The Power Of DAOs

The power of DAOs comes from like-minded people joining together to accomplish a common goal, or represent a common set of interests. This is obviously a good thing, with many potential positive benefits.

The real problem stems from the nature of human beings. We are fundamentally tribal: We want to get together and form groups which share common interests. Of those interests, nothing is stronger than “identity based” associations along the lines of race, gender, social class, educational attainment etc.

In other words, if given the choice, a large proportion of humans would choose to organize along racial and gender lines. We are only prevented from doing so by the restrictions of physics, time, energy and cost (as well as social barriers). DAOs make such groups not only possible to form, but easy and natural.

As DAOs gain traction and spread, I am concerned we might witness a world where everyone chooses to join Decentralized Autonomous Organizations purely based on their gender and race. And when that happens, a truly extraordinary threat may emerge.

The Dangers of Checking Out

If everyone on earth is able to “check out” of their local heterogeneous community and “check in” to a homogenous world where they are only associating with others of their same race, gender, religion or belief system - we may soon see warring factions. Groups which wield significant talent, effectively run their own “Central Banks” and host members placed across the industry, financial and government institutions.

Such decentralized organizations might prove to be extremely effective operators, at waging war in cyberspace or in person…far more effective than any normal human institution, government, state or corporation. They would become very powerful, and there would be little that anyone could do to prevent them from being formed and operated.

The members of these DAOs would be significantly more loyal to these groups than to the institutions, corporations or governments which members belong to.

Pirate DAOs

I can see also the potential for the formation of “Pirate DAOs” which operate effectively like independent pirate kingdoms, pooling the talents, placement and resources of their distributed membership into a highly effective set of “information weapons” which can be used to “Attack” and “Raid” the physical world.

While I love the idea of DAOs and the innovation occurring in the space: Make no mistake, there are great dangers hidden in the nature of DAOs.

To summarize my argument:

• I believe that Labor Unions will return as powerful Decentralized Autonomous Organizations which are able to mint and control their own funds and exert leverage across the tech industry via their elite skilled membership

• These Labor Unions will grow to become significant political and economic influencing entities capable of going “toe-to-toe” with major corporations and governments

• I believe that communities of ethnic minorities and women, especially from the STEM fields, represent an ideal starting point for these organizations and that change may happen faster than we might expect

I have been watching the forces beneath the surface bubbling for the last decade. Am I right? Perhaps. But my instinct tells me something big is coming, and soon.

A history lesson on Unions

Before we get started, I need to first revisit the concept of “A Union.” Basically: Workers organize together into some structure which wields significant negotiating power on their behalf. Unions were once The Community’s champions in negotiating with The State and The Market on behalf of workers. They were once a much more influential force in American society than they are today.

Over the last one hundred years, The Market and The State have collaborated to use regulations and even military force to suppress and destroy Unions, culminating with actions by President Ronald Reagan during the 1980s. As a result of The State and The Market collusion, Unions no longer have the power and influence they once possessed.

A significant additional cause of the downfall of unions was intense international competition which adversely affected corporations where workers were predominantly unionized, as was the case for Detroit automakers during the 1980s.

Tech worker unions have made slow progress

There have been some attempts in tech, but the going has been slow, with large tech companies seemingly able to shrug off and fire organizers at will. It also feels that there are many downsides to Unions which make highly skilled creative and technical workers (who are often highly compensated for their work) unwilling to participate in such structures.

All this feels like it is about to change, because a series of technology advancements have made it possible for unions to return in a new, redesigned form.

Digital Reparations

I personally have largely been cool on the topic of unions due to some of the downsides mentioned above. However, the events leading up to and following the firing of AI researcher and ethicist Timnit Gebru felt like a tipping point. In reading the discussions online, I came to realize that the rage and frustration within the black community has grown to a point that can no longer be merely ignored.

Some of the concerns I witnessed (to name a few):

• Superficial efforts at diversity meant to placate ethnic workers over the last few years no longer are trusted by the black community

• The tokenization of black workers as statistics or KPIs to parade in front of investors is resented (to put it mildly)

• Situations where black workers who have inconvenient opinions are “Swapped” for other black workers has left many in the community filled with rage

The groundwork now seems to be in place for decentralized Unions, and the motivation is there - But what is missing is the action.

The future I can imagine

Here is the future that I can imagine. This is just one possibility, but I think you can understand where I am going with this:

Imagine the following:

• Black STEM workers organize into a global distributed workers union as a DAO

• The DAO is funded globally by donations from the community, cryptocurrency world, large corporate investors

• The DAO launches it’s own Ethereum-backed token

• The DAO organizes itself into a governance structure with governance tokens granted to Black and underprivileged workers

• DAO members who hold the token receive a monthly payment funded by the investment fund and tech sponsors

• Members are brought into the organization by way of interview and screening process to ensure they match the desires of the community

• The DAO opens an investment fund which consists of a token on the Ethereum block chain that invests in black workers projects and provides community grants

• Members begin receiving pension options and other benefits, all denominated in cryptocurrencies

• The longer you are a member of the DAO, and the more you contribute, the larger the future pension will be for black workers

• Large tech companies wanting to hire members of the union must fund the DAO or be ineligible to hire it’s members

• Workers who decide to join tech companies who do not fund the DAO receive reduced privileges until those tech companies agree to pay into the DAO

In other words: I foresee a world where black workers are paid every month by being members of a giant distributed DAO which negotiates with the tech world on their behalf.

Thank you, thats enough for today.