DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization)
An organization governed by token holders voting on-chain, where rules and treasury live in smart contracts instead of a boardroom.
A DAO replaces a company's management structure with code and votes. Members hold governance tokens and vote on proposals, such as how to spend the treasury or whether to change a fee. The outcome executes automatically through smart contracts.
It is a flat, transparent way to coordinate strangers, but it has rough edges. Turnout is often low, whales can dominate a vote, and legal status is murky. The original The DAO raised about $150 million in 2016, then lost a third of it to a hack months later.
Related terms
A token that grants voting power over a protocol's decisions, from fee settings to treasury spending and upgrades.
Smart ContractSelf-executing code on a blockchain that runs exactly as written when its conditions are met, with no party able to intervene.
DeFi (Decentralized Finance)Financial services run by code on public blockchains, letting people trade or borrow without a bank.
DApp (Decentralized Application)An application whose backend logic runs on a blockchain through smart contracts rather than a company's private servers.