $10 Million and onboard the third and final (for the time being) cohort of DAO Members
Organize continuous fundraising events and activities through commonly used fundraising methods including crowdfunding
Explore new ways and avenues of raising funds (including launching social enterprises, creating crowdfunding platforms, exploiting of the project’s intellectual property etc)
Continue to raise funds and issue effective grants debated and voted upon by the community
Continuously evaluate the impact of grants and improve upon the effectiveness of the grantmaking process and the DAO in general.
Rinse and Repeat 9 to 12 Ad infinitum.
Eventually spin off new DAOs for specific EA cause areas
OK, So What Next?
I strongly believe that this plan is something worth pursuing so I need people who will like to collaborate, contribute, support, help out etc (and if they have the sufficient financial means) to consider buying one of the 172 NFTs during the upcoming auctions and join me in setting up the DAO.
If you cannot actively participate, you could instead buy one (or some) and donate them to someone / people you know who could contribute usefully.
This will be a very difficult project and my team and I cannot do it alone. It will require substantial effort, teamwork and input from other EAs. Therefore I’m looking for critical thinkers, organizational planners, EA cause area experts and highly motivated EAs to come on board to help me flesh out my ideas and build up the DAO.
In my next update I shall elaborate on my planned framework. The update will be posted here on EA Forum in a few hours time. I will add the link to the end of this article when it has been posted.
Last Word: A Call to Adventure
Will this plan be easy to implement?
Not at all.
In fact I expect it to be a very difficult, very tasking and very time consuming process with many hurdles and many unknowns. It will be a journey fraught with many challenges. A scary adventure of epic proportions.
So if you like great adventures or near-impossible challenges then come and join me let’s go on this journey together.
This DAO might just turn out to be the most impactful EA project ever. So if you care about doing good effectively then you should definitely be a part of this.
Join me let’s make the most massive impact imaginable.
You just need to believe it can be done, embrace the vision, trust my lead and join me to FIGHT. Like a WARRIOR.
We can actually make this happen folks!.
Please share this to all EA communities and groups.
This is history in the making...
More Updates On the Way
In the next update I shall go into more granular details about the framework.
I will also post other updates in the coming days providing even more details about the full plan, how it shall be executed and how anyone interested can obtain the NFT and join the DAO.
Below I will add the links to each update when they have been published.
Taking into consideration the feedback received in the comments, I will not be posting any more DAO updates here on the forum. Updates shall henceforth be posted on our new substack at https://effectivedao.substack.com
Anyone still interested in this project may check / subscribe on the substack or follow us on:
I’m About to Raise $1 Billion for (and Fix the Problems of) Effective Altruism Using a DAO. Anyone Care to Join Me?
[Update (25 February 2023):
Taking into consideration the feedback received in the comments, I will not be posting any more DAO updates here on the forum. Updates shall henceforth be posted on our new substack at https://effectivedao.substack.com
Anyone still interested in this project may check / subscribe on the substack or follow us on:
Twitter: @EffectiveDAO
Telegram : https://t.me/effdao
Remember the auction dates: 12:01 AM UTC on 27 February 2023 to 11:59 PM UTC on 1 March 2023.
Auction link: https://bit.ly/altruistwarriors
More about the auction: Click Here
If you do end up buying an NFT, please send me a DM here or on Twitter so that I can send you an invite to the DAO’s Private Discord. ]
Summary / TL;DR
In the last three months I’ve been developing the blueprint for a very ambitious and audacious plan (if I do say so myself).
Also in the last couple of months, there’s been increasing calls for various changes and reforms in the Effective Altruism (EA) community.
My plan, I strongly believe, has the capability to solve (or mitigate to a great degree) several (maybe most, if not all) of the concerns raised in the various critical articles and comments on the EA community’s problematic issues.
It will also make it possible (and feasible) to attempt raising at least $1 Billion in donations for EA within 12 months.
The plan is to create a DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization) with a core mission to raise at least $1 Billion USD for (mostly) effective altruism every year (and to give out grants selected by the DAO members through democratic processes).
A DAO is an internet-native, blockchain-enabled organization made up of a group of people with shared interests or goals and a shared treasury coming together to collaborate (usually over the internet) and to work towards achieving their shared goals.
Decisions in a DAO are made democratically with every member having a say in the affairs of the organization usually through the ability to discuss, debate and vote on issues relating to the DAO’s activities, policies and governance. Financial controls are enabled by blockchain technology with transactions and voting results commonly recorded on the blockchain for full transparency.
Learn more about DAOs and how they work here and here.
