Delegate Statement

Nounish Discussion
1

After months of being a Nouner, I decided to update my Delegate Statement on Nouns Agora as I have now shaped a more informed opinion.

I ended up getting really philosophical in my conclusions and I think they’re worth sharing because some of them go against the status quo. My opinions can of course change in time as I learn more about our history and culture. Anyway, here it is…

Delegate statement

Nouns DAO is the most perfect example of how a truly decentralized DAO should work.

Nouns has become an integral part of my life as it’s the community and technology I most enjoy being a part of.

Now that I’ve been a Nouner for months and have started building on Nouns DAO, I have come to better understand Nounish culture. I’ve assimilated a good bit of it while still trying to think as independently as possible. I have now shaped a more informed opinion on what our purpose is and how we can be better.

My current (Feb 17th 2023) beliefs are:

On Our Purpose

  1. To build, experiment, tinker with cutting edge DAO technology
  2. To be the leading DAO in brand proliferation, innovation, and public goods
  3. To be an example to other DAOs in the Ethereum ecosystem
  4. To stay so interesting to builders that daily auction prices stay strong, allowing our mission to be sustainable
  5. To grow the Treasury through alternative (other than auction) means, adding to our sustainability

On Auctions

  1. I don’t believe auction prices will rise much in proportion to how much we proliferate the Nouns brand to the masses, no matter how efficient we are
  2. I believe auction prices rise the more interesting we become to builders that want to participate in this amazing experiment and innovation
  3. I don’t believe our only income should come from auction prices

On Book Value

  1. Even though 1 Noun = 1 Vote, I don’t believe speaking of book value makes sense as every Noun is different. They each have different provenance, different traits, and different on-chain history (name, voting record and reasons, etc.)
  2. Current Nounish culture is such that speaking of book value doesn’t make sense as a prop to close shop and distribute the Treasury pro-rata to Nouners wouldn’t be remotely close to passing

On Buying a Noun as an Investment

  1. The value of your Noun is not directly related to how much is in the Treasury, as money in the Treasury is meant to be spent with no expected return or plans for dividends
  2. The value of your Noun is a function of the Noun’s provenance, traits and on-chain history
  3. You should consider the base value of your Noun to be the median of the last few auction prices as its base value originates from the fact that your Noun is a ticket to participate
  4. Any marginal value is not related to the Treasury; it’s about the differentiating properties mentioned in #2 that your Noun might have

On Use of the Treasury

  1. The Treasury could be used much more efficiently
  2. We are generous with our spending
  3. We need to ensure we spend on the most deserving props through mechanisms like private voting and functional funding
  4. If the purpose is to proliferate the brand to the masses, then we should have a strategy that allows Nouns DAO to monetize from it. imho our current focus on proliferation → higher auction prices is the wrong model for this purpose
  5. If the purpose is for auction prices to increase in time, allowing us to be sustainable and build bigger and bigger things, we need to focus proliferation on people that would be interested in buying Nouns → Builders

On Being a Nouner

  1. There are two types of Nouners: A. Those who are only in it for the fun of participating in the best DAO built to date. B. Those who enjoy participating but also want to build and expect money for their time and effort.
  2. Since it still hasn’t been proven that proliferation sustainably increases daily auction prices, if you are type A, you are OK with your ETH flowing to builders (including type B Nouners) for the sake of betterment of the DAO.
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