# What's DAO

By [LeoLiang](https://paragraph.com/@joypolis) · 2022-08-04

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**The DAO** (stylized **Đ**) was a digital [decentralized autonomous organization](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decentralized_autonomous_organization)[\[5\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_DAO_\(organization\)#cite_note-5) and a form of investor-directed [venture capital fund](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venture_capital_fund). After launching in April 2016 via a token sale, it became one of the largest crowdfunding campaigns in history.

The DAO had an objective to provide a new [decentralized](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decentralization) business model for organizing both [commercial](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commercial_enterprise) and [non-profit](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-profit) enterprises. It was instantiated on the [Ethereum](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethereum) [blockchain](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blockchain_\(database\)) and had no conventional management structure or board of directors. The [code](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Source_code) of the DAO is [open-source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_software).

Christoph Jentzsch at the Festival of the Future (Festival der Zukunft) from 1E9 and Deutsches Museum in Munich, Germany on July 22nd 2022.

In June 2016, users exploited a vulnerability in The DAO code to enable them to siphon off one-third of The DAO's funds to a subsidiary account. The Ethereum community controversially decided to [hard-fork](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fork_\(blockchain\)#Hard_fork) the Ethereum blockchain to restore approximately all funds to the original contract. This split the Ethereum blockchain into two branches, each with its own cryptocurrency, where the original unforked blockchain continued as [Ethereum Classic](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethereum_Classic).

By September 2016, the value token of The DAO, known by the moniker **DAO**, was delisted from major cryptocurrency exchanges (such as [Poloniex](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poloniex) and [Kraken](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kraken_\(company\))) and had, in effect, become defunct.

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*Originally published on [LeoLiang](https://paragraph.com/@joypolis/what-s-dao)*