A DAO is well suited for movements like effective altruism because it provides the tools and structural elements to efficiently manage and govern large communities at scale in a decentralized and democratic fashion.
My planned DAO aims to transform EA into a community-led movement by decentralizing governance and providing a way for the wider EA community to have a say in key decisions, grantmaking and fundraising.
Anyone who wishes to join the DAO would need to buy/obtain a membership NFT (Non-Fungible Token) that will grant them access to the DAO’s platforms and give them voting abilities (plus other member-only capabilities). The sale of these NFTs also serve as one of the means of raising funds for the DAO.
I will post more updates in the coming hours and days to provide more details about my full plan, how it shall be executed and how anyone interested can buy the NFT and join the DAO.
Full article:
Who am I?
Let me start by briefly introducing myself and explaining my main motivations for embarking on this project.
I have an engineering degree with 10+ years experience in technology consulting where I’ve led various teams to develop simple software, mobile/web applications and other ICT solutions.
Over the course of my career, I have worked on more than 30 web and mobile apps and supervised teams of up to 20 people. I have also grown and managed online communities having hundreds of thousands of members and subscribers.
My superpowers include product experience design, building online communities and growth hacking.
I’m also a cryptocurrency and web3 hobbyist and have consulted for up to ten crypto/web3 projects including two fairly successful DAOs.
(Note: I happen to be an extremely and obsessively privacy-oriented person (the type that always uses pseudonyms online) so I’m not really keen on putting my name and private details out here in public just yet—but this is not a burner account, it’s my main and only EA forum account, just bearing a pseudonym. Notwithstanding, I’ve interacted with a handful of people in the EA community and they already know my real identity.
My intention is to fully “dox” myself to people who join the DAO. To them I will reveal my face and all my important personal details and even go through transparent KYC procedures if necessary.
However what I can say here in public is that I am a 40+ male from a country in Sub-Saharan Africa. )
[Edit (added after some feedback in the comments): If knowing my true identity is an important factor for you please feel free to DM me with a request for such. I’m not against revealing who I am, I just don’t feel comfortable doing it here in public]
I first heard about effective altruism in September 2022 after coming across an article that mentioned Sam Bankman-Fried’s $1 Billion donation/pledge/promise to EA. Out of curiosity I sought to learn more about this movement and why it deserved to receive such a massive sum from him.
On learning more about EA, I realized that many of its core values aligned with mine, so I decided to become a part of the community and find ways to contribute in any effective way I could.
I though of various things I could do to create impact (based on my strengths and experience) and eventually settled on founding an organization (christened EffectiveCauses Organization).
This organization is meant to be a kind of lab and think-tank for EA projects and ideas; our primary mission is to think up impactful and neglected EA-related project ideas, raise funds for the ideas and execute or incubate them.
The organization would also act as a kind of anchor point or base from which we could drive EA expansion (and provide extra support for EA communities) in Africa (which has very few or no EA communities in most countries).
Right now I’m actually just trying to get things off the ground with the organization. I’ve been holding meetings with some persons who have shown interest in being a part of the project and we have been brainstorming.
So far we have already come up with a number of ideas.
This DAO idea is one of them.
What Exactly is a DAO? How Does it Work? Will it Work for EA?
DAO is an acronym for Decentralized Autonomous Organization and, according to Wikipedia, ”...is an organization constructed by rules encoded as a computer program that is often transparent, controlled by the organization’s members and not influenced by a central government.”
In general terms, DAOs are member-owned communities without centralized leadership. They are internet-based organizations that are owned and managed collectively by their members.
They usually have a shared treasury on the blockchain that is accessible only with the approval of the members; and in many DAOs, financial transactions, voting results and key governance decisions are also recorded on the blockchain for transparency and accountability.
The decision-making and governance processes in a DAO are inherently decentralized and democratic, usually carried out through proposals that are voted upon by members. Proposals are commonly preceded by a more general discussion or “temperature check” to gauge the opinions of members regarding the proposal and if it should be put to vote at all.
This sort of system ensures that the voice of every member counts and that each member has some influence in the direction the organization takes and in the decisions it makes.
DAOs are emerging as a new organizational paradigm enabled by blockchain technology. They have been used to successfully raise considerable funds in recent times both by for-profit and non-profit entities.
Two notable DAOs (amongst several others) are UkraineDAO (raised $6.5 Million to support Ukraine) and ConstitutionDAO (raised $45 million to buy a rare copy of the United States constitution).
This is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the huge potential of DAOs (note that these results were obtained despite the fact that the concept of DAOs is still relatively new and largely unexplored).
