A Prehistory of DAOs

DAOs present an alternative organizational structure that tries to align incentives for the long-term among a variety of stakeholders. The relationship changes from creator and consumer to everyone as co-creators. Creative organizations begin to look more like flat peer-to-peer networks as opposed to hierarchies.

The org structure of DAOs looks like modern day cooperatives, but over the next decade I believe their scale and impact will rival some of the world’s largest public companies.

However, anyone that has worked within a DAO in the past year knows this is rarely the case. In reality, many DAOs operate using socialware, relying on documented practices and hoping there is sufficient human attention and coordination to follow these written rules.

The sooner cooperative ownership is enshrined as a legitimate form of organization through DAO structures, the sooner we can build first-class structures for our future cooperatives. DAOs even present a unique opportunity to do so. The LLC is designed for a small set of owners. The public corporation is designed for mass ownership by capitalists. B... See more