Introduction
The mission of MODA DAO is to redefine the future of Web3 music ownership, publishing, and licensing via NFT standards, decentralized governance, and automated finance. We call it Music3.
MODA partners and the MODA community have come together to launch the token and take a huge leap towards a fully decentralized music ecosystem. As we look to the future of MODA DAO, one of our core goals is to transition fully to being an entirely self-running, autonomous organization, capable of directing its own activities, handling its own funds, and choosing its own direction, free from any external influence or geographic boundaries.
The DAO governance road map is intended to provide a compass for how the organization will transition from an operations-led entity to a real DAO, in which all critical decision-making will be carried out on the blockchain. There is no set rule book for DAO creation yet, but we hope our work navigating the challenges can help develop the DAO blueprint for builders everywhere, especially those in creative arts and music.
As with all things MODA, this roadmap is subject to change as we experiment and grow. However, we plan to align the governance of this DAO closely with our overall values and mission.
Where We Stand…
Today, we are in what we have called the Demo Phase of our Governance journey. For the next 12 months, we will be focused on designing, testing, and releasing the mechanics that will enable our first Governance processes. We are integrating early governance via a roadmap of proposal categories, trialing snapshot-based voting, and beginning to hand voting seats to the community itself.
We have created a number of DAO roles that will be launched alongside our token staking, which will give members specific roles and responsibilities. These roles are as follows:
From this point on, we want to bring the community into our work and our movements as much as possible, as soon as possible. We want to begin by encouraging everyone to join and engage with our token-gated Discord and start to participate in the conversations that we believe will shape the future of the global music ecosystem.
The Path To Decentralised Governance
Our first step is to outline the actions that will be taken to develop the DAO’s governance framework to ensure that it is effective and efficient, and that premature, on-chain voting with full autonomy doesn’t endanger the DAO in its formative stages.
The governance framework will be based on the principles of collective decision-making, meritocracy, and transparency. The goal is to provide a system that is fair and equitable, while also being efficient and effective.
To ensure that decisions reflect the interests of the community, we will be providing opportunities for community input and transparency.
We are currently continuing to perform the tasks necessary for the completion of our feature, community, and product roadmap — however, these functions are all being performed by a small team of current core contributors at MODA DAO who have had their experience shaped by decades of collective technology and music industry experience.
Our end goal is that MODA token holders will be enabled to vote on all matters related to this project and its future governance.
In Brief, The Roadmap Will Be As Follows:
- We will establish a group of 9 DAO Custodians who, in the short term, will collaborate with the MODA Foundation on decision making and strategy. 8 of the 9 Custodians will be appointed by the MODA foundation, and one from the community based on proposals and pledges from tokenholders.
- 1 Custodian seat will be handed to the community per year, from the 9, until all seats are eventually voted by the community.
- This system will be in place as we build the rails to transition to full DAO governance. We will be using this time to experiment with different strategies and allow the MODA DAO to see the results of those experiments.
- As we move into that phase, the board of Custodians will become an advisory council to MODA DAO token holders. The council will be able to provide direction on decisions that are voted on by MODA DAO token holders. Additionally, the Custodians will also have the ability to bring proposals directly to MODA DAO token holders for an up or down vote if needed.
- The DAO Council will provide the community with weekly updates to demonstrate transparency and accountability. Our goal is to share as much information as possible; however, sensitive information related to development or business strategy may be held until it has been validated by the MODA Council and operational teams. Any member of this project can provide updates through MODA DAO official channels.
- During the first 24 months, we will implement a community voting system for proposals, and begin transferring governance decisions to the community through the administrative efforts of the Custodians. These decisions will center around community proposals aligned with a predetermined roadmap of governance categories.
How Will We Appoint Custodians?
In short, we will operate as follows:
- 8 Custodians will be selected from the MODA Foundation director and advisory board based on time available, domain expertise, and prior engagement levels.
- 1 Custodian will be elected from the community
- Each year, another community seat becomes available and one MODA Foundation member drops off.
An initial Custodian candidate list will be collected from the community through a public application process that is open to anyone who has demonstrated an interest or skill set relevant to MODA. Members must become an ambassador before they can put themselves forward as a Custodian candidate. The board will then select applicants for each position and finalize them.
- All users can apply to be an Ambassador by staking 100 $MODA and by demonstrating their membership in MODA DAO for 6 months on-chain.
- Any member can redeem their staked $MODA at any time, which will remove their qualification as Custodians.
- All $MODA holders can vote for the Ambassadors they support. The MODA DAO team takes random snapshots of the number of votes obtained by all Custodians every day, calculates the average numbers, and sorts them in descending order.
How Do Dao Members Initiate A Community Proposal?
Once initiated, community proposals will follow a clear and consistent framework and process. All proposals will be submitted and voted on via Snapshot. The proposal will contain all the information required to present the proposal to MODA token holders, including a detailed description of what the community would like to do with the funds you seek.
Your proposal should also include specific milestones for completion and should detail how much funding is required, as well as the duration of the project.
All proposals must include a clear action plan with specific, measurable targets in order to qualify for voting. The more specific your proposal is the better your chances are of reaching community consensus.
- A proposal must be written in full, meeting the requirements and format of the DAO proposal template.
- A proposal must be submitted to an ambassador to be placed into Snapshot. Ambassadors submit proposals at their own discretion.
- After the proposal is successfully submitted, its content will be vetted by the Custodians for voting and execution.
Collectives
Groups of members and creators with aligned interests are encouraged to create collectives and nominate an Ambassador in order to submit proposals.
Snapshot Voting
Snapshot is a decentralized voting system. It provides flexibility on how voting power is calculated for a vote. Snapshot supports various voting types to cater to the needs of organizations. Creating proposals and voting on Snapshot is user-friendly and does not cost gas as the process is performed off-chain.
In short, Snapshot is an off-chain gasless multi-governance client with easy to verify and hard to contest results.
Key Snapshot Features
- Free (gasless) to create proposals and vote on them
- Votes are signed messages easily verifiable online
- Multiple voting systems — Single choice, Approval voting, Quadratic voting, and more
- Flexible voting strategies to calculate voting results — vote with ERC20s, NFTs, other contracts, and more
- Spaces can have their branding with custom color schemes and domain name
- Fully open-source with MIT license
MODA Foundation & MODA DAO
The MODA Foundation was formed in late 2021 for the sole purpose of MODA DAO being able to interface with the ‘real world’. For example, a DAO member releases a song that needs to be registered for traditional royalty collections. That would require an IRL entity. Or, other simple operational tasks like renting office or studio space.
You can find the MODA Foundation entity here. The MODA Foundation directors will be appointed by Q2 2022; the delay is required so that the Foundation can appoint the best contributors to the roles.
MODA DAO is technically separate from the MODA Foundation but has some inherent connections. The DAO consists of all onchain activities, the community, the token holders. The DAO represents the future of MODA, as the intention is to dissolve the foundation when A) governance, treasury, and size of the community are mature enough and B) when regulatory frameworks allow for the DAO to interface with ‘real world’ organisations either here in Australia or in another jurisdiction if required. For now, Australia is taking some progressive steps towards DAO recognition.
Resources
https://cointelegraph.com/news/australian-digital-finance-industry-wants-to-legally-recognize-daos