In addition to decentralized governance, a DAO will also provide a way for EA to diversify funding sources and democratize grant making.
Two Pros and a Con
Main Pros of DAOs:
DAO members decide on how the DAO is run, how money is spent, what projects are funded, how governance is done and various other key issues concerning the DAO.
There’s democracy and transparency (which are both enabled by the blockchain).
Main Con of DAOs:
The major con is that DAOs are still largely an experimental concept with no best practices developed yet.
Can this DAO Really Raise at least $1 Billion for EA Every Year? Can it Really Fix EA’s Issues? Can EA Governance and Grantmaking Actually be Decentralized and Democratized this Way?
To all these questions I would answer an emphatic YES with over 90% confidence (but only if the DAO is setup and managed properly).
The effective altruism movement is a prime example of an organization for which a DAO structure would be very effective (no pun intended) especially if done right.
The EA movement has been growing and expanding at an ever increasing rate in recent times. The movement is maturing and can no longer afford to NOT have a formal (or informal) decentralized co-ordination and governance backbone structure of this nature.
Many great movements have evolved such structures in one way or the other at some point in their life time and this helped them to handle the complexities of scale without disintegrating, splintering or imploding.
The effective altruism movement is fast approaching a tipping point where the absence of such a structure (or some other far reaching reform process / mechanism) may lead to the eventual splintering, disintegration or implosion of the movement as we know it today.
While my plan is not perfect, it’s as close to “doing it properly” as I can envision.
During the ideation process, I observed and studied other successful DAOs and infused some of their best features into my framework. This adds to what gives me much confidence.
This DAO is not meant to be a separate / parallel / rival community to the current EA community or organizations, rather it is meant to be an addition to the movement: an instrument to draw the diverse EA communities and groups (scattered all over the world and online) closer.
A symbolic icon that all EAs can rally around and identify with as being as close to a collective representation of the broader movement as possible.
It is meant to be a formalized organizational construct drawing in and embracing EAs of all shades and hues of thought, beliefs, opinions and preferences without sacrificing the epistemic health, effectiveness, cohesion and morality quotient of the movement.
An organization that is collectively owned, controlled and governed by the entirety of the effective altruism community and geared towards growing and improving the entire movement (together with currently existing EA organizations, groups and sub-communities).
A mechanism that can finally help to provide a satisfactory answer to the multi-billion dollar question “Who comprises the “EA Community?”.
Something that provides a true sense of identity and a symbol over which all EAs can confidently claim a real and equal sense of belonging and ownership.
A way to concretize what the phrase EA Community really means so that people will stop enclosing it within f*****g quotation marks ffs!
This DAO project is meant to be a community effort and my team and I will not be the only ones doing it all. The success of a DAO depends on passionate, dedicated members and quality / visionary / experienced handlers.
I’m not exactly an egghead and I’m not super-knowledgeable about EA cause areas and methodology. But I have experience with building and managing large online communities and I know how to construct DAOs.
So I need the eggheads and other knowledgeable and passionate EAs to join me in hashing out the basic structures, processes and policies around which this DAO will operate.
Please come join me let’s build the EA of our dreams.
DAO Membership
It is usual for people interested in joining a DAO to purchase some kind of blockchain-based token (fungible or non-fungible). This token grants the holder official membership which comes with voting rights and access to the members-only online groups, channels and collaboration platforms of the DAO.
In my plan, prospective members will need to buy/own a specific non-fungible token (NFT) to join the DAO.
An online auction for the first set of these NFTs will be held in a few days time (more on this in my next update to be posted in a few hours time).
Why am I Doing This? (or My Many Motivations)
I am doing this in order to kill six gigantic birds (and many smaller ones) with one massive boulder (pardon the awful metaphor, I won’t be killing any real birds, I promise).
The six birds are (in no particular order):
SBF/FTX: Doing my bit for EA to make up for the SBF/FTX funding shortfall
Fix EA’s Issues: Doing my bit to tackle the various issues / complaints raised by some people regarding EA governance, grantmaking, epistemics etc
Crowdfund my own funds for my own projects in a decentralized manner
For other EAs: Doing my bit to help others like me who are also finding it difficult to get funding for their EA projects
Creating a new, diversified funding source for EA
Researching on (and experimenting with) organizing people at scale
1. SBF / FTX
So SBF promised EA $1 Billion.
Sadly most/all of that is no more.
And Now there’s a funding shortfall.
A challenge for the EA Community.
Challenge Accepted!
2. Fix EA’s Issues
In recent months there has been an uptick in posts critical of certain aspects of the EA community / movement including parts of its culture, governance, grantmaking process, funding sources etc. (See this, this, this, this, this and this for some examples of these critical posts).
