# Traction *Updates about our community progress* By [Sensemaking - SpiritDAO's Weekly Newsletter](https://paragraph.com/@spiritdao) · 2026-05-18 community --- Contents: --------- 1. Three Communities, Three Conversations 2. Donation Infrastructure: Two Clear Paths 3. Pod Module Upgrades 4. New Features 5. Quick Meeting for Pods 6. What This Week Means 7. Upcoming events * * * Three Communities, Three Conversations -------------------------------------- This week we sat down with three intentional communities to explore SpiritDAO as shared infrastructure: **The New Paradigm Circle of Friends**, **Dancing Rabbit**, and **Artisans Coop**. Each brought their own operational realities and governance challenges and each helped us see more clearly how the platform meets communities where they actually are, not where a product roadmap imagines them to be. We're going to save the specifics for a future newsletter, but there's good news coming. We can share this: **two communities have made verbal commitments to move forward with SpiritDAO!** The Executive Pod is taking a deliberate approach to onboarding. We're not rushing these partnerships or offering a one-size-fits-all experience. Each community has custom needs, and we're doing the work to understand what integration actually looks like for them, what tools they need first, how governance maps to their existing structures, and where the platform needs to adapt rather than the other way around. This is the moment we've been building toward. Stay tuned. * * * Donation Infrastructure — Two Clear Paths ----------------------------------------- We've rebuilt how donations work inside SpiritDAO, and the result is a cleaner, more transparent experience for everyone who supports this ecosystem. When you visit the donate page, you'll now see two options: **Get $SYSTEM** works the way it always has. Your contribution generates $SYSTEM tokens — the intercommunity exchange currency that powers bounties, marketplace transactions, events, and treasury operations across the platform. 8% of each donation supports SpiritDAO operations (4%) and our Community Fund (4%). **Direct Donation** is new. This is a straightforward charitable contribution with no tokens involved. **100% goes directly to supporting SpiritDAO's operations fund, and the entire amount is tax-deductible.** For supporters who simply want to help us keep this infrastructure free for communities around the world, this is the most direct way to do it. Both donation paths now generate official PDF tax receipts delivered to your email with full documentation for your records. Behind the scenes, we've separated payment processing into dedicated accounts for each donation type, strengthening our financial transparency and audit trail. We also unified the visual design across all donation pages in the app, ensuring a consistent and clear experience from the moment you decide to contribute through the moment your receipt arrives. As a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit (EIN: 99-1308806), SpiritDAO can offer tax-exempt status on charitable contributions. If you've been thinking about supporting the work, it's never been easier (or more transparent) to do so. ![](https://storage.googleapis.com/papyrus_images/e9a1d0f5e7f8086119a2e9aa797bcd537c289e4c3d9facbd287f89b6243c3c3c.png) * * * Pod Module Updates ------------------ **Module** — We've reimagined how we integrate modules into pods. Our core vision was that every pod would have the core functionalities of a community group, which we define as those accessible from our home page. Beyond that, we wanted to ensure that optional modules were available to communities, both free and (optional) paid choices so that communities could truly shape their specific experiences. ![](https://storage.googleapis.com/papyrus_images/2955b2b57b17879c4e14d757e32cbed0c155d04b8e8eed2bf9d41fa4c6f01404.png) Now in modules there are togglable selection lists. This helps keep our interface clean while still allowing our infrastructure and feature sets to scale alongside our communities. When you toggle an 'Add-on' or 'Paid' module, new tabs will appear in your Pods page (typically restricted to those with Leader Roles). ### Core The building blocks that come with every pod. These are the essential tools for running a community: chat, forum discussions, treasury, events, bounties, marketplace, knowledge base, and sub-pods. Toggle on what you need and toggle off what you don’t. No cost, no limits. ### Add-Ons Extended capabilities that go beyond the basics. Currently, this includes **Surveys**, (see