How many DAOs are there? If you find a documented number, it’s not considering all the budding DAOs that are only a dozen people in a Telegram channel, or a mission statement that has been spoken aloud between friends, but has not been written down yet.
When I connect my wallet address to DAOhaus, I’m shown a list of all the DAOs that I’m a member of. Many of which are comprised of similar people and intentions, although evolved in various directions and intermingled in countless combinations.
The DAOhaus hub, displaying all the DAOs on DAOhaus, prompts reflections on nascency. New DAOs emerge from conversations in more established DAOs. The process is only constrained by what members are willing to try.
Communities gather around a mission and share responsibilities and coordinations. Sometimes it’s three friends building at hackathons. Sometimes it’s a neighborhood with a shared garden. Other times it's a global network of people who’ve never met, but are doing everything they can to funnel resources into sustaining public goods infrastructure.
DAOhaus v1
When DAOhaus first got started, the only thing a DAO was really good at was raising funds and distributing them. Examples of these early DAOs are grant giving DAOs, like MolochDAO and MetaCartel. If you are a member of MolochDAO or MetaCartel, you have executive voting power. This means that however you joined the DAO, whether contributing work or capital, you have equal access to governance power proportional to the size of your contribution.
DAOhaus v2
The second version of DAOhaus integrated the upgraded Moloch DAO contracts to include two kinds of shares. It kept the original executive voting power shares, which also had economic stake that gave members exit rights, with their portion of the treasury. It included a new type of share, called loot, that only had economic stake and no executive voting power. This opened up opportunities for new kinds of DAOs, including investment DAOs like MetaCartel Ventures and the LAO, product DAOs like the team building DAOhaus itself, and community management subDAOs like the GraphAdvocates DAO.
Shortly after version 2.0, Minions were introduced. Minions are smart contracts with the ability to make arbitrary contract calls on behalf of a DAO. Like the name suggests, passing a Minion proposal means that the smart contract will go out and do extra work for you, like distribute funds to multiple addresses or manage the DAO’s treasury via DeFi protocols.
These improvements from V1 to V2.5 gave us a taste of some experimentation in customization, but more so on the individual proposal level, not as much on the organizational level. Returning our attention to the DAOhaus hub, we recognize the diversity and potential diversity in what communities organize around, like pizza, family and dApps. Every DAO has unique governance needs.
Introducing DAOhaus V3
Gather all the scattered pieces of what you’ve been calling your DAO. Don’t worry about putting them in any sort of order, or whether they can fit into a preconceived DAO template. DAOhaus V3 is here and it’s customizable.
The new architecture greatly improves the flexibility of a DAO and opens up new possibilities. — Typto, *DAOhaus V3 - Not an upgrade, but a revolution *
Not every DAO needs every feature, but every DAO is different. That’s why DAOhaus V3 gives DAOs lots of options to choose from and the flexibility to adjust them as the DAO evolves.
Shamans
Shamans are external contracts that have been approved by the DAO. An approved Shaman can programmatically manage DAO logic and configuration, opening up a huge design space of experimentation, flexibility, and programmability for DAOs. Without requiring the typical proposal process, a Shaman can directly mint and burn shares and/or loot, convert a member’s shares to loot or vice versa, and adjust governance parameters.
One example is that NFT’s can be staked to the DAO in exchange for governance shares. Similarly, contributors to a fund raise can automatically receive governance shares when they give capital; or they can swap funds(like ETH) for a DAO’s token (like HAUS).
This is a brand new capability, and we have just started exploring what’s possible. Exciting times!
Zodiac Compatibility and Safe Treasury
Previous versions of DAOhaus DAOs have held their treasury in the main governance contract. In V3, however, every DAO holds its treasury in a Safe, controlling it via the Zodiac standard. Members can still ragequit their portion of funds from the treasury – they’re still Moloch DAOs, after all – but now every DAO also has the option to utilize all the wonderful Zodiac tools to further customize and configure how they operate.
Now, simply by relying on the battle tested Safe and Zodiac infrastructure, DAOs can batch proposals or messages, work across chains, and conduct modular experiments.