So the main problems have already been identified and many people agree that something needs to be done about them. Some people have also proposed possible solutions that could be tried out.
But there is still no consensus on the best way forward.
Having given the matter some thought myself, it has become clear to me that a well-run DAO would solve (or mitigate to a large extent) many of the issues presented.
A DAO has the ability to transform the effective altruism movement into a community-driven affair with a flatter, more decentralized governance structure instead of the current top-down pyramidal structure where a few individuals at the top of the pyramid wield most of the funding and decision-making powers.
In a DAO, governance is not restricted to a specific group but spread out evenly with every community member having a say in the affairs and governance of the organization (for EA that would also include decisions on the issuance of grants amongst other things).
By using a DAO, it will also be relatively easy to embed checks and balances into the organic functioning of the organization, ensuring that there is a continuously active check on any excesses or deviations from the generally agreed norms, values, mission and vision.
So this DAO is my own solution which I am not only proposing but also going ahead to implement.
Right now my plan is still largely an untested (minimum viable) draft framework crafted based on my experience and knowledge of DAOs and Web3. While this draft is enough to kickstart the organization, a lot of things still need to be figured out and improved upon with time.
These improvements will be largely community-driven and fine-tuned through research, experimentation and continuous iteration.
The long term vision of the project is to eventually spin off (from the main DAO) new independent DAOs focused on specific EA Cause Areas, thus we could have a DAO just dedicated to Biorisks or AI risks or Global health or Animal welfare etc
Each of these new DAOs will be set up using the improved framework as reference. They will operate autonomously and largely independent of the parent DAO but will maintain close ties and alignment with it.
Eventually this framework will be released as an opensource resource which other DAOs could use as a starting template or reference model instead of having to reinvent the wheel.
In my next update, I will elaborate more on this framework and how it tackles the contentious issues in EA including that of uneven concentration and distribution of governance and grantmaking power as is currently the case.
3. Raise My own Funds
(or “Test a New way for EAs to Raise funds / Democratize Fundraising” or “Take the (Funding) Bull by the Horns”)
I mentioned earlier that I am currently in the process of setting up an organization whose core mission is to generate ideas for impactful but neglected EA projects and raise the funds to execute them.
We had actually generated some ideas but try as we might, we weren’t able to secure any funding for any of them.
We applied to various funders and donors, even got some positive feedback for some of the proposals, but unfortunately none has been funded till date.
After more than two months of futile attempts at getting funding, it felt kind of frustrating and draining. I also got to learn that there are others in the community who have complained about facing similar challenges with securing funding.
That was when I decided to try a different strategy to raise funds for my organization’s projects and at the same time see what I could do to make it easier for EAs in my shoes to raise funds for their own projects.
I decided to take the bull by the horn and crowdfund my own projects by myself, while at the same time crowdfunding for the wider EA community, especially those who have had a similar experience to mine in the course of trying to raise funds.
I’m therefore using this opportunity to test out the viability of a crowdfunding-inspired decentralized strategy for fundraising (as a possible alternative to the conventional way that most EAs are used to seeking funding, which is to apply for grants from the major funders and donor organizations).
In this strategy, the idea is for many people (i.e. the DAO members) to pool their fundraising efforts by individually going after many smaller donations from several donors (within and around their own networks) instead of chasing after one large lump sum from a big donor or funding organization.
4. For other EAs Trying to Raise Funds
One of the oft-repeated complaints by EAs who have project ideas is the challenge faced when seeking funding from some of the major EA funders, which is apparently made worse in some cases by an alleged lack of transparency in the selection process and opaque rejection notices that often seem to be missing specific details as to why a project was rejected.
As stated in the previous point (#3), one of my motivations is to create a new funding source for these other EAs and also test out a decentralized crowdfunding strategy with which they can successfully raise their own funds by themselves for their Projects instead of putting all their hopes on the big funders (who, to be fair, are most likely regularly swamped by an unending deluge of proposals and funding requests).
5. Create a New, Diversified Funding Source for EA
$1 Billion for EA every year is substantial enough to be a major new source of funding for the movement independent of the current major funders.
This will improve the financial resilience of the movement and offer some cushioning against unexpected events (like the SBF debacle) so that in the future, such events will not affect the movement’s funding the way that the SBF thing did.
The availability of such new funds will also create further diversity in the movement’s funding and reduce over-dependence on the big funding organizations. It will give the “EA community” its own funds (especially since it has already been made clear that the “EA community” does not own its donors’ money).