more about this new feature below) which lets you create and distribute polls across your pod and sub-pods. Add-ons are free, but separated because they support more specialized workflows that not every pod needs. ### Paid Premium modules powered by external services. For example, the **Community AI Agent** can: * Post daily discussions * Respond to mentions * Generate events autonomously These modules have real operational costs (API usage, compute, infrastructure), so they require either a subscription or a pod treasury contribution to sustain. * * * New Features ------------ **Surveys** — Pod leaders can now create and distribute surveys directly to pod members, sub-pods, or the entire community. The module supports multiple question types — multiple choice, single select, free text, and rating scales — with real-time results tracking and one-response-per-member enforcement. This gives pods a structured way to gather input without resorting to external tools or informal polls that disappear into chat history. When a community needs to make a decision, the first step is knowing what its members actually think. Now there's a built-in way to ask. ![](https://storage.googleapis.com/papyrus_images/d6739ba756cd204a748a7ec99b25be7ea3ed7dfe5600cdf25314e134ea708430.png) **Knowledge Base Export** — Pod leaders can now export their entire knowledge base as a single ZIP file, including all documents, PDFs, videos, and markdown content organized by category. Your community's institutional knowledge should never be locked inside any platform — including ours. This makes it easy to back up, share, or migrate everything a pod has built. Data portability isn't just a feature. It's a statement about who owns the knowledge. ![](https://storage.googleapis.com/papyrus_images/e2c80cf67c3ec04b13cf36e6c6a07050c68f5aeeec550a3287385b9ba3fae2ab.png) * * * Quick Meeting for Pods ---------------------- Pod leaders can now start an ad-hoc video meeting directly from the pod detail page (the "View' button on the Pod Card) no formal event creation required. Click "Start Meeting" and you're live. When a meeting is active, all pod members see a banner with a pulsing red indicator and participant count, and can join with a single click. The meeting uses the same full-featured conference room as scheduled events (host controls, screen sharing, reactions, speaker view) and automatically ends after five minutes of inactivity. Not everything needs to be on the calendar. Sometimes a community just needs to get in a room and talk. Now they can, in about two seconds. ![](https://storage.googleapis.com/papyrus_images/c0bba7f2b65a12aa4adecc61af6675fcd372eb7f1617db95b8e511ba6f903270.png) * * * What This Week Means -------------------- There's a pattern in the last few newsletters worth naming. We rebuilt the notification system, rebuilt Pulse, launched optional AI agents, unified the app's design, and refreshed outreach. And now community commitments, a mature donation infrastructure, surveys, knowledge base portability, and instant meetings. Each week has built on the one before. The platform is no longer just infrastructure looking for communities. Communities are looking at the platform and saying yes. That's a different conversation entirely, and we're ready for it! * * * **Upcoming Events This Week** We strongly recommend registering for events within the SpiritDAO app (Events section) at [app.spiritdao.org](http://app.spiritdao.org), it's how we gauge attendance and shape the flow of each session. **Town Hall** — Mon, May 18th · 8:00 PM EST - A standing community gathering for conversation, questions, and shared presence. [Join here](https://meet.google.com/twa-ghig-qxp) **First Contact** — Wed, May 20th · 12:00 PM EST - The official starting point for new members — a peer-to-peer orientation into how participation works. [Join here](https://meet.google.com/twa-ghig-qxp) **Feedback Loops** — Fri, May 22nd · 12:00 PM EST - A live working session where the community helps shape the app — bring your bugs, your questions, and your ideas. [Join here](https://meet.google.com/twa-ghig-qxp) * * * ### Questions? The best way to get in touch is within our community: [https://app.spiritdao.org](https://app.spiritdao.org) If it's easier, send us an email: [community@spiritdao.org](mailto:community@spiritdao.org) [Donate](https://www.spiritdao.org/donate) * * * Thank you for reading! Please share this email with any friends you think might enjoy this newsletter. We are spreading the message one curious person at a time. 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