Shares are ERC 20 Tokens
Both shares and loot are now ERC20 tokens. This is a big upgrade for several reasons. First, members can now have fractions of shares and/or loot (down to 18 decimals, like most other ERC20 tokens) which gives DAOs a lot of flexibility for what shares and loot represent and how they operate.
Second, it means that DAO membership is compatible out of the box with all of the wallets, apps, token gates, and other tools oriented around ERC20 tokens.
Third, DAOs now have the option to make their shares and/or loot transferable. Transferable governance power is a big evolution from the original Moloch DAO ethos, so this feature should be used carefully, and DAOs by default will start with transferability turned off. But if and when they deem appropriate, DAOhaus DAOs can opt into some of the advantages of transferability.
Finally, members with shares can now delegate their executive voting power to others, just like in many token voting DAOs today. This is a big unlock for DAOhaus DAOs, enabling them to scale much larger while maintaining a strong set of high-context governance participants.
Rapid Application Development
With a rapid prototyping framework that works with Moloch DAOs, community developers spend less time and effort to build apps and tools for DAOs. Instead of large monolithic apps, partnerships and collaboration allow for customization with elements that can be chosen, depending on needs.
Developers don’t need to start from scratch and organizations don’t need to force themselves into predefined constraints.
Custom DAOs
When communities gather around a mission or vision, we do the best we can with what tools we have. When we try to accomplish our goals in ways that don’t fit into conventional processes, our work is multiplied by uncovering challenges that can’t be predicted in such novel ways of organizing.
In addition to building and maintaining V3, the core team at DAOhaus also provides custom DAO development for discerning communities who are looking to coordinate the facilitation of success of their missions while keeping true to their values as they interact with the world around them.
For example, using the V3 toolset, the DAOhaus team built custom DAOs on V3 for Protocol Guild and the Gitcoin Fraud Detection team.
Protocol Guild ⛓️🛡️
Consisting of core Ethereum developers across many projects and teams, Protocol Guild prioritizes minimal governance for maximum member engagement. Their DAO on DAOhaus V3 manages Guild membership, limits Guild-wide governance decisions, and integrates 0xSplits for automated treasury management.
Gitcoin FDD
As a subDAO within Gitcoin, the Fraud Detection team allows for active and inactive status that adjusts individual voting power. Their DAO on DAOhaus V3 manages a ragequitable treasury as well as separate trading and operations Safes.
Management of each Safe is delegated by the DAO to a dedicated small team of signers. The signers on the trading Safe have the authority to respond quickly to changing market dynamics. Any profits are returned to the main treasury.
The signers on the operations Safe have the authority to pre-allocate funds for payroll, vendor expenses, and general operations without requiring a full DAO proposal.
Putting aside all the technologies and features introduced in this article, I think what is more valuable is the persistence of DAOhaus. Since 2019, we have seen the birth and demise of a lot of DAO products, but DAOhaus has been focused on building without interruption and is never disturbed by the noise around them. This focus and persistence are more important than the product, and that’s why I’ve been bullish on DAOhaus. Typto, DAOhaus V3 - Not an upgrade, but a revolution
PublicHaus
DAOhaus believes that the best tools to empower DAOs are open-source and publicly owned. Over the last year, the DAOhaus core development team has been focused on building towards decentralization and openness. If DAOhaus V3 is a common good and a public utility for the greater DAO ecosystem, we’ve done our job well.
Until now, DAOhaus has primarily been structured as a permissioned product DAO. This has served us well, but as the protocol opens up with DAOhaus V3, so should its governance. It is time to give the holders of the HAUS token – many of whom have shown considerable long-term financial and community commitment – more power to govern DAOhaus.
It is time for PublicHAUS!
PublicHaus is the new governance structure for DAOhaus. Built on DAOhaus’ own V3 protocol and toolset, PublicHaus is designed to leverage the knowledge, creativity, and commitment of HAUS token holders to guide DAOhaus into the future. Join us in the Discord to learn more and participate!