Furthermore, the fact that these funds will be raised from a variety of sources and controlled by the broader community of the DAO’s members means that their sourcing, management and use will not be in the hands of a small group of people or organizations but will be under the control of the wider EA community.
6. Research and Experimentation
One thing that many of EA’s critics agree on is the need to explore and experiment with various methods and approaches to solving or mitigating the issues identified.
Managing the DAO will afford an opportunity for EA to carry out governance and co-ordination research and experiments within a live organization.
The endgame of such experimentation for me is to develop a highly scalable opensource framework for decentralized fundraising/grantmaking that can be used by new (non-profit and for-profit) organizations to quickly get up and running.
Here’s My Plan in a Nutshell:
Start by auctioning 172 NFTs in an online Dutch Auction to raise at least $75,000 “pre-seed” funds.
Onboard the 172 NFT buyers as the first cohort of DAO members (the “O.G”s as they are called in the crypto world)
Work with these OGs (for about 2 or 3 months) to set up, flesh out and test the basic structures, processes and policies of the DAO in preparation for full kick-off; and to prepare to onboard the second cohort of members.
Sell 5,555 NFTs to raise $20 Million for the DAO
Onboard these 5,555 NFT buyers as the second cohort of DAO members
DAO begins to issue first series of grants from the funds raised from the 5,555 NFT sales. Grants are debated and voted upon by the DAO members to decide which ones to fund
Begin various decentralized (and centralized) fundraising activities
Auction 10,000 more NFTs to raise at least $10 Million and onboard the third and final (for the time being) cohort of DAO Members
Organize continuous fundraising events and activities through commonly used fundraising methods including crowdfunding
Explore new ways and avenues of raising funds (including launching social enterprises, creating crowdfunding platforms, exploiting of the project’s intellectual property etc)
Continue to raise funds and issue effective grants debated and voted upon by the community
Continuously evaluate the impact of grants and improve upon the effectiveness of the grantmaking process and the DAO in general.
Rinse and Repeat 9 to 12 Ad infinitum.
Eventually spin off new DAOs for specific EA cause areas
OK, So What Next?
I strongly believe that this plan is something worth pursuing so I need people who will like to collaborate, contribute, support, help out etc (and if they have the sufficient financial means) to consider buying one of the 172 NFTs during the upcoming auctions and join me in setting up the DAO.
If you cannot actively participate, you could instead buy one (or some) and donate them to someone / people you know who could contribute usefully.
This will be a very difficult project and my team and I cannot do it alone. It will require substantial effort, teamwork and input from other EAs. Therefore I’m looking for critical thinkers, organizational planners, EA cause area experts and highly motivated EAs to come on board to help me flesh out my ideas and build up the DAO.
In my next update I shall elaborate on my planned framework. The update will be posted here on EA Forum in a few hours time. I will add the link to the end of this article when it has been posted.
Last Word: A Call to Adventure
Will this plan be easy to implement?
Not at all.
In fact I expect it to be a very difficult, very tasking and very time consuming process with many hurdles and many unknowns. It will be a journey fraught with many challenges. A scary adventure of epic proportions.
So if you like great adventures or near-impossible challenges then come and join me let’s go on this journey together.
This DAO might just turn out to be the most impactful EA project ever. So if you care about doing good effectively then you should definitely be a part of this.
Join me let’s make the most massive impact imaginable.
You just need to believe it can be done, embrace the vision, trust my lead and join me to FIGHT. Like a WARRIOR.
We can actually make this happen folks!.
Please share this to all EA communities and groups.
This is history in the making...
More Updates On the Way
In the next update I shall go into more granular details about the framework.
I will also post other updates in the coming days providing even more details about the full plan, how it shall be executed and how anyone interested can obtain the NFT and join the DAO.
Below I will add the links to each update when they have been published.
Here’s the first update:
DAO#2: Details of My Plan to Raise $1 Billion for EA using a DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization)
[Update (25 February 2023):
Taking into consideration the feedback received in the comments, I will not be posting any more DAO updates here on the forum. Updates shall henceforth be posted on our new substack at https://effectivedao.substack.com
Anyone still interested in this project may check / subscribe on the substack or follow us on:
Twitter: @EffectiveDAO
Telegram : https://t.me/effdao
Remember the auction dates: 12:01 AM UTC on 27 February 2023 to 11:59 PM UTC on 1 March 2023.
Auction link: https://bit.ly/altruistwarriors
More about the auction: Click Here
If you do end up buying an NFT, please send me a DM here or on Twitter so that I can send you an invite to the DAO’s Private Discord. ]