Hello everyone!

In collaboration with DAOstack, the Enigma core team and community are excited to launch the first version of Secret DAO using the Alchemy platform. Looking ahead, we believe members of the global technology ecosystem should have increasing levels of control in governance of the Enigma protocol. Our hope is that Secret DAO allows the Enigma community to get further involved with projects and applications built with the Enigma protocol, as well as research that benefits the Enigma ecosystem and beyond.

At the end of this post we’ll describe how (and why) to join Secret DAO and the Enigma Collective. But before moving on, many readers may be wondering: what exactly is a DAO?

Let’s break down this oxymoronic acronym:

Decentralized

Like all three words in “DAO,” this word has lost some meaning in the context of distributed ledger technologies (DLTs). Essentially, decentralization is a spectrum! Nothing is fully centralized or decentralized. The challenge lies in finding the proper balance.

Autonomous

The definitive characteristic of a DAO is that rules are programmed, i.e. they can be applied or enforced automatically when specific events happen. Still, code is not law (exactly). In traditional organizations, people have to interpret rules for themselves. As Phillippe Honigman of OrgTech Network said in this article, “DAOs are ‘autonomous’ in the sense that rules are self-enforced. No one can stop it, nor change it from the outside.”

Organization

Usually, when talking about DAOs, the context is distribution and maintenance of shared resources. It’s helpful to consider two kinds of governance. First and foremost, there is code governance for managing development of technology. Additionally, there is community governance for coordination around shared goals.

Governance processes are fundamental components of any social, political, or economic system(s). We like how Binance Research defines it: “an organizational form that coordinates the efforts and resources of members through an a priori binding, formalized and transparent set of rules agreed upon in a multilateral fashion.”

Why Secret DAO?

If you’re familiar with DAOs, you probably know it’s almost impossible to start one without a common purpose. Why should anyone join and contribute to Secret DAO? Fortunately, we are not starting from scratch. The Enigma core team and contributors have put years of energy into building a sustainable community with high-quality ambassadors. No doubt, the Enigma Collective will play an important role for Secret DAO going forward. Overall, this DAO represents our intentions to realize a more decentralized future of Enigma.

For example, we recently introduced an opportunity for members of the Enigma community to get published on the Collective Blog. While the Collective is jointly collaborating on the first article, we aim to review future submissions from a variety of contributors. Secret DAO can help us by deciding which posts are featured. Votes are weighted by how much (non-transferable) reputation each member has earned through proposals.

Who is allowed to join?

All are welcome to apply, and the DAO will vote on your membership! Submit a proposal using the Alchemy platform. If you’re working on a project that is related to Enigma or privacy in general, you should also think about joining the Collective. This group represents the core group of community leaders, who may get unique opportunities to earn reputation and other forms of incentives. They also collaborate on a number of different projects within the Enigma ecosystem, including application development, research, privacy education, design, and more!

How will members participate?

The answer to this question will evolve as more people join and contribute. We’re looking for ideas! Ultimately, the goal is to allocate funds toward relevant projects and tasks. Secret DAO might decide how node rewards feed back into valuable pieces of the Enigma ecosystem.

As a first step, we’re conducting an experiment at ETHDenver. Potential members will request reputation, then our DAO is responsible for voting on hackathon submissions to determine winners of Enigma’s three bounties (details TBA).

Follow these 3 steps:

Ask for reputation (example of a reputation proposal from GenesisDAO) Reputation gets approved by the DAO Take action: Vote on existing proposals and create new proposals with templates like this one from PolkaDAO

Submitting Proposals

You may already know that Enigma has offered a series of grants in the past. Going forward, our plan is to experiment with allocating resources through collective decision-making processes. Initially, we are only accepting proposals for membership and ETHDenver hackathon submissions. However, one possible goal is to distribute staking rewards via our DAO.

The Enigma core team will operate nodes identical to those of other ecosystem participants throughout testnet and mainnet. Portions of these rewards and fees earned by these nodes may be distributed according to votes by Secret DAO members.

Earning Reputation

We are continuously inspired by all the work done by people doing research and collaborating on various governance platforms like DAOstack. They introduced a reputation system for distributing power in the voting mechanism. We are planning to use many different kinds of reputation. Here’s a more detailed explanation of that protocol.

Another interesting reputation protocol is SourceCred, led by Dandelion Mané. It uses data from GitHub and Discourse to generate multigraphs of actions. Dr. Michael Zargham of BlockScience, who is a contributor to SourceCred and other interconnected projects, wrote a fascinating blog post titled Network Formation Games.

Making Decisions

DAOs often use a variety of tools and methods in order to effectively drive progress toward shared goals; however, efficiency is another question. We’re planning to support community initiatives via Secret DAO for the purpose of transparency and accountability. Ultimately, our integrity depends on feedback loops that involve stakeholders and participants.

From Vitalik Buterin’s Notes on Blockchain Governance:

“The approach for blockchain governance that I advocate is “multifactorial consensus,” where different coordination flags and different mechanisms and groups are polled, and the ultimate decision depends on the collective result of all of these mechanisms together.”

To Infinity and Beyond!

We love the Enigma community because of all the great people building valuable solutions that benefit everyone. Launching Secret DAO is a turning point for us, and our collective intelligence will never stop growing and evolving. To successfully navigate the oceans of change, you have to learn from experience and ride the waves! 🌊🌊🌊 🏄

We may explore various platforms as well following our initial experiments with DAOstack. Recently, our Community Experience Manager (James) began leading a governance Working Group as a project within the Enigma Collective.

Exploring DAO platforms:

What can I do right now?

As always, please let us know any ideas or questions you may have by posting in the Enigma Developers Forum. Transparent collaboration reduces information asymmetry while driving progress toward specific goals and universal improvement. Everyone can be part of the system!

Right now you should consider joining the Enigma Collective and becoming a part of Enigma’s core community of passionate privacy advocates. You can also join the Enigma Discord to ask any questions or just chat with all of us!

Secret DAO will be launching early next week. If you’re interested in participating, check back here — we’ll be updating this post with a link to the live DAO! Or you can leave your email here and we’ll contact you immediately after the DAO is launched. In the meantime, please reply to this forum post with any feedback.

Resources from DAOstack

Additional Resources